Fear No Fear

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

No, this is the kind of fast I want: I want you to remove the sinful chains, to tear away the ropes of the burdensome yoke, to set free the oppressed, and to break every burdensome yoke. I want you to share your food with the hungry and to provide shelter for homeless, oppressed people. When you see someone naked, clothe them! Don’t turn your back on your own flesh and blood.
Isaiah 58:6-7 (emphasis added)

The Sabbath was designed for the Israelites to spend a day totally dependent on Adonai Elohim. They didn’t spend time on their own desires. They didn’t make themselves food. They didn’t work to provide themselves support. They spent the about sixteen hours they were awake totally and completely focused on Adonai. It was their tithe of time and mental effort. A seven day week is 168 hrs. A tenth of that is 16.8 hrs, which is about an average person’s awake time – assuming a 7 hr sleep cycle. The Israelites needed to DEEPLY understand the idea of Sabbath: total dependence on Adonai. They needed that because they were meant to teach all the Gentiles about it when we entered the Sabbath of the New Covenant. Without the dependence, we would have nothing but our senses to rely on. There is a natural unbelief inherent in the negative information that comes from our five senses. Without dependence on Adonai, without time spent in the spiritual world, it is almost impossible for us to truly grasp the things of Adonai and engage them in our lives.

Sabbath in Jesus’ Covenant with His Father is total dependence on the Father. The biggest thing that is a trust killer is unbelief. How can we get over natural unbelief? We have messages that program into us from our senses that tell us what is ‘normal’. We get it about phenomena (it’s flu season, headaches are natural, cancer is incurable, etc). We get it about relationships (men are martians, sex is a need, fighting is normal, etc). We get it about feelings (you can’t just change a feeling, feelings are what validates us, etc). We get it about almost everything because our senses process the world around us, the media around us, the social environment around us, the culture around us, and the traditions around us. That is a lot of information coming in about this physical, natural world of ours. There is a LOT of information. It comes in and it is processed through our natural, human minds which have been conditioned to treat all information coming through the senses or through our feelings, as inalterable facts. But EVERY SINGLE THING that comes through our senses or our feelings are malleable. Because everything in this WORLD is malleable.

That means by definition we are not trapped in bad marriages. We are not trapped in wounded marriages. We are not trapped in dying marriages. It ALSO means BY DEFINITION that we do NOT need OUT of marriages. If there is something wrong with the marriage, it can be healed. Everything about the human condition can be healed. Marriage is a covenant and covenant is trust. The trust that is the covenant is what makes it POSSIBLE for us to be IN the marriage in the first place. It is a self-fulfilling prophesy of positivity. It is only this fallen creation and the lack of Word thinking that has caused us to pick up prophesies of negativity. They aren’t sent by Adonai, engineered by Him, created by Him, or permitted by Him. He wants our marriages to succeed. To prosper. We were told that in Genesis 1:28: “God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply! Fill the earth and subdue it! Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that moves on the ground.”” Have a fruitful marriage that multiplies and gets better and better every day. A marriage should have MUCH fruit – this does not mean simply ‘just have kids’. It CAN mean that. But that is NOT the only meaning of fruitful. Fruitful means all the blessings that come out of marriage. Children, education, business, house, family affairs, cars, sex, companionship, and so on. As long as you aren’t obsessed with the fruit and neglecting the marriage unit itself, you are being fruitful. Adonai wants that. He wants us fruitful and to prosper in that fruitfulness.

When our marriages stop producing fruit that prospers us, we have a marriage that needs healing. To prosper means to flourish physically; grow strong and healthy. To make successful. Is THAT what your marriage looks like? If it doesn’t, it needs healing. To GET a successful healing, you need to not be overly dependent on that malleable information reported by your senses and feelings. It isn’t that it isn’t truthful information, it is simply that the information can be CHANGED. We can only do that when we are focused and receiving spiritual information from Adonai. When we have that TRUTHFUL information coming at us about what can be and what HE sees when He looks at us, we can change the facts of our mortal world and our natural marriage. We need true trust in Adonai and His Word. True trust demands action. It’s easier not to get. It’s easier to throw up our hands and say look at what my senses are telling me! It’s easier to believe with lip service to Adonai’s ways and not back it up with anything. ‘Waiting on God’ is what we call that. It’s nonsense. That isn’t trust of ANY kind. It’s a LIE of trust, which is momentum toward death (John 10:10. All the devil does is to service death. It’s the only ‘power’ he has.). We will develop and nurture true trust when we are in communion with Jesus. When we look at our marriages as Sabbath to Adonai. Total dependence.

Today’s verse is a list of things we need to do and not do to be successes in our marriages. Remove chains of sin – do things in trust. Remove burdensome yokes – ignore traditions and expectations, replacing them with the Word. Free each other from the oppression of negative behaviour and words. Break burdensome yokes – be yoked with Jesus to the Father. Share food – spiritual and natural. Provide shelter – be a support, a blessing, a safe place without judgment. Don’t oppress each other – encourage each other. Clothe each other – don’t let shame rule your words and thoughts. Stand together, side by side, hand in hand and arm in arm, you are flesh and blood. Never turn your backs on each other.

That’s some list, right? We can’t do that in ourselves. We can’t do that outside Jesus. Whenever you find you’re NOT doing one of those things (and others like them) or when you find you NEED TO, take it to Jesus. Take Communion on it. As a couple. As a UNIT. As equal partners, side by side. The bottom of the triangle seeking the top. “Through these things he has bestowed on us his precious and most magnificent promises, so that by means of what was promised you may become partakers of the divine nature, after escaping the worldly corruption that is produced by evil desire” (2 Peter 1:4). In Jesus, we can escape the worldly corruption. He is our redeemer. Our restorer. In HIM we are cleansed. In HIM we are NEW CREATIONS. How to we get in Him? We abide. We seek. We find out where the will of the Father is, use the tools Ruach Hakodesh makes available to us, use the authority and dominion Jesus makes available to us in accordance to the Word, and get ourselves in the middle of that will and stay there. We can have marriages that are NEW CREATIONS in Him. Communion is a WONDERFUL way to do that because we must do it in REMEMBRANCE of what HE has done for US. “While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after giving thanks he broke it, gave it to his disciples, and said, “Take, eat, this is my body.” And after taking the cup and giving thanks, he gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood, the blood of the covenant, that is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:26-28). It is hard to be negative or selfish when you are consciously as a UNIT remembering what Jesus has done for you TOGETHER.

“He is the reason you have a relationship with Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31). We can’t say that A is holding up the marriage. We can’t say B isn’t pulling their weight. Not when we are acknowledging that Messiah Jesus is the reason for the marriage in the first place AND the one we are yoked to AND the one through whom ANYTHING and EVERYTHING is accomplished, period (John 15:5). “If anyone confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God resides in him and he in God” (1 John 4:15). If we are AS A MARRIED UNIT confessing that Jesus is the Son of God and our Lord and Saviour, then we are residing in Him and He in us. How can we be petty when THAT is our mindset? Things will NOT be about he said/she said. They won’t be about what he wants or what she wants. They won’t be about what I WANT or I NEED. In Jesus, it is all about what HE wants. What HE needs. All the ‘correcting’ will be about how the UNIT can be more like Jesus, modelling Jesus to the rest of the family and the world around them, worshipping Him more or better, Wording more, thanking more, more of Jesus in every area. More, more more. That’s the way it works in the Kingdom. Serving Jesus, serving others, all in service to the Father. The Kingdom is a Kingdom of servants to the Father’s Glory (John 13:1-17). If it doesn’t glorify the Father or glorify Jesus who glorified the Father, then it isn’t the right thing to do.

“And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has in us. God is love, and the one who resides in love resides in God, and God resides in him” (1 John 4:16). If we walk in love toward others, we’re loving Him. We need to walk in His love toward our partners. If we are walking together in the love of Jesus husband to wife and wife to husband as covenanted believers, then the marriage will never be broken. Husband (male) + Wife (female) + Jesus (Saviour) = a three-stranded cord of love. “Although an assailant may overpower one person, two can withstand him. Moreover, a three-stranded cord is not quickly broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:12). A healed marriage is possible. It is more than that. It is our covenant RIGHT (Isaiah 54:17).

Come together regularly in communion with thanksgiving in your heart. Remember what Jesus has done. Come together in communion to correct strife. Remember what Jesus made available to you. Come together in communion to re-affirm your commitment. Remember what Jesus brought together in your marriage. Come together in communion in praise. Remember who the Father sees when He looks at you. Come together in communion to listen. He speaks constantly, but sometimes we need to clean our ears to hear Him clearly. Remembrance of Jesus is the way to avoid stumbling.

Remembrance of Jesus is the way to stay in His peace because when we get close to Him, He gets close to us. Remembrance of Jesus is the way to stay Jesus-centric. To rely totally and completely in Him. To affirm your need and desire to hear His instructions. To affirm your desire to go where He goes and nowhere else. To affirm your submission in humble obedience to your Lord and Saviour. To affirm your servant heart. To affirm your desire to model a Jesus-centred life and marriage to all who see you – whether you know they are looking or not.

Sabbath is a total reliance on Jesus. A Sabbath Marriage doesn’t seek to do things in the strength of the couple. A Sabbath Marriage doesn’t find ways to make it work. A Sabbath Marriage asks and obeys. A Sabbath Marriage isn’t an ordeal, isn’t a struggle, and isn’t hard work. It is a SIMPLE and EASY thing to submit to Adonai. It isn’t WORK. It’s a privilege. The tests of the enemy to destroy us can be hard, but when we are safe in Jesus it is all just sleeping in the boat while the storm rages. The devil has no power over you. The devil has no power over your marriage. A Sabbath Marriage depends TOTALLY in absolutely ALL ways and ALL things on Adonai Elohim. The One who Lives. The One whose Name is ULTIMATE authority. The One who brings us peace. Peace beyond the five senses. Peace beyond our feelings. Total, soothing, safe-place peace. And THAT is the place your marriage can inhabit. THAT is the place where your marriage will ever-prosper, be ever-fruitful, and be living, breathing, demonstrable proof that marriage can be the Righteousness of Elohim in Messiah Jesus. Just like you as individuals, so too as a UNIT.

Marriage doesn’t NEED to fail. It was DESIGNED to succeed. To succeed when totally dependant on Messiah Jesus. Let your marriage be healed. Take it to the Communion table and never take it off.

Daily Affirmation Jesus IS Messiah: Isaiah 50:6

“I offered my back to those who attacked, my jaws to those who tore out my beard; I did not hide my face from insults and spitting.” Messiah would be spat upon. This is part of derision. The ejection of our saliva has long been tied to offence, vulgarity, impudence, and shame – it being considered shameful to let someone spit on you, instead of hitting back. It was and is a serious affront to spit in someone’s face because it is considered a manifestation of your disdain or hatred toward someone. Messiah would be so hated by some people that they would spit in His face. “They spat on him and took the staff and struck him repeatedly on the head” (Matthew 27:30). “Then they spat in his face and struck him with their fists. And some slapped him, saying, “Prophesy for us, you Christ! Who hit you?”” (Matthew 26:67-68). Jesus was spat upon. By the religious elite who hated Him. By the Romans who took this opportunity to mock and deride a Jew (throughout history letting people ‘go’ on another human has been a BAD idea. With Jesus it was no different). Jesus took the humiliation. He took the shame. He made no complaint. He took it on our behalf. Jesus IS Messiah!

Your Daily Confession of Jesus/Yeshua’s Identity:

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

Matthew 16:16b