Life-threatening danger has a way of focussing the mind like nothing else. As the adrenalin pumps, that flight-or-fight instinct that’s been woven into our DNA kicks in.

I was chatting with a friend recently, whose cancer has returned for a third time with some messy, embarrassing and frightening physiological symptoms –  and that fear of dying envelopes him like a dark cloud, 24 hours a day.

He’s in his mid-sixties, so ordinarily, according to the law of averages, he could expect to live for another twenty years or so. And sure, He knows that God could heal him, but will He? Yeah, life-and-death fear is all consuming.

I know what you’re thinking. “Berni, why are you talking about this, just one week out from Christmas?” Good question. Answer, because it was exactly that sort of fear, the uncertainty of whether they’d make it or not, that gripped Mary and Joseph not long after Jesus – the alleged Saviour of the world – was born.

Matthew 2:13 After the wise men left, an angel from the Lord came to Joseph in a dream. The angel said, “Get up! Take the child with his mother and escape to Egypt. Herod wants to kill the child and will soon start looking for him. Stay in Egypt until I tell you to come back.”

After they fled, Herod had all boys under the age of two, in and around Bethlehem, killed. He wanted this Jesus dead, even before the child could speak.

Jesus was in danger from the very beginning. And we know where He ended up – hanging lifeless on a cross, before rising again in glory.

Make no mistake, if and when it happens, God knows what your danger feels like. He’s right in there with you.

That’s His Word. Fresh … for you … today.