What To Do With Our Fears
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Psalms 3:1-8: “A Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son. O LORD, how many are my foes! Many are rising against me; 2 many are saying of my soul, there is no salvation for him in God. Selah. 3 But you, O LORD, are a shield about me, my glory, and the lifter of my head. 4 I cried aloud to the LORD, and he answered me from his holy hill. Selah.”
We’re beginning a short series today on the Psalms which we’ll be in for the next six to eight weeks. We want to draw out several of the common themes and experiences of the human heart that often trouble us as followers of Jesus.
Fear, anger, doubt, tears, guilt and depression are all emotions that we’ve experienced and will experience. Some, even today, may feel completely overwhelmed by one or several of these emotions. The challenge for us as God’s people is not IF you’ll struggle with these, it’s HOW you’ll struggle that makes all the difference.
The difficulty with religion in general and Western Christianity in specific is its lack of desire to deal biblically and faithfully with our emotive life.
In a more traditional church or family, emotions are dangerous and the instinctive goal is to stuff them down by force of will and master them by exerting great energy to try and suppress them. It is viewed as a kind of step of maturity to not express your emotions in a more traditional community. This is why Psalms can be so startling to us because the honesty in these poems and songs are a shock to our religious upbringing.
There are probably a number of you that would like to sit down with David and counsel him on the proper emotional etiquette in the church and help him reign in his emotions for his own good and for the sake of the cheeks and teeth of his enemies. We want to tell him that he shouldn’t be angry and maybe he should switch to decaf, buy some aromatherapy, and play some soundscape music of a bubbling brook.
In a more progressive family that lives in the cultural moment, we assume we’re in touch with our emotions and are quite proud of how we express them. We make “emotional honesty” a badge of honor that we wear proudly, as if emotions themselves are the greatest good and the goal of our maturity.
But the Psalms do neither with emotions. They neither stuff them down to control them, nor act is if they are most important. The Psalms show us another way, a different way, not just a middle point between a traditional or modern view.
The Psalms are intense, vivid, raw, and very emotionally charged, but they don’t idolize these feelings and make them into a god we’re forced to serve. In these songs, we’re taught to not stuff them down nor bow to them. We’re not to deny them nor vent them.
Instead, what we’re going to learn over the next few weeks is that we’re to be gospeling them. In other words, we need to be as honest with God about our emotions as David was, but as willing to bring these emotions to God as David was.
This doesn’t mean we simply parrot some script to God without really believing the truth, it means that we pour these emotions out in the presence of God and deal honestly with them in prayer.
David has armies of soldiers pursuing him to destroy him. Verse six says that it’s many thousands who are hunting him and want him dead. Yet he is able to say in the midst of this incredible threat, “I will not be afraid.” So, we look to David and ask what it the world it was that David believed that helped him be so honest and yet deal so effectively with his fear.
Fear has a History
When God created the earth, fear didn’t exist. In
Then something happened that ruined everything; they believed the lies of the liar and now instead of seeing God with eyes of faith, they were suddenly seeing Him with eyes of fear.
Genesis 3:8-10: “And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, ‘Where are you?’ 10 And he said, ‘I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.’”
Instead of God’s voice being one of fellowship and trust that drew them to Him, His voice became one of dread and fear that caused them to run from Him. The shame of their sin produced a fear of His voice. Instead of finding their freedom in their Father, they attempted to find it on their own and became slaves to fear.
All confidence was lost. All assurance of their acceptance was lost. All the peace and joy they enjoyed with God, each other, and God’s beautiful world was now bent and turned into doubt, insecurity, and fear.
Simply put, sin produced fear. It has a history of which we need to be aware.
And fear is the most primal emotion for humans. Think of our first emotional response as we are taken from the warmth and safety of our mother’s womb, buck naked, spanked, flipped upside down with suckers plunged into our nostrils and how we responded—confusion and a pretty deep cry of fear. And as we grow, we are faced continuously with things that cause us to fear.
I’m not speaking about the kind of fear that increases our adrenaline and gets our autonomic nervous system firing so that we focus and move quickly as a response to danger. God designed our body to respond to adrenaline in this way.
I’m speaking about the kind of fear that is different from an impulsive reaction to jump out of the way of a speeding car. The kind of fear I’m talking about is found in the heart. It’s the kind of fear birthed from believing a lie instead of the truth.
So, let’s look at how David deals with this kind of fear and learn how we can have the confidence and faith he does.
Two Threats, One Response
Verse 1: “A Psalm of David, when he fled from Absalom his son. O LORD, how many are my foes! Many are rising against me;”
The first temptation to fear is found in verse one. David’s son, Absalom, has turned the hearts of men in
This is the worst of treachery, the worst of betrayal because it is by the hand of his son. So David and some of his followers flee into the desert to hide. Absalom sends thousands after him to capture and kill him. So David isn’t being paranoid; he’s experiencing real danger and a real threat to take his life and the life of his loved ones.
He’s being physically threatened and his well being is being attacked.
For many of us, the idea of physically being harmed, whether by fearing someone who can hurt us when we’re alone or fearing the call from the doctor that the results are back and it is cancer, is overwhelming.
It may be the fear of loss of provision because of the possibility of losing your job, or the fear of harm to your loved ones, your spouse, your parents or your children.
Because these are definable and specific fears, even if those fears have utterly paralyzed you, most will tell you that it’s natural to worry and be fearful about these things. You may even hear, “It just shows you care.”
Really? Is that how we’re supposed to deal with our fears of physical harm or well-being? Continue in them and allow them to dominate our thoughts and emotions?
I don’t think it’s simply a matter of showing your love for these things, I think it’s more sinister than this. The reason we fear for ourselves physically is because we don’t believe that our Father loves and cares for us more than we can. So we try to compensate and we can’t rest because we don’t really believe He’s either interested in us or knows what is best for us, even if it means allowing some physical harm to come.
In other words, we can’t rest because we think we have to control what happens. We have to admit before God that we don’t trust Him, His love, His provision and His parenting over our lives.
This is a significant fear. But there is a fear that is deeper still. Verse 2 shows us what that is.
Verse 2: “many are saying of my soul, there is no salvation for him in God. Selah.”
David admits that he has thousands following him to kill him, but the greater threat, the greater fear that has the potential to not simply paralyze us, but to bring us to such despair we are willing to give up, is found in this verse.
They are treating David as if he’s another mad king like Saul. King Saul had strayed from God and so God removed His hand from Him, withdrew His Spirit and eventually took away his crown. Saul’s identity was found in being a king and not in his God, so God let him live out that identity until it destroyed him.
They are doing more than simply threatening David’s body; they’re attacking his very identity. They’re claiming that God will not save him, that God has abandoned him, that God is not for him, that his sin will not be covered by God’s grace, that he’s not really a child of his Father.
If you read about David’s life and sin, you can see why they might say what they did. He had an affair with Bathsheba, then he had her husband, Uriah the Hittite, one his mighty men, killed to cover up his sin. He committed terrible sin. And like Satan, they stand as accusers of his sin and try and undermine the forgiveness he’s been given. This attack is at the core of his being, which is why David says they are saying of his soul, his center of existence, the deepest part of his being.
This kind of fear is often less definable for us than even for David. David realized what was going on and so it allowed him to fight against it with faith. But for most of us, we’re not aware of the war that’s being waged and how it is attacking us from within.
When we develop a habit and pattern of disbelief that God is bigger than our definable, specific fears, we begin to experience a kind of general fear that stays with us.
You see, when it is specific and definable, you know what it is and when it’s happening. But when you allow fear to shape you, it becomes less and less definable and it stays longer and longer until it becomes anxiety.
It is a fear that keeps us worried, jumpy, concerned and restless. It is a deeper kind of fear. It is when our very existence and security is attacked. It’s general, non-specific. It doesn’t go away. You’re constantly anxious, and because it is constant you begin to physically and emotionally fall apart.
Anxiety comes when something that we’ve put our real trust and security in that defines our identity is shaky and we fear losing it.
This is why we’re up at night and can’t figure out why we can’t sleep. This is why we’re touchy and irritable and don’t know why. This is why we feel a knot in our stomach but when asked what’s wrong we don’t know how to answer.
It’s like a constant drizzle on our soul that causes it to mildew. Anxiety is what we feel when our very soul, our very existence is threatened.
It is more than our physical circumstances. This is why, no matter how many things we possess to make our lives more comfortable, no matter how nice
What happens when we’re worried and fearful is that our body thinks something is about to happen, some impending danger, so it releases more adrenaline into our system and our autonomic nervous system is on heightened alert for prolonged periods of time until we develop a nervous system problems and adrenal problems. We are not physically meant to continually be “on” like this.
So, the great solution is to simply medicate it away, even though the drug becomes less and less effective over time and we’re back to square one. It’s like putting a band-aid over cancer. And here we are, in perhaps the nicest place with the nicest weather in the country, and yet we’re fearful and anxious and unable to truly rest.
This is because it isn’t our surroundings that are the problem; it’s our soul.
Also, this kind of fear actually debilitates you and causes you to freeze up more and more until you feel less able to respond and less hopeful things will ever change. It’s a self-feeding loop. The longer you remain anxious, the less able you are to change, the more you feel helpless, the more anxious you become.
We multiply the problem of fear when we regularly disbelieve that our God is bigger and stronger.
This kind of threat attacks our sense of self. It attacks who we believe we are.
How does David fight this fear monster that is grabbing him by the throat and trying to lift him off of his feet?
David fights by remembering three things and then he voices them out loud to God in prayer. In the same way, we need to remember the three things and check to see what they’re made of.
Three Things to Check When We Fear
Verse 3a: “But you, O Lord, are my shield about me…”
1) Check Your Shield
He tells God what is happening, he acknowledges the threats and the potential fears, he doesn’t ignore them. And most importantly, he turns from fixing his eyes upon the problem and instead places them upon what He knows about God.
He begins with the greatest words, “But you…” No matter what is going on, no matter what your current fears are, you are able to turn and begin with the same words, “But you, O Lord.”
There were two kinds of shields used in battle during this time. One was a small shield that was used for defense. You would strap it on your forearm and then, depending on your skill, you were able to defend from the enemy’s strikes. It was an effective defense, but it did no good if you were weak.
The other shield was a large shield that went around a group of soldiers and it covered them from the top, front, sides and back. It went all around them. This shield wasn’t used for defense; it was used to follow your general or captain to besiege a fortress. It was used for offense. It protected from 300-pound rocks, arrows, and anything else that could be thrown from the walls of a fortress.
The effectiveness of this shield wasn’t dependent upon the skill of the soldier. This shield was not a shield to get you away from danger; it was a shield that was only good when taken into danger. If you wanted to run away, then a small portable shield was good. If you wanted to storm a tower, you needed something more substantial.
I think most of us are afraid because we try to use God as a small portable shield that we can hang up on our walls and look at after we’ve run from our fears and danger. If our protection is dependent upon our skill and strength, than we have much to fear.
But if God is more than a small shield, bigger than what our arms can carry, then His protection is best when we are moving forward and following Him into danger. This shield isn’t effective moving backwards.
I remember being a little boy and my dad taking me to a haunted house during Halloween. I put on a brave face going into the place, but as soon as the place went dark, and strobe lights kicked in, and I heard the first scream, I about filled my shoes with more than my feet. My first reaction was to immediately grab the back of my father’s jacket. I closed my eyes, and followed him deeper into the haunted house. As soon as the first dudes started jumping out and scaring people, I wanted to run backwards as fast as I could. The problem is, if I did, I’d have to let go of my only security which was my death grip on dad’s coat. I held on to that thing, for what felt like eternity. But I knew if I let go, if I separated myself from him for just a moment, I would be paralyzed in fear. And even though it seemed to get worse at every step, as long as I was connected to him, I knew I’d be ok.
I look back on that experience now and realize that every time I’ve thought about that incident since it happened, I’ve focused on the fear I felt and the grip on my dad’s jacket. But as I think back on it today, I realize that what kept me was not my courage (that was gone in seconds), nor my grip, as hard as I may have held. What made me confident I’d be ok was a deep and profound trust that my dad was stronger and tougher than the scariest monster around the darkest corner. I knew that he would never let one of them get me or hurt me. And I knew he would get me through it to the other side. It wasn’t a deeply intellectual thing, it didn’t have to be. I simply knew my dad and that was that! My dad was stronger than my greatest fear in the moment.
Do you remember the movie Crash? What a great and complex film. There is a scene that brings tears to my eyes every time I see it. It’s the scene where Michael, the locksmith, and Lara his daughter are talking in her bedroom. He comes home to find her hiding under her bed, frightened. They moved from a neighborhood that was pretty bad. At one point a bullet came through her window and she has been afraid ever since, even though they moved to a nicer neighborhood.
The dad, in one of the greatest scenes of a dad being a great dad, tells her that when he was a little boy he was given a magic cape to put around his neck so that he was no longer afraid. He asked her if she wanted it as a late birthday gift and she said yes, so he pretended to tie it around her neck and told her that now that she has it, she doesn’t have to be afraid anymore. You can tell this dad really loves his little girl with how gentle and patient he is. He wants her to come out from hiding under her bed and realizes the only way to do so is to give her a gift that she will believe is bigger than her fear of a stray bullet.
I was thinking about that and realized that that is exactly what we’re doing with one another. We’re reminding each other that our Father is stronger than the scariest monsters in our lives, around the darkest corners, and that because we are now His children, He gives us this incredible gift of love so that we no longer have to be afraid. We no longer have to hide. His perfect love casts out all fear.
What small shields are defending you right now that are failing? Are you willing to trust your general to take you into battle so that your enemies will be defeated? If not, you’ll always be running, you’ll always be hiding, and you will never really sense the safety and protection of having God protect you and shield you.
Second, we not only need to check our shields, we need to check our glory.
Verse 3b: “…my glory…”
2) Check Your Glory
David has exchanged his glory for a greater glory that is now his. This is why David is saying you are “my glory.” It’s personal. The only glory David has is God.
Don’t you see? David has utterly failed. All those other things that promised him glory and significance are gone. He’s failed as a husband. He’s failed as a parent. He’s failed as a king. He’s failed as a child of God. Anything that would have given him an identity in his own strength has been shattered.
David has come to realize that there is nothing in himself that will ever keep his identity secure. There is nothing he can do to ever secure himself. David had once placed his glory in these things and has learned that they utterly failed him.
Sin is replacing the glory of God for some other thing, some other ultimate, even something that is good. But redemption is when that false glory is replaced by God’s glory and we exchange the cheap, knock-off copy for the real thing. When we exchange these lesser glories for the true glory, we experience what David experienced, we can say, “you are my glory.”
Our problem emotions, like fear, are a kind of alarm for us to wake up and see the danger of what we’ve made more significant than God.
Take a glass of polluted water, for example; if I wanted to empty the glass of the water so that it couldn’t be refilled, what would I need to do? I’d have to do more than simply empty it. I’d have to fill the glass with something heavier than the water, like sand or something similar. As I add the heavier substance to the water, it sinks to the bottom of the glass and the water begins to pour out of the top. This happens until the glass is filled with the substance and the polluted water is slowly pushed out of the glass.
This is your heart. The pollution is sinful fear and anxiety and instead of simply emptying our hearts, what’s needed is something heavier, something weightier, something permanent, something better than sin, more beautiful than our fears, and more powerful than our anxiety.
That’s what glory is. It is kâbôd, which is the Hebrew word for heavy or weighty, significant and permanent.
Most of our fears and anxieties feel like an invisible weight being placed upon our chests. We can’t see it, we may not even be able to explain what it is, but we know it’s there. It’s like a ghost, but this ghost weighs a ton and is crushing us.
Have you put your glory in something that will die? Is it permanent?
What is it that you’re turning to as your glory that has failed to be weighty enough to chase away your fears and anxiety?
Verse 3c: “…and the lifter of my head”
3) Check Your Vision
What are you staring at? I don’t mean right now, I mean, what is the thing that you’ve been looking at, focusing upon when fear comes? Do you keep looking down, keep looking to yourself? Do you keep feeling insecure and hopeless that things will change?
Our heads need to be lifted.
To lift David’s head means to lift him from sorrow and despair to boldness and confidence. It also means that He is David’s joy and approval. When your head is bowed it’s often because of mourning or guilt. But God deals with both his sorrow and his acceptance.
David doesn’t lift his own head in pride, the Lord is the lifter of his head. It is his Father’s hand than cups his chin in His hand and brings David’s head up to look at Him with joy and approval.
What have you set the eyes of your heart upon that keeps failing you? Are you willing to looking into the only eyes of the universe that matter and have already told you that He loves you and you have nothing to fear?
But how did God lift David’s head? How is his sorrow and despair turned into confidence and joy? Verse 4 tells us.
God’s Solution to Our Fear
Verse 4: “I cried and He answered me from His holy hill.”
Are you willing to cry out to God? Are you willing to hear His answer and believe that it is true? If so, like David, he will answer you from His holy hill.
What is the holy hill?
Genesis 15:1: “After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: ‘Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.’”
Genesis 15:8-10: “But he said, ‘O Lord GOD, how am I to know that I shall possess it?’ 9 He said to him, ‘Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.’ 10 And he brought him all these, cut them in half, and laid each half over against the other. But he did not cut the birds in half.”
Hebrews 10:19-23: “Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.”
The Results of Believing Our Redemption
Verses 5-6: “I lay down and slept; I woke again, for the LORD sustained me. 6 I will not be afraid of many thousands of people who have set themselves against me all around.”
God’s Victory Over Our Enemies is Our Salvation
Verses 7-8: “Arise, O LORD! Save me, O my God! For you strike all my enemies on the cheek; you break the teeth of the wicked. 8 Salvation belongs to the LORD; your blessing be on your people! Selah.”
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