Living Courageously: You Can Face Anything, Just Do It Afraid by Joyce Meyer

they ever hope to control their actions. God’s Word teaches us that as a man thinks, so does he become (see Proverbs 23:7). Right thinking will lead to right living!
Emotional and Physical Symptoms of Fear
    The symptoms of fear, both emotional and physical, that people experience will end up controlling their behavior if they don’t recognize them for what they are and confront them. When fear is present, we might experience a variety of symptoms ranging from a mild feeling of nervousness, to anxiety and panic attacksthat require a hospital visit. People shake, sweat, their heart may race rapidly, or they may feel weak physically. If their breathing is affected, they may start to hyperventilate, making them feel they are suffocating, and that turns into a panic attack. These symptoms make us want to run from whatever is causing the fear. In fact, part of the definition of fear is to take flight or run away from. In short, fear does bring torment on many different levels.
    Most people experience the milder symptoms of fear, and it would be easier for them to decide they are going to “do it afraid” no matter what. For those who experience more serious symptoms, they might need to do what they fear a tiny bit at a time, and each time they see progress it will encourage them to believe that they can do even more the next time. The Holy Spirit knows us intimately, and we can trust Him to never move us along any faster than we are able to go.
    The Holy Spirit knows us intimately, and we can trust Him to never move us along any faster than we are able to go.
    During the years I was being healed from the sexual and emotional abuse I endured from my father, I was set free in tiny degrees. As the Holy Spirit led me to confront one issue at a time, I experienced freedom. On some occasions I seemed to get over huge obstacles in one leap of faith, but at other times freedom came so slowly that admittedly it often seemed that I was making no progress at all even though I was. The Word of God speaks often of “walking” in faith, or “walking in love,” or “walking in the Spirit.” Walking is the slowest mode of travel known to man. Walking requires one step after another and another and another, but eventually we get where we are going if we don’t give up along the way. It may take some time, but I encourage you to keep “walking” toward total freedom from fear.

CHAPTER 5
Cultivating Courage
    Let us not lose heart and grow weary and faint in acting nobly and doing right, for in due time and at the appointed season we shall reap, if we do not loosen and relax our courage and faint.
    Galatians 6:9
    Before we begin discussing the various types of fear we often have to confront in life, I think it is important to discuss the answer to all fear, no matter what type it is. We only overcome fear by believing that God loves us unconditionally, placing our faith in Him, trusting that He is with us at all times, and letting that give us the confidence to be courageous.
    Perhaps instead of praying for our fears to go away, we should pray to be courageous enough to press past them. Satan gives us fear, but God gives us faith, and anything God gives is always more powerful than what Satan offers. My point is that even when fear is present, if faith in God and courage are also present, those things will defeat fear—every time.
    Courage is not something we wait to feel before stepping out on it, but it is a force we believe we are equipped with because we believe that God is with us. We should pay more attention to what God has said to us in His Word than we do the lies of Satan. Courage is what enables us to look at the things we fear and “do them afraid.”
    One summer morning as Ray Blankenship was preparing his breakfast, he gazed out the window and saw a small girl being swept along in the rain-flooded drainage ditch beside his Andover, Ohio, home. Blankenship knew that farther downstream, the ditch disappeared with a roar