Overcoming Fear Kathryn Kuhlman

And who can take away all of life's fears? Like our Heavenly Father. The fourth verse of the 34th Psalm is this. I sought the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. Somebody said, Catherine Kuhlman, that's just exactly what I wanted you to talk about one of these days in our little heart -to -heart talks. That's it. Fears. Fears. I sought the Lord, and He heard me, the psalmist said, and delivered me from all my fears. And there's only one who can deliver you from all of your fears, and that one is the Lord Jesus Christ. Do you want to know something? Fears are the most disruptive thing that we can have. And all of life bears this out. I knew a lady who is in a mortal, absolutely immortal dread of germs. Oh, she has a phobia when it comes to germs. She stays inside of her house. The prisoner of her own fear. She should meet someone. She wouldn't shake the hand of a friend or a neighbor or anyone unless she has gloves on. She's so afraid of germs. She doesn't realize that the fear itself is ten times more deadly than the germ. I mean that. Besides, if she had a confident attitude toward life, germs would probably not get a foothold in her life. Her very confidence and faith would act as an antiseptic. It's that simple. Have you ever seen people who were so afraid of sickness that they were sick all the time? Have you seen folk who were so afraid of catching cold? Oh, my goodness, you know. I've seen in a restaurant. So afraid of catching cold that there's quite a scene with the waiter before they're seated because they are afraid they might sit in a draft or they might catch cold. And they do. They're never disappointed. They're usually the folk who have a cold all the time because they are afraid of getting it, and so they do, you know. It's like that. And a woman with her germs, her fears become a culture ground for the germs that she fears. The thing which I greatly feared has come upon me, Job said. And that was not chance, but cause and effect. A teacher had a basic fear that brought on a stomach ulcer. And when she got rid of the fear, she got rid of her ulcers. It's true. What I am saying is the most practical thing that I could bring to you today. When you talk about ulcers, every time somebody says, I have a terrific case of ulcers. Just stop and say, well, now, what is that thing that is really gnawing at your mind? Well, what is it? What is it you're afraid of? When you get rid of that thing, you'll get rid of your ulcers. I'm tense. I'm worried. All the troubles in the world, you say. And I'll promise you, stomach ulcers before too long. That man will never be well until he relaxes and surrenders all those strained worries to God. You'll find that most people's ulcers, especially businessmen, go up and down with the stock market. Investigation has shown that When the Dow Jones averages on the stock market skidded down, most businessmen have upset stomachs. Their ulcers are at their worst. And then when Dow Jones goes up, well, I'll tell you something, their ulcers are not quite so bad. And even more than that, they're in bitter humor. There's not that strain there. Worry and fear is the greatest enemy that you can bring into your life. Men of old saw the connection between worry and disease. The Word of God says, banish all worries from your mind and keep your body free from pain. I know a woman who had a fear of having cancer. How often she's told me. Every time there was the slightest pain in that body. She was dead sure it was the beginning of cancer. Her mother had cancer. Died of cancer. And she kept saying to me, I'm just the image of my mother. I'm so like her that I'm going to get a cancer just as she did. And as a result of this... constant brooding, this constant fear, she was afflicted with constipation. There was this difference between her and her mother. The mother had ten children. She had none. And the doctor told her she would never get rid of that constipation until she gets rid of her useless fears. Her useless fears had tied her up, not merely physically, but mentally and spiritually as well. She was a tied -up personality. And I'll promise you, she'll never die of cancer. She'll die of something else. As a result of her fears and her worries. Fear over something that she'll never have. A useless fear. A useless worry. A young minister began to complain of tightness of the chest and developed a hacking cough. The doctors found no real physical reason. Then he began to complain of severe pain in the lower bowels, saying, I think I have cancer there. Examinations by several doctors found nothing physically wrong, absolutely nothing. But he was so possessed by this fear that he actually resigned his ministry. He was no good to himself or anyone else. And he just sits around moping and complaining all the time. It's fear that's upsetting him. The fear itself is the disease. Fear. is sand in the machinery of life. I want you to know something. Fear is costly. Fear is the most costly thing that you can bring into your life and into your body and into your mind. I give any in the world in these next few minutes, I could do something to rebuke that fear in that mind of yours. It's costly. It's the most costly thing that you can take into your life. If you just sit down a very few minutes, analyze yourself. Just look yourself directly in the face. It's so hard for people to be honest with themselves. All of your troubles really stem from fear. Fear of what? Nine times out of ten, fear of something that never will happen to you. Just like that. Now, we have to realize something. We have to distinguish between normal fear and abnormal fear. There's a certain kind of fear that is healthful. If you did not have that kind of fear, you might walk out across a busy street or across a freeway, heedless of the traffic, and be killed. Now, that fear is a good fear when it comes to driving. an automobile. I've seen people who'll get behind a steering wheel and boast of the fact that they have no fear whatsoever. They drive like it and sooner or later will either kill themselves or someone else. Now when you get behind a steering wheel You need to know the danger. You need to recognize the responsibility that you have. You need to have good, normal, healthy fear and drive carefully lest you have an accident or bring disaster to someone else. Normal fear. gives you that caution that you must have to survive on Earth at all. We need good, normal, healthy fear to survive. Abnormal fear, on the other hand, is a dim and a shadowy area peopled by imaginations, obsessions, ghosts, confusion, apprehensions. of our inheritance from the early days of the human race when men were superstitious and afraid. You know, we have an awful lot of superstition among us. Superstition is a ghastly thing. I am shocked at sensible people who are literally controlled by superstition. And if you're being controlled by superstition, you'll be controlled by fear. Abnormal. And you're being ruled over by imaginations, by obsessions, apprehensions. We're only 5 ,000 years old in civilization, maybe not even that much. And yet the primitive fears of... ancient men are still ruling our unconscious minds. Fear of what? Let me just ask you that. Let me say something else. In addition, we've had fears projected upon us as children by... who would not knowingly have heard us for the world, but who had their fears. And we were so close to them in our childhood that we picked up those fears. And though the time that they were imparted to us has gone by a long time ago, they still continue in our lives because they made such a deep impression. Life is difficult. I wouldn't sit here and tell you that life is easy. Life is difficult. It's full of pain. It's full of sorrow. It's full of suffering. And finally, the ordeal of death. And so we become afraid of the future, afraid of the economic conditions, afraid of ill health, afraid of other people, afraid of old age. We're also afraid of ourselves. We're afraid of tomorrow. Fear, fear, fear. And we must deal with these fears. If today you have a mind full of fears, then you do not have a mind that's full of God. It is a fact, isn't it, that we are going to be what our minds contain. If you have a mind that's full of hate, you're going to live in a world of hate. Let's just be practical about this thing. If you have a mind that is full of lust, you're going to live in a world of lust. It cannot be otherwise. If you have a mind that's full of love, you're going to live in a world of love. You become what you think. And if you have a mind full of fear, then you live in a world of fear. And I am amazed at the thousands and thousands of people who this very hour are living in a world of fear. Fear because their mind is full of fear. There are two supremely powerful forces in the world. Just two. They're not related to atomic energy. There are greater forces than that. Of these two forces, one is fear. And it has literally killed its tens of millions. The other great force is faith. And whenever fear and faith come to grips, faith will win because faith is the more powerful. Nothing is more powerful than God. And faith is God. If you have been entertaining fear thoughts for years, do you know what you've done to yourself? Fear thoughts, over a long period of years, form a channel through the mind until fear becomes your primary thought. It governs you. It governs your mind. It governs your body. It'll govern your day. It cuts a great channel and every thought that you think is drained into this basic thought. channel appear. And it soon becomes the governing factor of you. You. Now, it's one thing to talk about these things. But another thing to give the answer, how do you correct this condition? you correct it by beginning to practice the very presence of God. How can you be afraid when you know that God is with you? God is your Heavenly Father. You do not have to be afraid of today. You begin this day with God. If God is with you, You have nothing to fear. He's never lost a battle. Never. Do you realize that God has never known defeat? And you begin the day by saying, God is with me. No matter what I have to face today, I go forth unafraid. He is with me. In the midnight hour when you awaken and you think about tomorrow and you lie there in bed, Cold perspiration just breaking out over your entire body. I know I've done it too. There's a reason I can describe it so well. But then you say, God will be with me. I cannot fail. Whatever the problem, whatever the temptation, I sought the Lord, and He heard me and delivered me from... All my fears. Dear old lady said to me, I am so afraid I'm going to die in the poorhouse. And I said, well, that's all right, honey. God will be with you there, too. You know, afraid of old age? Oh, no, honey. Not if you know the Lord. to the Lord. And He heard me and delivered me from all my fears. He'll give you that deliverance if you want it.