Fear No Fear

“Know this: In the last days perilous times will come. Men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, slanderers, unrestrained, fierce, despisers of those who are good, traitors, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying its power. Turn away from such people” (2 Timothy 3:1-5, MEV). Jesus loves us enough to tell us the truth. In today’s culture, it is so easy to believe a lie. To believe something that is separate from the TRUTH of what God created. It is so easy to believe those lies, Jesus tells us the truth. Self-delusion is when we believe something in spite of what we hear. We can be shown evidence and facts, but we justify them away. We do this because what WE think and WE experience and WE believe and WE feel often trumps all secondary information. Not because we are unintelligent, but because we perceive the world through our senses. We are the filter of what constitutes life. We are very self-centric. We do it every day in small (and big) ways. Spiritually, we can do the same. And that is VERY dangerous. More dangerous than every other way we self-deceive. It might be harmful to our relationships to always think we’re right. But when we do it with spiritual things, we’re deluding ourselves about something that directly affects the rest of all the existence we’re going to have ever. I’m not talking about big things like if you believe in God, if Jesus is our saviour, etc. I’m talking about the small things. The mini-compromises. What we watch. What we listen to. Where we let our eyes look and what we do with the things we notice. What we dwell on. Every single day I come across something – often from my past enjoyments – and it gives me pause. Not because the material changed. Because I am in a different place, noticing different things. I am starting to see the unspoken messages and programming that was always there, but that I was blind to. It helps me evaluate what was, as well as what is. It helps me look at my daily content in a different way. It helps me unseat the lies of acceptability that I’ve been taking in. It helps me see things the way God sees them. Jesus speaks to us every day to help us keep from deceiving ourselves. To help us from picking up attitudes and choosing to participate in things that will keep us from aligning with God. Keep us from maintaining a close relationship. Jesus loves us enough to tell us what is bad for us, whether we agree or not. Do we love Him enough to listen? Do we trust Him enough to obey? Nothing in this world is worth any amount of separation from God. Nothing. He is the BEST. He is a GOOD God.