I remember the place, overlooking a moonlit Nile, on my husband’s and my “vision trip” to Uganda. The place I managed to eke out in prayer that if God asked for the lives of my children, He could take them.

By that point, I’d witnessed the death-defying traffic, knew the names of the region’s most threatening parasites, bacteria, and viruses that could snuff the breath from their lungs.

At the time, I was paging through Hebrews 11.

“By faith Abraham, when called… obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country… as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise.”

And living in Uganda, some things I feared actually happened—actually were terrible. My husband did get malaria. My son was hit by a motorcycle. My family was mugged while Christmas shopping. I was involved in a lethal accident.

I take odd comfort in 1 Peter 3:6—that God says I am Sarah’s daughter if I “do not fear anything that is frightening” (emphasis added).

But fear is also simply a question of which god—or God—is bigger.

Jackie Hill Perry points out the difference between the spies who God kept from entering the Promised Land, and Caleb and Joshua:

“The difference between the two and the ten is this: one group believed God; the other didn’t. We don’t usually relate courage to faith or fear to unbelief, but considering the spies, it’s evident the two had an elevated and thus right view of God that influenced how they perceived the land. For one, they believed He was with them.

…Most times we are the ten [spies]. So awestruck by the bigness of whatever is in front of us that our fears become our Lord and King.”

Sometimes, rather than surrendering my fears in prayer to a God bigger and more powerful than my concern, I’m just ruminating. Fear swells, inflames.

I’m not chewing on what’s true, noble, right, pure, lovely, excellent, admirable, praiseworthy (Philippians 4:8-9). Author Jan Johnson reminds me that if I know how to worry, I know how to meditate! …Ouch. On what will I meditate?

When my prayers “worry in God’s direction,” I don’t come away with God’s promised, beyond-comprehension peace (Philippians 4:6-7). I come away with heartburn and stress-related hair loss.

I associate childhood with vulnerability. But God’s fear-antidote is to be His child (Romans 8:15, 1 John 4:18). To be loved. God as our Father overwhelms our vulnerability.

Which master will I choose? (Which one’s trustworthy?)