“Fear not!” God said that. God said that to Abraham in 2000 BC (Gen 15:1). He said that to the apostle John in AD 90 (Rev 1:17). In fact, the most repeated command in the Bible that God says directly to His people is, “Fear not!” or “Do not be afraid!” or “Do not be anxious!” or “Do not worry needlessly!” or “Stop fretting! (Ps 37; Phil 4:6). They all mean the same thing.
This statement that God makes repeatedly to His children is an imperative, or a command. As believers we are expected to obey it since it is one of God’s commands. It is just as much of a binding command as any of the Ten Commandments (Exod 20), or any of the most basic New Testament commands, such as when Jesus commanded all people to “repent and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15), or when God implores Christian men, “Husbands, love your wives” (Eph 5:25).
Not Optional
Because this statement from God is a command, it is not an option. It must be obeyed. And to reject it is to disobey God. To disobey a command from God is a sin. How often do Christians think that when they are fearing or being anxious they are at the same time disobeying God? From my experience, not often.
How often do Christians pray regularly, saying, “Dear Father, forgive me for fearing all the time, for not trusting in you and all your promises”? I don’t know the answer to that question, but repenting to God for fearing and being anxious should be a regular part of our prayer life. King David prayed this way, admitting to God that having anxious thoughts was “offensive” to God (Ps 139:23-24). Fearing and fretting in the wrong way is often tolerated and excused by Christians for countless reasons.
Another implication about this statement from God which is given in the form of a command to be obeyed is that God apparently expects us to obey it because we can actually do it; God seems to think that believers can live life regularly without fearing or being anxious.
And in fact, that is exactly what the Bible teaches. Jesus taught this very thing in the Sermon on the Mount, four times telling the multitudes to “stop worrying” (Matt 6:25, 28, 31, 34). Paul famously said the same thing to believers in Philippi when he wrote, “be anxious for nothing” (Phil 4:6). The Greek text actually reads more like, “Stop worrying!”
Sinful vs. Non-Sinful Anxiety
The worry that God condemns all throughout Scripture is the illegitimate kind of fretting and anxiety that results from wrong thinking, which is self-focused, emotionally and experience-driven, not based on reality, is contrary to biblical truths, and worst of all, directly contradicts a previously given promise of God.
God is not condemning legitimate concern people have. I am always concerned about the health and safety of my family, and I pray to God accordingly asking for his protection and leading, in keeping with His will. The same Paul who condemned the Philippians’ sinful anxiety also said that he was “concerned” for their welfare (Phil 2:20, 28). So the Bible clearly recognizes a healthy concern we can have versus the counterfeit, out of control, destructive anxiety that needs to be identified and managed.
Christians can get to a point in their lives where they are not constantly overwhelmed with anxiety and fretting and the key to that is in controlling one’s thought life. Sinful anxiety is the by-product of wrong thinking which usually flows from being driven by emotions or experiential “feelings.” This is the exact opposite of the way God designed us to function.
God gave us emotions and the ability to “feel.” But God intends our emotions and feelings to flow from our thoughts; they are not to dictate our thoughts. To have your emotions inform your thought life is putting the cart before the horse or the caboose on the front of the train. Disaster always results. So, if you want to get your overwhelming anxiety under control begin by getting your thought life under control. Following are a few basic suggestions from God on how to do that.
Getting Your Thought Life Under Control: Four Steps
First, recognize and admit that you have a problem with letting your emotions and your experiences inform and dictate your thought life. If you can’t do this first, you won’t make much progress in this area of your life.
Luke’s Gospel tells the story of “Martha, Martha,” a troubled believer who lived by her emotions and circumstances. Martha was overwhelmed and out of control as she was being driven by her immediate bad experiences and her emotions. It was so bad she was trying to command Jesus, the Lord of the universe around, telling Him what to do (Luke 10:4). Jesus bluntly confronted and remedied her problem, not with psychology, psychoanalysis, medication, therapy, hypnosis, acupuncture, yoga, the horoscope, diplomacy, or any other man-made technique, but by addressing her thought life, basically telling her she was thinking wrong and she needed to immediately amend her wayward thoughts, and think and operate in accordance with truth.
If you are a “Martha, Martha,” living life driven by your ever-changing and unreliable emotions, then stop, pause, evaluate, and make an honest assessment. Don’t live in denial.
Second, after recognizing that you are frequently led by your emotions, feelings and experiences, ask for God’s help (Ps 50:15). He wants to help (Ps 72:12). This needs to be a specific, ongoing regular prayer of your heart.
Third, recognize that God wants to help you by growing you in mind control, or learning how to control your thought life. Your thoughts are driven by what you are exposed to. So, expose yourself to God’s Word, biblical teaching, biblical principles, and the memorization of key Scriptures. The Holy Spirit will use the truth of God’s Word that is hidden in your heart to change you (Ps 119:9, 11), to transform your thinking patterns, and help lead you with self- control in your thought life so you will walk by the Spirit, producing the fruits of the Spirit, one of the most difficult to attain being “self-control” (Gal 5:23).
Back to Martha: her behavior was to be driven by biblical principles, not by her experiences or the behavior of anyone around her. Jesus directly addressed her thought life because He lived by the divine law which He taught which says, “Know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” That was His concise way of saying, “Get your thoughts in order, calibrated with truth.” The apostle Paul echoed this basic teaching of Jesus (cf. Rom 12:1-2). Our thoughts need to control our emotions, not vice versa. This is why Jesus commanded His people to “love God with all your….mind” (Mark 12:30). The converse is also true: since your thoughts are driven by what you are exposed to, don’t expose yourself to things that will sabotage your emotions (Phil 4:8-9).
Fourth, recognize that God’s Holy Spirit lives in you, and the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Christ. As such, the Bible says, “Christ lives in you” (Col 1:27). And because Jesus lives in you, He is always with you….literally. That’s why He said, “I am with you always” (Matt 28:20) and “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you” (John 14:18). Hebrews gives the same promise: “He Himself has said, ‘I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you’” (Heb 13:5). If you are a Christian, then the Almighty, Sovereign, Creator God of the universe is always with you. He will never abandon you or leave you alone and isolated.
That is a truth; a promise of God. And reality. You either believe it or you don’t. To reject it is to have a lack of faith. Without faith it is impossible to please Him (Heb 11:6). To reject this truth is to remove all stability in your life, especially in your thought life. God relates to us based on truths He gives to us that are cognitively received, processed and assimilated. Mature spirituality is based on right thinking.
Meditating always on truth is then paramount for healthy, stable living. This is why Paul commanded Christians to “think….on truth” (Phil 4:8-9). The Bible really does teach, “You are what you think” (Prov 23:7). The point here is, since the Holy Spirit lives in us, we can in fact obey the command, “Fear not.” Or, we don’t need to fear because the triune God of the universe is always immediately and imminently present with us, no matter where we are and no matter what is going on in the world around us. Greater is He that is in us, that he that is in the world (1 John 4:4).
Anxiety and A.I.
How does all of this apply to the current A. I. craze? In many ways. I just watched a very popular YouTube video by some guy warning of the dangers of A.I. It had a “gazillion” or so views, meaning it was reaching a wide audience across the world. The overall tenor was one of generating panic among the viewers. One of the introductory statements made, that was then repeated over and over was, “This is really scary!” What he was trying to say was, “Hey viewer…you should live in fear in light of the rise of A. I. as it is taking over the world….and even putting human existence in jeopardy.”
The guy who made the video was not a Christian and was not operating by biblical presuppositions. He seemed to be wanting to generate countless views for his Youtube channel, and he knew that fear was a universally motivating tactic to capture people’s attention and allegiance. False teachers, charlatans, corrupt politicians, Hollywood movie actors, and manipulative parents have used fear all throughout human history to control people.
I watched this guy’s dramatic, sensationalistic video, full of its perilous scenarios and “evidences” of the current demise of life as we know it due to the out of control, growing, independent sinister intelligence of Artificial Intelligence, and I wasn’t worried in the least bit.
I have no fear whatsoever that A.I. is going to take over the world because I know what the Bible teaches. I know who God is. I know what God has already revealed and planned. I believe Scripture. God has already determined the end from the beginning (Isa 46:9-10). I think on His truth. Much of the fear and fretting about A.I. concerns its impact on the future. Truth about the future has fully been revealed by God in the Bible. The topic of what happens in the future is called “eschatology,” the theology of the last things or future things. The Christian who has a fully, biblically informed eschatology is not fazed by the ubiquitous cries of, “The sky is falling!” because of A. I. Artificial Intelligence is a human construction. Humans are finite, so A.I. is finite and has limits. God is the sovereign Lord over all of it.
So Christian, God’s command given in 2000 BC to Abraham still stands for Christians in 2026, in spite of the unknown advances of A. I. If you know God personally through Jesus Christ, you have nothing to worry about because He is always with you and will never forsake you–even if a world-wide pandemic hits us out of the blue, or if robots become spontaneously sentient and try to start taking over the world. Trust in God, His Word and “fear not!” Everything is going exactly according to His eternal plan.
