Fear No Fear

(All scripture from the NET, netbible.org, all rights reserved)

Come on! Let’s return to the Lord. He himself has torn us to pieces, but he will heal us! He has injured us, but he will bandage our wounds!
Hosea 6:1 (emphasis added)

Assumptions are NEVER good and ESPECIALLY not good when dealing with spiritual things. Why does Holy Spirit have so many roles? Because it is THAT EASY to get lost, off track, or plain misunderstand what is going on. One of the things those who believe Yahweh heals are criticised for is making God do what you want. Nothing could be further from the truth. Yahweh heals. Period. But that DOESN’T mean you know what you are about when you ‘demand’ healing. In context, today’s verse is all about how you can assume you’re getting stuff – but your motivations are preventing you from receiving.

Repentance is a serious thing. It is not sorry feelings. It is not a ‘well, I guess you were right this time’. It is most definitely NOT sorry you were caught. Repentance is a complete and total switch. A transformation from one direction to another. A realisation that the entire way you were thinking about something is wrong and you need to change your thinking. It is a move to not only change your opinion about something, but to also move to never again do that thing that you now know and believe is wrong.

We NEED to humble ourselves. To remove the ‘self’ from our thinking. It is not an easy thing. The best example I can give is of a skill. Chess, sports, a musical instrument, a card game, anything like that. Anything that takes real skill to be proficient at it. NO ONE picks up something like that and becomes an instant world champion. Nope. There are people who are gifted and are prodigies, but even they need to develop and train and practise. The people who coach them. The people who mentor them. These are people who have intimate knowledge of how the skill is APPLIED. The way it truly works. And they impart that knowledge. The student – the wise one anyway – never says that they know better. No. They humble themselves and sit under that tutelage for months, years, even decades. Learning from someone who knows better.

Isn’t it fair to say that the individual who MADE you knows you better than you do? Wouldn’t it be equally fair to say that that individual knows this world, this creation, this material existence better? How it works, how it should work, how it did, and how it will? Wouldn’t it benefit us to take that individual’s word for things, even if we didn’t see it or feel that it is true? Wouldn’t it be worth it to take that information – ANY information – that the individual doled out and assume that it is the BEST information, the BEST advice, and the TOTAL TRUTH?

That is what we do when we humble ourselves. We take Yahweh at His WORD. We agree with Him that He is right and we put down the feelings that don’t. Not PUSH them down, PUT them down. If we push down feelings, then our psyche emotes them in secret. Building up a powder keg until it explodes. That isn’t healthy. We aren’t in business as believers to DENY feelings. But they are JUST FEELINGS. They have no right to control us. No right to take centre stage. No right to tell us what to EMOTE. Or ACT. Or THINK. Or BELIEVE. We can acknowledge them, and learn from them, and factor them in. THEN we can get the tea from our spirit (which is Jesus’ own – Romans 8:9-10), and CHOOSE to do what Yahweh says is right.

I have been reading through Chronicles in the Jewish Study Bible, and I have been interested that in several verses the translation is they did wrong from God’s perspective. From HIS perspective. Repentance then is a shift of perspective from OURS to HIS. It doesn’t matter what WE think, WE feel, or WE know. It is HIS perspective that matters, not ours. Sobering thought when you consider everything that Yahweh sees, feels, knows, and proclaims from HIS perspective. “Indeed, my plans are not like your plans, and my deeds are not like your deeds,” says the Lord, “for just as the sky is higher than the earth, so my deeds are superior to your deeds and my plans superior to your plans” (Isaiah 55:8-9). Talk about a perspective difference.

This makes repentance – TRUE repentance – of immense importance. Which gets us back to today’s verse. A lot of assumptions are being made by these people. Not all of them good. In fact, very little of it is good. You see, it becomes not a question of WHETHER Yahweh heals or IF Yahweh wills it. It becomes a question of what is in your heart. Sometimes, when we look at and meditate on Grace, we forget an important point. No matter how loving the Lord is. No matter how much He can be HERE with us. No matter of friendly our relationship is. It is JESUS’ righteousness transforming us that makes it possible. Yahweh is not one little iota less RIGHTEOUS than He was in the Old Covenant. In fact, if we were taken to heaven without His MERCIFUL intervention, our flesh would IMMEDIATELY explode and we would cease to be in the sheer RIGHTEOUS GLORY of the Father’s presence.

Moses spent forty days fasting and worshipping the Lord. He was TALKING to Him. They had a serious relationship and Moses was IN HIS PRESENCE. But Moses STILL couldn’t see Yahweh’s face. “But he added, “You cannot see my face, for no one can see me and live.” The Lord said, “Here is a place by me; you will station yourself on a rock. When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and will cover you with my hand while I pass by. Then I will take away my hand, and you will see my back, but my face must not be seen”” (Exodus 33:20-23). That’s the effect of pure righteousness. Anything but pure righteousness will not survive. Which is why Jesus did what He did so that we can join Him in His resurrection, abide in Him, and approach the Throne of the Father with BOLDNESS (Romans 6:5; John 15; Hebrews 4:16).

If you read today’s verse it seems very positive. We KNOW Yahweh heals (Exodus 15:26). We KNOW it is the will of the Father to heal (Isaiah 57:18-19). We KNOW Jesus healed everyone who came to Him (Matthew 8:16-17). We KNOW Jesus doesn’t change so He STILL will heal everyone who comes to Him and ALWAYS HAS (Hebrews 13:8). On the surface this verse is full of confidence and certainty. But if you look at the verses that surround it, there is a VERY different picture here.

The picture is of those who SAY these things, but do NOT believe them in their hearts. It is a picture of false repentance. Empty repentance. Repentance of word, or maybe deed, but NOT of heart or mind. These are IDLE WORDS. Words spoken with no power behind them. These words are NOT the words of the Lord. The Lord has been clear from Day One. TRUE repentance, TRUE investigation, TRUE seeking of His face combined with humble submission to what you find is the ONLY real repentance. Nothing else will do.

There are times that we confidently call out for healing, but we are NOT repentant. We have NOT scoured our hearts to see where – if anywhere – we have stepped wrong. We ASSUME we are fine and dandy with the Lord because we gave Jesus our heart. We confessed He was Lord. Well, there is a big difference between knowing that Jesus IS Lord and having Jesus AS Lord. That is the danger of religion. That is the danger of making things – devotion time, bible reading, worship, church attendance – a habit on the way to a chore. To do them with our bodies and voices, but not our hearts. To embrace the IDLE WORDS of religion, without the true heart belief of relationship.

I am NOT saying that every time someone isn’t healed it is because they are unrepentant. I AM saying that unrepentance can hinder healing. Don’t ASSUME. Ask Him about it. Does it hurt? NO. Is that what Holy Spirit is here for? YES! (John 16:13). 2 Corinthians 13:5 tells us that we should be TESTING OURSELVES regularly. Testing to see what is what. To see if we truly believe what we SAY we believe. It is a good practice. So that WE won’t end up assuming the same kind of things as in today’s verse. God is WITH us. God is FOR us. But God only moves for faith. Everything else? Blowing in the wind (John 9:31). Don’t use idle words. Use faith. Real faith.

Daily Affirmation Jesus IS Messiah: Exodus 3:13-15

““Moses said to God, “If I go to the Israelites and tell them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’—what should I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I AM that I AM.” And he said, “You must say this to the Israelites, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” God also said to Moses, “You must say this to the Israelites, ‘The Lord—the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you. This is my name forever, and this is my memorial from generation to generation.’”” Jesus walked on the water. Which is a whole thing in an of itself, but when He came near to His disciples He called out this exact name of Yahweh: I AM (Matthew 14:27). He told it to the Samaritan woman by the well (John 4:26). He declared it to the religious Judeans in the Temple who were disbelieving of who He was (John 8:58). Jesus IS the Great I AM. Jesus IS the Son of the Living God. Jesus IS Messiah.

Your Daily Confession of Jesus/Yeshua’s Identity:

Yeshua is the Christ, the Son of the living God.

Matthew 16:16b