Faith = Fear

One of the most common phrases I have heard during the COVID-19 pandemic has been “faith over fear”. I have seen masks worn by politicians with this phrase. I have seen signs outside businesses and churches with the phrase. I have seen social media posts with this phrase, and the majority of the time it has come from men and women who also claim to be Christian. The phrase has come in response to the various restrictions implemented during the pandemic. The primary restrictions being masks and social distancing. The idea behind the phrase is that one trusts God, thus is choosing to live by faith in God and not by fear in relation to this virus. The opposite would mean that those who are wearing masks and distancing are living in fear and not by faith. But what if the one who lives by the motto “faith over fear” is not actually living by faith? What if that motto is actually revealing that the opposite is true for the person who claims it?

For the sake of this post, I am limiting my argument to those who claim to be Christians. I am sure there are many who have said this motto, and they mean something entirely different than faith in God. The many I know who say this also claim to be Christian, and since I am a pastor I will focus my argument there. That being said, let’s move on.

As Christians, we are to live our lives by faith in the Son of God (Jesus), who loved us and gave himself for us (Galatians 2:20). So it is important that we understand what it means to live our lives by faith in the Son of God. Faith for many has been reduced to something foreign to the Bible. When someone makes the argument that they trust God with the virus so they won’t wear a mask, they are not talking about what the Bible calls living by faith. Living by faith does not mean living a life of risks and trusting God to protect you. Let me take you to Matthew 4 real quick. In Matthew 4, Jesus is in the wilderness and being tempted by Satan. In the second temptation, found in verses 5-7, Satan takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple and says to Jesus in verses 6-7, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’ and, ‘On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’” So just to make sure we all get what’s happening here. Satan tells Jesus to throw himself off the temple, and then quotes Psalm 91:11-12. This is a test to see if Jesus really is the Son of God, and Satan is accurately quoting the Scriptures. Do not miss that! Jesus responds and says, “Again, it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’” Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 6:16, which is a reference to Israel putting God to the test in the wilderness. Jesus could have jumped here and trusted God to keep his promise and prove he was God’s Son. Why didn’t Jesus trust God here, right?! He did, and that’s why he didn’t jump. True faith will not put God to the test, thus living by faith means not living a life of putting God to the test.

If you live in a home surrounded on every side by a wild fire, it is not living by faith to remain in the home trusting God when a helicopter is outside offering you safe passage out of the fire. That would be putting God to the test. Choosing to disregard public health restrictions in a global pandemic caused by an aerosolized respiratory virus is not living by faith. It’s putting God to the test, and reveals that one is not living by faith. Now, one may argue here that they can be living by faith because they trust God either way with their life. They may say, “My life belongs to Jesus, so if I live or die I will be with him forever. I will live my life, and if the Lord wants me to catch COVID and die then his will be done.” For this person, faith over fear means that they are not going to let a virus keep them from living their lives and are OK with the prospect of death, should that be God’s will. I’ll be honest, this is a hard one to push back against. At least when we consider a surface reading of it. But dig a little deeper, and we will see that even this is not living by faith. How so?

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 teaches us that we are not our own, but we have been bought with a price. This is repeated in 1 Corinthians 7:23. We who trust in Jesus Christ alone for salvation are not our own. We now belong to Jesus. This means that we are identified with Christ, and thus our lives should become more and more like Jesus. You are not your own, which means you are no longer to live according to your will and your way. To live our lives by faith in Jesus means we live our lives in obedience to Jesus. This is literally what he has commanded the church to do in the Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20. We are commissioned to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and teach them to obey all he has commanded us. Did you get that last line? Jesus called us to teach them to obey all that he has commanded us. This is what it means to live by faith in Jesus. It doesn’t just mean we believe who he says he is, and believe what he has done for us in his death and resurrection, but also that because we do believe who he is and what he has done we now obey him in faith. We live according to his will and way because we trust that He is the Son of God. So to make the claim that you are living by faith because your life belongs to Jesus and you trust him with whatever, reduces the Christian faith to life after death. It reduces the Christian faith to a life of just getting by until you die. And worst yet, it reduces the Christian faith to a self-centered life in which you only see your life in terms of yourself. While claiming to belong to Jesus, you actually live a life that says something opposite of that. Further evidence that this is not living by faith is the fact that when one lives this way they clearly do not have in view the global, life rescuing mission of Jesus on their hearts and minds. Because to have this in view would cause one to do all they can to not endanger the lives of those who are without Christ. They would be seeking their good holistically (body, mind, heart, and soul).

Now, I am going to say something that is going to seem strange. Living by faith is living by fear. Faith equals fear. OK, hang with me here. Let’s look at Ecclesiastes 12:13. It says, “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.” This may seem like a strange verse to bring into this post, but let me explain it. This is how Solomon ends the book of Ecclesiastes. After all that has been looked at and said, he states that the whole duty of mankind is the fear God and keep his commandments. The phrase “the whole duty of man” literally translated means “whole mankind”. The idea here is that this is what wholeness looks like for mankind. If we were truly whole or complete or perfect, we would fear God and keep his commandments. Fearing God is reverence. It is not living in terror or being afraid of him. When we fear God we keep his commandments. Fear and faith go together in this sense. We are not whole right now, but Jesus is making us whole by the Holy Spirit. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge (Psalm 111:10, Proverbs 1:7; 9:10; and 15:33). To fear the Lord is to live according to his will and his way in all of life. This is what it means to live by faith. It means we live by fear. Because we believe God is God and we are not, we submit our lives to him in faith trusting his ways are right and good and just. Because we believe that He has rescued us in the sending of his Son, Jesus, to die on the cross for our sins and raised him to life we live in faithful obedience to all that Jesus has commanded us. Because he has given us the Holy Spirit, we live in humble submission to the Spirit of God who leads us in the way of Jesus. The evidence of our life of faith is seen in our humble submission to King Jesus in all of life. It is seen in our obedience to Jesus, and in our becoming like Jesus.

So Jesus taught us that the second greatest commandment is to love our neighbor as ourselves (Matthew 22:36-40). Paul writes in Galatians 5:13-14, “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” In 1 Corinthians 10:23-24, Paul writes, “‘All things are lawful for me,’ but not all things are helpful. ‘All things are lawful for me,’ but not all things build up. Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor.” I could keep adding verse after verse that speak to what it means to love our neighbor and one another as ourselves. This is a commandment to all Christians that we are to obey in faithful submission to Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit. Thus, when we live by faith in Jesus, we seek the greatest good for our neighbors. We lay down our lives, our rights, and our freedoms, just like Jesus did, for the sake of the “other”. To claim “faith over fear” and not do everything you can to serve others in a global pandemic is the opposite of faith. Not only is it putting God to the test, it is putting others at risk for the sake of your rights, your freedoms, and your good. It is the same as claiming “all things are lawful” while neglecting that we are called not to use our freedom as a cover for evil, but to live as servants of God (1 Peter 2:16). When Peter writes to use our freedom to live as servants of God it is in the context of calling the church to be subject, for the Lords’ sake, to every human institution, whether emperors or governors (1 Peter 2:13).

It is deeply concerning when those who claim Christ, who claim faith over fear, live counter to what Jesus has called us to in his word. To truly live by faith means that we deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and follow Jesus. We do not put God to the test. We do not live for ourselves. We do not put others at risk for our own gain. Rather, we use our freedom in Jesus to lay down our freedoms and rights and choose to love and serve others seeking their greatest, holistic good. Like the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37 teaches us, it’s not about who our neighbor is but about us being the neighbor. The one who was the neighbor to the man who was beaten and left for dead, was the Samaritan who cleaned the man up, placed him on his donkey, used his own money to put the man up in an inn and care for him, and then left extra money at the desk to cover anything else the man may need. The Samaritan saw the man in need, moved toward him, and gave of his own for the good of the other. Jesus is the Good Samaritan, and this is what we’re to be like on this earth. May we live by faith, which is living by fear in God who has loved us and given us Son, Jesus, for us. And this we can and will do by the power of the Holy Spirit whom we have been given so we may truly live as Christ in this world.

Bryan Padgett