Fear

We all experience it. Every one of us. That awful, awesome, visceral feeling of facing the known or unknown which causes us trepidation and unrest. Sweaty palms. Racing heart. That pit deep in your belly. Despair. Hopelessness. Insufficiency.

You know the feeling.

It affects us, this specter of fear. And specter it is, for it has neither body nor form, can be neither touched nor heard nor sensed in any physical sense but it exists just the same. It is real. As real as is love, as real as is pain. As certain as the cold bite of winter chilling our bones, though we can see neither.

Fear.

It can save your life, or end it. Drive you to seek shelter, or to run blindly into the storm. It can cause the weak to achieve the impossible, and the strong to do nothing. Fear can destroy. Fear can fortify.

Truly awesome is this insubstantial phantom of fear.

Solomon said, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom," and also, "The fear of the Lord leads to life."   Jesus said, "And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell."

That is the kind of fear which can save your life. The kind of fear which can cause the weak to achieve the impossible. Fear can fortify.

Fear can also destroy.

Gideon was so paralyzed by fear that though he was a mighty warrior, he was afraid to act. The entire Israelite nation were so afraid that they refused to enter the good land God had prepared for them, and they wandered in the wilderness for 40 years.

The stories go on and on. What's amazing is what happens when people truly fear God more than they fear this world. Gideon conquered an army of 135,000 with 300 men. Caleb and Joshua were the only two from an entire generation of Israelites to see the Promised land. Daniel survived a night in a pit of lions. Jonah was saved from certain death.

Do you see the theme here?

Fear of this world gets you nowhere. Fear of God can take you anywhere.

When that feeling of trepidation comes over you, when your heart races and your mind spins, ask yourself, "What am I afraid of?" Is it more dangerous than lions? Is it more mighty than 135,000 trained warriors? Is that thing or person bigger than Almighty God?

No. It's not. Whatever it is, it's not.

Take a deep breath. Remember Daniel. Remember Joseph. Remember Paul, and Moses, and Abraham, and David and . . . remember God.

Fear Him, and Him alone. For if He be with you, who can stand against you?