“Be afraid . . . very afraid.”

Steve Brown: Be afraid, very afraid. Let's talk about it on Key Life.
Matthew: Welcome to Key Life. I'm Matthew, executive producer of the program. Our host is Steve Brown. He's an author and seminary professor who teaches that God's amazing grace is the key to a life of radical freedom, infectious joy, and surprising faithfulness to Christ.
Steve Brown: Thank you, Matthew. Hope you had a great weekend, and I hope your pastor's sermon was as good as my pastor's sermon. If you're just joining us, I had a book that came out recently. I'm going to keep doing this till I get it right. And I decided to spend some time on this broadcast on the themes of that book. Now, that doesn't mean you don't have to buy it. Key Life needs the money. I don't get anything for these books, and I need to make that clear. Years ago, I heard that Billy Graham didn't get anything for his books, and I thought that's a cool idea. All of it went into the ministry of the Billy Graham Association. I thought I can do that. I was probably smoking something at the time. I don't know. But for years, all of the royalties from anything I write and the honorariums from any place I speak go directly to Key Life. So, I'm not hustling bucks for myself, but for the ministry of Key Life. So, go buy it and give it to your friends. The title will tell you what it's about. God's not mad at you, confronting the lies of guilt and shame and fear and regret. And what I was saying before I so rudely interrupted myself is that on this broadcast, we've been looking at some of those lies and some of the themes that are in the book. And today, we're going to start with another one, and that is the lies that make us afraid. Before we do that, let's pray and then we'll study. Father, we come into your presence, and always surprised we're here. This doesn't make any sense. We're not good enough to be in your throne room. We're not kind enough, we're not merciful enough, we're not obedient enough, we're not faithful enough. But here we are in your presence. And that's amazing grace. It's because of your son and the cross. And it's because you were so kind to give us his righteousness. And so we come with joy, clothed in the righteousness of Christ. Father, you know everyone who's listening to this broadcast, the hard places and the soft places, the tears and the laughter, remind us of your sovereignty over all of it. That you're large and you're in charge. And then, Father, we pray for this broadcast and the one who teaches for giving him his sins cuz they're many. We would see Jesus and him only. And we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. If you've been listening, we've looked at a bunch of lies, the lies that confuse us, that define us, that cheat us, that exalt us, that test us, that discourage us, that divide us, that manipulate us. And we're going to look at a new lie starting today. We'll spend a week or two on it. And these this is the lie that terrifies us. And the lie is simple, be afraid. Be very afraid. And I have a text that's kind of a jump-off text, and then we'll be looking at other scripture as we look at this particular subject. Text is John 14:1. Jesus said, "Let not your heart be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me." In Franklin Roosevelt's 1933 inaugural address, he said, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." The president, of course, was trying to calm the fears about his fairly radical at one time, at that time, fairly radical New Deal economic programs. And he was right. Fear is a major cause of national economic failure, even greater than the economic policies themselves. What's happening is of less importance than what one believes is happening. Listen to me. Fear can destroy economies as much or more than anything else. Fear, by the way, can do the same with our lives. As Shakespeare's Caesar said, "Cowards die many times before their deaths. The valiant never taste death but once." That could be said about Christians with one provision. In Jesus, death died. I 've noticed that most of the things I feared in my life never happened. The unexpected caused the problem. I didn't see it coming. So, on top of my fears, I'm now afraid of what I don't know to fear. Something that will happen that I didn't expect. And so that makes me fearful. Not only of what I fear, but of other things that are a part of my life that come up and whack you on the side of the head, and you didn't expect it. So, I wrote about it in the book. We're going to confront some of the lies about our fears. You may be wondering how on earth someone who struggles with fear could write a chapter dealing with fear. That's because of a principle. I've mentioned it before. Never ask anybody about a serious or difficult issue unless that person knows and has experienced how difficult it really is. And that would make me your go-to guy in the area of fear. Fear is obviously an appropriate response to fearful situations. My boat is really small, and the ocean is really big. If the doctor gives me a cancer diagnosis, if I see out of control semi truck headed for my car, if a lion escapes from its cage in the zoo and heads for the ice cream parlor where I am, if someone's pointing a gun at me with the threat of pulling the trigger and I don't experience fear, I'm a fruitcake or high or drunk. As human beings, God gave us the gift of fear at creation. And we should be thankful for that gift. However, there are other fears. Other fears that come from lies that we believe. For instance, as Christians, we're often afraid of expressing our convictions lest we offend somebody. We're afraid of life's uncertainties, thinking that there isn't anything we can do to make it better. We fear and I could go on. We fear what people think about us. That we will be rejected and shamed and that we may not be good enough to deal with normal life. And as I said, I could go on and on and on, but there is so much we fear because of the untruths the Bible clearly teaches are untrue. I could give you some practical advice on dealing with fear. You can deal with fear by denying that there is anything to fear. That's difficult to pull off, but it's doable. I remember visiting a friend in the hospital and I asked if she was afraid. She said, "Are you crazy? This is a hospital, and people die in the hospital." She was right. People die in hospitals, and that's hard to ignore. There's a spurious belief in our culture that we create safe places where there is no need to fear. I hate to say this, but if you're in the safe places where you feel comfortable, you're in for an unpleasant surprise. Those places just don't exist. But I suppose that you can pretend that they do. When I was a young pastor, I often made the mistake of withholding information from people I loved and served so they could pretend that everything was good. I'll tell you a story about that tomorrow, but I'm running out of space. But we're going to be digging into the word and talking about the fear that some Christians experience and and don't have to simply because the Bible says fear not. I'll never leave you alone. I will come to you. Hey, you think about that. Amen.
Matthew: Thanks, Steve. That was Steve Brown continuing our series based on his new book, God's Not Mad at You. And today, we turned the page on a new chapter about the lies that make us afraid. If that connects for you like it does for me, then I hope you'll stick with us all this week. Question. What do you do when it feels like you can't take one more step? We talked about that recently with author Tish Harrison Warren on Steve Brown, etc. Tish said something really interesting, that spiritual droughts are a normal thing, and they aren't just something to grit your teeth and get through. We put that entire encouraging conversation on a CD, and we'll mail it to you for free. Just call us right now at 1-800-KEY-LIFE. That's 1-800-539-5433. You can also email [email protected] to order that CD or go to keylife.org/contact to find our mailing addresses for the US and Canada. Again, just ask for the absolutely free CD featuring Tish Harrison Warren. One last thing before you go. If you've been blessed by the work of Key Life, would you help share that blessing with others by giving as generously as you're able? Giving is easy. You can charge a gift on your credit card or include a gift in your envelope, or you can now give safely and securely by text. Just pick up your phone and text Key Life to 28950. Again, that's Key Life, one word or two, doesn't matter. Text that to 28950. If you can't give right now, that's all good. But if you think about it, please do pray for us, would you? Really appreciate it. Thanks. Key Life is a member of ECFA in the States and 4C in Canada, and Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.