“And although they were seeking to arrest him, they feared the crowds because they held him to be a prophet.”
– Matthew 21:46
So this is Matthew’s commentary on the chief priests and the Pharisees who heard Jesus’ parables and knew that he was talking about them. And they wanted to arrest him verse 46 says, “but they feared the crowds.”
Matthew 21:46 Encourages us to Examine our Hearts
And the reason I want to lead us to pray according to this verse in particular, and we see it at different points with these religious leaders, but we also see it in Scripture at different points in our lives. The fear of others can drive us in so many unhealthy ways. This is what Jesus talks about in Matthew 10. “Don’t fear people. Fear God alone.” And I just want to encourage you to pause for a moment right now and consider any ways that you fear people, that you fear what people can do to you, maybe in light of what people have done to you, or any ways that you fear what others think about you or how others might respond if you do this or that.
Just take a moment to consider any evidence of fear of others in your life and lift that before the Lord and say, “God, take this away so that I fear You alone.” It is good to examine our lives periodically, our motives, our minds, and our hearts, and to ask, in what way or in what ways is the fear of others driving me, factoring into what I’m doing? And to lay that before the Lord and say, “God, take it away and help me to fear you alone.” It’s said of saints of old that they feared people so little because they feared God so much.
God, we pray that that would be true of us. We pray that you would make us people today who fear you. We think Acts 9 walking and the fear of the Lord. God, we pray that that would be true of us. We think about Proverbs telling us the fear of you is the beginning of wisdom.
Matthew 21:46 Leads Us to Pray for a Healthy Fear of the Lord
God, we pray that you would help us to live today in fear of you, in awe of you, in reverence of you, overwhelmed by your holiness and your greatness and you as our Judge. No one else as our judge. You alone as our Judge and our King and our Savior. God, help us to fear you for who you are and help us to see everybody else in proper perspective. We pray that you would free us from the fear of others, from fear of what they might do to us, knowing they can do a lot to us. “But if you are for us,” Romans 8, “nothing can stand against us, that when you are with us, then we have no reason to fear despite what others can do to us.”
God, we pray that you would deliver us from acting today, living today for the approval of others out of fear of what others might think or say. God, help us to live boldly, to obey you boldly to proclaim the Gospel boldly today without fear, without shame, Romans 1, “Not ashamed of the Gospel, but knowing it has power to save.”
Praying for the Tibetan People
God, we pray that fear of others would not cause us to stay silent with the Gospel today or in the world. God, we pray today for Tibetan peoples in very hard to reach places where it’s very hard to get the Gospel to them. It’s risky. It’s costly. God, we pray that you would raise up your people to go to the Tibetan people groups of the world and to the nations, all the nations, especially hard places, to get the Gospel.
Help us to go without fear, fearing you alone and following you into hard, difficult, even dangerous places maybe near us and far from us for the spread of your Gospel. Because we are fearless in this world when it comes to the things of this world and we are fearful of you alone. God, we pray that would be true in each of our lives today and every day in the end that it would be said of us that we feared people so little because we feared you so much. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a Lead Pastor for McLean Bible Church. He is also the Founder of Radical, an organization that makes Jesus known among the nations.
David received his B.A. from the University of Georgia and M.Div., Th.M., and Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Some of his published works include Radical, Radical Together, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Don’t Hold Back, and How to Read the Bible.
He lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area with his wife and children.
