Fear No Fear

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

“Moses said to Korah, “Hear now, you sons of Levi! Is it a small thing to you that the God of Israel has separated you from the congregation of Israel, to bring you near to himself, to do the service of Yahweh’s tabernacle, and to stand before the congregation to minister to them; and that he has brought you near, and all your brothers the sons of Levi with you? Do you seek the priesthood also? Therefore you and all your company have gathered together against Yahweh! What is Aaron that you complain against him?” Moses sent to call Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab; and they said, “We won’t come up! Is it a small thing that you have brought us up out of a land flowing with milk and honey, to kill us in the wilderness, but you must also make yourself a prince over us? Moreover you haven’t brought us into a land flowing with milk and honey, nor given us inheritance of fields and vineyards. Will you put out the eyes of these men? We won’t come up.””
(Numbers 16:8-14)

“For the time will come when they will not listen to the sound doctrine, but having itching ears, will heap up for themselves teachers after their own lusts, and will turn away their ears from the truth, and turn away to fables. But you be sober in all things, suffer hardship, do the work of an evangelist, and fulfill your ministry.“
(2 Timothy 4:3-5)

There were those who didn’t like what God had called them to do. They wanted to be ‘important’. To do what THEY felt like. To be in the sight of the people. To be lifted up. But they were already doing VITAL work. They were already set apart as sacred and holy to God. They were already special. But they were insisting on going their own way. They were insisting on picking their calling. And that isn’t how loving service to God works.

In the same way that those men wanted to choose their calling, the world wants to choose their salvation. They don’t want to listen to THE truth, they only want to hold up THEIR truth. They want to pick a single aspect of their mind and personality and claim THAT as their identity, instead of taking the WHOLE package of themselves as their identity. They want to dictate to God what gender they are willing to accept, what religion, and what sex (regardless of biology). They want to change the things they don’t like in order to avoid negative feelings. But that isn’t how loving service to God works. That isn’t how humble acceptance of salvation works. We align with God and His values. We don’t try and make our values and ideas work within His framework.

Summary

We have a tendency toward arrogance as human beings. I, I, I. Me, me, me. MY opinion. What I think. The truth is the TRUTH. Not yours or mine. HIS. God is the ONLY one who can say what the TRUTH is, because He is the ONLY OBJECTIVE OBSERVER there is. Because this trend of ignoring truth is getting worse and worse in the world, we need to hold onto the truth more and more. No matter what we FEEL. No matter what our OPINION is. We need to align with God and do what HE says is right, say what HE says is proper, and think on HIS things. This is how we endure persecution for doing what Jesus tells us to do. This is how we finish our work. Centred on Jesus and consumed with HIS point of view.