I, even I, am he that comforteth you: who art thou, that thou shouldest be afraid of a man that shall die, and of the son of man which shall be made as grass; And forgettest the LORD thy maker, that hath stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and hast feared continually every day because of the fury of the oppressor, as if he were ready to destroy? and where is the fury of the oppressor?
— Isaiah 51:12-13
My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him for the fear wherewith he feared me, and was afraid before my name.
— Malachi 2:5
Therefore say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Although I have cast them far off among the heathen, and although I have scattered them among the countries, yet will I be to them as a little sanctuary in the countries where they shall come.
— Ezekiel 11:16
Wherein the Kinds and Nature of Fear are Opened, and Particularly the Distracting, Slavish Fears of Creatures, by John Flavel. The following contains Chapter Two of his work, “A Practical Treatise of Fear.”
Say ye not, A confederacy to all them to whom this people shall say a confederacy; neither fear ye their fear nor be afraid. 13. Sanctify the Lord of Hosts himself, and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread; 14. And he shall be for a, sanctuary.— Isa. 8:12, 13. and part of ver. 14
CHAPTER II
Sect. I. THERE is a threefold fear found in man, viz.
1. Natural.
2. Sinful.
3. Religious fear.
1. Natural fear, of which all are partakers that partake of the common nature, not one excepted.
Natural fear is the trouble or perturbation of mind, from the apprehension of approaching evil, or impending danger.
The word φεθος comes from a verb* that signifies flight; this is not always sinful, but it is always the fruit and consequent of sin. Since sin entered into our nature, there is no shaking off fear. No sooner had Adam transgressed but he feared and fled, hiding himself among the trees of thegarden, Gen. 3:8. When he had transgressed the covenant, he presently feared the execution of the curse: first he eats, then he hides; and this afflictive passion is from him transmitted, and derived to all his children.
To this natural fear it pleased our Lord Jesus Christ to subject himself in the days of his flesh; he was afraid, yea, he was sore amazed, Mark 14:33. for though his human nature was absolutely free from sin, yet he came in the “likeness of sinful flesh,” Rom. 8:3.
This fear creates great trouble and perturbation in the mind, 1 John 4:18. Fear hath torment; in proportion to the danger, is the fear; and in proportion to the fear, the trouble and distraction of the mind: if the fear be exceeding great, reason is displaced, and can conduct us no farther, as the Psalmist speaks of mariners in a storm, “they are at their wits end,” Psal. 107:27. or as it is varied in the* margin, all wisdom is swallowed up. And this is the meaning of Deut. 28:25. that they should go out against their enemies one way, and “flee before them seven ways,” i.e. so great shall be the fright and distraction, that they shall attempt now one way, then another, striving every way, but liking none; for fear so far betrays the succours of reason, that their† counsels are always in uncertainty, and at a loss, and the usual voice of a man in this condition is, I know not what to do, I know not which way to turn.
Evil is the object of fear, and the greater the evil is, the stronger the fear must needs be, and therefore the terrors of an awakened and terrified conscience must be allowed to be the greatest of terrors, because in that case a man hath to do with a great and terrible God, and is scared with apprehensions of his infinite and eternal wrath, than which, no evil is or can be greater. You see at what height Christ’s conflict wrought with it when it made him sweat as it were, great clots of blood. Of all temporal evils death is the greatest, and therefore Job calls it the King of terrors, Job 18:14. or the most terrible of terribles. Thuanus‡ relates two strange instances of the fear of death: “One of a certain captain who was so terrified with the fear of death, that he poured out a kind of bloody sweat from all parts of his body. Another is of a young man condemned for a small matter by|| Sixtus Quintus, who was so vehemently terrified with the fears of death, that he shed a kind of bloody tears.” These are strange and terrible effects of fear, but vastly short of what Christ felt and suffered, who grappled with a far greater evil than the terrors of death, even the wrath of an incensed God poured out, to the full, and that immediately upon him.
But yet evil, as evil, is rather the object of hatred than of fear, it must be an imminent or near approaching evil, which we see not how to escape or put by, that provokes fear, and rouses this lion. And therefore the saints in glory are perfectly freed from fear, because they are out of the reach of all danger: nor do we, that are here in the midst of evils, fear them till we see them approaching us, and we see not how to avoid them. To hear of fire, plague, or the sword in the Indies, doth not affright us, because the evil is so remote from us; it is far enough off, we are in no danger of it; but when it is in the town, much more when within our own dwellings, we tremble. Evil hurts us not by a simple apprehension of its nature, but of its union; and all propinquity is a degree of union, as a* learned divine speaks. And it is worth observation, that all carnal security is maintained by putting evils at a great distance from us, as it is noted of those secure sensualists, Amos 6:3. “They put far from them the evil day.” The meaning is not that they did, or could put the evil one minute farther from them in reality, but only by imagination and fancy: they shut their own eyes, and would not see it, lest it should give an unpleasing interruption to their mirth; and this is the reason why death puts the living into no more fear, because it is apprehended as remote, and at an undetermined distance, whereas if the precise time of death were known, especially if that time were near, it would greatly scar and terrify.
This is the nature of natural fear, the infelicity of nature, which we all groan under the effects of: it is in all the creatures in some degree; but among them all, none suffer more by it than man, for hereby he becomes his own tormentor; nor is any torment greater than this when it prevails in a high degree upon us. Indeed all constitutions and tempers admit not the same degrees of fear; some are naturally courageous and stout, like the lion for magnanimity and fortitude; others exceeding timorous and faint-hearted, like the hare or hart, one little dog will make a hundred of them flee before him. Luther was a man of great courage and presence of mind in dangers,† Melancthon very timorous and subject to despondency. Thus the difference betwixt them is expressed in one of Luther’s letters to him: “I am well nigh a secure spectator of things, and esteem not any thing these fierce and threatening Papists say. I much dislike those anxious cares, which, as thou writest, do almost consume thee.” There might be as great a stock of grace in one as in the other, but Melancthon’s grace had not the advantage of so stout and courageous a temper of body and mind as Luther’s had. Thus briefly of natural fear.
Sect II. There is a fear which is formally and intrinsically sinful, not only our infelicity, but our fault; not our simple affliction and burden, but our great evil and provocation; and such is the fear here dissuaded, called their fear, i.e. the fear wherewith carnal and unbelieving men do fear when dangers threaten them; and the sinfulness of it lies in five things.
1. In the spring and cause of it which is unbelief, and an unworthy distrust of God, when we dare not rely upon the security of a Divine promise, nor trust to God’s protection in the way of our duty. This was the very case of that people, Isa. 30:15. “Thus saith the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, in returning and rest shall ye be saved, in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength; and ye would not. But ye said, no, for we will flee upon horses; therefore ye shall flee: and we will ride upon the swift; therefore shall they that pursue you be swift. One thousand shall flee at the rebuke of one,” &c.
Thus stood the case: Sennacherib with a mighty host was ready-to invade them; this puts them into a fright; in this distress God assures them, by the mouth of his prophet, that in “returning and rest they should be saved, in quietness and confidence should be their strength.” The meaning is, never perplex yourselves with various counsels and projects to secure yourselves under the wings of Egypt or any other Protector, but with a composed, quiet and calm temper of mind, rest upon my power by faith, take my pro-anises for your security, this shall be your salvation and your strength, more effectual to your preservation than armies, garrisons, or any creature-defence in the world; one act of faith shall do you better service than Pharaoh and all his forces can do.
But ye said no, q. d. we dare not trust to that, a good horse will do us more service at such a time than a good promise; Egypt is a better security in their eye than Heaven. This is the fruit of gross infidelity. And as wicked men do thus forsake God, and cleave to the creature in the time of trouble, so there is found a spice of this distrustfulness of God, producing fear and trouble, in the best of men. It was in the disciples themselves, Matth. 8:26. “Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith?” A storm had befallen them at sea, and danger began to threaten them, and presently you find a storm within, their fears were more boisterous than the winds, and had more need of calming than the sea; and it was all from their unbelief, as Christ tells them; the less their faith, the greater their fear. If a man can but rely upon God in a promise, so far as he is enabled to believe, so far he will reckon himself well secured.* Illyricus, in his catalogue of the Witnesses, relates this remarkable passage of one Andreas Prolcs, a godly aged divine, who lived somewhat before Luther, and taught many points soundly, according to his light then. He was called to a Synod at Milan, and afterwards in the Lateran, where, opposing a proposition of the Pope about burdening the church with a new holiday, he was brought into much danger, and escaping very narrowly from Rome, he bought him a bow and weapons: but as he was riding, he began to bethink himself, that the cause was not his but God’s, and not to be maintained with sword and bow; and if it were, yet what could such a decrepit old man do with weapons? upon which he threw away his weapons, committed himself, his. cause, and his journey to God, relied upon his promises more than sword or bow, and came home safe, and afterwards died quietly in his bed.
2. The sinfulness of fear lies in the excess and immoderacy of it, when we fear more than we ought; for it may be truly said of our fears, as the Philosopher speaks of waters, difficile suis terminis continentur, it is hard to keep them within bounds; every bush is a bear, every petty trouble puts us into a fright; our fear exceeds the value and merit of the cause. It is a great sin to love or fear any creature above the rate of a creature, as if they were masters of all our temporal and eternal comforts. Thus when the men of Israel heard of the confederacy and conjunction of their enemies against them, the text saith, “their hearts were moved, as the trees “of the wood are moved with the wind,” Isa. 7:1. or as we use to say proverbially, like an aspine leaf: It is a sad sight to behold men shaking and quivering as the trees do on a windy day; yet thus did the house of David, partly through the remembrance of past calamities, but especially through incredulity in God’s protecting care in their present and future dangers; yea, this is too often the fault of good men in creature-fear as well as in creature-love, to transgress the due bounds of moderation. It is noted of Jacob, though a man of much faith, and one that had the sweetest encouragement to strengthen it, both from former experiences, and God’s gracious promises to be with him, yet when Esau was come nigh, he was “greatly afraid and distressed,” Gen. 32:7. It was but a little before, that God had graciously appeared to him, and sent a royal guard of angels to attend him, even two hosts or armies of angels, ver. 1, 2. and yet as soon as Esau approached him, he was afraid, yea greatly afraid, afraid and distressed, notwithstanding such an encouraging vision as this was.
3. The sinfulness of our fears lies in the inordinacy of them; to fear it more than we ought is bad enough, but to magnify its power above the power of a creature; to exalt the power of any creature by our fears, and give it such an ascendant over us, as it had an arbitrary and absolute dominion over us, or over our comforts, to do with them what it pleased; this is to put the creature out of its own class and rank, into the place of God, and is therefore a very sinful and evil fear.
To trust in any creature, as if it had the power of a God to help us, or to fear any creature, as if it had the power of a God to hurt us, is exceeding sinful, and highly provoking to God: This inordinate trust is taxed and condemned, in Isaiah 31:3. They would needs go down to Egypt for help, and trust in their horses and horsemen, because they were strong; i.e. in their opinion, they were able to secure them against all those dangers the prophet from the Lord’s own mouth had threatened them with: but, to take them off from this sinful and inordinate dependence on the creature, he tells them, ver. 3. “Now the Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses flesh, and not spirit: when the Lord “shall stretch forth his hand, both he that helpeth shall fall, and he that is holpen shall fall down, and they shall fall together.” q. d. It is a sinful and dangerous mistake for one creature to give that trust and dependence to another creature, which is due only to God; to look upon men as if they were gods, and horses as if they were spirits: all creatures, even the strongest, are but as the hop, the vine, or the ivy; if they clasp about the pole, the wall or the oak, they may be supported, as you may also by leaning upon God; but if they depend and entangle themselves one upon another, as you and the Egyptians do, you shall fail, and fall all together.
And, as one creature is apt inordinately and sinfully thus to trust and lean upon another, so there is as great a profaneness in the creatures inordinately to fear and dread each other, as if the creature feared were rather a god than a man, rather a spirit than flesh; and thus our fear magnifies and exalts the creature, and puts it, as it were, into the room and place of God. This was the sin which God rebuked in his own people, Isa. 51:12, 13. “I, even I, am he that comforteth thee: Who art thou, that thou shouldst be afraid of a man that shall die, and of the son of man who shall be made as grass? and forgettest the Lord thy maker,” &c. See how fear exalts man, and depresseth God; it thinks upon the noxious power of men so much, that it forgets the saving power of God, as if that stood for nothing: thus a mortal worm, that shall perish as the grass, eclipses the glory of the great God, that stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth.
And this was the evil against which Christ cautioned his own disciples, in Matth. 10:28. “Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell;” q. d. Have a care you never fear any man, be he armed with never so much power and rage: as if the power of making or marring you for ever were in his hands, as if you lay at the feet of his will and pleasure to be saved or ruined for ever: fear not him that can only touch your bodies, as if he could damn your souls; invest not any creature with the sovereign and incommunicable power of God.
4. The sinfulness of fear consists in the distracting influence it hath upon the hearts of men, whereby it discomposeth and unfits them for the discharge of their duties.
Fear sometimes puts men into such a hurry, and their thoughts into such disorder, that for the present they have scarce any succour or relief from their graces, or from their reason; for under an extraordinary fear both grace and reason, like the wheels of a watch, wound above its due height, stand still, and have no motion at all. It is rare to find a man of that largeness and constancy of heart and mind, in a day of fear, that was found in Jehoshaphat, 2 Chron. 20:2, 3. “Then there came some that told Jehoshaphat, saying, There cometh a great multitude against thee from beyond the sea, on this side Syria, and behold they be in Hazazon-Tamar, which is Engedi; and Jehoshaphat feared, and set himself to seek the Lord.” He set himself, i.e. he composed and fixed his heart for prayer in the time of so great a fright and terrible alarm: but it is rare to find such constancy and evenness of mind as this; in like cases it is with most in great frights, as the prophet describes the condition of the Jews, Isa. 22:2, 3. when the city of Jerusalem was besieged, and the enemy came under the walls of it; that which a little before was the joyous city, or as some read, the revelling city, is now in such a panic fear, that it is full of stirs and tumults, some run up to the tops of the houses, either to hide or bewail themselves, or take a view of the dreadful enemy without; others prevent the sword of the enemy, and die by fear before-hand, their own apprehensions of misery killed them before the sword of any other enemy once touched them; but you read of none that ran into their closets to seek the Lord; the city was full of stirs, but. not of prayers, alas, fear made them cry to the mountains, rather than to God, ver. 5. The best men find it hard to keep their thoughts from wandering, and their minds from distraction, in the greatest calm of peace, but a thousand times harder in the hurries and tumults of fear.
5. The sinfulness of fear consists in the power it hath to dispose and incline men to the use of sinful means to put by their danger, and to cast them into the hands and power of temptation. “The fear of man bringeth a snare,” Prov. 29:25. or puts and lays a snare before him: Satan spreads the net, and fear, like the stalking-horse, drives men right into it. It was fear which drew Abraham, that great believer, into the snare of dissimulation, to the great disparagement of religion; for it was somewhat an odd sight to see Abimelech, an Heathen, so schooling an Abraham for it, as he did, Gen. 20:9. And for the same evil you find God chiding his people, in Isa. 57:11. “And of whom hast thou been afraid, or feared, that thou hast lied, and hast not remembered me?” There is a double lie occasioned by fear, one in words, and another in deeds; hypocrisy is a lie done, a practical lie, and our church history abounds with sad examples of dissimulation through fear: it is Satan’s great engine to make his temptations victorious and successful with men.
Sect. III. There is an holy and laudable fear, a fear which is our treasure, not our torment; the chief ornament of the soul, its beauty and perfection, not its infelicity or sin, viz. the awful filial fear of God; natural fear is a pure and simple passion of the soul; sinful fear is the disordered and corrupt passion of the soul; but this is the natural passion sanctified, and thereby changed and baptized into the name and nature of a spiritual grace. This fear is also mentioned in my text, and prescribed as an antidote against, sinful fears; it devours carnal fears, as Moses’ serpent did those of the enchanters. It is one of the sorest judgments to be in the fear of man day and night, Deut. 28:65, 66, 67. and one of the sweetest mercies to be in the fear of God all the day long, Prov. 23:17. The fear of man shortens our days, Isa. 22:24. but the fear of the Lord prolongeth our days, Prov. 10:27. The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life, Prov. 14:27. But the fear of man a fountain of mischiefs and miseries: By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil, Prov. 16:6. but, by the fear of man men run themselves into evil, Prov. 29:25.
This fear is a gracious habit or principle planted by God in the soul, whereby the soul is kept under an holy awe of the eye of God, and from thence is inclined to perform and do what pleaseth him, and to shun and avoid whatsoever he forbids and hates.
1. It is planted in the soul as a permanent and fixed habit; it is not of the natural growth and production of man’s heart, but of supernatural, infusion and implantation, Jer. 32:40. “I will put my fear into their inward parts.” To fear man is natural, but to fear God is wholly supernatural.
2. This gracious fear puts the soul under the awe of God’s eye, Psal. 119:161. “My heart standeth in awe of thy word.” It is the reproach of the servants of men to be eye-servants, but it is the praise and honour of God’s servants to be so.
3. This respect to the eye of God inclines them to perform and do whatsoever pleaseth him, and is commanded by him: Hence, fearing God, and working righteousness, are connected and linked together, Acts 10:35. If we truly fear God, we dare not but do the things he commands; and if his fear be exalted in our hearts to an high degree, it will enable us to obey him in duties accompanied with deepest self-denial, Gen. 22:12. “Now I know thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not with-held thy son, thine only son from me.”
4. This fear engageth, and in some degree enableth the soul, in which it is, to shun and avoid whatsoever is displeasing to God, and forbidden by him; in this Job discovered himself a true fearer of God, he would not touch what God had forbidden, and therefore was honoured with this excellent character, “He was one that feared God, and eschewed evil,” Job 1:3. And thus of the several kinds of fear.
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