Scripture Devotion
Fear steals all three at once: power, love, and a sound mind.
“For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”
Reflection
The verse works by naming what's been given and, by contrast, what hasn't. Not the spirit of fear — that one, whatever its source, isn't the gift. What is given comes in three: power, love, and a sound mind. Fear tends to steal all three at once — it paralyzes the power, shrinks the love into self-protection, and scrambles the sound mind into spinning. So naming fear as "not from here" is the first move toward recovering what is. A sound mind is the quietly remarkable item on the list — not just courage and love, but a mind that's settled, sound, undisordered. That's the opposite of the anxious spin fear produces. A Monday full of what-ifs is met by the reminder that the spirit given isn't the fearful, spinning one, but a composed one, equipped with power and love and soundness. Reach for the given spirit, not the stolen one.