Fear No Fear

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

So the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and you are not permitted to carry your mat.”
John 5:10 (emphasis added)

There are few better examples of living logs than the Pharisees. They were always focused on the observance of the Law as a RITUAL. A series of acts regularly repeated in a set precise manner in order to claim the mantle of righteousness. They consistently turned the Old Covenant inside out and approached it the WRONG WAY. The Old Covenant was a Law (collection of 613 commandments) meant to do two things. One, show humanity that they NEEDED a sacrifice on their behalf because they could NOT do it alone. And Two, to learn TRUST in Yahweh that He would ACCEPT the sacrifice on their behalf. If you weren’t being constantly turned to Yahweh as your source, you were not getting it. If you weren’t constantly building your trust, you were not getting it. The Pharisees weren’t getting it.

From the Pharisaical point of view, works meant faith. Works meant righteousness. But in reality, works don’t gain us anything. We have something, so the works naturally flow from us. We love Adonai, so we want to do what He says. The more we love Him, the more we can’t HELP but do what He says, the way He says, and when He says. Because our TRUST builds in proportion to our LOVE. We’re under Grace, so we have the benefit of Jesus having been the acceptable PERMANENT sacrifice fulfilling ALL the Old Covenant Law sacrifices. Jesus was each and every one of them. Just like you would go with your sacrifice to the Temple, repent with it, and seek to sin no more; we do the same with Jesus. We come to Him, repent of it, and seek to sin no more. Same process, but HE is the sacrifice. The sacrifice freely made. The one we don’t deserve. But the one Yahweh accepted. Therefore, we are now the righteousness of God in Messiah Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:21).

The Pharisees weren’t amenable to that. They wanted the rules. They believed only by keeping the rules could you ever be righteous. They believed keeping the rules MADE you righteous. They missed that it is by loving and trusting Yahweh with EVERYTHING that the rules have meaning: keeping them becomes an expression of love for Adonai without fear of retribution because there is GRACE for when we (inevitably) fall short of the goal. Change your heart and the rule following falls into place. Follow only rules and your outside may become sparkly, but your inside will be rotten (Matthew 23:25-29).

Anyone like the Pharisees goes around pointing out the nitpicky things others get wrong while having a huge bloated corpse of wrong intent festering inside themselves. “Why do you see the speck in your brother’s eye, but fail to see the beam of wood in your own? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye,’ while there is a beam in your own? You hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you can see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye” (Matthew 7:3-5). It is not our outward appearance and behaviour that Adonai focuses on, but our inward attitude. Our HEART. Yahweh looks at the tiniest things inside us seeking to make us right with Him. For us to adopt HIS point of view on things. Then the SEEMINGLY big outside things fall away. Would you have a porn addiction if you changed your heart on the value of a woman? Or the satisfaction of the Word? Probably not. You can’t have impure thoughts from inside you when you treasure something like Adonai does. You can’t be greedy or gluttonous about something if you are satisfied with the food of your spirit. We can only be addicted to wrongful attitudes, ideas, thoughts, and behaviours when we are feeding on the wrong things. Plant the Word in our heart and it will displace the specks that are growing into logs.

Religious thinking like the Pharisees cause us to place ourselves where we either WON’T accept healing (or anything else) or we DROP it before we let it plant a root. We strain out a human-made gnat of doctrinal offence, but only because we’ve swallowed a camel-sized unbelief in the Word. We keep the technicality and call it good. We let the camel weigh us down as we reject what is ACTUALLY good. We have swallowed the idea that healing stopped when the Apostles died – as if those twelve men were the reason for the healings. Or when the apostles the Twelve appointed died – as if THEY were the reason for the healings. We say that now we have the bible as a sealed book, we don’t NEED the ministry of apostles or signs and wonders or healings. If you take those things away, if you strain them out, what are you left with?

Why should people flock to the church if we only get help in the afterlife? Why not rely on deathbed confessions? Why not do whatever we want in the meantime? Why live a life devoted to the things of Adonai if we are going to suffer the same way other people suffer? Look at the Book of Ruth. Naomi and her husband leave the land of blessing and following the rules – even though it was under temporary bad circumstances. NOTHING good follows. When Naomi returns to the land of blessing and following the rules? Good things start to happen. Elijah was told to go to where the Ravens would provide him food. Yahweh was PROVIDING food in a famine. But if Elijah didn’t GO THERE, he would have none of it. The man from today’s verse was HEALED. He was therefore taking his stuff home – even though it was the Sabbath and he technically wasn’t supposed to carry anything (which was work). The Pharisees didn’t care that DECADES of sickness were gone. The Pharisees didn’t care that a new lease on life was strolling by. The Pharisees didn’t care that this thing was an impossibility. They cared about the fact he was carrying a mat.

Like seriously. You’re walking with a MAT, you’re in trouble with Yahweh. The one who healed you in the first place. On this day which is the Sabbath. By His supernatural power. And then told you to get up WITH YOUR MAT and walk. THAT Yahweh. You know, I don’t think this man was in trouble. I think this man was being shown Grace over an infraction that didn’t mean much in the scheme of things (Mark 2:27). I think heaven was rejoicing over the FREEDOM that this man was willing to literally WALK in.

Don’t be a Pharisee. Concerned about the nitpicky things more than the Blessings of Adonai. Don’t let religious skullduggery take root in your heart. Plant the Word there. Let THOSE seeds grow. Let your ability to realise that Adonai has maintained a consistent attitude of Blessing His chosen children grow. Take what Adonai offers you. And those around you. Don’t let yourself be denied the FREEDOM of WALKING in Him and His things.

Daily Affirmation Jesus IS Messiah: Psalm 31:11

“Because of all my enemies, people disdain me; my neighbors are appalled by my suffering—those who know me are horrified by my condition; those who see me in the street run away from me.” Messiah was going to have to stand alone. Trusting only in Yahweh, with no evidence of being saved, left alone by even His closest companions. “Then all the disciples left him and fled” (Mark 14:50). Jesus was abandoned. By all His followers. By His closest friends. Jesus was left trusting in His Father, Yahweh, completely and totally. Jesus didn’t falter. Even though He was alone. Jesus IS the Messiah!

Your Daily Confession of Jesus/Yeshua’s Identity:

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

Matthew 16:16b