A 'Koi' story.

So someone decided they were tired of rearing their pet ornamental fishes in their house, and decided to dump them into this pond at the foothill of Bukit Wawasan  While I'm sure the big pond is a more ideal home (to the fishes) , the change must be somewhat intimidating.

All of a sudden,  these fishes,  confined all its life to a tank  and accustomed to being  fed daily now finds  it has to forage for food and compete with other 'resident' fishes ( tilapias, haruans, turtles), and other creatures in this small pond. Being the newbie in this 'neighborhood'  I saw it was attacked by the turtles, nipping at their glorious flowing tails. Without doubt they were traumatized. 

Hiding in a safe place

Disoriented and unaccustomed to this new (and hostile) environment, the big 'koi' would flee everytime it was picked on. (I was witnessing a 'school pond' bullying of sorts.). But here is the thing,  the big koi could easily flip the turtle out the water with a head flick. The small turtle was less than a third the size of the fish, neither as fast nor as powerful, but astonishingly  the turtle kept exerting dominance and bullied the big fish around. 

 drawing strength from each other

 As i watched the big Koi fish fleeing in fear .. the parallels in the spiritual realm are surely unmistakable;  

."Christians are just like that big fish being bullied by a small foe; we become harassed by an enemy far less in stature, when (blindsided) thrown into a 'hostile' environment plagued by problems, we are caught off balance. Our first response is to be cowed in fear. The enemy rarely threatens physical harm, but specializes in 'mind games' introducing 'scenarios'  causing needless anxiety and worry, and we imagine the worst outcome possible (always) . Financial worries, health issues, family / children issues, infidelity issues, etc, etc, and his specialty is ( of  course) , painting you a future where God is not there!  

The only thing to fear is fear itself - Franklin Theodore Roosevelt

The common 'christian' adage is we need more 'faith' to overcome the fear. " Lord.. I NEED more faith!! " 
No you don't!. Faith is not the antidote to fear. 

LOVE IS. 

The bible states 'perfect love casts out fear* ".  It is the perfect love of God (towards) us that casts out fear. And we need to be. more CONSCIOUS of his unfailing and unconditional love coming towards us, more than the fears ( real or imagined) the enemy throws at us. 

When we are baptized into the river of God's redeeming love, it will displace every fear tactic of the enemy.  Because God has said, " I will never leave you nor forsake you ** " We can be assured; after ALL that God DID to save us ( did not spare his Son *** ), we can surely believe he won't hang us out to dry. 

He won't. 


So be encouraged.


Be of good cheer.

God's got our back.