by Margaret Curran
In the magazine ‘The Voice of the Martyrs’, Richard Wurmbrand writes of a renowned Indian mystic named Sadhu Sundar Singh who travelled on foot into Tibet, as he had no other means of transportation.
During a terrible snowstorm in the great Himalayan mountains, he was glad to find shelter in a cave. To his horror, however, he discovered a tiger was already in it. Terrified, he asked God to do the impossible; to keep the tiger from observing him. So it happened, and he was able to crawl out.
But when he thanked God for this he was chided, “Why did you get out? You are My child. You should have ordered the tiger to get out.” Singh re-entered the cave and the tiger left.

Our tiger
Many of us have a tiger in our lives that is terrorising and immobilising us. We cringe in its presence instead of ordering it out of our lives.
Sometimes we go on asking God to deliver us from the thing we dread and wonder why He does not act.
It may be that, like Sadhu Sundar Singh’s experience, God is waiting for you to take courage and command “the tiger” to leave you in peace. Critical to all of this is that you have your own personal relationship with God as Singh did.

Hiding
Perhaps you are hiding behind God, so to speak, wanting Him to do the thing that petrifies you.
Your heavenly Father, who is much wiser than we are, may be aware that you will only be delivered from this fear by confronting it yourself.
Of course, we do not do that alone: God gives us the strength but if we will not take it and use it, He won’t do it for us. That would interfere with our development and a good father does not do that. He just leaves the tiger there and keeps on encouraging us to deal with it and command it, in His Name, to leave us and get out of our lives.
I remember a time in my 1ife when I was asking God to help me to endure something that was a great trial to me. Like the Indian mystic I heard Him ask me why I always requested Him to help me to endure. “Why don’t you ask Me to help you to change it?” He said.

Startled
I was startled by this response because, upon reflection, I thought that was actually what I had been praying for over the years. But God showed me I was not asking Him to help ME to change things.
Without realising it I had been asking HIM to change them and that was why I had this attitude of having to endure matters till God chose to alter them. In actual fact, He was waiting for me to get up and act, trusting Him to help me.
That is the difference between fear and faith. I remember the verse from the Bible He showed me at that time: “Every place
that the sole of your foot shall tread I will give to you”. It is
in Joshua 1:3.
And so it has been whenever I step out in faith in the true and living God, everything works out.

Big tiger
But if I cringe in my cave the tiger grows bigger every day.
In Luke 9:1, Jesus told His apostles they could use His authority to banish demons and disease. The Bible tells us the Name of Jesus is above every name in heaven and on earth (Philippians 2:9-11). He is the highest authority because He exercises God the Father’s authority.
In Jesus’ Name we too can banish tigers, left, right and centre, so to speak. We have no need to live in fear and poverty of spirit, when we are God’s children.

Gaining rest
And if we are not yet His, we have no need to stay apart from Him either, because through Jesus He tells us to “Come unto Me all you who labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
Are you wearied by worry? Are you carrying burdens that God never intended you to carry? In Jesus you will find rest for your soul, and power to not tame the tiger, but banish it forever.