Silence the Fears

“I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears.”  Psalm 34:4

I recently saw a post on Facebook by Jane Lee Logan (Princess Sassy Pants & Co.), that said, “Don’t listen to the voices that tell you you’re not precious…Especially your own.”  It is ironic to me that this post would come at such a time.  The other voices that ring in our mind, the ones that compete to be the loudest can usually be tuned out with music, tv, etc.  However, there is one voice that is probably the most difficult of all for us to silence – that voice is our own.

David wrote Psalm 34 when he pretended to be insane.  David had been hotly pursued by King Saul and appeared before Achish, King of Gath.  Because David feared him, he acted like he was crazy in hopes that he would be freed.  And his plan worked!  David was quick to praise God for this deliverance, as well as, all the other times that God spared his life from Saul’s deadly attempts to kill him. 

“It is easy for us to idolize bible characters thinking that they are on an entirely different level than us.  But we must remember that David was a man, a human just like you and me. ”

— Kim Dockery

In this particular verse, David pens, “… he delivered me from all my fears.”  We know that David was fearful for his life; but what about the other “fears” that he must have battled in the silence of the night, when he was in the caves or in the desert.  Think about it, David was a shepherd boy anointed to be king.  This must have presented battles in his own mind on so many levels.  Fears such as would he be successful as king?  Would he be captured and killed?  Would the people follow him?  The war in his mind must have tormented him.

Aren’t we the same?  We, too, battle our own voices that cause a fierce war between faith and fear.  We want our faith to be stronger than our fears of not being enough – for God, for our family, our careers, etc.…  Or, our fear of failing God and failing in life itself.  And, what about the fear of never measuring up to be what God has called us to be or the fear that the addiction will win. 

It is easy for us to idolize bible characters thinking that they are on an entirely different level than us.  But we must remember that David was a man, a human just like you and me.  But there was one thing that David continuously did that caused his faith to rise over his fear – he worshiped God.  David was a worshiper.

In this verse, the word “sought” in the Hebrew has implications that the meaning is to seek, or to ask-specifically to worship.  David knew that when we worship, we shift our focus upward instead of inward.  When we reflect on all that God has done for us, and we praise Him with a thankful and grateful heart, our faith begins to rise, and our doubts and fears begin to fade.  Our faith in God drowns out all of the lies and causes us to believe that we are more than conquerors-that we are all that God says we are.

I want you to know that you are not alone in this battle.  We all struggle with this raging war that wants to expose our weaknesses and fears, desiring to break us and beat us down.  But!  We must remember that what God says is what matters.  As we worship, God’s voice will begin to ring louder than any other, proclaiming who God says that we are.  God says that we are loved and that we belong to Him; we are of value, we are important, we are strong, and we are precious in His sight.