{"id":8674,"date":"2021-12-15T01:37:54","date_gmt":"2021-12-15T01:37:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/?p=8674"},"modified":"2021-12-15T01:55:05","modified_gmt":"2021-12-15T01:55:05","slug":"you-will-not-be-afraid-of-the-terror-by-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/?p=8674","title":{"rendered":"You will not be afraid of the terror by night"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>You\u00a0will not be afraid of the\u00a0terror by night,<\/em><em><br \/>\nOr of the\u00a0arrow that flies by day;<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Of the\u00a0pestilence that\u00a0stalks in darkness,<\/em><em><br \/>\nOr of the\u00a0destruction that lays waste at noon<\/em>. Psalm 91:5<\/p>\n<p>How amazing is this verse!? Boldly, the Psalmist lists four fears common to humanity under the declaration, \u201cYOU WILL NOT BE AFRAID\u2026\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The top four on the fear list include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Terror by night [things that go bump in the night; creeper stuff]<\/li>\n<li>The arrow that flies by day [projectiles of all kinds: drive-bys; snipers; terrorist attacks; hold ups; stick ups; home invasions]<\/li>\n<li>Pestilence that stalks in darkness [covid; flu; plagues and diseases of every kind]<\/li>\n<li>Destruction that lays waste at noon [California wildfires; Midwest tornadoes; terrorist attacks; earthquakes; etc.]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Every one of these scary potentialities has enough \u201coomph\u201d to keep even the boldest among us tossing and turning, trying to sleep with one eye open, alert to the tiniest creak in the house. Hearing a noise outside can send the sleeper shooting upright in bed, heart pounding; the tiniest tickle in the throat can cause full-blown panic; and the brain\u2019s replay of almost any given newscast can steal shuteye from the most exhausted body.<\/p>\n<p>But Psalm 91 declares \u201c<em>YOU WILL NOT BE AFRAID<\/em>\u201d. Personalize it, and you will proclaim, \u201c<strong>I<\/strong> WILL NOT BE AFRAID\u201d, even when you DO feel afraid. You\u2019re not lying; you\u2019re quoting the Word of God.<\/p>\n<p>The beauty of it all is that the more you interact with this Psalm and this verse (and with <em>all<\/em> of the Word of God), the more you will believe it. And the more you believe it, the more of a reality it will be in your life.<\/p>\n<p><em>You will not be afraid of the terror by night.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I had frequent nightmares as a kid and was obsessively afraid of car accidents, break-ins, and the wolf man. Laugh if you want, but I\u2019ll bet <em>you<\/em> had a list, too! But as I started spending time in the Bible, reading its promises, and taking them for myself, the fear levels in my life slowly decreased.<\/p>\n<p>Then sometime in the last years of the Obama or the first year of the Trump administration, I sensed God saying, \u201cPray Psalm 91 a thousand times.\u201d I didn\u2019t try to do it in a hundred or even a thousand days, checking it off rapidly to get it done. No; I\u2019m <em>still <\/em>not done! But as I walk my neighborhood or drive my car, I will likely be praying through something\u2026and often it is Psalm 91.<\/p>\n<p>I had been praying this Psalm for a good year or year and a half, and something happened that confirmed to me that I was indeed being changed on the inside by praying Psalm 91.<\/p>\n<p>In the middle of the night, outside my bedroom window, I heard noises at the side gate to my backyard. I woke up for a moment, said to myself, \u201cOh, it\u2019s probably just a bad guy,\u201d and fell right back to sleep, unconcerned.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps thirty or forty minutes later, around 2 AM, I was awakened by loud banging on my front door. I peeked out the blinds and saw two police cars parked in front of my home. I threw on a robe and went to the front door, opened it, and asked, \u201cHow may I help you, Officers?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>They told me a house had been robbed a block over, and they found the perpetrator hiding in my neighbor\u2019s bushes. When they approached him, he tore off into my back yard, and in the darkness of night, they lost him.<\/p>\n<p>I think they were shocked when I declared, almost triumphantly, \u201cI KNEW there was a bad guy back there!\u201d They told me if I heard any other noise out there to let them know, and they went on their way.<\/p>\n<p>But that lack of fear didn\u2019t leave! I actually had to restrain myself from going outside immediately to look for loot! I just about had to take myself by the scruff of the neck and say, \u201cListen here, young lady! You can look for it in the morning!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Now don\u2019t get me wrong\u2014praying and meditating on this Psalm will not automatically chase every fear out of your life. But when fear <em>does<\/em> crop up\u2014and it <em>will<\/em>\u2014you will have a well-worn path right back to the Scripture that declares \u201cI WILL NOT FEAR\u201d and by that, you can calm your soul as you look to God for His powerful help. And help He will.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<em>You will not fear the terror by night.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Dorothy<\/p>\n<p>\u00a9 Dorothy Frick, 2021<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You\u00a0will not be afraid of the\u00a0terror by night, Or of the\u00a0arrow that flies by day; Of the\u00a0pestilence that\u00a0stalks in darkness, Or of the\u00a0destruction that lays waste at noon. Psalm 91:5 How amazing is this verse!? Boldly, the Psalmist lists four fears common to humanity under the declaration, \u201cYOU WILL NOT BE AFRAID\u2026\u201d. The top four [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,537],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prayerperspective","category-psalm-91"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8674"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8674\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8680,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8674\/revisions\/8680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firstofallpray.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}