“While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, ‘This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!’ When the disciples heard this, they fell facedown to the ground, terrified.” Matthew 17:5-6
“This is the fear of the Lord. Most of our fears are poisonous. They steal sleep and pillage peace. But this fear is different. ‘From a biblical perspective, there is nothing neurotic about fearing God. The neurotic thing is not to be afraid, or to be afraid of the wrong thing. That is why God chooses to be known to us, so that we may stop being afraid of the wrong thing. When God is fully revealed to us and we get it, then we experience the conversion of our fear…’Fear of the Lord’ is the deeply sane recognition that we are not God.’
When Christ is great, our fears are not.”
from the book Fearless by Max Lucado
Don’t you just love that? When Christ is GREAT our fears are NOT. Ahhhhhhh.
So, how do we go about fearing the RIGHT things and not fearing the WRONG things?
How do we make Christ GREAT in our lives?
For me, it starts in the mind. Where do I fix my eyes? Where do I fix my gaze? Where are my thoughts? What do I spend most of my time thinking about? When I have “spare” time what do I find myself doing?
We cannot have more of Christ without more of His Word.
We cannot treasure Christ if we don’t treasure His Word.
We cannot fix our eyes on Jesus unless we are spending some amount of time in His Word. There is nothing legalistic about this. It’s not a list of rules that you must follow to live the good Christian life. It’s just the plain truth.
If I want more of God, I must have more of God’s Word.
If I want to KNOW God more, I need to be in His Word.
If I want to LOOK like Jesus in how I live my life and my relationships, I must study what Jesus did on this earth. And not be just a hearer or reader of the word, but a doer.
There is no magic pill. There aren’t some Christians that just seem holier or better at this whole faith thing. A hidden life with Christ is the magic pill…and there’s nothing magic about it.
It’s about relationship. Loving Jesus so much that you WANT more of Him, you WANT to spend time with Him, you NEED more and more of His Word, your prayer time becomes sweet moments with a Beloved Friend and Comforter. And then you walk out your daily life in the contentment of who you are in Christ and the knowledge of His love for you…which gives you the freedom to love others freely and unconditionally.
Fearing and loving God means accepting the fact that He is God and we are not. That may sound silly, but we try to control so many things in our lives. We may know in our minds that we can’t actually control them, but oh, we try! We think we can fix this or change that or do this and make things better or find our happiness. Have you noticed that when we try to take control of things that seem out of control our anxiety and fears being to rise within us?
Apart from Christ we can do nothing. Apart from Christ we are nothing. Apart from Christ there is no true joy to be found. There may be momentary pleasures to be found on this earth, but apart from Christ it will be fleeting…and deep down in our souls, without Christ, we will never have true peace and contentment.
I’m praying for you today, wherever you are and whoever you are. I’m praying that you will fix your eyes on Jesus. I’m praying that each of us will take a look at how we spend our time and how we spend our thoughts. What parts of our lives need to be realigned?
Take heart, dear ones. Because of Christ, we need not fear. Because of Christ, our future is secure. Because of Christ, we have victory over death. Because of Christ, we have hope. Because of Christ, we have true peace even in the midst of the storm. Because of Christ, we need not fear.
More from Fearless
- What if Faith Was Our Default?
- An Unstirred Christ
- A Greenhouse of Prayer
- Look Into the Storm
- Keep Your Gaze on Jesus
- Extinguishing Fear
- Courage Emerges
- God Makes Reassignments
- Stick Together
💗💗💗💗 this! Thank you!
I have got to read this book. Love the posts you are doing,very inspiring!