1 John 4:18
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
Recently, while mowing on my riding lawnmower I came around a tree and looked to my right at what I thought was a bag of leaves. It turned out to be a newly born fawn lying in the grass under the tree. This was in my backyard which has high fences in order to discourage deer from getting inside. They have such a high jumping ability I guess it doesn’t work as well as I’d hope.
What had happened was the mother had jumped the fence and then delivered the fawn in my back yard before she had a chance to get back over the fence. This newly born fawn was so new that it hadn’t developed enough strength in its legs to stand up and go with its mom.
I called Wildlife Rescue just to get some clarity on what I should do. They informed me that it was in the fawns nature to just lay there until the mother returned. It wasn’t afraid because it hadn’t yet learned what fear was just yet. It just raised its head and observed what was going on and slowly lowered it back to the ground again. I was told that the mother knew what was going on and would return after it had finished foilaging for food. There would be no way for the fawn to get out of the back yard without my opening a gate so I went around an opened several gates so it would be able to find its way out.
Sure enough that night when I had returned home, the fawn was gone.
It amazes me how engrained within animals is the nature to just instinctively know what to do. It is amazing how instinct takes over. I was also amazed to see how the instinct in this little fawn reacted to what I would expect to be fear as I came toward it on the mower. It had at this point not experienced fear and reacted to it so calmly. I was three feet away from it, lawn mower going, blades turning, very loud. The fawn just simply raised its head and looked at me like I was some kind of idiot for disturbing it and then slowly laid its head back down. As all of this was going on I watched its breathing as its lungs filled with each breath. The breathing was slow and relaxed. Totally contrary to what I know to be true about deer which is always nervous with high anxiety and always on alert. Apparently this part of their character doesn’t develop until later.
Fear is not something we are born with but something we learn. Through our life experiences we develop scars that begin to harden us from experiencing life to its fullest. The deeper the wound, the deeper the scar, the more protected we become.
One of the joys of being a Christian is knowing that this is an area that God wants to free us from. We may never totally over come our fears but through Him we now have the ability to face them and not let them control our lives. If we truly loved, we would totally trust. If we totally trusted we would not be afraid. God takes what we can give Him and works with us from there. We give Him what we can and trust Him to provide the rest.