Authentic Christianity #12: Overcoming Fear

Fear is something everyone experiences... but what if God’s love is the answer to overcoming it? In this message from 1 John 4:13–18, we explore the relationship between fear and love and discover how the gospel transforms our perspective on both. While the fear of God can be the beginning of wisdom, it is not meant to be the end of our journey. Through the cross of Jesus Christ, God provides forgiveness, acceptance, and confidence, replacing our fear of judgment with assurance in His love. Learn how perfect love drives out fear, why believers can face the future with courage, and how a deeper understanding of God’s love leads to a fearless and faithful life. 

Transcript

Well. Good morning. Are you afraid of me? That's what we're going to be talking about this morning. Fear and love and the relationship between the two of them. It is fear a useful or is it a harmful emotion? When is our fear helpful and when is it harmful? When should we fear God? And when should we love God? Can we both love God and fear God at the same time? What is the relationship between love and fear? We see in the Old Testament. In Proverbs chapter nine, it says this. It says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning or the prerequisite, or the very starting point of becoming wise. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and today, as we look at John chapter four, we're going to see this idea that there is no fear in love. That perfect fear drives, perfect love drives out fear. So what is this relationship between fear and love? What is the role that the fear of God plays in our life? And what is the role that the love of God plays in our life? When I was in junior high, I among, I'm sure the majority of the young guys in my class had a crush on a certain girl. And, I avoided that girl most of the time. Headed the other way when I saw her coming. And I put my head down when she was around the corner because I was afraid of her. I was afraid of her rejection. I was more afraid of her rejecting me than I was hopeful of her approval of me. If our fear of God is our fear of rejection, disapproval, or punishment, it causes us to avoid God. It is therefore a destructive fear. But if our fear causes us to face God's disapproval and ask the question, is there any way that I can come in to and please God, is there any way for me to come into God's favor? Then in that case, God's fear is used as the beginning of wisdom. It is what initiates are becoming wise. The irony about fear and wisdom is this that our fear of God is, that which initiates our path into wisdom. But once we are truly wise, we have no reason to fear him. We need fear to start out with. But the end of Wisdom's journey is to be fearless. To become wise. We must face our fear of our Holy Father. But once we have attained to wisdom, we have no need to fear. We must face the cause of our fear. And the cause of our fear of God is discord, our discord that we have with him. The, the discord that is between us and God as a result of our having violated him and violated his will and violated his nature, done what was in opposition to what is good, right, and true, and face the natural disapproval that God has for the evil that we have done. We, we, we face our fears when we recognize the ruin that we have caused to ourselves and others, and the dishonor that we have caused to God as a result of our disobedience to him. And when we face the dread of what our sins deserve, it is only then that we have that we find ourselves in a position to become wise, because it is only then that we seek out and desire his mercy to relieve our fears. We seek his love to forgive our sins. As we continue this morning on this, a topic, entitled Authentic Christianity reflecting Christ's Love A Study of First John. We're going to be looking at this interaction between fear and love, and consider how our fears are conquered by God's love. Are we confident in our prospects of coming face to face with our Heavenly Father, or are we still afraid of the prospect of facing his justice? What is the road that we must take if we want to live a bold and courageous and fearless life? And are we on that road to being free from fear, free from fear in the face of his judgment, free from fear in the face of his acceptance? What gives us confidence in the future? What conquers our fear? That's what we're going to be looking at this morning. The title of this morning's message is Overcoming Fear, and we'll be looking at First John chapter four, verses 13 through 18. Father, Lord, as we look at your word this morning, I. I thank you, father, that, even though our reaction often to our fears is to run away, to avoid, to turn away, not to face those things that are causing us to be afraid. But I thank you, father, that because of who you are and your nature and what you have towards us, that we're able to face our fears and to look into your face and see that even though you may be the object of our fear, you are also the solution to our fears. It is in your love, and it is in your embrace that we find ourselves able to boldly stand and courageously face our future. Help us, Lord, find our way into that fearless place through your Son, Jesus Christ. Amen. John chapter one, verses four through 13, beginning at verse 13. We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us His spirit. And we have seen and testify that the father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and He in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment. Because in this world we are like him. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. Now, last week we looked at that whole idea of being made perfect in love or being made complete in love. What completes us? And, we saw that. What makes us complete in God's love, what completes God's love in us is not just love. God's love coming to us, but God's love proceeding through us to others. And we use the illustration last week of electricity. You can have a wire that's charged with electricity, but unless the circuit is complete, the light does not go on. You need to complete the electrical circuit before the electricity is useful, even though it is already present. And so the completion of God's love is complete. Not just when God's love is present in us, but when it proceeds out of us and is connected to another person. We we looked at how it is that God's love is made perfect or completed in us. As we love each other. Today we're going to see what benefits us when God's love is made complete in us. And we're going to see one of the benefits of God's completed love in us is courage, fearlessness, the absence of fear. What causes us to be fearful and what makes us fearless are some of the questions we're going to be asking today. And so I'd like to start with the first question of what causes us to be fearful. What is fear all about anyway? And the theme of this morning's message is this fear has to do with the anticipation of suffering, right? Fear has to do with looking into the future and anticipating some harmful, painful, or tormented, occurrence happening to us. Let's take a look at verse 18. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. Fear. What fear has to do with, in this case, is the anticipation of being punished for the wrong things that we have done. The fear of God is knowing that God sees all and that all men are held accountable. The fear of God has to do with, looking at what we've done and recognize that we're accountable to God and that God is just and that we deserve and therefore anticipate, judgment. To fear God is to recognize that our violations of his goodness, our offenses to his beauty, our rejection of his truth, and in recognizing that we ins you know, we anticipate the possibility of suffering his just punishment. So when we see that Proverbs 910 teaches us that the prerequisite of wisdom is the fear of the Lord, that before we can become wise, before we can enter into wisdom's path, we need to first recognize that God sees all, knows all, and that we're accountable to him. That we're answerable to God. The fear of God is knowing that we live our lives under his, supervision and authority. To, face this fear, to face this fear is the beginning of wisdom. To face the fear that we've been rebellious against God's order, that we violated God and we violated others as we've lived out our of our selfish desires, and we've created conflict and discord leading to brokenness and death. And we deserve to be judged. This is the fear of the Lord. Now, why is that? The beginning of wisdom? Why isn't it just as why isn't it wise just to say, hey, you know what? I'm just going to pretend like God doesn't exist. I'm going to pretend like there is no judgment and there is no punishment. Why wouldn't it be wiser just to avoid the whole issue of God and God's justice? Ignore God and ignore our being accountable to him. Well, that certainly is one approach to, the fear of God. And it's a very common approach, it seems to, be one that many, at least until the day of reckoning, are satisfied living in to just to avoid God. But any honest man facing the prospect of God's judgment is fearful. Unless, of course, those fears are quieted by God's love. Facing our fears of God causes us to be receptive to what God has displayed through the cross and through His Son, Jesus Christ, which is his love and his mercy. Without, facing our fears to begin with, we can't appreciate, nor will we pursue, what would relieve our fears, which is God's love. Our fear of God can send us in 1 or 2 directions. It can either cause us to avoid God and continue to defy him, or run to the cross in a brave embrace. The forgiveness that he has for us, and seek to please him. You can kind of tell what kind of life somebodies, living by how they respond to a police car driving by myself, I wave at police cars because, I'm not worried about them. I haven't done anything wrong. I look at a policeman. Unless he's corrupt, which is always possible, with confidence, not worrying about whether or not he'll catch me doing anything. Because I'm not doing anything. On the other hand, if I, see a cop and turn a corner and run away, I, might have something to hide. It might be something that I'm dealing with, that it reveals my fears, our fear of punishment, is what would cause us to seek to avoid God's face. It started in the garden, when Adam and Eve wanted to avoid God. And, it is one of the ways in which man. And probably the most common way in which men deal with, their guilt. But the cross represents God's desire to set men free from the their fear of guilt and punishment. Where we don't have to hide from God and where we don't, have to pretend he doesn't notice our sin. The only truly way to become fearless is to face our fears, to recognize our condition, and to trust God's love, to relieve us of our sin and guilt. Again this morning, fear has to do with the anticipation of suffering. Point number one is God's love conquers fear. God's love conquers our fear. Let's take a look at verses 16 through 18. And so we know and rely on God, on the love of God has for us. So we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment. Because in this world we are like him. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made complete in love. The very nature of God is love. That is, he is beneficial. Activity in motion. God is love. His nature is to actively be doing what is good for the object of his love and his ultimate act of love. The ultimate good thing that he has done for us, and good thing that he does for us, can be seen in the cross of Jesus Christ and the empty tomb. When we are afraid of God's punishment, that fear becomes relieved. When we look at the degree to which he went to satisfy, his justice by transferring our guilt onto his son, Jesus Christ on the cross. And when we look at the cross and the empty tomb, the empty tomb representing to us the power of God available to us to conquer the power of sin in us. And we see on the cross the power of God to relieve us of the guilt of our sin. We, all of a sudden, see our fear start to dissipate when we recognize that the punishment that it was deserving us was transferred on to Christ. And the power that we need to conquer sin in our life is available to us through Christ. Suddenly our dispensation changes. We look at God differently. Back in the early 80s, I was working a, a swing shift for the California Youth Authority. And so I was coming home really late at night, around 1:00 in the morning, and I was driving down the I-15 freeway. Now, for some of you younger folks, this is pre cell phone era. And so when people were broken down along the side of the road, it was a time when people were helpful to one another because we weren't that well connected. Anyway, so I'm driving down at 1:00 in the morning and I see a car broken down on this lonely freeway, and I pull over to help out, to see if I could give whoever it was a ride to the gas station or somewhere to a to a. They used to have these things back then called payphones. To take them to a payphone or see what we could do. And as I walk up to the window of the car, it was a single woman in the car, and her face and her countenance just radiated fear. I mean, I was kind of a big guy. Lonely highway, kind of. I understand her position, but her fear melted into gratitude as soon as she realized I wasn't there to harm her, but to help her when she realized I wasn't there to hurt her, but to help her. Her fear translated from fear into gratitude. The funny thing about the story was, you know, I was a hero that night. She popped her engine. I looked in it and kind of wiggled a wire and said, try it now. And for some reason, it started up. She thought I was a genius in closing. No problem. On down the road, she went. I used that by way of illustration that, when we face our fears and we recognize God's awesome power and his righteous judgment and his holiness and our deserved punishment, naturally, our first response would be, oh, man. But when we see the face of Christ and Gethsemane, when we see the suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ, when he was taking on to himself the wrath of the world, if you can see his eyes and just so many looking at you, you might see sorrow, but you don't see, vengeance. You see the love of God willing to take it on for you. Take it all on for you. Take it completely on for you. And when you see in those eyes a God who will give it all for you, to help you, not to harm you, your fears are dissipated. The irony is, is we'll never see those our eyes unless we first fear God and recognize our perilous condition. But once we do see him, our fear turns into gratitude. Jesus taught his disciples when he left that he was going to send his spirit to them to teach them. And, you know, the name that Jesus gave to the spirit that he told that he would send to teach them. He taught. He called this spirit in Greek the Paraclete. We translate that word in English, counselor, but it more accurately means legal counselor or legal advisor, like an attorney. And the Paraclete does for us what an attorney does for us. If we're in trouble. What an attorney does for us is he would tell us our legal dilemma, our peril, what might happen to us as a result of the crimes or the legal, problems that we're in. And then our, attorney will try to provide the best possible legal remedy for us to be relieved of the peril that we're in in terms of, our legal violations. And that's exactly what the Holy Spirit does. Jesus said what? When the spirit comes, the first thing he will do is to convict the world of sin. He will come showing us our legal dilemma, the problem that we're in. But then he soon quickly after that shows us the legal remedy, which is the cross and the empty tomb. He shows us our legal dilemma, and he relieves us through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, of our legal peril. When we face our fears of God, we come to understand the magnitude of his love. And that magnitude drives out the fears that we have faced. But the irony is, is we'll never know it unless we face our fear and admit our sin. Fear has to do with the anticipation of suffering. Point number one is God's love conquers fear and point number two is God's love completes us. God's love completes us. Let's take a look at, at verse 18. Therefore, excuse me. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. So we're looking at this from the negative point of view, that fear, is unable to, make us complete. The fear of God is the prerequisite to wisdom, but it isn't a vehicle by which God can make us complete, or God can make us perfect, where God can complete us in his love to become what we ought to be, to become complete in Christ, to become virtuous reflections of God's nature and goodness. Fear does not have the capacity to do that. It is changing, our fear into faith and love that we enter into, relationship with Christ, where we are able to be made good in him, where we can be confident in him. For some reason, when I was thinking about this, I was thinking about the nature of a good coach. Anyone who's ever had a good coach knows that a good coach first has to establish a relationship of respect with his players. He can't be a good coach unless there isn't a certain degree of, you know, fear. But no good coach is effective unless his players sense that he loves them and wants to develop them into becoming better athletes. And when you transition from understanding that the, the, the, the coach's, demanding nature is really an expression of his love rather than being harsh and cruel. Then that fear translates into, allegiance. A coach can never gain. He, well, a coach may be able to gain compliance through being harsh, but he can never gain allegiance without being one who loves his players. What God wants us to become is willing agents of his goodness. He wants us to serve him joyfully by being like him and he wins us over. Not by our fear of him, but by what our fear leads us to, which is our love of him. Again, fear has to do with the anticipation of suffering. Point number one is God's love conquers fear. And point number two is God's love completes us. I'd like to once again read a passage that I've read several times, and it's really the paradigm of a perfect, man whose virtue is so great that he is so much like God that he even loves the object that his heart is for him to love his own enemies. Take a look at Matthew chapter five, verses 43 through 48, which, beginning at verse 43, says this you have heard that it was said, love your neighbors and hate your enemies. But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of the of your father in heaven. He causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Not even, the tax, are not even the tax collectors doing that. And if you greet only your brother, what are you doing more than others? Don't even the pagans do that? Be perfect. Therefore, as your heavenly father is perfect, the ultimate expression of the perfection that God has desiring for us is that our virtue will be so complete in him that we will even be beneficial to the people that are harmful to us, to our enemies, that our likeness to him would be so great that, and our virtue would be so complete in him that we will have a beneficial impact on even those that we don't like or don't like us. Let's pray. Father, every time, I read that passage, I realize. Got a way to go. I've got a long ways to go. But, Lord, I see the vision. Lord, I see the vision of being so free in your love that I would desire and would be able to be, a positive impact on all men, not just my brothers, not just the people I like. Not just the people that are closest to me. Not just those who it's beneficial to me to be beneficial to, but that my nature would be so like your nature that I couldn't help because I would be out of my nature. That I would be a benefit to all men. And, I look forward to that being, the completed work that you do in me. And I recognize that, that work is completed as I embrace your love for me, because that's exactly what you've done for me, Lord, you've benefited me even when I was yet your enemy. Through the cross and through the tomb, we. We yield ourselves to you. For for your spirit to work in us this week and to to, to move us more in that direction. In Christ name we pray. Amen.