Tis the Season to Feel Everything // How to Overcome Fear

We are in uh Luke chapter one this morning, and we are starting a brand new series entitled Tis the Season to Feel Everything.

For some of us, Christmas is really exciting.

Like some of y'all had your tree up since like November 1st.

But this time of year hits differently for everybody.

For some of us, this is well is hard.

And can I just say, you are not alone.

And what we're gonna be doing over the next few weeks is we're gonna look at the first Christmas story and the very real emotions that the people experienced in the very first Christmas, and how so often we experience the same ones.

And the first one that we are gonna see today is the emotion of fear.

How many of you have ever felt fear in your life before?

If you are breathing, you have felt fear in your life before.

And we are gonna see that Mary, the mother of Jesus, she felt fear.

In fact, in Luke chapter 1, verse 29, this is what it says.

Luke 1:29

It says, but she was deeply, what's that word?

She was deeply troubled.

She was troubled.

See, Mary was about to find out that she was going to have a child.

Now, for many, that's a rejoicing occasion.

But the problem with Mary, it was a little unique situation.

She was a virgin.

I'm not a medical expert.

But that ain't normal.

Mary's about to be told this, and Mary has fear.

In fact, everybody say the word fear.

Ready?

What is fear?

Here's what fear is very simply defined.

Fear is what rises in us when we feel out of control and unsure of the outcome.

And all of us feel this from time to time.

Now, sometimes in our life, we actually have fear and we don't even realize it's fear.

Let me ask you this: have you ever had a situation in your life where you are just overthinking things?

Maybe you're super indecisive and you're like, oh, I just I gotta figure this out.

Should I do this?

Oftentimes that that is a manifestation of the roots of fear.

How about this?

Have you ever tried to control something?

Maybe a person, maybe an outcome, maybe a situation, and you try to try to control things, or maybe don't raise your hand, but you know somebody that tries to do that.

Often that is a manifestation of the root of fear.

Now, to be sure, not all fear is bad.

In fact, how many are like me and you are scared of heights?

Scared of heights?

Okay.

You get to like you see a cliff or something, you get close to the edge, and something inside you screams like back up.

That's a healthy fear that God has put in all of us, but there's also this distorted type of fear, which is where anxiety and worry and overstress comes from.

And this is the type of fear that can literally destroy our lives.

But I have good news.

We don't have to live with that kind of a fear.

In fact, this is what it says in 2 Timothy chapter 1, verse number 7.

2 Timothy 1 · chapter mention

It says this, it says, God has not given us a spirit of, let's say it, a spirit of, but of power, love, and sound judgment.

Do you realize that you don't have to live in fear?

Do you realize that if you're a child of God in this room, you don't have to let fear have the final word in your life?

And what we're gonna see today is the mother of Jesus, Mary, was able to overcome the troubling, confusing fear that she had in her life through three little known but simple steps.

Three steps.

One, two, three.

And Mary took these three steps, and we're gonna see today it allowed her to be somebody that was overwhelmed with fear to somebody that was living their life free of fear.

And I want you to see how it unfolds because literally this can be game-changing, and literally this can be life-changing for you and your family and your friends.

Let's pick it up in verse number 26 of Luke 1.

If you're ready for it, would you say amen?

It says, In the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth.

So we have an angel he sent to a town called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man named Joseph of the house of David.

The virgin's name was Mary.

And the angel came to her and said, Greetings, favored woman, the Lord is with you.

But she was deeply troubled by this statement, wondering what kind of greeting this could be.

You say, Why was she troubled?

Because an angel has just appeared to her.

And if an angel appears to you, it is a fearful thing.

We read it all throughout scripture.

People were like, Whoa, what's happening here?

Then the angel tells her in verse 30, do not be afraid.

Why would the angel tell her that?

Because she was afraid.

Don't be afraid, Mary.

You have found favor with God.

Now listen, verse 31.

Gabriel says, You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus.

That word Jesus means the Lord saves.

He will be great, and he will be called the Son of the Most High.

This literally means that he will be a carbon copy of his father.

Gabriel's telling Mary, your baby is going to be God in the flesh.

The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, communicating this baby, this is gonna be the Messiah.

He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom will have no end.

Gabriel says, Mary, this is not just gonna be any baby.

This is the Messiah.

He's gonna be the source of peace, the source of hope of shalom.

It's found in this baby.

Now, as you can imagine, especially women in the room, if you're a virgin and you hear you're gonna have a baby and this is gonna be your baby, it's a lot to take in.

This is a lot of information to process.

So Mary does something that's very normal.

Mary asks a question.

This is what Mary says.

How can this be since I have not had sexual relations with a man?

I think that's a fair question.

Do you guys think that's a fair question?

I that's a super fair question.

The only people that don't think it's not a fair question is the guys in the room, okay?

Like, it's a fair question.

Then the guys are like, no, just trust God.

No, she's a virgin.

What's going on here, right?

And Mary has some doubts.

How can this be?

Let me ask you guys.

This is just for the honest people in the room.

Who's ever had a doubt before?

Who's ever keep your hand up if you've ever had a doubt that's directed towards God?

Okay, from me?

You ready?

Right?

Not one hand, for me, two hands.

Mary says, How can this be?

Now here's what's fascinating.

The angel's about to respond to her doubt.

But 10 verses earlier, you can read, I don't have time.

There's a guy named Zachariah.

He has doubts as well.

And the same angel Gabriel says, You have doubts?

You are going to be mute.

You're not going to be able to speak.

Was Gabriel playing favorites with Mary instead of Zachariah?

And if the angel Gabriel is about to answer Mary, does that mean that it's okay sometimes for us to have doubts?

Some of us think that doubt is the enemy of faith, but often doubt is the beginning of a deeper faith.

You see, in scripture, there's a couple types of different doubts, and if if for the note takers in the room, which there's a special place in heaven for those of you that take notes during the sermon, I want you to write this down.

There's bad doubt, which is proud and defiant, and then there's honest doubt, which is humble wonder.

Zachariah had bad doubt.

If you go back and read the earlier part of the text, I don't have time to.

But Gabriel comes home and he says, Hey, you and your wife, your wife, she's gonna have a child.

Zachariah says, She's old, and so am I.

There's no way that can happen.

Proud, defiant, there's no way.

I know you're a messenger from God.

That ain't happening.

Mary's doubt here is humble wonder.

Lord, I I don't really understand how all this can happen.

Like, after all, I've never been with a man, and now when I have a kid, like how but can you help me understand?

Can you help me like connect the dots here?

I I don't, I don't, I don't really understand it, but I want to, but I want to trust, I want to learn.

Zachariah says, No way, that can't happen.

Mary has this humble wonder that says, Teach me here I am.

Bad doubt, good doubt, honest doubt.

And watch what happens.

The angel is going to reply to Mary's honest doubt and her humble wonder of how can this be?

This is what the angel says in verse 35.

He says, The angel replied, The Holy Spirit will come upon you.

Mary, I'm gonna tell you how you're about to have a baby, even though you're a virgin.

The power of the Most High will overshadow you.

Therefore, the Holy One to be born will be called the Son of God.

And consider your relative Elizabeth.

She's conceived.

That was Zachariah's wife.

She's conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her, who is called childless.

For nothing will be impossible with God.

Can we all say this verse together?

You ready?

Here we go.

For nothing will be impossible with God.

Okay, this is such an important verse.

I want the balcony to say it.

You guys ready, balcony?

Here we go.

Ready?

For nothing will be impossible with God.

That's what I'm talking about.

Half of them just woke up.

I'm just kidding.

Nothing will be impossible with God.

And this is Mary's response.

See, I am the Lord's servant, said Mary.

May it happen to me as you have said.

And then the angel left her.

Now, if we kept reading throughout the chapter, this is what we would see.

We would see that Mary's going to come to a place of thankfulness, of joy, of gratitude.

But in verse 29 of this text, Mary started in a place where she was fearful.

So watch this.

Mary went from a place where she was filled with fear to a place where she was free from fear.

She was filled with fear, but she's going to get to a place where she's filled with joy, peace.

How does it happen?

Three simple steps.

Step number one, listen to God.

Verse 31 in the text, this is what Gabriel said.

Now listen.

Or Gabriel says, Don't be afraid.

You found favor with God.

Listen.

And what Gabriel is, he's an angel who's a messenger on behalf of God.

Now, when Gabriel says, now listen, Mary has a choice to make.

Is she gonna listen or not?

Is she going to pause and listen to God?

Or, and I'll be honest, it makes sense to me if she would have done this.

Is she gonna worry herself to death and be like, oh my goodness, this is so much information right now?

How do I process this?

What do I do?

Because in this time period, important to know, important to know, important to know.

Mary's about to find out she's gonna have a child.

In this time period, if you have a child before you're married, you could that is punishable to a point where you can be executed for that.

That's not good.

Mary, right Mary right now has a lot to be fearful of.

And she makes this choice.

Here's the choice: she's going to listen to God.

She's going to listen to God.

And did you know that just like Mary heard from God through Gabriel, did you know that God wants to speak to you as well?

God wants to speak to you as well.

Now, through Gabriel, here, that was a verbal.

God doesn't verbally speak to us.

But this is what he often does.

He uses his word to speak to us, he uses his spirit to prompt us.

And God speaks, but we have to make space to listen.

It's like this if you have friends or family, you have to make space to listen to them.

You gotta make space to.

Won't happen accidentally.

Now, when it comes to listening to God, sometimes people can way overcomplicate this.

Sometimes people are like, Well, I need to go out in the woods and spend three days in the woods and freeze my rear end off right now because it's December.

If I'm gonna listen to God, and that's great, like that's one way to do it.

But sometimes God doesn't always speak, and you don't have to do that to you from God.

You know, one way God speaks is through his word being taught on Sunday morning, just like this.

So it's coming to a service, it's like, okay, I'm gonna try to stay awake.

Pastor Nate's kind of boring sometimes, but I'm gonna try to stay awake and I'm gonna try to be engaged because God's gonna speak through his word.

Sometimes it's on your drive instead of listening to a podcast or sports radio or sports podcasts.

Okay, I'm just talking about myself.

Um, it's I'm gonna turn everything off and I'm just gonna drive and I'm gonna pray to the Lord and I'm gonna meditate on scripture, and I'm gonna make space on my drive for God to speak.

Sometimes it's at work.

You have a lunch break.

Okay, this is what I'm gonna do with my lunch break.

I'm gonna go in my car and I'm gonna make space.

I'm gonna open up my UVersion Bible app.

Come on, somebody, open up that UVersion Bible app, and I'm gonna go through a devotion or I'm gonna go through scripture.

I'm gonna make space for God to speak to me.

And here's what's gonna happen, and this is why it's so important that you hear God's voice.

It's because God's voice will overwhelm your fears, or your fears will overwhelm God's voice.

God's voice will overwhelm your fears, or your fears will overwhelm God's voice.

Some of us in our life, our our fears are speaking so loudly to us that we can't even hear from God anymore.

For some of us in our life, our fear is so big, and what's happened is our God is so small.

Rather than understanding that we have a big God, because when you have a big God, you will see that your fears are small in the light of God's greatness.

Step one, listen to God.

Step two, lean into godly people.

Let's all say that together.

Ready?

Lean into godly people.

It's so fascinating to me in the text here that Gabriel doesn't just say, Mary, you're gonna have a kid.

It's gonna happen, trust me.

In the text, what he does is he points her in verse 36 to her cousin Elizabeth.

And when Mary's doubting, Gabriel doesn't just say, Trust me, I'm from God.

Gabriel says, That godly person, Elizabeth, God has done a miracle and a work in her life.

And Mary, I want you to look to what I've done, what God's done in her life.

And if God's done it in her life, then God can do it in your life.

This is fascinating to me.

And this is what it really shows us is that God uses godly people in our lives to strengthen our faith and help us overcome our fears.

Gabriel points to logical, verifiable evidence from somebody else's life of what God can do.

And here's what all of us need in the room.

We all need godly people in our lives.

Because there is power in proximity.

There is power in proximity to godly people.

Now, how many of you are like me, and you know you can be in proximity to a bunch of knuckleheads.

You know what I'm saying?

We've all done that a time or two or three or four or five or more.

And we can be in proximity to people that draw us away from Christ.

Or we can be in proximity to people that draw us to Christ.

Mary was in proximity to Elizabeth, and this is what Gabriel says.

Hey, look at Elizabeth.

Look what I've done in her life.

This can happen in your life, and this is going to happen.

I remember a few years ago now.

I was in a very heavy, hard season in my life.

And I remember I had a conversation with a godly person in our church family.

And me and him, we met at a local coffee shop, and I could take you to the place, and I could probably take you to the seat that we were sitting in.

It was a pivotal time in my life.

And he had walked through something hard that I was walking through, and he had done it with godliness, with perseverance, and with integrity.

And as we talked, this person spoke truth into my life when I couldn't feel truth.

They spoke truth into my life, they spoke love into my life, they spoke care into my life, and I left that conversation.

Reminded of the fact that I can trust God no matter how hard life is.

Reminded of the fact that God's character has not changed.

And resting in the fact that even though life sucked, because it did, it did, even though life was super hard, that God was a redeeming God.

And God can bring strength from weakness.

And I left that coffee shop and I left that conversation strengthened in so many ways, not because I was godly and wise, but because I put myself in proximity with somebody that was godly and wise.

And because I was in proximity with somebody that was godly and wise, it was their faith that strengthened my faith.

And could it be that some of us right now are going through some things that if you'll just put yourself into proximity with the right person, with the right godly people, they can give you strength for what you're facing right now.

Because God uses people in our lives.

This is one of the reasons why we unapologetically talk about things like serving here.

You know, one of the reasons?

Here's it's a secret.

Okay.

One reason why we really want you to serve here is not just because we want like you to like uh use your gifts here, but we want you to be in relationship with people.

That's what we want you to do.

Because when you're in relationship with people, you're gonna rub shoulders with people and you're gonna build relationships that are gonna strengthen you in your faith.

That's what we talk about serving here all the time.

In fact, talking about serving, Pastor Kudiv was mentioning our volunteer Christmas party we have coming up next week.

That's a great time just to hang out and build relationships and have fun.

Why?

Because we grow with godly and godly relationships.

Relationships are so important.

This is why sometimes I joke around about how some of us, as soon as the service ends, we run out of here like a ninja.

I gotta get out of here.

I'm going to say, no, no, no, like just take a moment and meet somebody.

You don't have to meet two people, just meet one person.

You don't have to meet me.

I know some of y'all think I got pastor cooties.

I know, I know.

Meet somebody.

Why?

Why?

Because we need each other because we are better than me.

And what Gabriel does is Gabriel reminds Mary.

He reminds Mary, he points to what he's done in Elizabeth's life, and it gives Mary strength for the present life that she's in.

Step one, listen to God.

Step two, lean into godly people.

And step three is remind yourself of God's character.

Remind yourself of God's character.

And verse 37, this is what she says.

This is what Gabriel says.

For nothing will be impossible with God.

You know what the word nothing means?

Nothing.

Nada.

Zero.

Whatever your background is, however you want to use the word nothing, whatever you use nothing.

Nothing's impossible with God.

So Mary, remember God's character.

Now this matters a lot because often fear will have a cycle in our brain.

Often fear starts with a trigger.

You have a thought, like you see something, you hear something, you watch a video, and it triggers something in you.

For some of us, we have trauma in our past, so something can be like a trauma trigger.

And then what happens is whatever that trigger is, we start to interpret that.

So we can think, oh man, like this triggered, so things are always gonna be like this, or I'm never gonna get better, or I'm always gonna go through this.

And then what can happen is uh, well, we can ruminate on it.

And we just think about this all the time.

And then what can happen?

Then we start to react.

Some of our reactions are are physical, like our chest will get tight, our blood, our heart will beat really fast.

Sometimes our reactions are psychological, like we overthink a lot.

Sometimes our reactions are emotional, we get anxiety or worry.

Sometimes our reactions are actually spiritual.

We get mad at God.

Our reactions, God doesn't love me because I'm going through this, and we have this trigger, and then what happens is we interpret it this way, and then we have this rumination, this mental looping, and then we have this reaction.

Here's the reality about fear: you can't always control the triggers.

Mary was triggered.

What was the trigger?

She saw an angel, she was triggered in fear.

But what Mary did is that the interpretation part, she interpreted her fear through truth.

She listened to God.

And this is what Mary didn't do.

Mary didn't just take that fear and ruminate on it.

Because the reality about fear is fear grows when you give it space, but it dies when you tell it the truth.

Mary doesn't take her fear and just give it space to fester.

She speaks truth to her fear, and her fear died.

I want you to look at the process that Mary had, and this is how we overcome fear.

Mary had this trigger.

Mary interpreted her fear through truth.

Listen, Angel says, Now listen, what did she do?

She listened to the truth.

Mary ruminated on this.

We don't have time to walk through the rest of the text, but we see that she's meditating on these things.

And then Mary's reaction was joy, thankfulness, praise at the end of the chapter.

Mary went from somebody that was filled with fear to somebody that was free of fear.

And friends, the people of God have to say, I am not going to allow my life to be filled with fear.

Right now, this time of year, it's so hard for so many people.

But fear does not have to have authority over your life if you are a follower of Jesus.

You cannot allow yourself in the name of Jesus, let me exhort you to be in this cycle and in this chains of fear because that is not who God says that you are.

God has not given you the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of sound judgment.

And what we have to do is we have to interpret our fears, interpret our fears through the truth of who God is, God's word, and who God says that we are, and ruminate on that, and it will cause you to react with joy and praise and thankfulness.

Now, this isn't something that that can just stay in this room on Sunday morning.

Here's what we all need to do to participate in this.

One, we need to identify what our fears are.

Here's an honest question: What brings you fear?

Some of y'all, it's financial.

I get it.

Some of us it's emotional.

We're like, I'll never get through this.

Some of us, it's something completely different.

Can you identify your fear?

Would you listen to God?

In the light of God's character, your fears are small, your problems are small, and we compare our fears and our worries and our problems, not to our ability to fix them, but to God's character and God's ability.

And then, third of all, would we lean into godly community?

Later on in the text, after this story of Gabriel going to Mary, the first person Mary goes to and talks about this is Elizabeth.

That's the first person.

Her godly person.

And friend, this is what I invite you to do.

These three things.

In fact, not a reflection response on the screen.

Identify a fear.

Speak truth to that fear.

And when you speak truth to that fear, fear loses its power.

And take a step towards deeper community FCC.

Can we all bow our heads?