Fear No Fear

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

It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
1 Corinthians 13:7 (emphasis added)

Verse 8 continues “Love never ends”. No matter what Kingdom things are being discussed, love should always be central to the discussion. Not human love (which tends toward passion and selfishness), but Adonai’s pure and perfect love. The First Nations Version of the New Testament (FNVNT) puts verses 7 and 8 like this: “Love keeps walking even when carrying a heavy load. Love keeps trusting, never loses hope, and stands firm in hard times. The road of love has no end. The time will come when prophets are no longer needed, when people will stop speaking in unknown languages, and when the need for knowledge will fade away.” Whenever we have love as the basis of what we do, we have what we need to make it through all circumstances because Adonai IS love.

We need to have an attitude of love. First, it is a shield against sin. If we are seeking to be like Adonai in the way we love, we will naturally be seeking to emulate Him. Not hero worship, but pure worship. Seeking to truly be in His image. Choosing to take in His thoughts, ideas, and feelings. Impossible before salvation (Isaiah 55:8-9), it is within our grasp in Jesus (1 Corinthians 2:16). Obedience is love, so when we get our mindset in harmony with Adonai’s, we will naturally seek to obey. Not because we’re pressured, but because our character begins to change. It begins to improve and develop, so before you know it you want to be like Him. It is something we were meant to do. It is what we were created to be. “Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, after our likeness, so they may rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move on the earth.”” (Genesis 1:26). This isn’t just a shape or a form. This was us being little copies of Elohim Himself. Acting like Him, thinking like Him, being like Him. Adam chose rebellion and himself and his bloodline took on different characteristics. Jesus gives us a transplant, removing dead organs and putting back in living ones. Instead of being stuck in Adam’s mould, we can instead inhabit Jesus’ mould. “So also it is written, “The first man, Adam, became a living person”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit. However, the spiritual did not come first, but the natural, and then the spiritual. The first man is from the earth, made of dust; the second man is from heaven. Like the one made of dust, so too are those made of dust, and like the one from heaven, so too those who are heavenly. And just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, let us also bear the image of the man of heaven” (1 Corinthians 15:45-49).

If we are the image of the man of heaven, we are the image of the incorruptible. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he gave us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, that is, into an inheritance imperishable, undefiled, and unfading. It is reserved in heaven for you, who by God’s power are protected through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:4-5). We have to wait until heaven for the FULL image to be revealed. For us to have our new bodies to go along with the new spirit we have already received. Between the two, is our remaining time here on Earth. Not a time of losing. But a time of overcoming in Jesus, who overcame the world. Persecuted for His Name we might be, but also victorious against sickness and disease. If we weren’t victorious, the world could dismiss us as just another group of nuts. Another group of unenlightened, uneducated, misguided fools. But we ARE victorious. We can choose to believe the Word, trust that He will do what He says He will, and experience visible differences in our lives. Demonstrable supernatural realities that the world doesn’t share. They get sick, we don’t. They fear pandemics and infections, but we don’t because they don’t happen to us. Their finances get strained, ours aren’t dependent on the nation’s economy or the stock market. From the beginning this was true. Believers receiving and sharing and redistributing between households, nations, and church groups, so that all were taken care of – even in the face of droughts and disasters (Acts 4:32-35; 11:29-30). We’re not the same as the world.

What MAKES us different? The Love of Messiah Jesus. We get to enter into it. We get to share it. We get all things informed by it and formed through it. Are we sick when we shouldn’t be? The love of Jesus will get us through. When we miss it, or when we are charging ahead as little toddlers in Him who know no better, He lovingly directs us through Ruach HaKodesh into a better walk with Him. Are we set low in the world by misfortune and bad circumstances? The love of Jesus will guide our steps, assist our patience, and strengthen our thanksgiving and praise as we navigate ourselves AND those around us into His perfect will. We live in a fallen world that is full of free-willed people – not all of whom believe. There are some terrible things that go on. But the love of Jesus will get us through any and every circumstance that we might face. It drives away fear so that we can clearly see and choose His path, His will, and stand on His Word (1 John 4:18). Without His love, it is too easy to let fear get a hold of us – whether as anxiety, depression, worry, troubled minds, or being scared. Jesus’ ability to perform in our lives is determined by our knowledge of His love because if we don’t know it, we can’t ask for it. The more we know of it, the more we can ask of it. “Now to him who BY THE POWER THAT IS WORKING WITHIN US is able to do far beyond all that we ask or think, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen” (Ephesians 3:20-21, capitals mine). What is that power that works in us but the knowledge of the love of Jesus physically arrived (Ephesians 3:18-19). That knowledge opens the door to His fullness being manifest in us. It all comes down to His love.

There is nothing that His love cannot handle. No circumstances. No situations. No joy. No sorrows. No successes. No betrayals. No elections. No fraud. No theft. No gift. No anything, anywhere, ever. The love of Jesus is the foundation of all things because He made all things and in Himself upholds all things, and He IS Elohim (Colossians 1:16-20; Hebrews 1:3; John 1:1-5). It is ALL about His love. That is where our victory lives. That is what sped our healing out from His stripes, bruises, and wounds. That is what channelled His blood from the Mercy Seat to wash over us and make us whole, pure, and His. It is His nature, it is His will, it is His action, and it is His past, present, and future. In Jesus, WE can be right there in the middle of it. Walking His path, not going to the right or the left, inquiring of Him before we take a step, leaning into Him when we get it wrong, believing in Him when He speaks, and always putting our full trust without doubting into the action of His love that binds us to Adonai Elohim in all things. A love that can be trusted. “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor heavenly rulers, nor things that are present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39). Amen.

Daily Affirmation Jesus IS Messiah: Daniel 2:34-35

“In the days of those kings the God of heaven will raise up an everlasting kingdom that will not be destroyed and a kingdom that will not be left to another people. It will break in pieces and bring about the demise of all these kingdoms. But it will stand forever. You saw that a stone was cut from a mountain, but not by human hands; it smashed the iron, bronze, clay, silver, and gold into pieces. The great God has made known to the king what will occur in the future. The dream is certain, and its interpretation is reliable.”” Messiah’s kingdom would be triumphant. He would first come as the Suffering Servant, but would return as the Triumphant King. “He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom will never end” (Luke 1:33). “Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, when he has brought to an end all rule and all authority and power” (1 Corinthians 15:24). “Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven saying: “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign for ever and ever.”” (Revelation 11:15). Jesus was proclaimed by angels to be that triumphant King. Confirmed by Ruach HaKodesh through the Word. Shown by prophesy to come and rule in this world as head of the Eternal Messianic Kingdom. Jesus IS Messiah!

Your Daily Confession of Jesus/Yeshua’s Identity:

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

Matthew 16:16b