[Editor’s note: The following article contains an excerpt from a message titled “Fear, Faith and Truth,” delivered by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan on Sunday, June 2, 1996, at Mosque Maryam in Chicago, Illinois. We are facing so much during these trying times that is making us afraid; we encourage you to read these words of comfort and guidance, as the message is just as relevant and timely today. To order this message in its entirety, visit store.finalcall.com.]
In The Name of Allah, The Beneficent, The Merciful.
Our subject today deals with three words which represent essentials that would allow us to live life successfully, the way God intended for human beings to live: Fear. Faith. Truth.These three words, if understood and acted upon properly, will give us a key to mastering every situation that life could pose. I want each of us to think about something in life that is troublesome to us. I want us to think about something in our own life that we need to overcome.
I want us to think about something in our life that we desire, but as yet have not been able to attain it. Mastery of the principles underlying each of these three words will not only give you The Solution to that particular problem that you and I personally may have, but it gives you The Key to any problem you will ever face at any time in your life.
›Fear: The Source of our insecurities
Is “fear” natural? If fear is a natural thing, then is it something that we must overcome? And if so, how? According to the dictionary, “fear” is a distressing emotion aroused by impending pain, danger, evil, whether that pain, danger or evil is real, or imagined. If you become afraid even of some imaginary thing that has not yet happened, the distressing emotion will still be present. “Fear” is the feeling, or the condition of being afraid. Fear restricts:
Whatever we are afraid of, that which we fear makes us insecure; and whatever makes us afraid and insecure could cause us to bow. When we are afraid, fear causes us not to think properly. Fear causes us not to act properly. Fear makes you so insecure that you have a tendency to acquiesce, to submit, to surrender to the thing that you’re afraid of.
And if you acquiesce, submit and surrender to what you are afraid of, then it becomes a god to you beside God! If God made man and woman in His Own Likeness, then can you imagine God being afraid? I mean, just think about God being afraid of a lion, or a bear! How could He be afraid of what He created? So if He is The Creator, and this is the creature, then He has Natural Mastery over it if He does not allow what He created to terrify Him.
This is no “Frankenstein,” that the thing which is created can, now, terrify its creator. There is nothing in Creation that can make God afraid! Well, then if God is not afraid of anything that He created, and you and I are in His Image and in His Likeness, will you tell me please how we can justify being afraid of anything in Creation?
There is another kind of fear that has reverence to it, and that is the fear of God. Once when I was out in Arizona taking a month to fast and pray and discipline myself for a fight against cancer, I was listening to a tape by the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. He was saying that God did not make The Original Man, Black man, to be afraid of anything in His Creation. He only made you, and me, to fear Him.
And it is The Fear of God, and God alone, that gives you Mastery over The Creation. But if you don’t know God, and won’t trust God and have faith in God, then things that make you afraid will become your master. God is worthy to be afraid of. You just have to believe and know that a God exists. The Bible teaches in Proverbs 9:10, “
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.” Soif the fear of God makes you a beginner, then what is wisdom? “Wisdom” is that which allows you mastery, and you cannot begin to become wise in life if you don’t learn the fear of God. And once you learn the fear of God, then nothing in creation becomes able to terrify you. Then you are in the Beginner’s Class of Mastery.
I want you to internalize this: Anytime we allow anything to make us afraid, and we refuse to challenge our fear of that thing, then we can never be that man, or that woman, that God intended us to be. Fear will not allow you to be yourself!
It is not that you won’t ever be made afraid, because there are some terrifying things in this world. But when you are afraid, that’s the Test of Faith! This is when you have to call on what you’ve got faith in! What am I saying to you? You’re going to be made afraid.
I don’t want you thinking that every time you’re made afraid that you will come out “all right,” because the other part of this is: Being “fearless” is not going to get you victory in every circumstance. This is where faith comes in.
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