Fear vs. Faith: What God Really Wants You to Do
Oct 21, 2025Summary
In this inspiring episode of Arise, Women of God, Tamara K. Anderson unpacks a powerful insight from Matthew 25 and the Parable of the Talents—revealing how fear can hold us back from fulfilling the divine callings God has placed on our hearts. Joined by members of the Women Warriors of Light accountability group, Tamara explores what it truly means to overcome fear with faith and act boldly, even when the path feels uncertain.
Through personal reflection and heartfelt discussion, this episode reminds us that the same fear that kept the servant from using his talent is what often keeps us from stepping forward today. Whether God is prompting you to start a ministry, write a book, launch a podcast, or simply reach out to someone in need, this conversation will help you replace hesitation with holy confidence.
You’ll learn how to strengthen your faith, feed it daily, and trust that God will open the right doors as you act on His promptings. If you’ve ever wondered how to overcome fear with faith and magnify your God-given gifts in preparation for Christ’s return, this episode is for you.
Takeaways
- The parable of the talents emphasizes that God bestows significant gifts upon us, and we are called to magnify these talents through faith rather than let fear paralyze our efforts.
- Fear is a universal struggle, even among the most faithful, as illustrated by the servant who hid his talent due to fear—this serves as a reminder that we must confront our fears with unwavering faith.
- The convergence of the parables of the talents and the ten virgins reveals the importance of preparedness for the Second Coming, urging us to act upon our divine callings with courage and resolve.
- Our journey toward fulfilling God's call may be fraught with fear, yet it is imperative to remember that faith can illuminate our path and empower us to take bold steps forward.
- The insights gained from these parables remind us that while fear may be a natural response, the imperative to act upon our divine inspirations outweighs such fears and leads to personal growth and fulfillment.
- As we face the challenges of our divine callings, we must continually remind ourselves that God equips us with the necessary tools, and our willingness to act in faith can lead to profound transformations.
Host & Guests
Tamara K. Anderson, Wendi Christensen, Carma Brown & Karalee Anjewierden
Transcript
Tamara K. Anderson
00:00:00.960 - 00:00:05.440
Have you ever felt fear when God impressed upon your mind or heart something.
That he wanted you to do? Stay tuned, because today we're going to talk about that and how an epiphany I had from reading two parables has Shifted my perspective on this completely.
Intro/Outro
00:00:21.920 - 00:01:18.760
Are you a woman who knows God is calling you to something more, but you're unsure where to start or how to grow it into something impactful?
You are not alone, and you're in the right place. Welcome to the Arise Women of God podcast, a show for Christian women who feel called to shine his light and step into their divine purpose.
Each week you'll hear stories of faithful women, both from the Bible and today, who heard God's voice and chose to say yes even when it felt uncomfortable or uncertain, to step with faith into the unknown. You'll walk away with encouragement, spiritual insight, and practical steps to follow those holy promptings in your own life.
So let's arise together as women warriors of light. Let's do it God's way, God's strong. Hello,
Tamara K. Anderson
00:01:18.760 - 00:01:41.960
Hello and welcome to another Arise Women of God podcast.
I'm your host, Tamara K. Anderson, and today I'm letting you take a second peek into one of our accountability groups where we have a discussion around two parables and fear and faith and preparing for the Lord's second coming. So let me share this epiphany with You, and hopefully it can change your mind and heart as well.
I'm actually going to start us off with the spiritual thought this morning. I had a big, big epiphany this morning, and I wanted to share it with you.
Kind of surprised me when I read it because you know how, you know how that happens when you've read something like what feels like a million times, and all of a sudden you see something new and you're like, how long has that been there? It's been there the whole time, right, honey?
I was reading in Matthew chapter 25 this morning, and I was reading the parable of the talents, rereading it, and you know that's where the one where the Savior gives the five talents, the two talents and the one talent. And I noticed two things that I wanted to point out to you today. The first is that the parable right before it is the parable of the ten virgins.
And immediately following that, that kind of rebuke to the unwise virgins, where he says, I never knew you. He starts this second parable, which is the parable of the talents. And of course we know that the five doubled it. The two Doubled it.
They were commended for working hard and doubling their talents. And I've always looked at the one. The. The. The servant who got the one talent and said, why didn't he or she do something with that?
Why didn't they?
And this time I was reading, and in verse. Let's see, verse 25, simple phrase. This is why he said, I was afraid. Whoa. Afraid.
And it, like, pierced me this time because I paused and I thought, oh, my word. I remember getting that prompting to write my book and being scared to death. I remember being told to start that podcast and being scared to death.
Yep. And having it stop me and delaying it and putting it off and all of these things.
And all of a sudden, it was like the Lord was saying, it's not just you who feels that fear. This is the part that I hadn't seen before, is here we are right before the Second Coming. Want to be wise. Want to be those wise virgins. Right?
We want to be prepared. And one of the things he's saying so that we're not foolish is this second parable.
I think that he wants us to push past the fear and do something with the talents that he's given us. And it was just like this huge, oh, my goodness gracious. Wow.
And it just kind of surprised me and humbled me all at once, because I was like, okay, I can see now because my prayers have been, how can I prepare for the Second Coming? That's how can I prepare myself and my family and those around me for the Second Coming? And this is the answer that he gave me. Magnify your talents.
Wow. Follow those inspirations that you're getting. Because the truth is, each of us is called to minister to a few or maybe a lot.
It doesn't matter how many we reach, only that we act on the promptings that we get. And we're not afraid. Right.
Carma Brown
00:05:39.670 - 00:05:40.070
Right.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:05:41.270 - 00:05:44.230
Kari, it looks like you have a thought. Go ahead.
Karalee Anjewierden
00:05:45.590 - 00:06:00.790
Just being reminded, I mean, that is the first temptation in the Garden of Eden is fear. He sets fear into their hearts. You know, they're hiding. They are afraid of God. They are hiding.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:06:01.430 - 00:06:37.540
Yeah. And the answer also is faith. Faith always overcomes fear. Right. And that's what helped me push through, is I focus on Jesus.
I focused on the people I knew he could help me reach because I remember being in their shoes not very long ago. And so I focused on, okay, this is going to make a difference for them.
And God isn't going to give me something that he's not going to qualify me or Open the right door for me so that I can. He's going to open the way. And that's what that faith is. God will make anything I feel is impossible because I feel I don't have the skills.
He'll make it possible.
Carma Brown
00:06:38.260 - 00:06:42.820
I wanted to share something with you. I don't know. Have any of you ever seen a talent?
Tamara K. Anderson
00:06:44.020 - 00:06:44.420
No.
Carma Brown
00:06:45.060 - 00:06:55.620
A talent is an actual. We would call it. We would call it a coin, only it's not. It is as big as a dishwasher. Oh, what?
Tamara K. Anderson
00:06:56.100 - 00:06:56.500
Really?
Carma Brown
00:06:57.060 - 00:07:12.240
A talent is huge and heavy. We saw these in the museum in Turkey. We saw an actual talent that they had dug up and it. It might weigh 2,000 pounds, I don't know. Oh, wow.
Karalee Anjewierden
00:07:12.240 - 00:07:13.000
I had no idea.
Carma Brown
00:07:13.080 - 00:08:08.100
Huge. I know. And so when you think that, when you just think about this parable, you think first that whatever the Lord gives us, it's huge. He gives us.
It isn't like just a little, oh, look, I have a gold coin. You know, how special. It's more than that. And secondly, what must it have taken to hide. Would take a lot of effort to hide something that big.
He said he had to bury it, but I mean, he's going to have to dig out a six by six grave to do it. Anyway, I just thought I would share that with you because we were so gobsmacked. We were just like, oh my gosh, that's a talent. Oh my gosh.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:08:08.820 - 00:08:18.340
I know, that's amazing. Thank you for sharing that insight. I've always pictured talents as little coins. Right, exactly.
Carma Brown
00:08:18.340 - 00:08:23.060
Well, that's what we thought. We thought, oh, we're going to get to see talent. I bet it's cute, you know.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:08:26.540 - 00:08:30.300
That's amazing. Awesome. Any thoughts you want to share, Wendi?
Wendi Christensen
00:08:31.180 - 00:09:08.980
I think fear, fear comes from Satan and to cast it out quickly, fear doesn't come from the Lord.
So it's interesting that it would be, you know, in the scripture that immediately he would have been tempted with fear from the adversary instead of the strength of the Lord from whom he was, you know, standing in his presence.
So I think it's good for us to remember that we need to stand in the presence of the Lord and gain all of the faith and the strength that we need from him and in his presence to remember who we are, to be able to face any of those fears that might come from the adversary, which is a temptation.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:09:11.140 - 00:11:01.140
Yeah, well, and I think it kind of goes back to that. You've heard the parable of. It's a Native American parable about the two wolves and that they're constantly battling each other.
And the grandchild asks his grandfather, well, which one wins this battle in that they're constantly battling for me? And the grandfather wisely says, whichever one you feed. And so that becomes something that we need to remind ourselves.
If we want to conquer the fear that holds us back from stepping into whatever divine calling God is placing on our hearts, then we need to feed our faith and not feed the fear. And I'm not saying you're not going to feel fear, because, hello, it's. It's part of the process.
When God places something on your heart, it's scary to step up and step out and write a book or start a podcast or blog or speak or whatever it is he's. He's calling you to do. It's hard to step up and do that. But at the same time, if you feed the faith, God is going to open the right doors.
If you feed the fear, you're going to stay stuck. And sometimes there's other things that keep us stuck.
You know, sometimes we have to overcome some past trauma, so we've got a journal about it or talk to a counselor about it so that we can move forward. Because there are a lot of things that can hold us stuck in fear. And so it requires work. It requires work to move forward.
And so sometimes you have to kind of. It's like stepping through these, almost a minefield. You kind of have to figure out, okay, how do I navigate this? But the good thing is God knows.
God knows the perfect path for each of us, and he'll inspire us what to do.
Wendi Christensen
00:11:01.940 - 00:11:48.920
Well, and there's that saying that where your mind goes, your energy flows. And so if you're putting a lot of your energy and time and effort into fear and. And those fears, they're going to definitely hold you back.
But if you put your mind and effort into. I may be scared, but I'm going to try and have faith that the Lord will bless me and put my. My energy there. You're going to see the feedback.
You're gonna find. You're gonna find that you're strengthened and uplifted through the.
Even if you don't know what you're doing right, even if you have no clue exactly what you're doing, but you keep putting. Putting energy into. This is what I'm creating, and I'm trying to create, and I'm going to have faith in God as I create this and that.
He's going to help me every step of the way and keep him at the forefront.
You'll get there.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:11:51.080 - 00:12:10.360
I think the theme for today is forward with faith.
You know that no matter what obstacles come our way, that we're going to move forward with faith and we're going to keep pressing forward and not let fear stop us. We're not going to let fear, the adversaries, slow us down. And if we get distracted, you know what? Guess what? You're normal.
You're normal.
If you get distracted and just realize that God is with us. He knows how long this process is going to take for us because he knows us perfectly and individually. So don't get discouraged with yourself.
Work with him through the process and it will all turn out all right in the end.
Intro/Outro
00:12:31.320 - 00:12:59.880
Thanks for tuning in to the Arise Women of God Podcast, brought to you by by Women warriors of Light.
If you're feeling unsure how to move forward in your calling or just tired of doing it alone, visit womenwarriorsoflight.com you'll find resources, accountability, and a community of women who get it. Sometimes the calling feels bigger than you. That's when you need steady reminders of the powerful God who called you, Subscribe now for weekly inspiration and the courage to keep going. Because with him, nothing is impossible. And you're not the only one God is calling that friend on your heart right now. Share this episode with her.
Your small act of obedience could be the breakthrough she's been praying for. Until next time. May you arise, walk God's way, and stand God strong.
