Steve Uppal examines fear and how to get free

Steve Uppal

Fear seeks to control and limit.

I recently went onto a website to look up the subject of phobias and I was intrigued to find that there were over 800 hundred listed phobias on one website, covering all sorts of different things; heights, water, open spaces, enclosed spaces. I even found one where people are afraid of pears - yes pears! Although some of these things might make us laugh, others we can identify with. The reality is that when fear comes into a person's life, that fear will limit them. Fear always controls and limits a person, eventually causing them to be ineffective in who they could be and restricting their potential in life.

You see fear shuts you down. It limits your capacity, limits the potential of your relationships and neutralises the gift God has given to you. Fear will also bring with it anxiety and worry, which in turn drains your energy. It opens the door to sickness; it impairs, distorts and kills vision. Fear can bring confusion; it causes cowardice behaviour and stops a person fulfilling their destiny.

You can be free from fear!

I believe that God wants us to live free from fear. I have noticed in my own life and in the lives of others, that people are afraid of other people and of rejection, they're afraid of circumstances and some are afraid of failure. I've even met people who are afraid of themselves; they are afraid that they won't be able to do something, they are afraid that they can't trust their own actions and responses in a relationship. People can also be afraid of the future or afraid of the past; fear of good things coming to an end, fear of death.

Philippians 4:6-7 in the Bible says:
"Do not be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving present your requests to God and the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus."

You see we have a choice to make, whether we allow fear to control us or not. This passage says do not be anxious about anything. You can choose not to be anxious but to present your request to God. If you give it over to him then His peace will come in and guard your heart.

Deal with fear by renewing your mind

Fear starts as a thought of anxiety; it's a thought of, well if this happens, then this may happen; if they say that then this could happen; if I go there then this could happen. If left unchecked, these thoughts continue to grow in our hearts and eventually form strongholds through which the enemy can control us in our lives.

In 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 it says this:
"For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons that we fight with are not the weapons of the world; on the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ."

The enemy has access into our lives via our thought-life. If I allow thoughts of fear to continually rule my life they will form a stronghold. It will be a house made of thoughts and that stronghold will be the fortress from which the enemy then controls my life; that is how fear works. You see the enemy has access to any dark areas of our lives - wrong thought patterns; these thought patterns become strongholds from which the enemy operates. The enemy builds strongholds in us made of thoughts, thoughts of fear, bitterness, unforgiveness, lust, pride; it could be anything that is contrary to the nature of Christ.

I want to help you today, to let you know that you can have the spirit of fear broken off your life by the renewing of your mind. If you can change your thought patterns by the grace and the power of God, you can see those thought patterns, those strongholds pulled down and the power of fear broken off your life. That's why this verse says we demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. Fear sets itself up against the knowledge of God and we have to take it captive and make it obedient to Christ and chose to say, I will not be afraid today; I choose not to be afraid of this situation; I chose to take it and make it obedient to Christ and I trust Him and trust what He says for my life. There has to be a change of thought and a change of thinking. Don't just pull the thought down; you need to put a new thought in. Take a scripture and say this is what I will meditate on and allow that to become the new stronghold in your life.

You can buy Steve's book Rousing the Warriors from Cross Rhythms Direct.