Faith or Fear

September 4, 2007

My daily readings of the Bible have taken me through Job of late. In most other years it was the drudge part of my reading. It always seemed that Job complained, his friends tried to say he was wrong, and on and on. It was really a depressing book. I do not know why but this year as I have been reading through it, it seems that I am finding a lot of nuggets to feast on.

Do not get me wrong, some of what Job complained about was wrong, for example he had it wrong when he said God had done this disaster on him. But there is a lot of truth in what he and his friends say if you can say if you separate the wheat from the chafe.

One thing that God gets wrong is his repeated claim that he has not sinned. For one sentence that he says shows that he has sinned.

Job 3:25 KJV
(25) For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me.

Fear is a sin. I am not talking about having a fear of flame or spiders, that is just healthy respect. What I am talking about is the fear that Job lived in. While he does not explain if it was his kids dieing, his crops being destroyed, his herds stolen or his sickness (or maybe all of them), he lived in fear and what he was afraid of happened. Fear is the opposite of faith, and we all know, 'without faith it is impossible to please God.' We know that if we do not please God we are in sin, so fear is sin.

Job's sin was he feared what would happen to him. Sometimes in my day to day struggles I to begin to fear. I begin to wonder where the next bill will be paid from, I wonder if my kids will grow up right, I wonder if .... well you get the idea. I am sure you also do the same. It is time to take those fears and put them where they belong. Away from us.