Fear of Being Prey: Hotel Parking Lots, Vulnerability, and the God Who Keeps Me

There is a kind of fear that settles in your chest when you travel alone and pull into a hotel parking lot late at night. The lights never seem quite bright enough, the shadows feel long, and the quiet has a way of reminding you that your body cannot run, fight, or escape.

That is the root emotion of this fear.

Not drama.

Just reality.

A disabled woman is vulnerable in ways that others do not always understand.

You feel it most acutely when you unload your ramp at night and sense eyes on you. Not imagination, but awareness. Every disabled woman knows what it feels like to be watched a little too long. You wonder if someone is noticing your weakness. You wonder if someone is calculating. You wonder if someone sees you as prey.

And that word is exactly the right one.

Being prey.

It is a real physical fear, and for a long time it was one I carried with a tightening in my stomach. I would roll through the dark toward the lobby with my keys in hand and a prayer whispered under my breath. A quiet prayer, not of panic, but of dependence.

This is where my mind always goes. God tells us in Scripture that Satan walks about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. That is not poetic language. It is truth. The enemy watches. The enemy studies. The enemy looks for weakness. He waits for the moment he thinks he has advantage.

And when you feel physically vulnerable, that verse becomes more than a warning. It becomes a mirror. The physical scene in the parking lot begins to reflect the spiritual reality I live in every day.

The enemy wants God’s children to believe they are alone.

He wants them to feel hunted.

He wants them to imagine that vulnerability equals abandonment.

He wants them to forget who they belong to.

But the Lord tells a very different story about His people.

We are the apple of His eye.

We are chosen.

We are loved.

We are known.

We are held in places we cannot hold ourselves.

Serving the Lord does not mean evil cannot touch me. It does not mean harm will never come. Scripture never promises that. What it does promise is something far deeper: nothing touches me without passing through the hands of the One who keeps me.

Nothing surprises Him.

Nothing outmaneuvers Him.

Nothing reaches me outside His sovereign knowledge and care.

That truth steadies me in ways my physical body cannot. When I roll through a dark parking lot, I am aware of my vulnerability, but I am even more aware of who walks with me.

Sometimes courage looks like rolling across cracked pavement with whispered prayers and trusting that the Lord is not only watching, but keeping, guarding, and covering me in ways I cannot see.

There may come a day when harm touches me. We live in a fallen world and Christians are not immune to danger. But even if the worst were to happen, I would still be His. Evil can wound the body, but it cannot steal the soul that belongs to Christ. Harm can touch flesh, but it cannot undo redemption. Darkness can threaten, but it cannot unchoose what God has chosen.

If the enemy is a lion seeking prey, then I am a daughter under the watchful eye of the Lion of Judah.

If Satan roams in malice, then God reigns in power.

If danger lurks in shadows, then His presence fills the hidden places.

If the night feels long, He does not sleep.

So yes, I am careful.

Yes, I stay aware.

Yes, I pray as I move.

But underneath all of that sits a truth that fear cannot uproot.

I am loved.

I am carried.

I am kept.

And I am safely His, now and forever, until He brings me home.