Fear! We all deal with it, but there are times when life happens and we become completely overwhelmed by our circumstances. Or we become paralyzed with the thought of God’s judgment or anger at us. But Jesus strolls up to our boat and says “fear not it is I”. The message is loud and clear that Jesus is something much bigger and more powerful than the disciples ever imagined. Jesus was connecting himself to the Old Testament God and proclaiming his power over creation.

The disciples let Jesus into their boat. We need to let Jesus into our boat but we need to let all of who Jesus is into our boat. This may involve repenting from old ideas of who Jesus is, that are false or only half true. When he comes into our boats he wants full surrender to him. This means we must seek our hearts for idols that prevent us from accepting his full love and presence in our lives. These idols often create a great deal of fear in our lives.

Once we let Jesus truly guide our boat will find that his love and presence are enough, and will dissipate the fear we so often fight, for perfect love cast out fear!