The Enemy is Fear – Sunday, May 04, 1980
Here in the United States, we have grown increasingly concerned about the health of our economic system. Indeed, the eroding effects of inflation seem to be eating away at the values of currencies in almost all nations. In this country, the value of the dollar has decreased rapidly during the past decade, while the incomes of many individuals have risen slowly.
The consequences of this economic sickness affect almost everyone: the young couple’s dream of owning their own home must now be postponed, at least for the time being;
providing for the educational and temporal needs of children is becoming increasingly difficult for parents; and the retirement hopes of older couples are being frustrated as savings are used up to pay the demands of present-day living.
As with malignant diseases which attack the human body, the causes of this economic tumor are complex. No doubt, deficit spending by governments and by individuals are partly to blame. Recent declines in the rate of worker production along with the great number of individuals in our society who consume without producing must also bear some of the responsibility for these inflationary times.
These contributing factors must be dealt with in the same way the causes of any disease are handled: they must be isolated and eliminated as much as possible. .
There is, however, one other factor which is more injurious to our economic system than these, and even more harmful than the inflation itself. That factor is fear: the fear that the future will not alter the maladies of the present, the fear that the economic structure will collapse altogether, the fear that the traditional values which have made ours a strong and vibrant economic system are no longer relevant. Fear itself, is the greatest threat to our economic survival.
The antidote for fear is faith. Not an ill-founded faith which believes that everything will resolve itself, without work or sacrifice, but a confidence which has been personified by tens of thousands of businessmen in this country, individuals who have proven that the tenets of free enterprise are sound, individuals who have placed their talents and resources on the open marketplace and have reaped the dividends. It is this faith in hard work, honest production, and open competition which will provide the remedy for our present ills.
May we overcome our doubts. May we accept the gift from Him who conquered all fears and said to us: “My peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you. . . Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”1
1 New Testament, John 14:27.
“The Spoken Word” heard over KSL and CBS from the Tabernacle, Temple Square. Salt Lake City, Utah, May.4, 1980 11:30 a.m. to 12:00 noon, Eastern Time Copyright 1980 Bonneville Productions
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May 04, 1980
Broadcast Number 2,646