Fear No Fear

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

““Isn’t God in the heights of heaven?
    See the height of the stars, how high they are!
You say, ‘What does God know?
    Can he judge through the thick darkness?
Thick clouds are a covering to him, so that he doesn’t see.
    He walks on the vault of the sky.’
Will you keep the old way,
    which wicked men have trodden,
who were snatched away before their time,
    whose foundation was poured out as a stream,
who said to God, ‘Depart from us!’
    and, ‘What can the Almighty do for us?’
Yet he filled their houses with good things,
    but the counsel of the wicked is far from me.
The righteous see it, and are glad.
    The innocent ridicule them,
saying, ‘Surely those who rose up against us are cut off.
    The fire has consumed their remnant.’”
(Job 22:12-20)

“Be careful that you don’t let anyone rob you through his philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the elemental spirits of the world, and not after Christ. For in him all the fullness of the Deity dwells bodily, and in him you are made full, who is the head of all principality and power. In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, in the putting off of the body of the sins of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. You were dead through your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh. He made you alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, wiping out the handwriting in ordinances which was against us. He has taken it out of the way, nailing it to the cross. Having stripped the principalities and the powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.“
(Colossians 2:8-15)

The wicked can’t justify themselves and through their behaviour they get judged – this is what Job’s friends were pushing. They even use the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah as examples. Wickedness brings punishment, so if there is punishment there MUST be wickedness. Job demanded to know how to know whether it was punishment. Many wicked APPEAR to go scot free. Many righteous appear to have trials. Everything is arbitrary unless you know the mind of God. And there was no mediator to show them the mind of God. No one to speak with face to face to discover the truth. To be justified through. To prove the righteousness of their actions. Again, Job was DESPERATE for a Messiah.

In the right time, Messiah came. In Him we are justified, not in our own actions. It is not what we DO that makes us saved. It is what we BELIEVE and TRUST in. We have to believe Messiah Jesus was able to be our sacrifice. We have to trust in Messiah Jesus’ sacrifice. If we do, we are saved. We are cleansed. We are justified through Him and what He did. Jesus cut off our old nature. Jesus cut off our instinct to sin. Jesus made us clean and whole and His. Jesus is our mediator. Jesus took our case to the Father. Jesus justified us through His sacrifice and brought us into the Kingdom of Righteousness where we are whole, healed, and His. Completely and totally.

Summary

In Jesus we are strong. In Jesus we are righteous. Not OUR righteousness, but HIS. Not OUR works and efforts, but HIS. In HIM we are made right with God. It is by HIS grace through HIS mercy that we are who we are in Him. Job knew what he needed. He knew the answer to their questions was beyond them. He knew where to look. But Jesus hadn’t come yet. Jesus wasn’t available to them yet. We, however, have Jesus. We get to be justified. We get to be seen as His righteousness. In Jesus, we have all our answers. In Jesus, we have all our solutions. In Jesus, we have abundant life. We need to believe. We need to trust. And we need to remember to keep believing and trusting every single day. To look to Jesus for all our answers, because Jesus provides them.