The second basic fear is the fear of nonbeing.  Why are so many people today caught in the fear of nonbeing?  Because modern man does not have any idea where he came from, and not having any answer to Being, is eventually locked up in the sequence of pure chance.  Therefore he has a fear of nonbeing.  But the Christian, in the total system of Christianity, has the answer to Being, as we have already seen.  Knowing the answer to Being, there is no fear of nonbeing.  I have been created by an infinite-personal God, created truly outside of himself.  So I know who I am in my being.  I have a valid existence.  That being so, there is no reason or need for a fear of nonbeing.   

It is ‘because of’ and ‘through’ the finished-work of Jesus Christ wherein a person can come-to the personal awareness and knowledge of the infinite-personal God who is really there.  When we acknowledge that God is there…when we acknowledge that we are not in a relationship with Him and we do not have personal knowledge and awareness of Him…God then places us before the cross of Christ and we get to make a decision.  The decision is this:  Do ‘I’ believe that I need Christ to be ‘my’ Savior?  Do ‘I’ believe that Christ’s substitutionary death on the cross was for and included ‘me’?  And as, through faith, I accept God’s provision of ‘salvation’ as personal and specific for ‘me’…I am accepted into God’s eternal family, His eternal kingdom.  At that moment in this experience, which in the biblical Christian system is called new birth – conversion – being saved, this experience includes having the Spirit of God (the person of God the Holy Spirit) coming to live inside me, coming to take residence in my internal spirit-me.  And it is in this real experience that I come to a personal knowledge and awareness of who I am.  I begin to truly ‘know’ who I am.  I am a created ‘being’, created by the Infinite-Personal Creator God, for the purpose of having a personal knowledge of and a relationship with Him so that I can enjoy Him forever.  I realize that prior to my conversion experience, I was separated from this knowledge and awareness of Him.  But through the finished-work of Christ on the cross, wherein I place my faith, wherein I am granted access and am reconciled to God my Creator, then I become aware of the reason and purpose for my Being.  And the lights come on.  And then we can say and understand what the blind man said as recorded in the Gospel of John after Jesus opened his eyes and restored his sight…But I know this: I was blind, and now I can see! John 9:25 NLT.  When we come to God, through Christ, by faith, our eyes are opened and we know who we are.  We are His, forever, now and into eternity.  And ‘that’ is just tremendous news! (you should be grinning ear to ear. 😊)  (tomorrow, the fear of death) 

Thoughts developed or used directly from the work of Schaeffer, Francis. True Spirituality . Tyndale House Publishers, Inc