Isaiah 41:10, “Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.”
I remember when I was a student at Moody Bible Institute we had a missionary conference and during this conference a missionary came to our dormitory floor to just chat with us. We learned he served in some third world nation where there was a revolution. During this revolution he and other foreigners were taken captive by the rebels. He casually said: “Yeah, I remember one time they took us out to shoot us. Our hands were tied behind our backs and they put us against a wall before a firing squad. Standing next to me was a French diplomat who appeared quite frightened so I turned to him and said, ‘I hope they aim at me and not you.’ Apparently, the Frenchman was shocked at my statement and stammered, ‘Wwwwhy?’ I said, ‘because they are terrible shots, they will miss me and hit you.’” The missionary then concluded his story by saying, “I don’t get it, that Frenchman did not see the humor in my joke.”
I remember someone ask if the missionary was afraid and then he got real serious and said that indeed he was frightened, but when they put him against that wall suddenly he was flooded with all this courage and the knowledge that God would protect him and then he said, “But most important, I felt that presence of God at that moment.”
This missionary could have been quoting Isaiah 41:10 for that is exactly what this verse is saying. When we face a real threat God is telling us not to fear. This word for fear as used here is a fear for one’s own personal safety. The reason we need not fear is because God is with us. But God does not stop there he goes on to say, “Be not dismayed.” The word dismayed in Hebrew as used here is tisheta’ which comes from a Semitic root meaning to be blind. When someone is really frightened they become irrational and are blind to the real situation, all they can do is imagine all the horrible things that are about to happen. Yet God is saying, “I am with you.” There were a lot of gods out there but none were saying, “Hey, Sport, over here, I’m your god.” With all these other gods you had to sacrifice, suffer, plead, beg and give a gift card from Walmart to get their support. But if you go running to God Jehovah and ask, “How much for your services, I mean do you need an offering, a sacrifice, want me to put a hit on someone, name your price.” He will say, “It will cost you nothing, I will not only be with you but I am already with you.”
Then he tells us that He will strengthen us. The word strengthen in this verse is ‘amas which from its Semitic root carries the idea of imparting courage. This is exactly what this missionary testified, he received courage at the moment he needed it. Then we have a very interesting word that follows. It is the word yea. In the Hebrew this word is ‘ap. ‘Ap is a common word throughout the various Semitic languages. In the Old Testament it is rendered as even, indeed, surely, how then, how much more, and also. Its Semitic root however, has the idea of how much more and I would like to use that in this verse. In modern English we would say, “But, better yet…”
So God is telling us that He will not only give us courage but better yet, he will help us. This word for help is interesting. It is the word ‘azaretika from the root word ‘azar and has the idea of protection but not like, “I am taking over, just sit back,” but more of the idea of supporting us and assisting us in the battle. In other words we still need to enter the brawl, but God is telling us, “Don’t worry, I’ve got your back.”
Yet, there is one more thing that has the ‘ap (better yet) before it and that is that God will not only give us courage to enter this conflict, but better than that, He has our backs but even better than all of that He is upholding us. This word for upholding is tamar which in its root form means to take hold, hold fast, or glue oneself to something. The best part is that God will not only give us courage and watch out backs, but He will glue Himself to us, so if we go down, so does He (a very unlikely event).
Our missionary friend could testify to the truth of Isaiah 41:10 for as he faced that firing squad he found in one quick swoop, courage from God, assurance that God was watching his back, but most important the presence of God that was glued to him.
Looking back on his experience, he admitted that he suspected the firing squad was just a tactic to get a confession out of him, but at the time when you are looking down the barrel of a gun, that old barrel gets bigger and bigger the more you stare at it and the confidence in your reasoning fades quickly, but it is also just as quickly replaced by confidence in the God he learned to love.
One thing we know, maybe we do not feel as if we have all this courage and support yet, but it will be there when we need it. Isaiah 41:10 assures us of that.
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