The church needs workers. Jesus once said, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few” (Luke 10:2). He was talking specifically about soul winning in this statement, but the same thing might be said about the collective work that God has given the church to do. When it comes to the work of the church, particularly the local church, there are always things that need doing. There are weak members that need encouraging, new members that need teaching, sick mem-bers that need visiting, and then, of course, there are always souls that need saving. Without will-ing workers, the work will not get done.

One thing that stops some in the body of Christ from doing their part of the work is fear. Some brethren are afraid of serving in the worship services (leading prayer, reading scripture, etc.), while others are afraid to teach a Bible class or engage in personal work and things of that nature. The question is why are some brethren afraid to do the work God has given us to do? One rea-son is a fear of failing.

Nobody likes to fail. The fear of failing can be so strong that it paralyzes an individual and stops him from working for the Lord. Even outstanding Bible characters such as Timothy were affected by it. Notice the exhortation that Paul gives him.

2 Timothy 1:6-7 (ESV)
⁶ For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands, 7 for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.

While this is a mild rebuke of Timothy, he still needed to be pushed a little bit to use the spiritual gift he received by the laying on of Paul’s hands. Notice, Paul reminded him that God had not given us a spirit of fear. Could it be that Timothy was allowing fear to slow him down? It sounds that way to me.

When it comes to doing the work of the Lord, we should never be afraid of failing because, the truth is, we really cannot fail as long as we are trying. We may not always get the results that we want, but that does not mean that we have failed. Remember, God is more interested in the effort involved in our service than He is the result. In fact, most of the time the results are out of our hands. For example, when we try to win someone to Christ, we have no control over what the person ultimately decides to do. All we can do is teach, the rest is up to God and His word. We may be disappointed when the one we are teaching does not obey the gospel, but we have not failed.

There is one way we can fail when it comes to doing the work of the Lord—we can fail by doing nothing. Do you remember the parable of the talents? Jesus taught us about a one talented man who, instead of using his talent wisely, he buried it in the ground because he was afraid of losing it. Jesus refers to him as a wicked and slothful servant. That is God’s view of us when we allow fear to stop us from doing His work.

Not all fear condemns us. Paul was afraid when he went to Corinth to preach the gospel (1 Corin-thians 2:3). However, he did not allow that fear to stop him from proclaiming the gospel. When our fear reaches the point where we are not doing what God commands, then we are condemned by God (Revelation 21:8). Let us not allow that to happen. Let us have the courage to let our light shine by doing the work of the Lord. As long as we are doing, we cannot fail.

As you wind down for the night, think on these things.