Dear Friends and Family of RRUMC,
Rev. Dan Bogre, Senior Pastor at RRUMC
We are well into 2019 and I am wondering if you are still hanging on to your New Year’s resolutions. How are they going, and what made you choose that one, or those ones?
I heard a song recently called, “Fear is a Liar.” As I am thinking about 2019 and RRUMC, there are many times that fear can take over. I believe that happens with our New Year’s resolutions. We make them out of the fear of what will happen if we don’t make that particular change in our lives. Fear is a real emotion in our lives that, if left undefeated, will be exactly the place where we live our 2019. I don’t want fear to be how and why I make decisions for me, my family, and RRUMC.
I heard a sermon in which the pastor said that fear is the absence of faith. That makes complete sense. Fear is the feeling of being completely helpless in a certain situation to the point that something terrible will happen to us or the people that we love. The feeling of being totally helpless in any situation is to not have the faith in the one true God who can navigate us and carry us through any life situation. It is those life moments that can only do one of two things. Difficult life situations will either push us into the arms of God or send us running from those same arms. In those times in life, it is almost impossible to remain in the status quo. What happens to you when life just seems to hit you out of nowhere when you least expect it? In my 23 years of full-time Christian ministry, I have seen people go in both directions. I have had people leave the church because they are blaming God for a terrible life situation, but not trusting him enough to get them through it. I have had others who run right into his arms because they know that there is no other way to make it through that particular life struggle.
I guess the question for all of us in 2019 is, do you run to him or from him when life hits? Fear is a liar. Jesus says in the Gospel of John, “Peace is what I leave with you; it is my own peace that I give you. I do not give it as the world does. Do not be worried and upset; do not be afraid.”
In order to not be worried, upset, or afraid, we need to know that we are being offered a peace that the world cannot give through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It is an offered gift to each one of us so that fear can be crushed by faith as we face those difficult times. Jesus understood how we as human beings are wired. It makes sense then, that he would tell us that the only way to defeat fear and worry is to trust in him.
I pray that we all can live out of the faith that we have in Jesus Christ and the faith that he has in us. Remember, fear is a liar.
Peace,
Rev. Dan