For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind (II Timothy 1:7).

This scripture tells us 2 things:

• Fear is a spirit.
• It does not come from God.

If fear is not from God, where did this spiritual force come from?

Fear came into the earth with sin. God created Adam in His own likeness and image (Genesis 1:26). Adam’s spirit contained all of the forces of eternal life (zoe) that reside in God…faith, love, righteousness, wisdom, peace…  When Adam disobeyed God and bowed his knee to satan, he came under the authority of his new “god”.

Satan perverted all of the life forces of God within Adam and they began to work in reverse. What had been faith…was now fear. What had been righteousness…was now sin. What had been love…was now hate. What had been divine health…was now sickness. What had been abundance…was now lack and insufficiency. What had been blessing…was now a curse.

Satan began to use these destructive forces to destroy man and all that God had created.

For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death,(Romans 8:2).

This scripture outlines the 2 spiritual laws operating simultaneously in the earth. The law of life and the law of sin and death. Jesus is Lord over the law of life and satan is the lord over the law of sin and death. Every human being on earth is living their life under one of these two laws, whether they know it or not.

By living in a fallen world under the devil’s influence, people have been trained to speak and practice things contrary to God’s Word and don’t think anything about it. There is only one method for operating in faith and fear—speaking and believing.

When everybody is saying and doing the same negative thing, it is coming to pass and they think it is normal. But if you take the same method, turn it around and begin to say what God said about the situation, now you are doing the same thing but it is based on God’s Word instead of the lies of the devil. Now you are exercising faith—not fear and it will also come to pass.

You are a spirit, created by a spirit being—Jehovah God.    Satan is a spirit (fallen angel) and he has never come up with anything new. He can only take the principles of faith and the spiritual laws put into place by God (to bless us) and pervert them in order to steal, kill and destroy.

With satan’s help, instruction and deception people have been operating under the law of sin and death by what they say and believe contrary to God’s Word. As a result, centuries of unbelief has been passed from one generation to the next, from family to family, establishing a system of failure.

Romans 8:2 tells us that Jesus has (past tense) delivered every born-again believer out from under the law of sin and death and translated us over into the law of life. But from a victorious standpoint, many Christians are still dominated by satan and are operating under the law of sin and death, by what they say and believe.

In Matthew 12, Jesus talked about how good things and bad things come to pass. Either make the tree good, and his fruit good; or else make the tree corrupt, and his fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by his fruit…for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy wordsthou shalt be condemned(verses 33-35, 37).

The fear of death is the source of all other fears.  People are not afraid of airplanes, they are afraid of dying.  Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself (Jesus) took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had (pasttense) the power of death, that is the devil; and deliver them who through FEAR OF DEATH were all their lifetime subject to bondage (Hebrews 2:14-15).

The real fear and panic gripping the world today is not the Covid 19 virus. It is the fear of death.  Because Jesus has defeated satan and stripped him of his spiritual authority, he is limited to the physical/seen realm. He can only use fear of something in the physical realm (sickness/shortages) against you. Because he has no authority in the spirit realm, he has to rely on deception.

Joyce Meyer created an appropriate acronym that describes this: False—Evidence—Appearing—Real. It doesn’t even have to be something that has actually occurred. Just the threat of it is enough to generate fear.

It is understandable that anybody that doesn’t know Jesus as their Lord and Savour is (and should be) afraid of dying. For the born-again believer there is no reason to fear death but we are also not going to let satan take us out of here prematurely before we finish our assignment.

I am not down-playing the current situation but the news media thrives on generating fear and exaggeration. Instead of telling you that 95% of people who actually contract Covid 19 recover, they major on how many have died.  They report nothing that would ease tension and put the current pandemic in its proper perspective.

What do statistics say about the current Chinese Covid 19 infection in comparison with previous public health outbreaks?

The yellow fever epidemic—Philadelphia 1793.

The population of Philadelphia at that time was 50,000. 20,000 people left the city—5,000 died. That is a mortality rate of 10%. The projected mortality rate of Covid 19 is around 1.5%.

The Spanish flu epidemic—1918.

700,000 people died in the U.S., when the population was around 100 million. Around 50 million people died worldwide.

More recently, in 2019 there were 60,000 deaths from flu in the U.S.

While I am not minimizing the infectious nature of this organism from hell, the existing statistics for Covid 19 mortality fall short in comparison to previous outbreaks.

More fear and panic can be generated by the news media today than in past generations. It used to take weeks or months for news to travel around the world. By the time people heard about an epidemic or natural disaster, it was over with and they just dismissed it as old news.

Now with satellites and the internet you have instant access. You can now worry and be anxious as it happens in real time. You can dial in for the 8am…10am…12noon…2pm…5pm…10pm…midnight…version of the same event.

Keep in mind that just because you have access to instant information does not mean it is accurate or unbiased. Neither does authority and expertise guarantee the truth. As one professor of Molecular Biology in the U.S. said, “if in Google you trust, you’ll get answers.”

With this in mind, it’s easy to feed and raise your fear level and this is where most people are—including many Christians. Like one person said, “if people would read the newspaper the way they read the Bible and read the Bible the way they read the newspaper, they would be better off.” In other words, most Christians have more confidence in what they read in the newspaper than what they read in the Word of God.

We don’t have to rely on secular networks to stay informed. We can hear every worldwide news story through the lens of faith by choosing an organization like the Christian Broadcasting Network or The Stream.org available online.

Jesus said, These things I have spoken unto you, (concerning His departure and return)that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world (John 16:33).

There is at least one positive thing that is coming out of this situation. This is a faith-check for every Christian and the entire Body of Christ.  Where is your faith? In man’s solutions or the promises of God? Fear, sickness, disease and shortages have been around since Adam sinned and will continue as long as we are here and satan is here.

The question is “how will we respond”?

In closing, let’s look at II Timothy 1:7. For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. A sound mind is one that is free from worry, anxiety and is in control.  In the original Greek it means “safe-thinking.” It denotes good judgment, disciplined thought patterns, and the ability to understand and make right decisions.

Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid (John 14:27).

The understood subject here is “you”. You let not your heart be trouble…you don’t be fearful. So it’s up to us whether or not we are troubled, anxious and fearful. It’s up to us what we listen to and feed into our spirit.  Will we feed on the cares of this world and allow them to choke the Word in our heart, or will we guard our heart and feed it on the promises of God’s protection and provision?