Fear or Faith?
However, it appears that economic health and growth have tied itself to building construction, especially single-family and multistory apartment housing. As edifices sprout up like weeds in an untended garden, four-lane streets soon predominate. Frankly, many buildings mimic institutional architecture. Okay. A live-and-let-live shrug of the shoulders eases the feeling of encroachment.
Yet, the "living was easy," and remained that way for 14 years. Early one evening, though, while the Owner worked in her office, she thought she saw a tiny mouse skitter from the closet to somewhere! It happened so quickly it took longer to register than she could process. No! She. Had. Not. Seen. A Mouse. It couldn't be. Was she hallucinating? Now16 years later, she didn't shriek like a cartoon-damsel in distress; she just sat there---mouth open.
Then, he yelled downstairs to her daughter, who raced up the stairs, and listened to my rather hysterical recount of the incident. Lord, have mercy! Perhaps a week later, unnerved after numerous sightings in bedrooms, laundry room, and pantry, I called a well-known exterminating company and began a quarterly decontamination regimen. No more mice (who grow, by the way), spiders, ants, and other creepy-crawlies. Construction of a sprawling new development two blocks down the way accounted for the scourge.
Why this tale of woe? Simply this, while watching the technician at work, my anxiety which had ratcheted from zero to one thousand at the speed of sound, deflated like air from a punctured tire. By the time the technician had completed the first application outside and inside, I felt a peace and ebullience that I thought had disappeared like the "bird of paradise."
Early the next morning, I awakened to an uneasy question. Why had it been so easy to accept with surety the technical competence of an exterminator when it often takes so very long to embrace the power of God Almighty? Why is it harder to believe, to trust the Creator, who stepped into a formless void and declared, "Let there be light" and there was light? Is it easier to believe what I can see? Is that why I trusted whatever was in the container and bait boxes---even when I didn't know its composition or chemical efficacy? I certainly had never met the technician!
I grew up hearing songs like, "There are some things I may not know; There are some places I can't go, But I am sure of this one thing, That God is real for I can feel Him deep within." Did I really certify those words with behaviors? From the periscope of past doubts, fears, and flip-flops, can I truthfully answer affirmatively? No, of course not. Saying "yes" would only put me at the head of a line of hypocrites Am I delusional?
Hard questions to ponder, much less attempt to answer. Why does it as if each time I make my request known to God, it's as if I have no track record from which to rely upon? Maybe that's why a dear friend said to me years ago, "Try to remember what God has already done for you." I'm the person, after all, who reflexively assures one and all that there's no prayer God has not answered "You might not have recognized His answer. You might not have liked His answer. You may have discarded it for who-knows-why, but He answered has been my retort, for decades. And I believe it each time I say it.
It boils down to belief, to trust, and resting in faith. Either I believe, trust, and relax knowing the Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent God has it, or I don't. Either I believe, accept, and honor God's Word, as contained in the Holy Bible or I don't. All things are possible when I believe. "Yes, God is real, real in my soul; Yes, God is real for He has washed and made me whole; His love for me is like pure gold, Yes, God is real for I can feel Him in my soul."
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