When faced with a crisis, I have always lived somewhere between fight and flight
I fight for a bit first, and when I don’t get the results I am hoping for, I “flight” and honestly neither work that well for me but are both my natural response and always in that order.
During this time in our history, when so many questions remain un-answered, so much chaos consumes every media outlet, every thought can quickly be turned to anxiety, fear, chaos and a myriad of other emotions, what is your “go to” to deal with it?
I have personally chosen to instantly fight with my emotions, I have taken out my fear on my family and friends, either through quickly reacting with fighting words or crying uncontrollably. I have gotten mad at God and have asked Him why? In my head I have gotten mad at people, that somewhere in my thought process, I believe had the choice to stop this before it got to where we are. But as none of these really helped.
I have also questioned “flighting”. Where can I go to get away from the madness? The beach? The mountains? Back to the familiar, in Michigan? A bucket list location? Where can I escape the madness that is everywhere and for the first time in my life, the answer is nowhere. We are all here! We are all in this together! And we must face our fears head on and choose to deal with them the way God has always intended for us to!
In a bible study we are currently facilitating, last week’s topic was surrender, and I don’t believe that it is by any “coincidence” that that was our topic during the height of COVID 19 outbreak in America. When I have gone through this particular chapter in semesters prior, surrender for me looked like, “God I will surrender this one part of my life, (that is easy to hand over) and I will trust You with that, but I will hang onto everything else.” But in times like this, I have two choices: To completely trust Him in everything or live in a puddle in the middle of the floor, just hoping to make it to the next minute, the next breath, without crumbling, emotionally, physically and spiritually, under the weight of my fear.
As I have considered the fight or flight options during this season, I have come to a couple of conclusions. God is ok with us having and dealing with emotions, in fact He created emotions and had them Himself.
“Jesus wept.” John 11:35.
“for the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God” Deuteronomy 4:24
BUT….He does not want us to make our decisions based on our feelings.
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love and sound mind.” 2 Timothy 1:7 (emphasis mine)
He desperately wants us to make choices based on His Word and in turn our feelings will follow.
As I drifted off in my mind, into a world of escape from the current condition of our world and realized that every thought I have is a dead end, I was struck in the early hours of this morning, that my “flight” reaction is best consumed with flying into the arms of my Father. He has called me and quite frankly, all of us, primarily out of complete necessity, and nowhere else to turn, to run, to the only safe place, His arms.
“Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” Matthew 11:28-29
As we live through this time in history, that will be discussed for generations to come, take a deep breath, look for what God is doing in and around you, don’t miss the small ways He loves us, that we now have the time to see and soak in, and the Truths of His Word, that will never return void!
He is still on the throne
He wins and if we have accepted Him, we win too!
He has never forgotten your name
He is lovingly and patiently waiting for you to run to Him
Don’t miss this time in your history, in HIStory!