The fear of man brings a snare,
But whoever trusts in the Lord shall be safe.

– Proverbs 25:29 (NKJV)¹

If he had a name, we never knew it.

How he got down there, we’ll never know.

My brother and I never saw him, but we knew he was there. We heard him through the vents. We saw what appeared to be claw marks in the wood stairs. We even smelled the faint aroma of must and decaying banana peels wafting up from the beneath the floorboards.

He was there alright. Lurking. Waiting. Scheming. Planning for the day one of us would wrangle up the courage to dare go downstairs.

We had a monkey living – thriving – in the dark, dank basement of our childhood home. He lived on bananas and the flesh of small children. This is why, when I was five, my parents had to sell the old house. I’m sure Mom or Dad went downstairs to grab a can of green beans only to hear the monkey’s raspy whisper: “Get out of the house.”

That monkey is the reason I could never read the Curious George books. It’s why, as a teenager, I would shudder with a cold spinal shiver every time “Shock the Monkey” came on the radio. To this day, I can’t go in the primate house at Como Zoo without great trepidation.

Poltergeist had nothing on this terrorizing, child eating primate.

In our minds, he was real.

As I grew up, that dread of fear never really left me. We moved away from the monkey, but the monkey never moved away from me. I was afraid of everything. I remember when I was about eight – three years after we moved into our new, basementless house – feeling extremely anxious one night because I had inadvertently brought home a library book.

A reference library book.

You know, from the school library shelves of books that should never, ever leave the library, on pain of whacks.

I had broken the rules. Yes, I signed my name to the card inside the front cover and put it on the librarian’s desk. But I was sure that would not prove my good intentions to return the book on time and in the same shape I found it. Instead, it would serve as my signed confession of guilt. My death warrant. Death by paddle. A big, twenty-pound wooden paddle, with holes drilled in it to deliver the pain with stealth aerodynamics and grooves in the handle to provide extra grip for the school executioner. I was sure the last sound I would ever hear would be the whistle of the wind blowing through the holes in that oak instrument of torture as it sped toward my backside.

The next morning I went straight to the school library and, after carefully wiping down the book to remove any fingerprints, placed it on the return cart.

Not a word was ever said. The summons to the principal’s office never came.

The crack and sting of the paddle was not for my bottom to bear.

As an adult, the monkey continued to harass me. I feared so much in life. Eventually the monkey wore me down. There was no sense in trying anything. Every failure served only to prove the monkey was stronger than me.

Fear had a stranglehold on my life. It felt like everything I tried ended in failure. I tried so hard to overcome my anxieties. Yet I lived in fear of failure, fear of people (authority figures, folks I thought were above my station, you name it)…

Much later in life, I began to realize the depth of faith in God. I started to figure out that these awful things I felt, thought, believed about myself and my life were wrong. They were rooted in lies. They were founded on trying to do everything myself (after all, I had to prove my worth to everyone).

Here is the truth I’m finally getting into my thick skull: God is sovereign. Good is faithful. God is good. God is love. I can – must – trust God, no matter the circumstances. My knowledge is limited. God is omniscient. My strength wains. God is omnipotent. I spread myself too thin too often, trying to take on so much to prove my worth to myself and others (and even God!). God is omnipresent.

The only fear we ought to have is the fear – the reverential, awe-filled respect and recognition – of God, revealed to us through Jesus Christ and His Word. If I fear anything – or anyone – else, I’m telling the all-mighty God of the Universe, the Creator and Sustainer of All, that I don’t trust Him with my life. That He is incapable of taking care of me. That His Way is trumped by my own thoughts and feelings.

How arrogant of me.

It;s a matter of trust. Will I trust the lies of fear, rooted in untruth, unreal and inaccurate thoughts and feelings? Or will I trust the Lord, the Author of Truth? Today, I choose God. I repent of ever allowing that monkey to dig his claws into my back. I strive to seek the Lord above all things.

Do I fail? Every day.

Do I keep going back to Jesus? Every day.

Does He renew things in my life and continue to strengthen and guide me – even when the monkey comes back for a visit?

Every day.

I’ve stopped buying the Monkey Chow. You should, too.

Read the below Psalm. Then read it again. Let the words sink into your soul.

¹ I will bless the Lord at all times;
His praise shall continually be in my mouth.
² My soul shall make its boast in the Lord;
The humble shall hear of it and be glad.
³ Oh, magnify the Lord with me,
And let us exalt His name together.

⁴ I sought the Lord, and He heard me,
And delivered me from all my fears.
⁵ They looked to Him and were radiant,
And their faces were not ashamed.
⁶ This poor man cried out, and the Lord heard him,
And saved him out of all his troubles.
⁷ The angel of the Lord encamps all around those who fear Him,
And delivers them.

⁸ Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good;
Blessed is the man who trusts in Him!
⁹ Oh, fear the Lord, you His saints!
There is no want to those who fear Him.
¹⁰ The young lions lack and suffer hunger;
But those who seek the Lord shall not lack any good thing.

¹¹ Come, you children, listen to me;
I will teach you the fear of the Lord.
¹² Who is the man who desires life,
And loves many days, that he may see good?
¹³ Keep your tongue from evil,
And your lips from speaking deceit.
¹⁴ Depart from evil and do good;
Seek peace and pursue it.

¹⁵ The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous,
And His ears are open to their cry.
¹⁶ The face of the Lord is against those who do evil,
To ^[c]cut off the remembrance of them from the earth.

¹⁷ The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears,
And delivers them out of all their troubles.
¹⁸ The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart,
And saves such as have a contrite spirit.

¹⁹ Many are the afflictions of the righteous,
But the Lord delivers him out of them all.
²⁰ He guards all his bones;
Not one of them is broken.
²¹ Evil shall slay the wicked,
And those who hate the righteous shall be condemned.
²² The Lord redeems the soul of His servants,
And none of those who trust in Him shall be condemned.

• Psalm 34 (NKJV)

1. Scriptures in this post taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved. ↩︎
2. The picture of monkeys is actually a painting by Gabriel von Max: Affen als Kunstkritiker, 1889 Öl auf Leinwand, 85 x 107 cm – Neue Pinakothek, München {{Category:Gabriel von Max}} {{PD-art}} First uploaded to de.wikipedia 9 May 2005 by de:Benutzer:Luestling. Category:Primates in art ↩︎