Eighty-one times the Bible quotes God or Christ urging his people not to be afraid! Ours is certainly an 'age of anxiety'. Anxiety is fear in search of a cause. The wealthy are afraid inflation will eat into their savings. The poor are afraid they won't make ends meet.

Fear is what we feel in the presence of real or imagined danger. Some fears are our friends linking us to reality. Other fears - perhaps most? - are imaginary, and destructive. Normal fear makes us jump back onto the kerb if an unexpected car is coming.

Face your fears with the help of another. Don't settle down to live permanently with your fear. If you do you will never be at peace. And you won't get rid of fear by changing your geography. I visited a town in the U.S. where psychologists and architects worked to produce an 'ideal' living environment. But it had a record number of suicides!

Do we move beyond fear and anxiety by summoning our courage and saying, 'There, now, be brave!'? You can't easily exhort yourself out of fear into bravery. Some fears come from an over-active imagination. Replace fear with faith. 'The only known cure for fear,' says a famous psychiatrist, 'is faith.' Then externalize your fears - in your journal, or by verbalizing them with a trusted friend.

Perfect love casts out fear: help me to understand this, Lord. Amen.