The Confines of Fear: Living Fearlessly in a World of Fear

Caveat: Before beginning this post, we owe everyone an apology.  We should have started working on our What's a Cult Wednesday well before we did.  Because of this, it will be posted next Wednesday, and this will be our second post this week.

Fear is one of the most addressed topics in Scripture.  From famous passages like Adam fearing God after eating forbidden fruit to Paul "despairing of life."  Just as often, God replies to us "Do not fear."   There is however, another type of fear I also want to address.  This is a Godly fear like the one Isaiah shows when he falls on his face before God and cries out “I am unclean and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips.”  Hopefully, this post will show you what kind of fear is good and Godly, and how to avoid bad fear.

There is often a question we pose about Christianity.  Perhaps not consciously, but we ask it nevertheless.  Is it safe?  Will Jesus allow my life to continue as it has to this  point?  Will Christ simply act like an insurance agent, there when I need him but otherwise happily absent?  The simple answer is no.  The grace by which we are saved is costly.  It requires that we give up our lives and be crucified with Christ. It is human nature to be afraid.  To fear death, pain, solitude, heights, clowns, daleks, tight spaces, darkness, is our nature.  But, it is not our new nature as children of the King.  Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German pastor who resisted Hitler and was martyred, put it this way:

But the human being doesn’t have to be afraid; we should not be afraid! That is what makes humans different from all other creatures. In the midst of every situation where there is no way out, where nothing is clear, where it is our fault, we know that there is hope, and this hope is called: Thy will be done, yes, thy will is being done. “This world must fall, God stands above all, his thoughts unswayed, his Word unstayed, his will forever our ground and hope.” Do you ask: How do you know? Then we name the name of the One who makes the evil inside us recoil, who makes fear and anxiety themselves tremble with fear and puts them to flight. We name the One who overcame fear and led it captive in the victory proces­sion, who nailed it to the cross and committed it to oblivion; we name the One who is the shout of victory of humankind redeemed from the fear of death—Jesus Christ, the Crucified and Living One. He alone is Lord over fear; it knows him as its master; it gives way to him alone. So look to Christ when you are afraid, think of Christ, keep him before your eyes, call upon Christ and pray to him, believe that he is with you now, helping you . . . Then fear will grow pale and fade away, and you will be free, through your faith in our strong and living Savior, Jesus Christ.

We forget this quite readily though, and not we alone.  Even when the disciples had Jesus with them, they feared storms, public opinion, and a multitude of other common fears.  The only way they were borne through is Christ. The only way we conquer fear is through Christ.  To quote Bonhoeffer again, “And that’s the worst of it: we don’t even want to find a way out. That is the final triumph of Fear over us, that we are afraid to run away from it, and just let it enslave us.”  This is why Christ had to act upon us to save us.  Why He tells Peter “When you return comfort your brothers.”  Not ‘if.’ “WHEN!”  There is no question of if we shall sucumb to fear.  There is nothing, no fear, not even fear itself which can separate us from Christ and his love.  This is the very nature of the Gospel.  As we come to understand Christ’s love for us, fear begins to leave us.  John put it this way, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.” (1 John 4:18)  We know we will not be perfected in love while we sojourn in this world, but perfect love is what we strive for throughout these brief, pilgrim days.

The title of this posts claims that fear confine us.  Here is what is meant by that.  When we fear, we do not ask God for big things.  We fear to ask for something to big.  Often this even comes from a God motive.  We fear God in a holy way and forget his love as we do.  His love is such that he asks us to ask him for the impossible, trusting he will deliver in his time.  He may answer no or wait, but we are commanded to ask!  If we fear, then we forget God’s love.  This is the greatest crime that can be committed.  (Hebrews 2)  Fear confines our faith, our hope, and our vision of love.  It causes us to focus on death.  Our own death, death of friends and loved ones.  Fear is death.  This is why Christ came to free us from fear and conquer death.  The moment He arose victorious, fear and death died, and we are set free to love.

Now, a brief case study in this attitude toward fear.  There are dozens of places in Scripture to which

we could turn.  From From Abel to Zechariah, from Genesis to Acts there is story after story where God uses his people to overcome fear with his faith, hope, and love. However, in this instance, we’re going to turn to the Gospels for an account like few others. In the Gospel of Matthew 14:22-33, we read of Jesus walking out in the middle of a storm to his disciples who are in a boat.  In a typical Peter moment, Peter asks Jesus if he can walk on water too.  As long as Peter’s eyes remain on the goal, that is Christ, he walks upon the waves as he would the sand.  His faith wavers though and his eyes go from Jesus to the billows around him. The turbulent seas draw his eyes from the only hope he has.  Here Jesus intervenes in his love to prevent Peter from drowning.  The world and the devil and our sinful nature are doing everything they can to distract us from the love of Christ which alone will bring us through this World.

Good Fear?  How does that even make sense?  Those of us who grew up in the church heard passages read about fearing God and just threw it into the blender with everything else we learned.  However, this is an important concept.  C.S. Lewis touches on this in the Chronicles of Narnia:  

“Ooh!” said Susan. “I’d thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.”

“That you will, dearie, and make no mistake,” said Mrs. Beaver, “if there’s anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they’re either braver than most or else just silly.”

“Then he isn’t safe?” said Lucy.

“Safe?” said Mr. Beaver. “Don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about being safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.”

In the book of Isaiah, the prophet is brought before God in the holy of holies in the Temple.  His reaction is astounding and terrifying.  “ And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5)  If we were to survey Christians in America today, I don’t think this would be their response when asked how they would react to seeing God.  And yet, every time anyone in scripture sees God, their reaction is a holy fear.  This holy fear is a reverence for God’s might, wisdom, and beauty.  It is the only reaction to truly understanding God and his love.  Awe that an omnipotent and omniscient God would love and even die for pitiful creatures such as we are is impossible to imagine.  This is a Godly fear which drives worldly fear far from us.  In light of God’s love and power, there is nothing else which we can fear.

“So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” (1Cor 13:13)  Once, I (Athanasius) was asked why Love is the greatest of these if we are saved by Faith Alone.  I wasn’t sure of an answer then, but in writing this post I realized something.  Faith and Hope are given to us as gifts to fight fear, but Love. Love conquered fear.

In Christ's Unconquerable Love,
Athanasius
Excelsior