What Can Man Do To Me?

Like many of my readers, most of my life has been spent with the fear of man and woman - desiring approval, wanting acceptance, afraid to offend and fearful of conflict.

I lost my voice unable to put into words what really was going on inside my heart. If I didn't like something, I said nothing. If I needed something, I was afraid to ask, fearful of being denied or viewed as weak. Not that everyone needed to know how I felt but there was no true self in my relationships. I'd become what I thought the other person wanted to see or hear from me. The labor and expense brought no return, but often strained relationships to a breaking point. All the while, the person didn't know that underneath all my attention, was a fear they would hurt me, walk away or reject me.

But unlike human relationships, in Christ, we are made complete. We can't add or take away from what He has done for us. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. No one can pluck or snatch us out of His hand. He won't despise our weakness and reject us because He has given up on us. Its a relationship we can be completely at rest without the driving fear of approval or rejection.

Yet so few of us come into a place of freedom and confidence in the Lord. Why? Sadly, the fear of man leaves an impress on our minds that shapes our relationship with the Lord.

David said in Psalms 56:10-11, "In God, whose word I praise, in the LORD, whose word I praise--in God I trust and am not afraid. What can man do to me? (NIV).

The same man who sinned against God by taking a census of the people. A possible indication that King David want to boast in the numbers of those who made up a nation to which he governed and shepherd. In others, numbers meant an approval rating of sorts. But when God reproved him through the prophet, David replies, "I am in deep distress. Let me fall into the hands of the LORD, for his mercy is very great; but do not let me fall into human hands." (I Chronicles 21:13 NIV).

Beloved, the fear of man is unlike the fear of God. With God is mercy but when we live our lives with the fear of man, we have no grace when we fall.