Letting Fear get the second best of him (and them).

Was reading Matthew 14 this morning. What a wonderful chapter. Many times my students will ask me, “Mr. Redding, what is your favorite book in the Bible?” And I have to say, the book that I am reading at the time. Well, today was my favorite chapter for this day.

The role fear played in this chapter is quite un-impressive to say the least, but it did strike my attention for only a moment. After Jesus had fed the 5000, He sent His disciples to cross the Sea of Galilee (Oh, please read Matt. 14 to get way more than I could ever convey in this hopefully brief blog). Then the next scene we see is the disciples struggling to get across the sea in a storm (most likely a little fear is rising) and then a more dreadful thing, a person walking on the water. But Jesus calms their fears based on poor human assumptions (“It’s a ghost.) The Bible teaches plainly and repeatedly that we are to fear God, only. Not fear what we inaccurately think of God. But just fear God.

Peter overcomes the first two fears and becomes courageous! “Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.” (NKJV) And the Lord simply says, “Come.” What a faith-filled, faith-impacting, faith-building word from the One who begins and completes our faith (Heb. 12:1-2)

Peter starts to walk on the water and actually is walking on the water. And then he takes his eyes off the One who gave him the faith to do what he was doing. He places his eyes on what was going on around him and in the time it took for him to have faith, he now has fear. (“Oh Peter, you are ruining the story – come on – you are going to parish because you have taken your eyes off the One who gave you faith to conquer (Rom. 8:37) and have placed your eyes on the things that cause only fear!)

But we must read on (and I am hoping you do read this for yourself). Peter does what we should do in any given moment when ungodly fear tries to creep in, gripping our hearts, or when we let it flow in like a gushing flood. He cries out – “LORD, SAVE ME!” And immediately (not “Well you should have done this before”, or “Give me a few moments”, or “Wait and learn a hard lesson”, or “Drown a little more in your ungodly fear”, or “You know fear of anything besides of Me is sin and so you will have to get over it on your own” or “What were you thinking in the first place stepping out on the water, don’t you realize this is something I am only suppose to do”, or… you can fill in any other human reasonable response.) The Bible says in Matt. 14:31 “IMMEDIATELY” (all English versions, AEV) Jesus reached out and rescued him.

This is our great Son of God and Savior – “Whoever calls on the name of the LORD will be saved” (All through out the Bible) Jesus saves those lost in sin (whether you are an unbeliever for the first time calling upon Him to save you or you are a aged believer who somehow finds yourself entangled by sin that so easily besets you.) And when He immediately saves, we have no other response than found in Matt.14:33. (I beg you to look at that verse in context, although you probably already know the immediate response of sinful men, like me, who call on the name of the Lord.)

Ungodly fear never get’s the best of a child of God, it is just another worldly tool that the Savior can use to teach us how to godly fear Him and call on Him who loves to save.