"love Drives Out Fear"

“Love Drives out Fear”

1 John 4:7-21

This passage of Scripture contains so much, so many nuggets that you could probably have an entire sermon series based on these 14 verses.

There is one thing, however, that has always stuck out to me about this passage.

It’s something that has always intrigued me, and I’d like for us to focus on it this morning, if we may.

It comes from verse 18 where it says that true, perfect love drives out fear.

The word used for fear in this verse is your run-of-the-mill Greek word phobos which is the root of all our various English words ending in “phobia.”

In the Charlie Brown Christmas Special, Charlie goes to Lucy’s Psychiatric Help for 5 Cents booth and tells her that he is afraid.

Lucy asks him if he has a fear of heights, a fear of enclosed spaces, a fear of cats…

…she asks him, “Do you have Hynophobia, the fear of falling asleep?...

…Do you have Heliophobia, the fear of the sun…

…to each of these Charlie Brown says, “No I don’t think it’s that.”

Lucy starts to get a little annoyed, and finally says, “Maybe you have Pantaphobia. Do you have Pantaphobia?”

Charlie Brown responds, “I don’t know. What’s that?”

“It’s the fear of everything,” Lucy replies with a smile to which Charlie Brown jumps up and screams “That’s it!” so hard that Lucy goes flying in the air and lands headfirst in a snowdrift.

Many of us have phobias and some may even have the kind that poor Charlie Brown has.

I don’t think John is talking about fears like that in the passage we are looking at for this morning or maybe he does mean something closer to Charlie Brown’s depression-inducing pantaphobia in which fear is the general way of life.

Can you relate to this kind of fear?

Do you wake up afraid?

Do you live your life afraid?

A friend of mine once said, “When I was a child I was afraid to go to sleep because I suffered from nightmares.

Now the nightmares begin when I wake up.”

Life can be difficult, and if we let it, fear can do a number on us.

It’s paralyzing and saps the joy out of life, does it not?

Before the unveiling of the God of Abraham, Jacob, you, and me, the people believed in all kinds of gods and most of them were vindictive, petty, scary and deceitful.

They were immoral and unworthy of respect, but the people feared them, and so they would offer the gods the appropriate sacrifices, but mostly they didn’t want to draw the attention of the gods to themselves.

They didn’t want the gods to become too involved in their lives and they didn’t want to become too involved with the gods because getting involved with the gods was dangerous.

And, you know, on the face of it, this was reasonable way to view things.

Think of how fickle life can be and how vulnerable we are to nature and to changes in our well-being, whether it’s our health or financial status.

Why would we view the hidden forces that operate behind the scenes as anything but erratic, fickle and dangerous—something to be feared?

Many of us live our lives this way today—even those who would say we are Christians.

A lot of people come and ask me to baptize their baby, even though they don’t attend church.

They want to “do the right thing” in order to appease God, get some fire insurance for the young tike, but they keep a careful distance.

They don’t want to get too involved with God.

Others get involved, but have a relationship built on fear.

I had a very close aunt who was diagnosed with lung cancer and was only given a short time to live.

And although she had a very strong faith in God, I was saddened to see that she was absolutely terrified of death.

She would sit on the couch saying over and over again, “Oh, God, forgive me. I’ve been such a horrible person.”

But she had been a saint, really.

Human, yes.

But a saint.

She had been taught, though, by her denomination that if you happen to die while you are in the midst of sinning, no matter how the rest of your life has been, no matter whether you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior or not—you will not go to heaven.

It’s a religion based on following the Law rather than grace.

It’s a religion that believes in a vindictive god that is just waiting to get us.

That’s a scary way to live.

And I’ve met many Christians over the years who, at the end of their earthly journey, ask questions such as, “How can I be sure I did enough for God to love me?”