Fear No Fear

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

But we have rejected shameful hidden deeds, not behaving with deceptiveness or distorting the word of God, but by open proclamation of the truth we commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience before God.
2 Corinthians 4:2 (emphasis added)

The closer we are to Adonai Elohim, the more blessed we are – just because we are near Him. “Now this is eternal life—that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you sent” (John 17:3). “But above all pursue his kingdom and righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33). We know that He loves us. That His love for us never changes, regardless of what we do or don’t do. It is constant. He is not looking to punish us, but to get us closer to Him so that we can have full Blessing here on Earth and ultimately walking and talking with Him face to face in Heaven. If we find that we are not in that kind of relationship, it isn’t because of our loving, merciful, patient and gracious Heavenly Father. It will be because of US.

Take healing. Adonai is EVER-PRESENT for healing. Anything less that instant or near-instant complete and total healing isn’t His best. He wants His best for us. Not getting His best isn’t wrong. It isn’t sin. He isn’t mad at us. He wants to get healing to us ANY way that we will accept it from Him. He already accomplished it. The cake has been baked and iced. It’s only a question of how WE choose to take it from Him. He will use gradual healing,;doctors; a travelling evangelist, teacher, or minister; a family member; church service; dream; or recorded message. He will use ANYTHING and EVERYTHING He can to get us to accept what Jesus did for us. But it is WE who determine where on the spectrum we are going to land.

Relationship with the Father, the Son, or the Spirit works the SAME WAY. WE determine where on the spectrum of relationship we are going to land. We can land in a spot where we don’t really know Him. The best you can hope for there is a ‘normal’ walk. Going to church on Sunday, dealing with the world with our own smarts, getting comfort here and there with the Word or a sermon or a worship service. The problem with that is that it is all OUR effort, OUR thoughts, OUR impressions. We might know ABOUT Adonai, but we wouldn’t know HIM. That kind of relationship won’t work out for us very well. “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the kingdom of heaven—only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day, many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many powerful deeds in your name?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you. Go away from me, you lawbreakers!’” (Matthew 7:21-23). We might be free from the requirements of the LAW (Romans 8:2), but we are meant to follow what Jesus said from our hearts because of our love for Him – keeping away from sin and leaning into His righteousness (Galatians 3:24-26). When we don’t love Him enough to obey Him, we are breaking the law of love. If we don’t KNOW Him, we will have no place in His Blessing.

Then there is the middle of the road. Knowing Him a little, obeying Him a little, and not ever quite arriving anywhere. Your spiritual life is full of deserts and plateaus. Places where you are desperate to ‘feel’ Adonai move. To see the miraculous. Study a little. Praise in services and devotions at home. Distracted a lot by life and what’s going on. Seeing some victories and praying through discouragements. Kind of acquaintances of Jesus moving towards good friends. This is not Adonai’s best for us. It isn’t the ideal. And there is a LOT that holds us back when we live like this. This kind of life is life among the thorns. “Other seed fell among the thorns, and they grew up and choked it, and it did not produce grain” (Mark 4:7). The cares of the world. Our life IN the world or our life outside of Jesus (own own households), it doesn’t matter. Anything that blocks the Word from getting in and growing will lead to a less than life. That isn’t His plan. A lot of things can stop us from removing the stones and becoming good ground (Mark 4:8), but the worst are the shadow habits.

“Now this is the basis for judging: that the light has come into the world and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil deeds hates the light and does not come to the light, so that their deeds will not be exposed” (John 3:19-20). We are not under the requirements of the Law. “For sin will have no mastery over you, because you are not under law but under grace” (Romans 6:14). The Law was meant to kick up sin. To show us that we are NOT perfect. That we sin. That we do things that are NOT rooted in Adonai. That in either word, or deed, or thought, without a saviour we are trained and influenced by evil intent and we sin through our own selfishness at wanting what WE want when WE want it because it FEELS good to US. But Jesus came to save us by FULFILLING THE LAW. Instead of kicking up sin, He forgives and offers us that forgiveness through Grace that we might walk in His ways WITHOUT the influence of the evil intent. Instead of a codified law of requirement and punishment, we have Grace and we are enabled to walk in HIS Righteousness (which will fulfil the laws – Matthew 22:38-40). The keyword under Grace is TRUST. That is what Ruach HaKodesh convicts us of. Whether or not we are trusting in Jesus (John 16:8-11). Are we keeping our mindset on who we are in Him? “God made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we would become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21). Because if we are, we have NO EXCUSE not to act like it.

If we are acting our our righteousness in Jesus, we aren’t doing this that are out of harmony with Adonai. We’re doing things that are focused and motivated from our Love of Him. We’re not doing things for our own reasons, for our own pleasures, in our own strength, or trying to make things go our way. “You desire and you do not have; you murder and envy and you cannot obtain; you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask; you ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly, so you can spend it on your passions” (James 4:2-3). We can’t be double-minded. We need to set our hearts on things that Adonai approves of from HIS point of view. Remember that He is our loving Father and wants only the BEST for us. Which means we won’t be giving up anything except our selfishness. When HE is first, we can handle anything. But are we MAKING Him first in every area. We could be billionaires if money had no hold on us. We could enjoy entertainment (movies, books, travel, hunting, fishing, or anything) if it had no hold on us. If we spurn those things that are immoral from His point of view – no matter if something had a ‘little’ wrong with it. It will change what we are willing to do, because when we focus on Him WE change to be more like Him – which is what we were designed to do (Genesis 1:26). A key part of that is paying attention to what the Word says about EVERYTHING.

Why did Ruach HaKodesh use THAT word? THIS phrase? What did it mean to those who were hearing it for the first time? Was anything lost or cut out in translation? These are the questions we should ask. We don’t have to learn the original languages. We can rely on those who have and have done the work for us. Then we compare their work to the Word and pray about it. Ruach HaKodesh will guide us away from those things which are not compatible with the Word. He’ll guide us to translations and commentary that are in harmony with Adonai’s TRUE nature. When we find out what is being said, we need to think about it. Mull it over. Consider how it fits into our lives and whether or not we have something we need to change. The Word is never wrong. So if it is rubbing us the wrong way, WE have a rough edge. A rough edge that we need Ruach HaKodesh’s help to identify and with the tools available to us in Jesus because of what He did for us on and through the cross, eliminate it. Without mercy. NOTHING in this world is important enough to put before Him. EVERYTHING here – no matter HOW GOOD – is a PALE imitation to what He has for us. We need to change ourselves to fit the mould He made for us: Himself.

How many things do we do and watch and read that we wouldn’t if our young children were there? Or our parents? Spouse? There are things we hide from them. We think that they’re not ‘that bad’, but we still don’t want them to see us do/watch/read it. Or to expose them to it. These are the types of things that hinder our walk with Adonai. Some might be things that He sees as morally wrong: infidelity, murder, lying, promiscuity, etc. Others might not be ‘wrong’ but they’re getting in the way. Obsessions. It’s funny how often we hide our obsessions even when they aren’t in and of themselves wrong. I think it’s because our SPIRIT knows that they’re taking us away from where our attention should be. Whether things are right or wrong are between us and Adonai. Remember though that He never changes and neither does His point of view. WE might use the excuse that society has changed, that things are different in today’s day and age. But Adonai’s morality is for all of time and all of space. It is eternal. It isn’t restriction either, but TRUE freedom (Matthew 11:28-30). So much of what we have been conditioned to leads to death. Death of the true human we could be. Death of trust. Death of obedience. Death of our willingness to be in the Blessing. We look to the flesh and we look to human thinking, and we think to ourselves: this is right and good. But it is not always so. It only LOOKS that way from OUR point of view.

Fast food is a great example. It TASTES good. But it does HORRIBLE things to our bodies. When we eat it there are spikes in blood sugar, inflammation, negative impacts on our blood pressure, and too much salt and fat intake. That’s just from eating it. Single meal or multiple, doesn’t matter. Those are negative short-term effects. Long term? It isn’t any better. Digestive issues, higher inflammation, lower control of infection, higher cancer rates, and a higher risk of allergic and auto-inflammatory disease. It helps foster a lower capacity for memory and learning. It raises the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease. Fast food isn’t good for us. Science has proven what our mother’s have told us for decades. The Fast Food Industry made 972.74 billion USD profit in 2021. It is HORRIBLE for us, yet look how many of us participate in it. It FEELS good and is not. There is a LOT in life that is like that. Humans got influenced, made something up, and then went with it. But we weren’t influenced by Ruach HaKodesh. We didn’t go with what the Word pointed out. We did out OWN thing. As such, it will be incompatible with the Word. Anything incompatible with the Word is something we should NOT be putting our time, energy, or trust into. We need to focus on Adonai’s point of view, not ours. We certainly cannot do both. “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Matthew 6:24).

Knowing how our Father is, learning more about His nature, choosing to be obedient to His point of view, THIS is what life is about. Now and eternally. Not submitting to this way of living can block our efforts to be with Him. It certainly prevents Him from Blessing us how He wants to because we’ve moved out from under His wings. No matter how big an umbrella is, if you walk out from under it you’re going to get wet. If we want to walk in the fullness of the Blessing, the fullness of the Anointing, and the fullness of a relationship with Adonai, then we need to marshal the self-control He gave us and walk under His wings. That is where healing is. Healing for our minds, bodies, hearts, and souls. It is the ONLY way to enjoy consistent health. It is the only way to SEE ourselves healthy – which is the first step to BEING healthy. We need to apply today’s verse and PUT AWAY that which was born in shadows. That which we keep to ourselves. We need to get His Light on every aspect of our lives so that we can live in the Sonshine.

Daily Affirmation Jesus IS Messiah: Daniel 9:25

“So know and understand: From the issuing of the command to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until an anointed one, a prince arrives, there will be a period of seven weeks and sixty-two weeks. It will again be built, with plaza and moat, but in distressful times.” Messiah would be announced. He would be announced publicly to His people, Elohim’s children. Four Hundred and Eighty-Three years to the exact day (which is seven weeks and sixty-two weeks) after the decree to rebuild the city of Jerusalem (Isaiah 44: 26-28), Messiah came to Jerusalem and was announced to all on His way in. “The next day the large crowd that had come to the feast heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him. They began to shout, “Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the king of Israel!”” (John 12:12-13). Jesus came on a donkey – both the sign of a servant AND a kingly vehicle for proclaiming rulership (1 Kings 1:33-35) – and was hailed by the crowds on the way into the city. Jesus was announced. 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