Whatever I feared has come upon me!

Modern science regarding human psychology has helped us to understand the power of imagination.  A person’s sanity or insanity depends on the kind of thinking one is engaged in.  At times we are helpless to think other than what our chemicals in the brain dictate and we call that “mental illness” which is still a taboo to talk about.  So many people could have lived happily if this sickness was accepted as any other physical ailment and treated accordingly.  However, there are other times when we allow our perfect brain to take a wrong course of action in creating a thinking pattern that destroys what could otherwise have been a happy life.  A mind set on good things will see good things come its way and a mind set on bad things will also see them come the same way.  A positive and a faith filled mind almost always enjoys better quality of life than a mind filled with negativity, fear and all kind of anxious thoughts.  Job’s experience provides one such example.

The stature of Job in the Bible is no less than that of Noah or Abraham; he was a giant of a patriarch with credentials like “blameless and upright, greatest man among all the people of the East” (1:1-3).  When we read about him, we enjoy the 20/20 hindsight but he had no such luxury.  As we read him, we have to look at him with his raw feelings and emotions. 

When calamities overtook his entire existence, wiping away his entire family and fortunes; in utter despair Job confesses “what I feared has come upon me; what I dreaded has happened to me” (3:25). In his relentless pursuit of remaining blameless and upright, Job had this uneasy fear about the possibility of God’s wrath coming upon his family due to some possible reckless behaviors of his children.  Every time his children would a have party, Job would rise up early in the morning and offer burnt sacrifices for each of his children thinking “perhaps my children have sinned and cursed God in their hearts”(1:5).

Most likely, it was this uneasy dread that opened the door for the Devil to come through his defenses and put him through such a test.  The man however lived up to his credential in the face of unimaginable calamities; his faith in God’s goodness could not be shaken.  But the fact of the matter is that he had feared for such a day; he had in his imagination allowed the possibility of such a day and attempted to prevent it on his own by appeasing God through sacrifices.  There is no way a man can appease God’s wrath on his own, not even a righteous Job could do it.

However, in Christ, God has done away with his wrath that was sure to come upon us.  Today, after thousands of year from Job and under the foot of the Cross, we stand covered by his sacrifice and thus, we can always imagine good instead of bad.  Paul said, “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things” (Phil. 4:8).  He goes on to say that “God is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine according to his power that is at work within us” (Eph. 3:20). 

Therefore, let us think on what our minds think on and if the things that our minds are dwelling upon are not in line with what God’s word has revealed; we better arrest those thoughts and bring them to the obedience of Christ.  Let us pull down the strongholds that are contrary to the promises of God (2 Cor. 10:4-5) and allow our minds to become the minds of Christ (1 Cor. 2:16).  Let us imagine about the things that “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him – but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit” (1Cor. 2”9-10).