Fear No Fear

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

As he spoke to me, a wind came into me and stood me on my feet, and I heard the one speaking to me.
Ezekiel 2:2 (emphasis added)

I am not much of a prize. I like to sleep. I’m a bit on the lazy side – at least until I start to work, and then I’m good. I have a tendency to over-indulge, whether it is food or entertainment or even just zoning out. I look at all of that and I think, is this all that I am? And you know what? It is. That IS all I am in myself. I am a big zero. I have never really accomplished anything spectacular. I’ve blundered into most things. I’ve wasted talents and used them wrong. I’ve been an addict. I’ve floundered a LOT. I’ve made HUGE mistakes. And if I get left on my own I tend to idle. To tread water. To do… nothing productive. That’s ME. And you. And everyone else. No matter how puffed up someone is. No matter what they accomplish. In the end it is all so much muck on the bottom of our shoes. We are NOTHING special in ourselves. We NEED Yahweh.

Yahweh showed up and Ezekiel did a face plant. Totally collapsed. I imagine we would ALL do that. But Yahweh sent a wind into Ezekiel to lift him up. Some translations say spirit. The original word can mean both and it is different from Ruach HaKodesh or ‘the Spirit of Elohim’ which shows up in different verses. Yet everything in the Old Covenant foreshadows the New. The wind of Elohim, the breath of lives, the breath that came from the four living creatures, or the Spirit of Elohim. It is all from the Father. From the Source. It is external power from Yahweh into us. When that happens, we are able to stand. We are able to listen to Him. We are able to travel. We are able to perform. We are able to speak. None of it in ourselves, but because of His wind in us. Without that addition, we are nothing special. Just created beings. Higher than animals, but just beings walking around. Spiritual zombies, walking without a living spirit, desperate to feed on life. It is not how we were meant to be. We weren’t meant to be walking nothings with no sustenance. We were meant to be SO MUCH MORE.

“While he was with them, he declared, “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait there for what my Father promised, which you heard about from me. For John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”” (Acts 1:4-5). The Father promised His Spirit. ““Indeed, a time is coming,” says the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah . . . But I will make a new covenant with the whole nation of Israel after I plant them back in the land,” says the Lord. “I will put my law within them and write it on their hearts and minds. I will be their God, and they will be my people.”” (Jeremiah 31:31, 35). “I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove the heart of stone from your body and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my Spirit within you; I will take the initiative, and you will obey my statutes and carefully observe my regulations” (Ezekiel 36:26-27). The promised Spirit would be more than an anointing. It would be His Spirit within us. Enabling us to perform what He tasks us with. That love of His that is so special, reflected back at Him from within us. When we think of it, we’ve got a love sandwich. HIM, us, and HIM IN US. Wrapped in His Love, how can we do anything BUT listen? BUT obey? BUT follow the lead of the one who has the initiative and is guiding us? The LOVE of the Father unlocks our identity in Jesus.

What does He say about us? He calls us sons and daughters. “Therefore “come out from their midst, and be separate,” says the Lord, “and touch no unclean thing, and I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters,” says the All-Powerful Lord” (2 Corinthians 6:17-18). “(See what sort of love the Father has given to us: that we should be called God’s children—and indeed we are! For this reason the world does not know us: Because it did not know him” (1 John 3:1). We are His children. Just like Jesus. It is because we are IN JESUS. We are PART of the family. We’re not left out. There is a comedian who is part of a family that had 6 kids. When they grew up two became comedians, two became doctors, and two were lawyers. The way he said it was: it was as if three of them grabbed the hand of another and said ‘I’m going with you’. This is EXACTLY what we do. We get saved, washed clean, look around, see Jesus, grab His hand and say ‘I’m going with you!’ Where HE goes, WE go. What HE does, WE do. What HE says, WE say. What HE believes, WE believe. What HE trusts in, WE trust in. That is how simple it is. That is how easy it is. That is how it works and how it goes. Jesus in us, and us in Jesus. And Jesus doesn’t come alone. “Jesus replied, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and take up residence with him. The person who does not love me does not obey my words. And the word you hear is not mine, but the Father’s who sent me” (John 14:23-24).

We’ve GOT to heal our view of the Father. We HAVE to start seeing His actions of Love. The Old Testament God was JUST AS LOVING as the one of the New Testament. We need to see these events from HIS point of view, not ours. We see the punishment and think that is all that there is. We can understand that. It may horrify us here and there, but we GET it. That is how WE are. I threw a fit today. I let my feelings run my body for about five minutes. I brought my youngest to tears. I didn’t yell. I didn’t get violent or physical. But I was not KIND. I was not GENTLE. And it came down to doing something their way or my way. Since I wanted my way, I did it. In spite of what was said. I hurt that child’s feelings with my actions and then with my unkind words. I had to repent. To the CHILD and also to the Father. I had to apologise. That was unkind parenting. But if you look at Yahweh in the Old Testament, you don’t see that. What you DO see is hundreds of years of patience. We don’t know how long Adam was in the garden before he rebelled, but if you look at the ages of his descendants when there were births, it was about 1656 years before the flood. How many years was Yahweh speaking to people (He spoke audibly to Cain in Genesis 4:7, so He was still speaking to mankind after the Fall)? How many years of warning them? Calling them to better behaviour? Showing them mercy? Remember, He could have left Cain to reap what He sowed and instead protected him (Genesis 4:15). It was only after humanity had hardened their hearts and engaged in every worldly pleasure, pursuit, and cruelty that Yahweh let them reap their harvest. Even in the midst of that, He preserved humanity instead of starting over. He loves us so much.

We attack cancer with such a vengeance with horrific treatments. There have been cases when a government body stepped in and FORCED chemotherapy treatment against the will of the patient. That’s how bad chemotherapy can affect you. But it can also be an effective medical treatment. So can amputation. These are not pleasant treatments. They are quite drastic. But we do them for the ‘greater good’ of a healthy body. Yahweh did the same kind of thing, but for humanity. Could He have forced us to comply and obey? Yes. But then He would have violated the will He gave us. The option to choose. He protected us from ourselves. He worked to change our opinion by showing us His mercy, His grace, and His love. He performed miracles. He supported. He brought at least three different nations to the promised land and ALL of them eventually rebelled – except there has ALWAYS been a remnant of the Israelites, the Jews, who maintained belief, trust, and worship of Yahweh. When they were too lost – intentionally by choice – Yahweh cut them out to preserve the rest. This was the judicial model. Blessing and cursing. Wrong and right. Crime and punishment. THAT was why Jesus came. To fulfil the system. To pay the price. To eliminate the curse and leave us with the blessing. Able to chose it without our earning it. Able to receive it because of what HE did not us. Like acing a test you not only didn’t need to study for, but you didn’t need to take in the first place.

Do you want to see the miraculous in your life? In your body? Your mind? Your heart? Do you want to be HEALED in every area that you can be healed in? See the Father for who He REALLY is. The LOVING All-Powerful Father. See the glory of Jesus. The sacrifice. The Saviour. The resurrection for us and through us. See Him in you. Understand the GRACE that we can walk in. Open your heart to Yahweh and let Him breathe His wind into you. And realise that with that wind in you, you CAN stand tall. You CAN be whole. His power at work in you TRANSFORMS you. You do NOT need to be broken. For ANY reason. He can RESTORE you. You can ACCEPT that. You can RECEIVE that. You can be all that He says you can be. It all starts with healing your vision of who the Father is. It all starts with shifting your thinking from what YOU think to what the WORD says. Ask Him to show it to you from HIS point of view. He will. He will reveal to you the depths of His love. It is all there in the Word and it is TRANSFORMATIONAL. Think about it. Dream about it. Breathe it in. You will rise to His place for you and never be the same again.

Daily Affirmation Jesus IS Messiah: Daniel 9:26

“Now after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one will be cut off and have nothing. As for the city and the sanctuary, the people of the coming prince will destroy them. But his end will come speedily like a flood. Until the end of the war that has been decreed there will be destruction.” Messiah would killed before the destruction of the Temple. That happened in 70AD. Messiah had to have died before that. “Then Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and gave up his spirit. Just then the temple curtain was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks were split apart” (Matthew 27:50-51). Jesus ministered for just over three years and there were three passovers during that time. Looking at the dates set down in scripture (such as in Luke 3:1 and 3:23), the Passovers would have occurred in 30AD (John 2:13), 31AD (John 5:1), 32AD (John 6:4), and finally in 33AD (John 11:55) when He was crucified between the Passover and the sabbath. 33AD was before 70AD. Jesus dies before the Temple was destroyed. 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