hey guys johnathan and melissa Helzer here we are at our ministry in North Carolina in a beautiful countryside and we just wanted to take a few minutes and send you guys an encouragement and just what we're hearing from the Lord about a week ago we were in Hawaii at the white Wayne base doing some worship visiting friends and we flew back through Seattle and had an overnight there and a couple days before we were headed back I started feeling crazy anxiety and fear as someone with a compromised immune system that's had an autoimmune disease for
20 years just feel the waves of fear and panic and anxiety hitting me and I I was just like lord I really need your help and what the Lord said to me was most I want to give you a gift and I'm like okay like what's the gift and he's like I want to give you a sound mind and it just hit me so deep and I went to bed that night and literally all night long I woke up every hour and I was praying for the Lord to give me a sound mind and to
release a sound mind and when I got the next morning I read 2nd Timothy 1:7 and and it says I'm not giving you a spirit of fear but of power love and a sound mind and that one there's actually in the King James Version but in the ESV and the NIV it says I'm not giving you a spirit of fear but of power love and self-control and I thought it was powerful that in one translation it's a sound mind and then the other it's self-control and what the Lord actually started speaking to me was you
have a choice Melissa and I'm asking you to lean into wisdom I'm asking you to abandon the fear I'm asking you to turn away from anxiety and panic and I'm asking you to choose a sound mind I'm asking you to use self-control and lean into my presence and and it was beautiful and I felt I felt something lift off of me and I just want to be honest like since then we are still exchanging that fear and anxieties for peace and a sound mind I feel like multiple times a day and we just want to
just encourage and release to you guys the capacity you to make powerful choices right now and to actually lean into the presence of Jesus he wants to give you peace for the anxiety he wants to give you a sound mind for fear and panic yeah and I've just been thinking into that I wonder if like the biggest battle we're facing is not a virus the biggest battle we're facing is fear and the fear coming against our minds and our hearts and I know for me like just a couple mornings ago I woke up and my
first instinct was to pick up my phone and look at the news and I went over my phone about to pick it up and look like is there an update what's happening and before I turned it on I just felt the Holy Spirit say are you gonna be more affected by the news of the world or more affected by my gospel do you want to look at my face and look at my perspective before you look at the world's perspective and like you want to look at the news and like that morning I just put
my phone down I picked up the scripture and I just let God's perspective God's news wash over my heart and I know we need to be informed it is really important but what's forming you in this in this situation is the news of the world forming your heart more or is God's perspective forming your heart and we haven't done this perfectly like we we are battling fear even with my wife's immune system like there are moments I just feel so much fear and I'm just running back to the word and I love how David handled
moments like this when chaos is breaking out all around him he would go and he would strengthen himself in God he would go and into God's presence and I've been meditating on Psalm 27 and I can't believe like how alive the scriptures are becoming in the midst of this battle it's like it's louder than it's a Ben yeah and from me Psalm 27 has been an anchor for this last week as the storms been raging and in this Psalm David it's like he's singing it in the middle of the battlefield and we want to just
close by speaking some of the Psalm over you releasing this over your heart releasing courage over your heart and these are the words of David that he sung on the battlefield thousands of years ago and they're echoing victory into today and they're releasing hope into your tomorrow so we declare over your hearts that the Lord is your light and he is your salvation the Lord is the stronghold of your life whom shall you fear when the wicked advance to gets you to devour your flesh it is your enemies and your foes who will stumble and
fall when an army the siege is you you shall be confident when War break out against you your heart will fear no evil for in the day of trouble he will keep you safe in his dwelling he will hide you in the shelter of his sacred tent and he will set you high upon a rock in your head and your thoughts in your mind and your heart will be exalted above the enemies who surround you and we prophesy over each of your lives each of your families each of your children and your homes that we
are confident of this you will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living so wait for the Lord be strong and take heart be strong and take heart you will see the goodness of the Lord bless you guys yes bless you
