Are You Cowardly?

I was reading the book of Revelation today, and as I was coming to the end I found a verse that shocked me. Revelation 21:7-8 says "He who overcomes shall iherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son." 

Verse 8 "But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in teh lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." 

I added the bold, italics to cowardly up there as I'm sure you know. However this shocked me so much because cowardly, is right next to murders, sexually immoral, and so on! Imagine that, God sees cowardice as just as bad a sin and those things! 

Most Christians never share their faith because of fear. Every day they walk down the street and pass several, maybe hundreds, maybe even thousands of people who are going to the lake of fire and they don't even hand out a few tracts! This is a horrible sin, and those who do that need to repent. We can see here in Revelation that it is not something to be taken lightly. 

Let's look at another example, Paul said in 1 Corinthians 9:16 "For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of: for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel!" Paul himself said "woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel." We need to take these things to heart and understand that it is sin to live in fear, and to keep the gospel of our Lord Jesus bottled up inside of us. Cowards will have their place in the lake of fire, we don't want that. We have no been given a spirit of fear, but of courage. So let's put off that old fear, and take up courage, and preach the gospel with fearlessness.  We know that the goal is to hear the words "Well done, good and faithful servant." There is nothing more important than that. 

Amen.