Fear

What I am going to talk about may be completely incorrect, and if so I am sorry, and please bring it to my attention, however, please note that when I am talking about fear in this blog, I am talking about a sinful fear, I am not talking about a righteous fear of God, but rather a fear that God is not good enough. - M.E.

I have a thought, this thought was brought to my attention when I went to church on Sunday night and the pastor asked us to have some discussion around our tables. A number of questions to get us going were put up on the screens, and one of those questions was something like "what is your favourite part/least favourite part of Christmas". A few answers went around the table, and a common theme, in both the fav and least fav categories was family. As the discussion continued we started to talk about why we did, and yet did not like seeing our families, and a big part of it was the confusion, the arguments and fights that take place, so that led to a discussion of emotion, where emotion comes from, and I input the idea that much of our negative emotion, that such as hate, comes from fear, in fact, a lot of the negative things that we do evolves out of fear; racism - a fear of people different from us, you could say the same of sexism, envy - a fear of not being as good, and so it goes.

One of my best friends recently blogged about idolatry and the fact that it is not just the worship of gold statues in the Old Testament, but rather it is the placing of things higher than God, that it is the placement of security, status, satisfaction and stability (as he said S4) in a place of higher importance than our Father. I believe that this is something that can sprout from fear. We fear that we won't have a good enough job to support our family so we overwork ourselves to make sure our families are in good position, we fear that we are not popular enough so we do whatever we can do be 'cool', and all this is sin. I'm not saying that those are not important things, it is important to be able to support your family, and it is important to have friends, however it is our placement of those things over our blatant need and desire for God that is the sin, a sin which I believe can be traced back to fear.

I'm going to say something bold, and when I do such a thing I am really saying that I am going to say that I am about to say something in which I want other people to comment on, I want people to question me, or support me, on. Tell me what you think of this. I think that all sin can be traced back to fear. Let me say that again, all sin can be traced, followed back to a fear of something.

Sin, deliberate disobedience from the will of God, going against God, can generally said to be caused because somebody was afraid that God's way wasn't good enough, that His way wasn't right, that it wasn't enough for them. That's fear. That's a fear that what has been given to you isn't right. But, is His name not "I AM"? Does not God say in His very own Word "Do not fear for I am with you" (Isa 41:10), "In GOD I will trust, I WILL NOT BE AFRAID" (Ps 56:11), (I will fear no evil for You are with me" (Ps 23:4). We have nothing to fear for GOD IS WITH US! We have nothing to fear for GOD IS!

Returning to the topic of idolatry, I believe that my own idolatry is caused by my fear that God's way won't please me like my idol of the moment will. I see myself saying "well, God is great, but He can't bring me joy like this new xbox game does", or "God makes me feel good, but not as good as looking at this does". That's wrong. That's my fear that God isn't enough, and that is SIN. And you know the only person who can help you overcome this fear? God. That's who. As I referenced before "Do not fear for I am with you, do not be dismayed for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you in My righteous right hand". (Isa 41:10). Does this sound like someone who can take away all of our fear? I think so, now I just need to act on it, and so do you.

What do we do now? We turn to God. We pray that He will take away our fears. We ask Him to take away that belief that He isn't enough. "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." (Mt 11:29-30)

So, in closing, fear the Lord, He is the only one worthy to be feared. Do not fear for S4, do not fear that He is not enough, for HE IS, "I AM" (Ex 3:14 & Jn 8:58). Cast your fears upon Him so that you may fear only Him.

In Him

Matty