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Fear Not; Do Not Be Afraid Part 1
(Rev. Barry Johnson and Rev. Rodney Johnson)
Introduction
Happy New Year everyone! As we begin a new year, we wanted our first lesson to be one of encouragement. Many people start the year feeling anxiety and fear about what a new year will bring. Analysts are talking about a recession and some are concerned about their job security. Still, others are dealing with unexpected health issues and have treatment plans that are not providing comfort based on the anticipated outcome. If you are experiencing any fear, anxiety, or concerns about this year, this lesson is for you. If you know of others who might be experiencing fear for this New Year, please share this lesson with them because God has said repeatedly in His Word to His children “Fear not and be not afraid.” Before we begin, I want to open with a word of prayer.
The Story of The Twelve Spies
To set the stage for this series of lessons on fear, we want to open with a true story about why it took the Children of Israel forty years to enter the Promised Land. The story is recorded in the thirteenth chapter of the book of Numbers. As Moses prepared to lead the Children of Israel into the Promised Land, at the request of the people, God directed him to send out leaders from the twelve tribes to spy out the land.
Numbers 13:1-3 records, “(1) Then the LORD spoke to Moses saying, (2) ‘Send out for yourself men so that they may spy out the land of Canaan, which I am going to give to the sons of Israel; you shall send a man from each of their fathers' tribes, every one a leader among them.’ (3) So Moses sent them from the wilderness of Paran at the command of the LORD, all of them men who were heads of the sons of Israel.”
Moses did as God had directed him. Now we want to draw this to your attention because of the impact these leaders will have on how the people responded to Moses later. You will hear us repeat this throughout this portion of the lesson.
When Moses sent out the leaders they departed with confidence and high expectations because of what God had promised. They returned with proof that the land was everything God said it would be. However, ten of the spies returned full of fear and dread believing that the inhabitants would overpower Israel and destroy them. Now, before we read the account in Numbers chapter 13, let’s turn to Deuteronomy chapter one where Moses reminds the people of God’s promise to them.
Let’s start with verses 19-21. “(19) Then we set out from Horeb, and went through all that great and terrible wilderness which you saw on the way to the hill country of the Amorites, just as the Lord our God had commanded us; and we came to Kadesh-barnea. (20) I said to you, ‘You have come to the hill country of the Amorites which the Lord our God is about to give us. (21) See, the Lord your God has placed the land before you; go up, take possession, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has spoken to you. Do not fear or be dismayed.’” (Deuteronomy 1:19-21)
First and foremost, these verses reveal to us the fact that Moses, instead of sending spies, would have gone up immediately to occupy Canaan from the south. The people were the ones who suggested sending up the spies. Moses took the matter to God Who then commanded him to send the spies as recorded in Numbers 13:1-2.
Now, there are three things in these verses that deserve our attention.
*The first thing we see in verse 19 is that the Children of Israel were being obedient – “just as the Lord our God had commanded us.” Obedience, doing what God asks us to do, is crucial to receiving His promises. After seeing that they were being obedient, God tells them, in verse 21, to “go up, take possession [of the land].”
*The second thing we see is this – being obedient gave Israel access to the Promised Land. Now the third thing we need to see and understand from this passage, which is also found in verse 21, is the command to “not fear or be dismayed.” Now despite this, look at how the people responded in verse 22. “Then all of you approached me and said, ‘Let us send men before us, that they may search out the land for us, and bring back to us word of the way by which we should go up and the cities which we shall enter.’”
Even though God had told them that the Promised Land was theirs and all they had to do was go up and possess it, the people still had doubts and wanted proof before they were willing to go into the land of promise. But when we read the latter part of verse 22, we see the real reason they wanted to spy out the land – “and bring us word of the way by which we should go up and the cities which we shall enter.” The people wanted assurance that they would be able to occupy the land without meeting any resistance from the people who were occupying the land.
Fear and dismay were already calling into question the truthfulness of what God had said. In other words, the people were saying to God, “Your word alone isn’t good enough for us to pack up and go.” Now stop and let that sink in. The word of the Creator of everything wasn’t good enough?!?!? The Bible says this about God in Titus 1:2 – “In the hope of eternal life, which God, Who cannot lie, promised long ages ago.” The Bible is the written form of God speaking truth to us. Think of it as a “letter from your Heavenly Father.” But how many times have we read something in His letter to us and had doubts about it? In that instance, were we really any different in our response to Him than the Children of Israel?
So, why are we including this passage from Deuteronomy? It’s important to understand why the spies were sent and Who sent them. As Moses was preparing to enter the Promised Land, the people came to him and asked him to send out spies to make sure they could take the land. Moses understanding their fear, inquired of God as to how he should answer the people and God told him to send the spies. God cannot lie and He knew exactly what they were going to find. Moses, who understood that God would not lie knew exactly what the spies would find. The people, however, did not know or trust God as Moses did so they wanted to know with certainty that God was not lying to them.
Please understand that this is a dangerous position to be in. When we do not believe or trust what God tells us, it opens the door for fear to reign in our lives. When we believe “our eyes” versus believing what God says, it keeps the door open for fear to reign in our lives. It is only our believing in God and what He promises that can calm the fears that are so easily trying to rule us. With this in mind, let’s continue.
Let’s read what the twelve spies, the leaders of the twelve tribes, said in Numbers 13:27-33 when they reported back to Moses. “(27) Thus they told him, and said, "We went in to the land where you sent us; and it certainly does flow with milk and honey, and this is its fruit.” “Moses, the land was everything the Lord said it would be and more. Just look at the fruit we found!” “(28) Nevertheless, the people who live in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large; and moreover, we saw the descendants of Anak there. (29) Amalek is living in the land of the Negev and the Hittites and the Jebusites and the Amorites are living in the hill country, and the Canaanites are living by the sea and by the side of the Jordan.”
Everything the spies said about the land was factual. Yes, the people were stronger than the Children of Israel. Yes, the cities were fortified and large. And yes, there were giants in the land, both in stature and wickedness. But what was God’s promise to them? What had God told them about the Promised Land and their possessing it? Did He tell them that they would have to fight hard to possess it and would lose many of their fighters? What did God promise them that would make them be so afraid to enter the Promised Land? It wasn’t what God had promised them that caused them to fear, it was their disbelief of the promise.
Let’s continue with verse thirty. “(30) Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, ‘We should by all means go up and take possession of it, for we will surely overcome it.’ (31) But the men (the leaders of ten of the tribes) who had gone up with him said, ‘We are not able to go up against the people, for they are too strong for us.’” Again, it’s important to acknowledge what they were saying. Israel would be facing people who were stronger and more warlike than they were. And again, we must ask ourselves, “What was God’s promise to them?” “(32) So they gave out to the sons of Israel a bad report of the land (the KJV says “an evil report” – a report that slandered and defamed God and produced doubt in the minds of the people about whether He could be trusted.) which they had spied out, saying, ‘The land through which we have gone, in spying it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants; and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great size. (33) There also we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak are part of the Nephilim); and we became like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.’”
Ten of the spies, who were also tribal leaders, instead of being excited about what God had given to them, became so afraid that they convinced themselves that even God could not defeat the giants in the Promised Land. In essence, the ten leaders called God a liar. They allowed their own inadequacies to color their view of what God could do. They allowed what they saw to diminish how they viewed themselves – “and we became like grasshoppers in our own sight, and (in our opinion) so we were in their sight.” (Verse 33)
Now this is important: fear had created so many images of defeat and destruction in their minds that they could not see how God could fulfill His promise. And because of their positions as leaders, who had the respect and trust of the people of their tribes, in this case, what they believed influenced directly what their tribes believed. Isn’t this similar to what we see in many churches today? Some of the members believe what they hear from the pulpit without studying the Bible for themselves to verify what they have been taught.
Here in Numbers 13, we read that Joshua and Caleb were ready to go in and possess the land, but the ten faithless and unbelieving leaders had convinced the people that it could not be done. Numbers 14:1-4 records, “(1) Then all the congregation lifted up their voices and cried, and the people wept that night. (2) All the sons of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron; and the whole congregation said to them, ‘Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! (3) Why is the LORD bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become plunder; would it not be better for us to return to Egypt?’ (4) So they said to one another, ‘Let us appoint a leader and return to Egypt.’”
The ten spies convinced all of the others in the congregation (the peoples in their tribes) that they could not go in and possess the Promised Land as the Lord had said and so the congregation as a whole decided that they would not go into the Promised Land. Because they refused to enter the land that God had promised to them, He let them wander in the wilderness for forty years until all of the adults who had refused to believe Him died. This story paints the crippling effects of fear. The Children of Israel had witnessed everything that God had done to the Egyptians to bring them out of Egypt and yet fear overrode their memories. Fear paralyzed them so much so that they didn’t think God could take them safely into the Promised Land. As we go through this series, we want you to keep this story in mind because we will learn that while the Children of Israel gave in to their fears, many others did not.
Defining Fear: The Feelings of Fear (Anxiety)
So what is fear? Fear is defined as “an unpleasant feeling of anxiety or apprehension caused by the presence or anticipation of danger.” It is also “the respect or awe for somebody or something.” In our lessons, we will examine both definitions, but our primary focus will be on what the Word says about our fears and being afraid. So let’s begin with the first definition, “an unpleasant feeling of anxiety or apprehension caused by the presence or anticipation of danger.”
The first definition talks about the feelings of anxiety that are caused by the presence or anticipation of danger. It is important to understand the word danger because it carries meanings of exposure or vulnerability to harm, injury, or loss. Our potential exposure or vulnerability to harm, injury, or loss is not just in the physical sense as it relates to our bodies. It includes our possessions, family and friends, jobs, etc. The people that we care about or the possessions we own that can be harmed or taken from us can be a source of danger and subsequent fear for us.
So fear is often about our feelings, regardless of the form they come in. But here is the catch: the definition says feelings are caused by the “presence or anticipation of danger.” We fear things that “could” happen “before” they happen! Have you thought about that? Someone said fear is false expectations appearing real. In other words, we experience fear because we expected something harmful or unpleasant to happen that never materialized. Have you done this – been afraid about something that never happened? How about having feelings of fear even after God tells you He will work it out? Let’s read a few examples of people who walked with God, had feelings of fear, and how they handled those feelings. In these verses we want to examine what the situation was and what was feared, why they had fear, and the outcome of the situation.
Israel
Genesis 46:2-4 says, “(2) God spoke to Israel in visions of the night and said, ‘Jacob, Jacob.’ And he said, ‘Here I am.’ (3) He said, ‘I am God, the God of your father; do not be afraid (fear) to go down to Egypt, for I will make you a great nation there. (4) I will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also surely bring you up again; and Joseph will close your eyes.’”
Before this passage, Israel (the Lord calls him Jacob) had sent his sons to Egypt to buy grain because of the famine that plagued the land. Later he learns that his son, Joseph, whom he had been told by his sons was killed in a vicious animal attack, is alive and second in charge of Egypt. Israel wants to see him before he dies (Genesis 45:28), but, in the back of his mind, he is afraid. He is not sure what might happen to him and his family once they’re on foreign soil. Can you imagine leaving your home where everything was familiar to you and traveling to a foreign land that was vastly different culturally than what you were accustomed to? Can you imagine being a Christian and moving to a place where the only Christians were you and your family? This is the scenario that Israel faced and this caused him some anxiety (fear) because he did not know what would happen to him and his family. So, the Lord reassures him in a vision and says, “Jacob, there is no need for you to have any fear about leaving your home.”
God tells Israel that He would make Him a great nation there, but here is the most important thing that God tells him in my opinion: “I will go down with you to Egypt.” Think about what God told him. God told Israel that He would go down to Egypt with him. Can you think of a better-traveling companion than God? Can you think of anyone who could better have your back and see to your every need that the Creator of the whole world? Not only did God tell him that He would go to Egypt with him, but He also gave him a promise. God says something that I’m sure gave Jacob his greatest peace and comfort – “Joseph will close your eyes.” The Lord says “Jacob, when you die, you will be surrounded by your family, and the son you thought you had lost will be the one who will close your eyes.” Israel set aside his fear and obeyed his God. He believed God and took Him at His word. Israel’s belief in what God had told him enabled him to overcome his fear of going to Egypt. Now consider what would have happened if he had not believed God. He would have attempted to stay where he was possibly leading to the death of some of his family members due to starving because of the famine. His decision to believe God and move beyond his fear not only saved lives, but it opened the door for God to fulfill His promise of making his family a great nation – the nation that Moses brought out of Egypt.
Moses and the Children of Israel
When you read the story of Moses bringing the Children of Israel out of Egypt, there is one part of the story that everyone remembers – Moses parting the Red Sea. Remember when the Children of Israel fled Egypt at the command of Pharaoh only to have Pharaoh change his mind and pursue them? Pharaoh regretted his decision to let them leave so He gathered his army together to pursue them with the intent of killing them at the Red Sea. When they arrived at the Red Sea the Children of Israel believed that they would soon be destroyed at the hands of the Egyptians. They had witnessed God’s mighty hand in bringing them out of Egypt, but when they saw the Red Sea before them and Pharaoh’s army behind them, those memories faded away. Seeing Pharaoh’s army approaching, the Children of Israel turn on Moses and blame him for taking them out of Egypt only to have Pharaoh slaughter them.
Exodus 14:10-12 records the following interaction between the people and Moses; “(10) As Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel looked, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they became very frightened; so the sons of Israel cried out to the LORD. (11) Then they said to Moses, ‘Is it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you dealt with us in this way, bringing us out of Egypt? (12) Is this not the word that we spoke to you in Egypt, saying, 'Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians'? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.’”
There is so much that could be said about this passage, but we must stay focused! Do you see what happened? Their fear caused them to remember when they were initially afraid to leave Egypt before they left. Every time their situation got harder as Moses dealt with Pharaoh, they complained and desired to stay because they were afraid. Their fear made the harshness of Egypt more tolerable. They began to panic because they didn’t see how God could deliver them and they did what many of us would normally do when we get afraid – we look for someone to blame. In their situation, they blamed Moses, over and over again. In their fear, they said to Moses in verse 12. “Is this not the word that we spoke to you in Egypt, saying, ‘Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”
Can you imagine witnessing God’s deliverance – ten plagues one after another that destroyed the Egyptian economy – and believing that God did all of that so that He could let you die once you left Egypt? Do you see how fear can be so destructive? As we pointed out earlier, fear can wipe out memories of the past deliverances we have seen at the hands of God. We know that some of you watching or listening to this lesson have seen God’s deliverance in your lives. But we also know that you have experienced situations and circumstances that have caused you to wonder sometimes if God was with you. Trust us when we say this: Your Father never left you alone. You’re His child. We can’t allow what we see to cause us to forget that the One we can’t see is with us.
Now let’s continue and see what Moses said to these fearful people. Exodus 14:13 records, “But Moses said to the people, ‘Do not fear! Stand by and see the salvation of the Lord which He will accomplish for you today; for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you will never see them again forever.’” The people see the Red Sea in front of them and Pharaoh’s army approaching behind them and then Moses tells them “Do not fear!” Wasn’t Moses seeing the same thing they were seeing? Wasn’t he in the same situation they were in? How in the world could he tell them not to be afraid of dying? What did he know that they didn’t know? The difference between them and Moses wasn’t him knowing something that they did not know. It was him remembering what God had done and what He had promised and believed it! Moses remembered everything that God had done in Egypt; he had not forgotten. He also remembered what God had promised; he had not forgotten.
Then, and this is important, Moses believed what God had promised. If God had promised to bring them into the Promised Land, then God would not allow the Red Sea to stop Him nor would He allow them to be destroyed by Pharaoh’s army! This was a simple truth. Both could not be true and Moses decided to believe God versus what He saw with his eyes! We fear what we see as the possibility of something bad happening, but when we are walking with God, we must train ourselves to see what He has said as the only possibility and believe those! Once they got beyond this moment, they were encouraged that truly God had them – at least until the next crisis.
We want to close out this section on Moses and the Children of Israel with what was recorded in Deuteronomy 20:1. It says, “When you go out to battle against your enemies and see horses and chariots and people more numerous than you, do not be afraid of them; for the Lord your God, who brought you up from the land of Egypt, is with you.”
In the book of Deuteronomy, as many of you know, God is giving His final instructions to the Children of Israel through Moses. The Lord is letting them know that when they enter the Promised Land they will face enemies who are better prepared for battle than they are. They will face enemies who are more numerous – who have more men who are trained for battle – than they have. They will face enemies who by all appearances will be better equipped for battle than they are. But here’s the Lord’s instruction to them – “do not be afraid of them; for the Lord your God … is with you.” The Lord tells the children of Israel – and us – “When you see your enemies, it doesn’t matter what you see, I am with you. I am the difference maker!” What a message for the Church today!
In this first lesson, we wanted to provide a Scriptural reference point that we will refer back to in future lessons. That reference point is the story of the Children of Israel being delivered out of Egypt. Their story started when Joseph was sold into Egypt and continued until they finally reached the Promised Land forty years after God brought them out of Egypt. That forty-year delay was caused by fear. Think about that. Fear delayed the Children of Israel from experiencing God’s promise to them. Now we want to ask each of you a question. All of us face fears in our lives – fears about change, fears about relationships, fears about a host of other things. Sometimes our fears paralyze us to the point that we fail to act. Sometimes our fear acts as a motivator to get us to act. How we respond to fears in our lives is dependent upon what is driving that fear and what we have within us to counteract it.
As Christians, what we have to counteract the fears that we face is the Word of God and the promises that it has. Second Timothy 1:7 says, “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” When Timothy was dealing with the situations he faced as a young pastor, Paul wrote to him to encourage him to not be afraid because God had not given him a spirit of fear, but one of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. The Amplified Bible reads this way, “For God did not give us a spirit of timidity or cowardice or fear, but He has given us a spirit of power and of love and of sound judgment and personal discipline, abilities that result in a calm, well-balanced mind and self-control.” (Second Timothy 1:7 Amp)
When you read what God has given us, the first thing Paul writes is power. The Greek word for power in this verse is dunamis. It means inherent power – power that can reproduce itself, implying a need for constant activity and use for continued reproduction. From this word we get our English dynamo and dynamics, the branch of mechanics related to motion; the principles of active operation. Just as a dynamo needs to be in motion to produce power, so we need to stir up into a flame the gift of God in his life. So what are we telling you? Have you ever heard the phrase, use it or lose it? It means that if you do not use something (a gift, vacation days, etc) you lose the ability to do so. Paul was telling Timothy (and each of us) that when we are facing our fears, we must continuously use the power that God has given us or we run the risk of losing it as we continuously give in to our fears. Barry, why don’t you close us out?
Thanks, Rodney. It is a fact that if we do not use the power that God has given us we will lose because of neglect. And I want to stress that it’s not a factor of the power going away, but a factor of our not choosing or forgetting how to access it in the midst of our fears. To be able to continuously access the power that we have been given, we must be in a constant, ever-growing fellowship with our Father in heaven. Paul told Timothy in First Timothy 4:14, “Do not neglect the spiritual gift within you, which was bestowed on you through prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands by the presbytery.” It is a fact that we can neglect what God has made available to us and we desire that through these lessons we will understand how to use the resources God has made available to us when we are faced with feelings of anxiety which can lead to paralyzing fear. Let us pray.
