Do Not Fear

But now thus says the Lord, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,and the flame shall not consume you.

For I am the Lord your God,the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.

Isaiah 43:1-3 (ESV)

Our pastor is taking us through the book of Genesis in our Sunday morning worship. In the last few weeks, we've been focusing on the life of Abraham. As we gone through the events in Abraham's life, I've been impressed with how human Abraham was. He had his ups and downs, mistakes, failures, victories and blessings, and the great Abraham experienced fear. In Genesis 15:1, God said to Abraham "Fear not, I am your shield and your great reward." Since God told Abraham not to fear, he must have been afraid.

This past week, my daughter was telling me about the irrational behavior of the parent of one of her friends. She could not understand why the parent was behaving in such a ridiculous manner. As I thought about it for a moment, I responded, "This person is afraid, and it is fear that is driving them to be irrational. The person is not trusting God.

As I've thought about Abraham, the irrational parent and me, I realize that one of the greatest hindrances we have in our Christian life is fear, and we fear because we do not know or trust our God.

God understands this about us, and He assures us with His promise that He will not fail us. And as we were reminded this morning, God came through on His promise to Abraham and to us, by giving us Jesus Christ and redeeming us. We do not need to fear.