Fear of Man
Us 21st century Christians too often feel the need to appeal to our own authority and logic on Biblical truth when it comes to interacting with the world. Rather than appeal to the highest authority of scripture, we tend to get embarrassed by culture’s hatred toward God and end up explaining His standards away in order to seem diplomatic and easy going. It would seem we either resent the truth that God has revealed, or we’re ashamed of Him, or worse - that we don’t actually believe it. That we’re just going through the motions in hopes that it works out for us in eternity in case it all exists.
Admittedly, the fear of man is a major factor for me. Many know I’ve said some hard-edged stuff from time to time, always as gracious as possible, but nobody WANTS to be attacked and disliked unless they’re some kind of masochist, which I’m not! Upsetting people or risking having people you care about look down on you, even for the sake of truth in a loving a way, is a troubling and stressful proposition. The hard part is, we know that even the truth in a loving way is super controversial today, so (and I’m guilty) we either downplay it or even just remove it altogether to keep a good reputation in the eyes of those who disagree.
Now, this doesn’t mean we just come in like a wrecking ball into every interaction we have. We’ve seen that various places - and no, mishandling ourselves and then patting ourselves on the back for being disliked isn’t the way to go. There are practical, Biblical ways to live this out in a way that doesn’t just automatically shut everybody off to God. We are to be at peace with others as far as it depends on us (Romans 12:8). But too often we opt for silence when there’s absolutely golden opportunities to speak and we confuse that for being loving. It’s a good thing to love unbelievers, but if our love for them causes us to avoid telling them God’s standard and the beauty of needing a Savior who died to give them eternal life do we really love them? Or do we just love ourselves?
Perhaps our barometer for what constitutes as eternal treasure is off. Perhaps we think never making waves is the goal. What’s better? Being nice and having everybody like you and then they die and go to hell thinking you were a super nice person, or risking relationship with people because you walked in God’s truth in a super gracious and loving way without compromise? Not arrogant or divisive, but humble, gentle, reasonable, and true without compromise. We must know and tell God’s eternal truth, even at the risk of people getting angry. We must believe the truth, know the truth, and proclaim the truth. Many of us today show resentment toward anything in scripture that isn’t directly benefiting us in a positive and eternal way.
But Oh! That we would understand that He commissioned His Christians to speak on His behalf to a dark world. We don’t understand things better than God, and we’re not making this stuff up as we go! We’re messengers of the eternal God of the universe. When we remove the truth from our conversations with culture, we are ultimately telling Him that we’re ashamed.
Let us be full of grace, full of truth, unwavering, anchored to scripture, ready to listen, ready to respond with heaven, and not fear what can be done since God is for us.
