Fear No Fear

(All scripture from the World English Bible, ebible.org, all rights reserved)

In God, I praise his word. In God, I put my trust. I will not be afraid. What can flesh do to me?
Psalm 56:4 (emphasis added)

This verse is echoed later in this Psalm when in verse 11 it says “I have put my trust in God. I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?” A better translation is ‘I have put my trust without fear in God’. Trust is a close sibling of belief, which is the twin of faith, which is the air of the Kingdom. If you are operating in fear, you are operating outside the Kingdom of God. If you are operating in faith, you are operating inside. Any time you are giving into fear you are not pleasing to the Father. This does not mean He doesn’t love you. He DOES love you. He loves you more than you can understand without Jesus to help you get it. He loves you no matter what. But do you please Him? Is He taking pleasure in your actions, or can He not see them because they are in sin? Are you obedient or are you obedient? You can obey to the letter an instruction, but be doing it out of obligation or fear or to get a reward. That is not obedience. That is merely adherence. That is not worthy of reward or a smile. That is worthy of not being punished, not having actually transgressed. But it might earn you a frown. It won’t get a smile.

It is good to adhere to a set of rules. It is. They are guideposts. They are boundary lines. They let you know where freedom is. They let you know where the country of Back Off lies. It is good to know how far you can take things and what to avoid. There is value in that. But there is no fellowship in that. There is no companionship in that. There is no reward in that. That isn’t keeping a commandment, that is observing a commandment. When you observe something you are complying with it. You are taking notice of it. You’re aware of it. But when you keep something you’re faithful to it. You’re conforming to it, maintaining it, preserving it. It has some value to you. That’s a big difference. My children observe the chore rules. They comply. But they don’t value them. They don’t cherish the opportunity to wipe the table, sweep the floor, or sanitise their bathroom. These are not things they seek to maintain and preserve. How much of Yahweh’s moral structure are we aware of, but not preserving?

To praise something is to commend it. To value, to express favourable judgment, to approve of it, to glorify it by the attribution of perfection. We are to praise His Word. If we do that, we’re agreeing with it. We are acknowledging its perfection. We’re approving it. Valuing it. But does it mean we’re keeping it? We obey it — or the parts we agree with anyway. We adhere to various interpretations of it — preferring certain translations because they really ‘speak’ to us. We call it out as wonderful and glorious and an inspiration. We put it on cups, t-shirts, coasters, and needlepoint. We quote it to win arguments. We follow the big points. Mostly. If they don’t inconvenience us — after all, OUR situation is special. We pour our attention on it for 45 min a week during church. But are we really keeping it?

The Lord Jesus describes Himself as a provider of living water (John 4:13-14). This living water is a key feature of heaven: “He showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street” (Revelation 22:1-2). Water that lives, flows. Stagnant water is water that is motionless. You’ll find in the Kingdom of God that things flow. In today’s verse there is flow. The Psalmist praises the Word. Puts trust without fear in the Lord. Isn’t afraid. And finally, realises that nothing can even be done to them. Without the first step, the rest don’t happen. If you misstep at the beginning you’re nursing road rash, not walking in peace. To keep the Word, we have to trust it.

Trust with fear isn’t really trust. It’s a worldly hope. It’s wishful thinking. It’s vulnerability, not open confidence. What good is it to say I’m broken, bloodied, and beaten up but I am still standing here with open wounds as you stand there in the same condition? That’s vulnerability. Everyone exposing their weakness and together choosing not to inflict more harm than absolutely necessary as you learn to hug each other with minimal pain. I’ll take a pass on that. I will always prefer openness. You seeing all my cards and me seeing all yours and both of us putting our weapons down and working together confident that we will be there to support each other when we need it. It’s built on something a whole lot better than mutual acknowledgement of pain. Trust is assured reliance on the character, ability, strength, or truth of someone or something. Vulnerability is capable of being physically or emotionally wounded which is the state of being open to attack or damage. I will take trust over vulnerability any day. We all need to be trusting and trustworthy. But if there is fear, you’re really just being vulnerable.

Fear poisons everything. It really does. It takes the stability of trustfulness and turns it into a place of pain and anxiety. It takes rock and turns it into sand. Fear is the giant bumphead parrotfish of life. This fish bites and scrapes algae off rocks and dead coral formations for food. All that inedible material passes through its system and then excreted as sand. Pure, white sand. A single fish can produce hundreds of pounds of sand a year. Try not to think about that next time you’re lying on a glistening white beach. But you’re lying on parrotfish poop. Fear works the same way. It takes something and grinds it up. Pooping out an imitation of peace. A glistening, pure-looking product that is not what it appears to be. No matter how you feel about it and how much peace and relaxation you believe your getting, it is still excrement. Anything built on it has a foundation of excrement. And you know what happens to stuff built on sand. It doesn’t stand up in times of trouble (Matthew 7:24-27).

At the end of that parable of the house on sand, Jesus says “Everyone who hears these words of mine and doesn’t do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand” (vs 26). At the beginning of that parable in the book of Luke Jesus says “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and don’t do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46-49). This parable isn’t the only time this is a theme. James 1:22 says “But be doers of the word, and not only hearers, deluding your own selves.” Hearing is not enough. Knowing is not enough. Observing is not enough. We need to keep it. We need to praise it. We need to hold the Word to be so precious as food to us. Not just to our spirit, but to us. Unable to continue without it. Needing it so bad you can’t get through a day without it. Daydreaming about large chunks of Psalms. A sliver of Timothy. A nibble of James. Maybe a side of John or Romans. Come on. We do it with food. Junk food even. Shouldn’t we do it with the stuff that really matters? “He humbled you, allowed you to be hungry, and fed you with manna, which you didn’t know, neither did your fathers know, that he might teach you that man does not live by bread only, but man lives by every word that proceeds out of the LORD’s mouth” (Deuteronomy 8:3).

If we praise His Word, we will be able to trust without fear because our trust will be built on something. Something that will last. Something that is trustworthy. Something that is not only based on truth but IS Truth. There is a confidence that comes from knowing the Word of God. Not knowing names, places, parables, and events. You can spout those off all day long and not catch a glimpse at the other layers of it. The Word is a multi-layered thing. I’ll go out on a limb and say that the Word is an infinitely layered thing.

There will never be a point — in life or in eternity — where we get it all. Where we understand it all. There will always be another mystery. Another layer. Another connection between verses. Deeper meanings. Vibrant lessons. Humbling discourse. Think of the wonders that will be revealed. Think of the wonders that are being revealed now. And learn of the wonders that have already been revealed. The Word is a place where there is never an end to learning. Bored? It will un-bore you. Once you start getting into it, there aren’t enough hours in the day to take it in. All that Wording builds confidence in the Lord. Seeing again and again that He doesn’t lie, that He knows the end from the beginning, that He is able to and wants to guide us to success in Him, and that truly He is the God of More Than Enough.

If that is the God that lives in you. If the Word is where you spend your time. You WILL find that fear has no hold on you. The Word is full of promises. About 8,000 of them. That’s a lot when you remember Joshua 21:45 that tells us not ONE word has failed of God’s good promises. It’s also important to remember context when looking at God’s promises. We see the scripture unfold across time. There were promises made to people in exile, people fighting for freedom, people on the run, and people looking for hope. Some of those situational promises sound great from the victory side, but not so great when we look at the conditions in which they were promised. Here is the most important thing though: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8).

That means His spirit is the same. He wanted freedom for them, He wants freedom for you. The principles behind the promises haven’t changed. So in Jesus, we can stand on them — not for the exact word for word promise to occur necessarily, but for the spirit that inhabits that promise to also be true for us. God promised Israel would be delivered from Egypt (Exodus 6:1). Don’t expect to be freed from Egypt (unless you live there and are being oppressed). We aren’t promised that we will escape from Egypt. But we know by that promise that the Lord doesn’t want to see us in bondage. We can stand on the promise of Exodus 6:1 to know in our spirits that we will be delivered from the situation we are in that keeps us in bondage — be it traffic or a horrible boss or legal conundrum. And just like the Israelites in Egypt it may not come in the form we expect or want, it may not happen the way that we expect or want, and it may not be difficulty free. But we have a promise that ultimately, we will be freed from bondage.

That gives us a lot of ground to learn from and stand on. A lot of promises whose spirit we can walk in. But we need to do it right. There is no point in grabbing promises willy nilly and flinging them around expecting manifestation. Praising His Word means valuing it, commending it, and agreeing with it. Agreeing with IT. Not bending it to agree with us. The Word is about getting our minds in line with it. Our spirits in line with His. The Word is His will. We are to acknowledge that will and submit ourselves to it. Jesus is the head of the church (Ephesians 5:23 & 25). We are the church. The Lord Jesus is our head. He is our authority (Matthew 28:18). We need to spend time with the Holy Spirit in the Word to find out what He wants for us. And then claim it, pray it, believe it, receive it, walk in it, and praise the Lord for it. Worship Him with the Word. Praise Him for the promise. And be obedient to the Spirit as you wait on Him for the manifestation of the promise. Not in fear. Not in I wishes. In trust. Without fear. Founded and grounded in the Word.

The Lord doesn’t promise us smooth sailing because the world is against Him. When we are for Him we will be persecuted by His enemies. That doesn’t mean He doesn’t want fellowship with you. It doesn’t mean He doesn’t want success and blessing for you. It doesn’t mean money is evil or prayer time is a chore. It doesn’t mean He doesn’t want a better world with better social justice systems. It does mean He knows what is truly what. He knows the lengths the devil goes to strike us all down. It does mean that while He wants to be a buddy with you, only truly righteous people can be in His presence and we cannot be truly righteous unless we are saved, renewed, and abide in Jesus. In Jesus, we are righteous. In Jesus, we are pure. In Jesus, we are new creations. In Jesus, we can fellowship with the Father. It’s all about Jesus, who is the Word.

We can be renewed in Him. We can trust in Him. We can be confident that His promises will come to pass. We can be confident in the blessing and victory that is ours in Him. We can be confident that if we sow, we will reap. That the more we sow, the more we reap. That riches are meant to be a blessing to us and through us to others. That we can’t give it away fast enough, help enough, bless enough, to ever run heaven’s storehouses dry. We can trust that our needs will be met and more. We can trust that situations will turn around. We can trust that our circumstances are always and ever on an up and up journey. We can trust that when we are persecuted because we trust in Jesus, Jesus will keep us in His arms, wrapped in His Spirit, and guide us through it — into victory here on earth or victory in heaven, either one is victory. If God is for us, what CAN flesh do to us? They can only influence us so far and then there is nothing they can do for ever after that point. While we, on the other hand, can stand on Him and in Him and never, ever, ever, EVER have to leave that position, that blessing, that victory, and that fellowship.

Praise His Word today. Trust without fear in Him today. Stand on and in Him today. Look around yourself, laugh at the circumstances, and say, ‘What can YOU do to ME?’ and praise God some more for His abundant, ever-lasting, loving-kindness and mercy. He is a GOOD God. He does GOOD things. And there are more GOOD things to come forever and evermore.

Daily Affirmation of God’s Love: Isaiah 54:13-17

I can stand on this promise. You can to. You can pray it over yourself and your family. Why? Because God loves you. God loves you and loves those who love Him. If we love Him, we keep His commandments. Keep them, not adhere to them. We do it to please Him. See Him smile. Feel His pride in us. We will NOT be afraid. We will trust. While we are trusting and not being afraid, we won’t have oppression. We won’t have terror. We will be in peace. We will grow in knowledge of the Lord. We will have a great thing to stand on. By declaration of Yahweh God, our legal right of inheritance as His children is the right to condemn every tongue that comes against us in judgment. This is our heritage. This is our lineage. Wisdom, teaching, peace, joyfulness, and love. The kind rebuke of a loving father, not a whip across the backside. Not legal justice. Righteous judgment. Not do this or, but enabled to walk in union with Him. Not doing because it is required, but loving so we do. That is the peace we get. That is the right we have. Being in His righteousness. His righteousness has no fear. No stress. No anxiety. His righteousness is trustworthy. His nature is trustworthy. We can inhabit His peace because we love Him. We love Him, because He loves us. The more He loves, the more we can love. He has imputed to us His righteousness in His son Jesus, the Anointed One. Because we are samsies, we can meet face to face. Worship Him in truth, looking full on at His glory. In Spirit. In truth. In Him. He loved us enough to return us to His image. He loved us enough to share Himself with us. Let Him love you today.

Your Daily Confession of God’s love to YOU:

Today God loves that I _______.