The Fruit of Fearful Faith: Well-Being

16 The Fruit of Fearful Faith: Well-Being

I think it is crucial to see that we began this study of the fruit of fearful faith with the first fruit of worth, and we are concluding with the last fruit in the cluster: well-being. We saw at the beginning that most people live with an abiding sense of a lack of self-worth. Likewise, most of humanity lives with a lack of a sense of well-being. They seem to live under a foreboding dark cloud that overshadows their sense of happiness. As a result, they live their lives dominated by the wrong kind of fear.

Tragically, this negative fear and sense of a lack of well-being is often passed from one generation to the next. But, as we saw in some of the verses in the study of the fruit of wealth, God wants us to pass along to our children a positive fear, one that will result in a wholesome feeling of contentment.

Look with me at just a few verses that relate a reverential fear of God with a growing sense of family well-being.

• “Blessed are those who fear the Lord, who find great delight in his commands. Their children will be mighty in the land; the generation of the upright will be blessed” (Psalm 112:1–2). • “Blessed are all who fear the Lord, who walk in obe-

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dience to him. You will eat the fruit of your labor; blessings and prosperity will be yours. Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table. Yes, this will be the blessing for the man who fears the

Lord” (Psalm 128:1–4). • “Whoever fears the Lord has a secure fortress, and for their children it will be a refuge” (Proverbs 14:26). • “All your children will be taught by the Lord, and great will be their peace. In righteousness you will be established: tyranny will be far from you; you will have nothing to fear. . . . And it is I who have created the destroyer to wreak havoc; no weapon forged against you will prevail . . . This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord” (Isaiah 54:13–17).

There is another crucial component of this fruit of fearful faith, one that desperately needs to ripen in most people’s lives. It has to do with a sense of well-being concerning their own death. It is impossible to have an abiding sense of well-being when we have not squarely faced the subject of our own mortality. Unquestionably, most of the human family lives with the wrong kind of a fear of death. And as the old expression goes, “you are not really ready to live until you are ready to die.”

It would be impossible, then, for a person to have an abiding sense of well-being without a sense of victory over his fear of death. The words of the psalmist David echo the secret death fears in most people’s hearts:

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My heart is in anguish within me; the terrors of death have fallen on me. Fear and trembling have beset me; horror has overwhelmed me. I said, “Oh, that I had the wings of a dove! I would fly away and be at rest. I would flee far away and stay in the desert; I would hurry to my place of shelter, far from the tempest and storm” (Psalm 55:4–8).

But there is only one place where we can flee in this life and find shelter from our fear of death—to the Lord Jesus! Among other things, He came to defeat our lifelong enemy, which is death. The writer of Hebrews reminded us of that in these words:

Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil—and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death (Hebrews 2:14–15).

Once we realize that the Lord Jesus, through His death, burial, and resurrection, has removed the sinful stinger of death, then we can cry out with Paul, “Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:57). And that victory only becomes ours through faith in His resurrection, which is proof positive of His victory over death and the grave.

Concerning Christ’s victory over death, I have these words from Isaac Watts written in the back of my Bible:

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Hosanna to the Prince of Light Who clothed Himself in clay, Entered the iron gates of death, And tore the bars away! Death is no more the king of dread, Since our Immanuel rose; He took the tyrant’s sting away, And spoiled our hellish foes!

There’s only one adequate faith response to those resurrection truths: “Hallelujah!”

But unless we are a part of that terminal generation that lives until His Second Coming, we will each still have to face physical death. However, our Good Shepherd has already gone there before us and will likewise lead us victoriously through death by the power of His resurrection. David sings of this victory in what is perhaps the most familiar and favored verses of the Bible: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me” (Psalm 23:4 kjv).

Also, just like we still have to face physical death as part of living in a sinful and fallen world, we also have to face trials, testing, and tribulations. But whatever the nature of our times of trial and testing, our fear of the Lord and His unfailing love for us will see us through. Listen again to David as he sings for us songs of spiritual well-being:

• “How abundant are the good things that you have stored up for those who fear you, that you bestow in the sight of all, on those who take refuge in you. In

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the shelter of your presence you hide them from all human intrigues; you keep them safe in your dwelling from accusing tongues. . . . Love the Lord, all his faithful people! The Lord preserves those who are true to him, but the proud he pays back in full. Be strong and take heart, all you who hope in the Lord” (Psalm 31:19–24). • “No king is saved by the size of his army; no warrior escapes by his great strength. A horse is a vain hope for deliverance; despite all its great strength it cannot save. But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love, to deliver them from death and keep them alive in famine. We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in His holy name. May your unfailing love be with us, Lord, even as we put our hope in you” (Psalm 33:16–22). • “Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him. Fear the Lord, you his holy people, for those who fear him lack nothing.

The lions may grow weak and hungry, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing” (Psalm 34:8–9). • “God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging” (Psalm 46:1–3). • “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God, whose word I praise—in God I trust and am not afraid.

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What can mere mortals do to me?” (Psalm 56:3–4). • “You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday” (Psalm 91:5–6). • “Surely the righteous will never be shaken; they will be remembered forever. They will have no fear of bad news; their hearts are steadfast, trusting in the

Lord. Their hearts are secure, they will have no fear; in the end they will look in triumph on their foes.

They have freely scattered their gifts to the poor, their righteousness endures forever” (Psalm 112:6–9).

Likewise, the prophet Isaiah exhorts us to fear God and fear nothing else:

• “This is what the Lord says . . . ‘Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. When you pass through the waters,

I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior’” (Isaiah 43:1–3). • “Strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way; say to those with fearful hearts, ‘Be strong, do not fear; your God will come, he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you’” (Isaiah 35:3–4).

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Therefore, whatever the trials and tribulations we may face in life, we need to learn to rest in God’s unfailing love for us. The more we have a loving fear of Him, the more we are able to rest in His unfailing love for us. Then, like Moses facing the encroaching Egyptian army, we can let the Lord fight for us. As our fears cry out to us, we can echo the words of Moses when he answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still” (Exodus 14:13–14).

Let me conclude our study of this last fruit of fearful faith with a great exhortation from the wisdom of Solomon: “The fear of the Lord adds length to life, but the years of the wicked are cut short” (Proverbs 10:27).

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