Overcoming fear of the flesh

"This prayer did not begin with trying not to be afraid, but rather, loving God with all the heart."

By Susan Mack

The Psalmist made a bold statement: "In God I will praise his word, in God I have put my trust; I will not fear what flesh can do unto me" (Ps. 56:4). How can we not be afraid of what flesh can do, especially when faced with the symptoms of disease that appear to produce great suffering and/or threaten dire consequences? I have always felt that this statement was not theoretical, but written from the depths of the Psalmist's prayer—perhaps in the face of overwhelming physical distress. And yet, he chose to trust God and not to fear a material power.

This prayer proved important to me in a healing I had several years ago. One day I noticed a red spot on my hand. At first I thought it would just go away and was no big deal, but after a while I noticed that it was larger, and the flesh was deteriorating. So I endeavored to pray for myself, acknowledging the perfection of God and His reflection, man—knowing that the reflection can't have even the tiniest spot that is not in the original. I prayed to be willing to release any personal sense of pride, criticism, self-condemnation, or anything that might claim to spread in consciousness—not so much because these mental elements could have caused the problem, but because they would attempt to bind me to a mortal sense of existence, where disease seems to operate involuntarily.

I endeavored to stop looking at my hand and drawing my attention to the physical evidence, but this proved most difficult. I would go through periods of days or weeks when I would pray diligently for myself, and if I happened to notice my hand, would quickly turn away from this material view to what I had been understanding of God's view of me as His spiritual idea. But then I would have some down-turning moments when I felt mesmerized by the difficulty, wondering how fast it was spreading and what it would do to me if my prayers didn't stop it in time.

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