Listen to no man who fails to listen to God.
~ Unknown
I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well. For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands, for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me His prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of His own purpose and grace, which He gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that He is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me. Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you.
~ from 2 Timothy 1
Oh beloved, it is true. We are a people so able to listen to everyone else other than the only One towards whom our ears should be bent. We, even though we believe; even though our faith is sincere, still hedge our bets with the worst kind of backup.
Fear.
We listen to the scoffing of our friends, instead of the Spirit encouraging us after speaking the truth in Love.
We lean towards anxiety and doubt when things are going any way except swimmingly.
We willingly worry when it looks like there might not be enough money for something or another.
We seemingly, intentionally forget the abundant blessings which He has consistently poured out onto and into our lives.
We look to the future and begin to wilt, instead of seeing the bright Son ahead of us – smiling and beckoning us forward into a glorious new day with Him.
And on and on and on and on and on it goes. As Oswald Chambers once said, we simply worry because we would rather.
There is absolutely only one place for fear. There is only one direction it should be pointed. We are to fear Him alone. And this truly dread fear is the only fear that makes any sense in our lives, for it is simply a recognition of us coming undone before the Truth before us. And in this coming undone, though, He breaks through and shows us the truest reality – when He draws us close to Himself, we realize that – even in His near presence (perhaps especially there) there is absolutely nothing to fear.
And further, this rightly placed fear has an astounding effect. It, when truly realized, gives us the wisdom to realize that we should never (read not ever) ever fear anything else ever again. And it is only when we take our eyes off of the One whom we rightly fear that we actually fear anything else anyway.
Can we see it? Fear of anything other than G_d is stupid, but it is also a beautifully accurate indicator of the direction of our gaze. If we are looking at anything other than the Solution to the problem, we are bound to fear. However, if we only look upon the Object of our fear (in who’s presence there is none), we simply do not fear (nor should we) fear anything else.
Said simply: Fear is looking away from Jesus, and it is therefore, completely unnecessary – and even a deadly enterprise.
Said even more simply: Listening to other people who are also afraid is idolatry. It is the goofy worship of a person so wrapped up in their own problems that they are pulling other people into the pit with them.
Oh beloved, this same Jesus, in whom we claim to believe, has both conquered and abolished death. Does it not make sense that He can and shall conquer the lesser evils we face before us?
Surely.
