My text points out the natural antagonism, and mutual exclusiveness, of
these two emotions. If I go to Jesus Christ as a sinful man, and get His
love bestowed upon me, then, as the next verse to my text says, my love
springs in response to His to me, and in the measure in which that love
rises in my heart will it frustrate its antagonistic dread.
As I said, you cannot love and fear the same person, unless the love is
of a very rudimentary and imperfect character. But just as when you pour
pure water into a bladder, the poisonous gases that it may have
contained will be driven out before it, so when love comes in, dread
goes out. The river, turned into the foul Augean stables of the heart,
will sweep out all the filth and leave everything clean. The black,
greasy smoke-wreath, touched by the fire of Christ's love, will flash
out into ruddy flames, like that which has kindled them; and Christ's
love will kindle in your hearts, if you accept it and apprehend it
aright, a love which shall burn up and turn into fuel for itself the now
useless dread.
But, brethren, remember that it is '_perfect_ love' which 'casts out
fear.'
Inconsistent as the two emotions are in themselves, in practice, they
may be united, by reason of the imperfection of the nobler. And in the
Christian life they are united with terrible frequency. There are many
professing Christian people who live all their days with a burden of
shivering dread upon their shoulders, and an icy cold fear in their
hearts, just because they have not got close enough to Jesus Christ, nor
kept their hearts with sufficient steadfastness under the quickening
influences of His love, to have shaken off their dread as a sick man's
distempered fancies. A little love has not mass enough in it to drive
out thick, clustering fears. There are hundreds of professing Christians
who know very little indeed of that joyous love of God which swallows up
and makes impossible all dread, who, because they have not a loving
present consciousness of a loving Father's loving will, tremble when
they front in imagination, and still more when they meet in reality, the
evils that must come, and who cannot face the thought of death with
anything but shrinking apprehension. There is far too much of the old
leaven of selfish dread left in the experiences of many Christians. 'I
feared thee, because thou wert an austere man, and so, because I was
afraid, I went and hid my talent, and did nothing for thee' is a
transcript of the experience of far too many of us. The one way to get
deliverance is to go to Jesus Christ and keep close by Him.
And my last word to you is, see that you resort only to the sane, sound
way of getting rid of the wholesome, rational dread of which I have been
speaking. You can ignore it; and buy immunity at the price of leaving in
full operation the _causes_ of your dread--and that is stupid. There is
only one wise thing to do, and that is, to make sure work of getting rid
of the occasion of dread, which is the fact of sin. Take all your sin to
Jesus Christ; He will--and He only can--deal with it. He will lay His
hand on you, as He did of old, with the characteristic word that was so
often upon His lips, and which He alone is competent to speak in its
deepest meaning. 'Fear not, it is I,' and He will give you the courage
that He commands.
'God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love,
and of a sound mind.' 'Ye have not received the spirit of bondage again
to fear, but ye have received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry
Abba, Father,' and cling to Him, as a child who knows his father's heart
too well to be afraid of anything in his father, or of anything that his
father's hand can send.