Fear: Healthy and Unhealthy Fear

Music.

A brand new series entitled Fear Not. In a world full of chaos,

it's easy to be overwhelmed by fear and uncertainty.

Today, we will be talking about two types of fear, healthy and unhealthy.

Grab your pen and your Bible as we listen to week one of Fear Not.

And now here's today's message.

Welcome to Generations Church. It is good to be with you this morning.

My name is Pastor Jeff. if you're a visitor here, or maybe you just haven't

been here for a minute, but it is my honor and privilege to be the lead pastor here.

And I hope that you will absolutely make yourself at home and feel right at home today.

This morning, we are starting a brand new series that we're calling Fear Not.

And whether you know it or not, we all struggle with fears.

We all live in a culture that is overwhelmed and plagued with fear and anxiety.

And if we're all honest with each other, I think we would all admit that at

one time or another, we have all struggled with fear.

We've all struggled with anxiety.

And if you've struggled with it, you know how paralyzing it is.

I've wrestled with fear and anxiety for a long time, the better half of my life.

I thought it would be fun to give you a little quiz and see if you can figure

out some of the different fears and phobias that you're afraid of,

not just that you, that we are afraid of as a culture.

And so we're going to put these up there and I'm going to put one up there and

then I'll let you see if you know what it is and then we'll put the answer up there.

Okay? Okay, so this is our audience participation part.

Okay, so help me out. Go ahead and put the first one.

Zoophobia. This is pretty easy. Anyone?

Well, you're really close. I thought it would be easy. Fear of animals. All right, next one.

Dentophobia. Fear of the dentist. I suffered through that this week. It was awful.

Next one. Social phobia.

Social interactions. Going to church can be very anxious for people,

right? All right, claustrophobia.

Very good. You know your fears. Small spaces.

Arachnophobia. Spiders. Anyone seen that movie, Arachnophobia?

It's terrifying, and I love it. I love it.

I am so ADD, but my son, our son, Mason, he still will not watch it.

He's still never seen it because he is afraid.

This is close but different. Acrophobia.

I got this one. Fear of heights. Fear of heights.

I'm deathly afraid of that. The scariest thing at any amusement park is the Ferris wheel.

I'm telling you. and that stems from when we first got married,

my bride and I, we thought it would be romantic. We lived in North Carolina.

We went to the, it was like a Hallmark movie, y'all.

We went, we didn't have any kids, so life was still great.

I'm kidding. I'm kidding. We were on this romantic date.

We went to the Raleigh, North Carolina County Fair and they had this rickety,

and when When I say rickety, like, I mean rickety Ferris wheel.

And we got in and we went to the top and I about lost my cookies right there in front of my new wife.

And she's up there opening the door that was broken. And I'm like, stop, stop.

I didn't say I was proud of it. I'm just saying I have that, that fear. All right.

Sinophobia. I thought I'd get you with that one. Fear of dogs.

Fear of dogs. All right. Hemophobia.

I got this one too. Blood, that's right. Go ahead and put it up there. Fear of blood.

It's not that I'm afraid of the blood. It's that I'm afraid of the accident

that happens to me that produces the blood. Next one.

Arachidiphyriophobia. Okay, this is a real thing, real fear.

It's listed in the DSM-5.

The fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth.

Anyone struggle with that? Anyone on meds today for arachnobutyrophobia?

I have fear of long words. Here's another one.

Nomophobia. And I know some of you kids, some of you teenagers, you struggle with this.

Oh, really close. Fear of being without your cell phone.

Real thing. Liz is like, oh my God, that's so bad. And this is a very serious one.

Viking phobia. Fear of playing the Minnesota Vikings.

I'm just kidding. Hey, hey, just kidding. Oh, wait, what?

Oh, no. I'm not sure. Listen, I apologize.

I'm not sure how that got in there. This is supposed to, hey,

hey, this is supposed to be a safe place.

And before the service started, we had like, I had like seven kids in my office

watching the Vikings game because they're in London today playing,

and they were up on the Jets 17-0.

So, oh, it's 17-7 now, and I told you you're not supposed to be on your phone

while you're in the tech booth.

That's my son. I can say that. So, hey, I'm so glad that you're here today.

It does my heart good to be with you. And so we're going to jump into this topic of fear.

But before we do that, I just want to give this time to the Lord.

It does no good for us just to gather together and have a few laughs and have

have some donuts and coffee if the Lord isn't present and isn't moving among us.

So, Father, we invite your spirit here.

And as we get into your word, as we open up your word, we ask that you would

speak to us, that you would put a new fear in our hearts, and that's a fear of your awesomeness.

God, I pray that your perfect love would just cast out fear over the next few

weeks as we dive into some specific fears that we all struggle with.

Holy Spirit, do what only you can do. Open our ears, open our eyes,

open our hearts, and help us to be obedient to you.

And all God's people said, amen.

If you have your Bibles or your favorite app with you, go ahead and turn to

2 Timothy 1.7, and we're gonna dive into our struggle with fear this morning.

And I'm so thankful for the word of God and the way that it speaks to us in

every situation in our lives.

That's why I'm encouraging you all the time to get into the Word and do those

Bible reading plans and just spend time in prayer because it will speak to your

life. It'll speak to your heart.

If you look up the phrase, fear not, in the Bible, you'll see that it appears over 365 times.

That's amazing. It's almost as if God knew what he was doing when he wrote it.

And he said, I know there's 365 days in your year.

And so I know that this is going to be something that you grasp hold of your

heart and that you're going to struggle with.

So I've got one for every day.

And then if there's a leap year, I got extra. So I want you to understand that

God doesn't want his people example to fear in the face of adversity or in the

face of decisions with your life.

2 Timothy 1.7 says this, for God did not give us a spirit of,

say it with me, fear. Oh, come on, church.

For God did not give us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

The first thing, if you're taking notes, God did not give us a spirit of fear.

In fact, not only did He not give us a spirit of fear, but Scripture is clear

that perfect love actually casts aside all fear.

And who is the only person that is perfect love?

Perfect love comes from Jesus Christ, from the Lord, right?

And so we're going to dive into that perfect love in the coming weeks.

So the fear that we experience is in our lives, but it's not from God.

It's interesting when you study the topic

of fear in scripture because you'll find verses that

talk about different kinds of fears you find one

in proverbs that says the fear of the lord is the beginning of wisdom awesome

awesome well we tell our kids all the time the fear of the lord is the beginning

of wisdom or what about deuteronomy 8 6 says so keep the commands of the lord

your god by walking in his ways and fearing him.

What? So on one hand, we're told fear not 365 times, right? Fear not, fear not, fear not.

But then on the other hand, there's all these commandments to fear the Lord.

Fear the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

Keep his commands by walking in his ways and fearing him.

If you're taking notes, the next thing you need to understand is this,

that there are healthy and unhealthy fears.

And we need to know the difference so that we can respond appropriately, right?

How many of you know that fear can actually be a good thing in your life, right?

Healthy fear can literally save your life.

I love being outdoors. I love to hike. I love to camp.

Man, it would be a dream of mine to be able to go camping.

And I mean camping, like in a tent camping in Colorado or in the mountains or in a real forest.

We're not talking big woods, forest, forest, or George Wythe forest,

where the worst thing you're going to encounter is maybe a squirrel or,

I don't know, a porcupine or something like that.

But pretend for a moment that we're together and we're hiking in the woods and

we happen to stumble across a mama bear. Right?

I hear the groans. Let's throw in some baby cubs too to make it even better.

Now, are you going to go over there and be like, oh my goodness,

you are so, come here, come here.

Oh, you like your ears cut. No, why?

Because hopefully, hopefully you have a healthy fear that that thing could rip

you apart and steal and take your life away. way.

If you and I are together and we're in the woods and we come across the bear, I'm going to run.

And my goal, listen, y'all, my goal is not to outrun the bear.

My goal is to outrun you. You know what I mean? I love you, but it's awful.

I'm going to outrun you. Healthy fear heightens and sharpens our senses,

and it can be of great benefit.

I love riding my motorcycle. We got a group that rides on Monday nights,

and I love riding my motorcycle, but I also have a healthy fear that keeps me, as I'm riding,

I'm wondering, is that old lady that's coming towards me, is she going to turn in front of me?

And so I ride differently because I have a healthy fear that this thing could

take my life or that car could take my life, right?

We have healthy and unhealthy fears and unhealthy fears will paralyze you.

And it's not what God's heart is for you. And so we're going to dive into some

of these life altering fears, but each week I try to give you a big idea.

And so let me give that to you as we dive into what the fear of the Lord is.

Our big idea today is that developing a healthy fear of the Lord is essential for Christian growth,

for guiding believers to walk in obedience and humility and reverence towards

God, ultimately leading to a closer relationship with him.

It guides us to walk in obedience.

It pushes us to be humble. It pushes us to have a reverence of God.

You see, everything that God does and has orchestrated in your life is because

God desires to have a close relationship with you.

And the Bible is God's love letter to each one of us. It's not a list of do's and don'ts.

It's a recipe for you to have joy. It's a recipe for you to have protection

and peace and a sound mind in the midst of.

Of chaos going on around us.

We just read about the fear of the Lord, how it's the beginning of wisdom and

knowledge and proverbs.

But I want to tell you that if you want a life full of purpose,

we need to live according to the fear of the Lord.

I want us to turn to Deuteronomy 10, and we find this incredible love letter

that God wrote to his people.

And I wish that we could go into this whole chapter.

Take some time this afternoon or this week and just read through this chapter.

It's amazing and it's awesome.

But for time's sake, I'm going to keep it to two verses. And now Israel,

what does the Lord your God ask of you except,

and I circled and underlined that in my Bible, this is what God's requiring of us.

If we want to be his children, If we want to be Christians, if we want to follow him, he says.

Accept to fear the Lord your God by walking in all his ways to love him and

to worship the Lord your God with how much of your heart?

All your heart and all of your soul.

Verse 13 says, keep the Lord's commands and statues I am giving you today for your own good.

You see, when we come and we hear about the Bible and we learn about the Bible,

sometimes we look at it and it's like overwhelming, like it's just a list of do's and don'ts.

But here, God says it's for your good.

It's for your protection. It's for your best interest.

And verse 12 starts out asking the question, what does the Lord your God ask of you?

Except to fear the Lord. First thing you need to know about the fear of the

Lord is that God requires us to fear him.

God requires us to fear him. And this is not God telling us that you have to

live in terror of him or dread of him or be afraid of him. Not at all.

He wants us to have an intimate, close relationship with him.

But he also knows that unless there is a holy reverence about him and his power

and his authority, we're prone to wander.

There are times, parents, that we have to step it up and get in our kid's face,

don't we? And we have to remind them, hey, I'm in charge.

I have the authority. That doesn't mean we don't love him. We do that That because

we love them, because we want their best, and God requires us to fear him.

And then he says right there in verse 12, we fear him by walking in all his ways. All his ways.

People may think that living with the fear of God is just simply having a respect for God.

And that's true that that is part of it.

We do have to have a respect for God. but it's so much more than that.

And so I want to give you a definition today, and it should be there in your notes.

And this is really what the fear of God is encompassed. It's living with.

Reverence, awe, and respect for God's holiness, power, and authority so much

that it affects every aspect of our lives.

We forget that God is so holy that he can't be around sin.

And yet then we might come and we say, pastor, I just don't feel God's presence,

because he can't be around sin.

And your sin has put a wedge and there's a distance between you because of that.

That's why it's so important to, we talked about a few weeks ago in the last

series, Back to the Basics, we talked about confession and repentance.

Why are those things so important?

Because it restores our relationship with the Lord.

If we want to live with the fear of the Lord, we have to be obedient.

We have to have an understanding and an awe of His holiness See,

the fear of the Lord, it aligns our hearts with God's purposes.

Do you hear that? The fear of the Lord aligns our hearts with God's purposes

and gives us wisdom for life.

And this morning, we're just going to walk through in the next 10 minutes or so, results.

What does living with the fear of God in your life bring?

The first thing it brings is wisdom and knowledge.

We read this earlier, but the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,

and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.

If you want wisdom for your life, if you want to know how to live and move and

operate through every circumstance of your life, it begins with submitting to the fear of the Lord.

And as you surrender your way, you begin to live out in such a way that is obedient

to him more and more and more until it affects every area of your life.

So wisdom and knowledge.

Number two, it brings about spiritual growth and maturity.

If you're here this morning, You're here because number one,

you want community, but you also want to grow. You want to mature.

Proverbs 8, 13 says, to fear the Lord is to hate evil.

I hate arrogant pride, evil conduct, and perverse speech, God says.

If we are going to be a people that's living in the fear of the Lord,

then we begin to hate what God hates.

And we begin to love the things that God loves.

And so ask yourself this morning, you know, just do a little checkup. How am I?

Do I love the things God loves?

Do I hate the things that God hates?

That's why Paul wrote to the church at Philippi.

And if you've ever heard this verse, you're kind of like, what does this mean?

But he says, even more in my absence, Philippians 2.12, even more in my absence,

work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

What does that mean, Paul?

Why fear and trembling? I thought we weren't supposed to be afraid of God.

We aren't. But we are to live with a healthy fear of God and understand that

there are consequences for our disobedience.

That's what he's talking about. Understand, guys, whether you're in school or

work or in your marriage or in a relationship, wherever you're at,

when you wanna live for the Lord and you love the things God loves and you hate

things he hates, you have to remember that there's a consequence for our actions.

It's either gonna result in blessing and peace and joy and happiness,

or it's going to result in pain in consequence.

We have to submit to him or else there's discipline.

And that's a hard thing to preach and it's a hard thing to live.

But he loves us so much that he will discipline those he loves. Hebrews tells us that.

The Lord disciplines the one he loves and punishes every son he receives.

Have you ever disciplined your kids and they look at you and say, you don't love me.

Anyone? Or is it just me and Jen?

Could just us. No, I know it.

I'm taking away this electronic thing, or you don't get a phone,

or you don't know Fortnite forever.

You don't love me. Yes, I do. That's why I do that. And it's the same thing with the Lord.

If you've been disciplined by the Lord, count your blessings,

because that means that he's He's received you and you're one of his. You should be glad.

So living with the fear of God brings growth and maturity. But number three,

it brings about protection and security. I love this verse.

Psalm 34, seven says, the angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him.

And he doesn't just give us his presence and camp around, but he also rescues them, it says.

I don't know about you, but I want God's presence in my life.

I want God's presence in my family. I want God's presence in my workplace.

I want God's presence everywhere.

I want his protection over my family. I want God's protection over my spouse and over my children.

It begins by fearing the Lord. Number four, it brings favor and blessings.

For those who fear the Lord, there is favor and blessing.

Psalm 115, 13 says, He will bless those who fear the Lord, small and great alike.

Aren't you glad that with God, there's no respecter of persons?

It doesn't matter if you're the richest man in the world or the poorest person

in the world, whether you're a CEO or a janitor or whatever. ever.

There's blessing for you if you fear the Lord.

Again, how could you not want this for your family and for your kids and for your own life?

I want God's favor on my family. I want God's favor on our church.

I want God's favor on your life.

Every single one of you, I want God's favor. And maybe you're here and you feel

like you keep getting passed over or overlooked.

I want to challenge you. Try living in the fear of the Lord and see if he doesn't

begin to pour out favor on you.

This is not God being a genie. This is just being faithful to his promises.

He will bless your life and give you favor.

Number five, increased intimacy with God. but there are some scriptures that

I studied this week that just really blew me away. And this was one of them, Psalm 25, 14.

The Lord confides in those who fear him. He makes his covenant known to them.

You see, there's an intimacy with the Lord that will never happen if you do

not live with the fear of the Lord.

I want to live.

Isn't that an incredible thing that the God who spoke out the universe,

the God who created everything, spoke out the stars.

Knows the number of hair on everyone's head, also will confide in you if you fear him.

That's a powerful, powerful thing.

It will grow and increase your intimacy with God.

Number six, if you fear the Lord, you will have peace and contentment.

Who doesn't need more peace in their their life. I do.

Who doesn't need more contentment in my life? I do.

You know, we need more peace. We need contentment. Proverbs 19 says,

the fear of the Lord leads to life.

One will sleep at night without danger.

When you live a life that is submitted to the holiness and to the reverence

of Almighty God, you can leave your fears and place them into the hands of God.

And when you you go to bed at night?

And I know all of us, a lot of us struggle with sleep.

Lisa and I were talking about this last week.

For me, man, I just can't shut down my mind.

I'm thinking about everything at church, and I'm thinking about soccer games

for one kid, and volleyball games for another, and football games for another,

and when am I going to do this?

I just cannot shut down.

But for others of you, you have fears.

What would it look like if you were able to go to sleep or go to bed and just

say, Father, I give you all my fears.

I know we have a bill coming out tomorrow. There's nothing I can do about it.

You've got everything. You said, don't worry about tomorrow and to trust you.

And so I'm going to go to bed. And while I'm sleeping, Stephen,

would you just take care of that?

Cast your cares on him. Why? Because he cares for you. He loves you.

He wants you to be at peace.

He doesn't want you to be wrestling all night and not getting any sleep.

Give your fears to him and it will bring you peace.

Isaiah 33, 6 says, there will be times of security for you, a storehouse of

salvation, wisdom, and knowledge.

And then he says, the fear Fear of the Lord is Zion's treasure.

The treasures that God have for us are all ours.

Don't worry. Don't live in fear. There is a security beyond the physical.

This world is a wreck. And it's kind of looking like it's a snowball.

And Jesus is coming soon, Lord willing. And we pray and we cry,

God, come quickly, right? Lord Jesus, come quickly.

But you don't ever have to be in need or want because you have all the treasures of heaven.

The fear of the Lord is a treasure, he says.

And then number seven, the fear of the Lord brings guidance and direction.

Guidance and direction.

Psalm 25, 12 says, who is this person who fears the Lord?

Who is he? He will show him the way he should choose.

Are you struggling with a choice?

Go to God about those choices. Check yourself and see where you're at.

Are you fearing the Lord?

Are you loving the things he loves? Are you hating the things he hates?

Are you following and obeying him in all of his ways?

Are you pushing in to a more intimate relationship with the Lord Jesus?

He will give you guidance. He will give you the direction that you need.

Are you feeling like you need a different job?

Ask him about it. Do you need help with the job you have? go to him about it. He's there for you.

As we wrap up this morning, I simply want to encourage you in just a few ways.

You may be here and you may think, man, I just have no idea what this would look like for me.

How do I live according to the fear of the Lord?

And because I'm a simpleton, I like ABCs. And so I put together these ABCs of

living with the fear of the Lord.

And it should be in your notes there. First one is acknowledge God's sovereignty.

The fear of the Lord begins when we recognize that we are not the ones that are in control.

We recognize his absolute power and his absolute authority over everything.

And once we begin to understand and see that he is sovereign,

it leads us to trust him in more ways.

What would it do for our fear and our anxiety if we could trust him?

I think it would change. I think it would revolutionize our fear, our soundness of mind.

Would shape how we approach him in our daily lives. So acknowledge God's sovereignty.

Be, behave in obedience.

Fearing the Lord means living in obedience to his commands, not out of fear of punishment,

but out of love and reverence of who he is.

See our actions every day our actions should reflect that it's our desire to

honor God in every aspect of our lives in everything we say in everything we do.

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Evaluate your lifestyle and commit to making changes that align with God's word,

choose to obey even when it's challenging challenging.

If you love me, you will keep my commandments, Jesus said.

It is our love for Jesus that motivates us to want to be godly.

It's our love for him that motivates us to be holy in all things because.

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Humility. See, the fear of the Lord puts us in a posture of humility where we

submit ourselves to God's authority.

In every area of our lives, we recognize that his ways are better.

I'm not going to push my agenda on people. I'm not going to push my agenda on God.

I'm just going to live and I'm going to submit humbly.

And as we trust in him, those fears will begin to dissipate.

Actively humble yourself in

prayer and decision making and seek God's guidance before you take action.

Surrender all your desires to him.

Brings us back to the big idea. today.

That developing a healthy fear of the Lord is absolutely essential,

for Christian growth, for guiding believers to walk in obedience,

humility, and reverence towards God, ultimately leading to a closer relationship with Him.

Isn't that what we want? in the coming weeks, man.

I hope you'll be here. I hope you'll bring a friend or two because people need

to understand and be able to go to battle against their fears.

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Perfect love conquers all fear.

And I know that fear is something that I have struggled with.

I'm gonna give a little bit of my testimony next week, how I've struggled with

fear, how I've wrestled with anxiety,

you are not alone in what you're going through we're in this together,

but we are more than conquerors in Jesus Christ amen amen let's pray Father

thank you for being here this morning thank you for allowing us to be in your house,

for being in your word God we love you and we know that you have already fought this battle.

The battle has already been won and so we can be more than conquerors if we're in you.

And so my question for my friends is, are you in him this morning?

Have you made a decision that you're going to follow Jesus with your life?

Before you battle fears, before you battle anxieties, the first thing that you have to do,

Commit your heart and life to him. And if you've never done that,

I want to encourage you. The Bible says, today is the day. Don't wait for tomorrow.

Don't wait for next week. Today is the day.

And you are here and you're saying, I don't know if I can make that commitment.

And I would say back to you, how can you not?

God sent his son, Jesus, to die for you.

And he said if you believe in me if you confess that i am lord and savior,

i will come in and i will save you,

some of you just pray that in your heart right now god come into my heart come

into my life i surrender my life to you i want to live for you help me if you

just pray that would you just slip your hand up i'm not going to embarrass you

i just want to pray for you and celebrate with you awesome.

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God's got something incredible for you. And it starts with surrendering your life to him.

God, we love you. I thank you for being here, for moving, for rescuing people

from hell and sending them on the road to heaven. let us live victorious lives this week,

let us live out of victory and from victory to victory we love you give us a

great rest of the day bless each person that made it a priority to be here this morning.

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We love you Jesus,

You've been listening to the Generations Church podcast. If you'd like more

information about Generations Church, feel free to get in touch with us at info

at generationchurch.us or head over to our website.

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