Learn to Fear Less

This coming Summer Chosen Books (A Division of Baker Publishing Group) will publish Fearless by Faith, a 60-day devotional by Brother Andrew and me designed to help us fight today’s spiritual battles. The following is an excerpt from the Preface:

Brother Andrew was a warrior, eager to rush in where others feared to go. When the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968, he loaded his station wagon with Bibles and drove 550 miles from his home in the Netherlands. As he pulled up to the Czech border a long line of cars was departing the country. A shocked customs official stamped his passport and waved him through the gate. In Prague he armed Christians with Russian Bibles and told them to go into the streets, climb on the tanks, tell the invaders that God loves them and hand them God’s Word.

That’s how you dismantle a superpower—with love, not bombs.

Listen to Brother Andrew tell the whole story:

As Communism in the Soviet empire collapsed, Brother Andrew turned his attention to radical Islam. He made friends with leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah so they could hear the Gospel. He invited himself to one of the world’s most radical madrassas, observed hundreds of boys memorizing the Quran, and arranged for them to hear a better, greater message. The school’s founder and principal watched and listened in amazement, seemingly powerless to stop this Christian invader.

These stories might imply that the Dutchman known as “God’s Smuggler” was unique in that he did not experience fear. Not so. His secret was that he knew how to overcome his anxiety. Approaching the Iron Curtain with a car that was loaded with hundreds of Bibles, he sometimes had to pull back and spend a day or two in prayer and fasting before he had faith to proceed. He said the secret was, “If you fear God, you need not fear any man.”

Brother Andrew was not fearless, but he learned how to fear less.

Make no mistake, fear is natural when battles rage all around. The antidote is supernatural. Scripture tells us that our earthly struggles are located in heavenly places (see Ephesians 6:12). In the midst of all the clamor, one thing seems to be forgotten. There is an author of all this confusion. He is God’s sworn enemy, and he brilliantly sows fear in our ranks. The Church needs to awaken to the real battle that occurs in the spiritual realm and spills into every conflict on planet earth.

God invites us to partner with Him in that struggle. To do that, we must overcome our fears. That is what our new book is about. Fearless by Faith contains Brother Andrew’s teaching over many years on spiritual conflict, drawing from examples of five Old Testament figures. Our devotional is designed to provide an antidote to fear. David, Elijah, Jonah, Moses and Gideon are going to teach us the essentials of spiritual warfare and demonstrate how to fight and prevail. The apostle Paul encourages us to learn from these great men. “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope” (Romans 15:4).

In the next few months before the book is released, I will send you some samples from the book as well as exclusive content that you will get nowhere else. I hope you will join me in seeking to diminish, even eliminate, our fears because we know what God has called us to do and understand that our conflicts belong to the Lord.

Blessings,

Al Janssen