Fear – Part 3

Last updated on January 19, 2023

Welcome back to Roots & Light! I am so pleased you’ve decided to join us for this series on Fear. This is post three of four.

If you’ve missed the first two posts in the series, start with the first post here and make your way back. We also did a little work in the second post that you’ll need for this post to have its maximum effect, so go take the time to do that, if you would.

It’s okay, we’ll wait.

Ok, so you’ve got your self-discovery notes (mental or otherwise) now, right? Since we’re using mine as an example for this topic, I thought it might be useful for me to explain how I came up with the roots I listed in the last post. Here they are again, with a bit of expansion.

Roots of the blog fears I have:

• Shame – I fear I won’t be consistent and post every week like I hope.
  • The shame here comes from a lifetime pattern of starting and never finishing. I feel like I should be consistent and trustworthy when I say I’m going to do something, and that certainly is a godly character quality to grow in. So, with such a track record of not doing that, I’ve got this fear bubbling up inside of me, rooted in my “should’ve” past that I’m just going to do it again and fail God, again.
• Worthlessness – I fear no one will have any interest in what I am talking about and I’ll be talking to the air, making zero impact on the world.
  • A huge part of the vision for this blog is to bring people closer to Christ. I desperately desire to make that kind of impact on each and every one of you reading this, no matter where you’re starting from or where you’re trying to go. I question whether what I have to say or the way God’s equipped me to say it will be appealing. Like, will you even want to read to the end of the post, or will I have bored you with my academic way of sharing? What if all this time and energy and bleeding of my heart and soul onto the keyboard doesn’t even matter? Is my deepest passion, that which drives my soul and spirit, just a complete waste? Does it honor God to work this hard for nothing?
• Inadequacy – I fear people will take to what I am sharing so strongly that the blog will explode and I won’t know how to keep it up.
  • What if my personal passion will, indeed, reach hearts thirsty for truth and intimacy with Christ in their daily lives? That could mean lots of views on the blog. The behind-the-scenes management of the spam (it’s real, people). Even more pressure to keep up posting regularly and expanding to provide more and more useful content to serve the needs of readers. Who am I? What do I know? Why should they trust me? What if I fail them and can’t get back to them when they really are sorting through hard stuff and they’re seeking answers to eternally important questions?
• Fallibility – I fear I’ll say something wrong and have to go back and correct what I said.
  • I can get pretty amped up about my convictions, but that doesn’t mean I’m always right. I really want to be, though. There’s the responsibility to “correctly teach the word of truth” (2 Tim 2:15) that belongs to anyone sharing or teaching God’s truths. I take that super seriously, which means, when an error in my teaching/sharing gets brought to my attention, it’s going to expose that I have handled the word poorly. Of course, I will go back and correct the error, but the fact that the error occurs will still sting. Will I have failed God by mishandling his Truth and unintentionally teaching falsehood to his people?
• Opposition/Persecution – Or I’ll say something right and not everyone is gonna be a happy reader about it.
  • Anyone who shares and teaches the gospel and the truths of God will fall under persecution. It’s just how it goes. The world hated Him, and it’s gonna hate those of us walking with Him. Putting these thoughts and teachings out on the wide world of the internet, where any troll or dissenter can throw anonymous (or not) comments in a text box, opens up my innermost convictions to the opinions and harsh words of others. I’m not one of those people who thrives on confrontation. I recognize there’s a time and a place for such things, but I’d much rather not go out seeking it. With these words out here, I’m not going to be able to avoid it. And it’s not going to be easy, thought I wish that were not so. What if I can’t stand? What if it hurts too badly?

Whew. That was a heavy process. Necessary, but heavy.

I hope you’ve given deeper thought to your fear and the root of it. My fears, your fears, are nothing new to the experience of mankind. God doesn’t leave us hanging in these areas, either. He knows what sort of creatures we are, and He offers true hope and direction when we encounter these fear-teachers and use them well.

Once we’ve gotten a good look at our hearts, then we go into God’s word and see what He says about it.

Why There’s No Need to Fear

And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him. In this, love is made complete with us so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment, because as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment. So the one who fears is not complete in love.

1 John 4:16-18 CSB

Whenever I start thinking about fear and what the Bible says about it, the above passage always comes to mind. Well, specifically the “perfect love drives out fear” part. So I went back and looked at the context to see what John is talking about. Man, John really gets love. Like really, really. And he wants us to get it too.

He contrasts fear with love here. They cannot co-exist. “There is no fear in love; instead perfect (complete) love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment.” Perfect/complete love. What is that?

Thank you, John, for answering that for us. “God is love and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him. In this, love is made complete with us…”

Complete love exists when we remain in God and God remains in us.

What does that even mean?

Remain?

In God?

Let’s take a look at the word remain as used in this passage for better understanding.

μένω ménō, men’-o; a primary verb; to stay (in a given place, state, relation or expectancy):—abide, continue, dwell, endure, be present, remain, stand, tarry (for) (source)

So, to remain in God means to hang out with God! Like “attached at the hip” hang out with God. And stay there! Talk to him. Practice His Presence (for a great book on practicing the presence of God, I love this one.).

“And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love”

So, here’s what I think John wants us to get about perfect/complete love:

1. Through the gospel, we learn about and believe fully that God loves us.
2. God’s character IS love and when we remain/continue/dwell/be present in our belief of God’s very real love for us, we are complete in love.

And why does that matter? Because it frees us.

“so that we may have confidence in the day of judgement, because as he is, so also are we in this world.”

Confidence in the day of judgement – when the judgement comes at the end of days, we who are in Christ do not stand condemned. There is NO condemnation from God for us. We may have confidence of this fact. It’s solid, sure. Our debts/sins/criminal activities are paid for. Cleared. Gone.

because as he is, so also are we in this world – hmm. In this world, Jesus was judged by others all the time, just read the gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) to see what I mean, but never stood condemned by His Father. So it is for those of us remaining in Him. We are judged and ridiculed and persecuted by others in this world. But we are not condemned by our Father. No, we are welcomed into the family. Remember this from last time?

Still true.

Then John goes right into fear.

“There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment”

fear involves punishment – we fear because we believe we will be punished. Either by God or by people. My list sure is evidence of that. Every one of the fears I’ve been listing for you can be summed up this way: I’m either worried that God is going to punish me with His disapproval, or people will.

What about you? When you get down to it, is your fear rooted in expectation of God’s condemnation or of people’s?

There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear – perfect/complete love, as we have discussed it, gives us confidence that we are NOT condemned EVER by God for those of us remaining, right? No punishment coming from that direction. Discipline and training, yes. Punishment, no. Fear has no place when we are fully living in the God who is love.

Then it comes down to punishment by people. For that, we need to look at the last part of this passage.

“So the one who fears in not complete in love.”

fears here is the greek word phobeo. In this context it means:

to fear, be afraid; absolutely to be struck with fear, to be seized with alarm: of those who fear harm or injury. (source)

So, the one who is seized with alarm or absolutely struck with fear of harm or injury is not remaining in the love of Christ. In those moments and seasons, we’re not “getting it” about Christ’s love. We’ve taken a detour away from our relationship with Him.

In Romans chapter 8, Paul waxes eloquent on this issue. I am not going to put the whole chapter here in this blog post, so please take a few minutes to go read slowly through it. We’ll be right here when you get back.

Read Romans 8 here

Interesting how much it parallels with what John says, isn’t it?

The part I want to zero in on regarding fear of harm or injury from people is verses 31-39.

What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He did not even spare his own Son but offered him up for us all. How will he not also with him grant us everything? Who can bring an accusation against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies. Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is the one who died, but even more, has been raised; he also is at the right hand of God and intercedes for us. Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can affliction or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written: Because of you we are being put to death all day long;we are counted as sheep to be slaughtered. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 8:31-39 CSB

What he says instead is, essentially, “Who are they? What harm can they really do to you?”

• who is against us?
  • Are they bigger and badder than our God? Their threats are powerless in comparison to the power of our God for us
• who can bring an accusation against God’s elect?
  • God is the one who has justified us, they have no real authority to truly accuse us. Their accusations are empty.
• who is the one who condemns?
  • Christ Jesus died and was raised and took our condemnation and put it to death and stands for us. Only God has the authority to condemn us, and because of Christ, He does not!
• who can separate us from the Love of Christ?
  • not affliction (Vine’s says primarily means “a pressing, pressure,” anything which burdens the spirit.)
  • not distress (Vines: “narrowness of place” (stenos, “narrow,” chora, “a place”), metaphorically came to mean the “distress arising from that condition, anguish.”)
  • not persecution
  • not famine (Strongs: a scarcity of food:—dearth, famine, hunger.)
  • not nakedness (Vines: of “want of sufficient clothing)
  • not danger (Strongs: of uncertain derivation; danger:—peril.)
  • not sword (Strongs: a knife, i.e. dirk; figuratively, war, judicial punishment)
  • not being put to death

No, Paul says, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. And to drive his point home even further, he gives another list of even broader things which have no power to separate us from this love.

• not death
• not life
• not angels
• not rulers
• not things present
• not things to come
• not height
• not depth
• not any other created thing

So why do we have no need to fear others? Because they do not have the power to take away what is most precious to us, His complete love in which we remain. God is the only one able to destroy that, and he will not. He guards it with his Son’s life.

Don’t fear those who kill the body but are not able to kill the soul; rather, fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.
Matthew 10:28 CSB

So where do our fears stand now?  Powerless?

Yes!

And no.

Because knowing the truth of God’s love in our heads, and even letting it saturate our hearts is only one part of dispelling the fear that plagues us.

Next time, I’ll cover the practicals of how we live out this truth in response to our fears by the Spirit given to us by our loving God.

Originally, I planned to cover more in this post, but I think we’ve had a lot to chew on and it would do us well to take some time to reflect on the truth of complete love and its power to expel fear before we dive into the next and last part of this series.

Thanks for hanging on today and getting this far.  I hope it’s been an encouragement to you.  It has to me.

Share Your Story

In what instances have you seen your own remaining in the love of Christ drive out fear? As you read through these passages, do any questions arise for you when wrestling with your fear and God’s love? Share with us in the comments!