Fear No Fear

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

““Awake, sword, against my shepherd,
    and against the man who is close to me,” says Yahweh of Armies.
“Strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered;
    and I will turn my hand against the little ones.
It shall happen that in all the land,” says Yahweh,
    “two parts in it will be cut off and die;
    but the third will be left in it.
I will bring the third part into the fire,
    and will refine them as silver is refined,
    and will test them like gold is tested.
They will call on my name, and I will hear them.
    I will say, ‘It is my people;’
    and they will say, ‘Yahweh is my God.’””
(Zechariah 13:7-9)

“I thank my God whenever I remember you, always in every request of mine on behalf of you all, making my requests with joy, for your partnership in furtherance of the Good News from the first day until now; being confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. It is even right for me to think this way on behalf of all of you, because I have you in my heart, because both in my bonds and in the defense and confirmation of the Good News, you all are partakers with me of grace. For God is my witness, how I long after all of you in the tender mercies of Christ Jesus. This I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense to the day of Christ, being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.”
(Philippians 1:3-11)

When the end comes, God will be right there. When Messiah comes back as Conquering King, these prophecies will come to pass. Those that stand up against Israel will see that God is for His people. That a remnant of believers has been preserved. That God is God and none can stand against Him. He is clear and He will be the righteous judge of the whole world. But those who believed Him. Who believed IN Him, they will be His people. Yes, they will be refined (not a happy process), but that refinement is for their own benefit. They will be true believers. They will not mix with idols or ideals not in alignment with God. They will accept Him and worship Him and have a relationship with Him. He WILL be their God and He will make them His people. New hearts written with His Word.

The church sees a partial fulfillment of that (Jew and Gentile). Those of us who worship God and accept Jesus as our saviour have Jesus written on our hearts. We have been transformed from something old into something brand new. We have been taken from the kingdom of darkness to the Kingdom of Light. We are in Jesus and Jesus is in us and we are living life under a whole new set of rules. We haven’t been perfected, but we are being perfected. Day by day, grace to grace, and one day, when the fulfillment of these prophecies come to pass, we will be perfected and standing face to face with God Almighty, worshipping Him in complete fullness.

Summary

We don’t deserve any of this treatment from God. None of it. Not the little things and not the big things. None of it. It is by His GRACE that it is offered to us. It is by His GRACE that we enter into Jesus and Jesus enters into us. God does the work because God loves us and wants to do the work. Our job is to believe in Jesus. To believe in Him and trust in Him and that is what saves us. Our acceptance of His grace. There is no other way to come to God but through Jesus. There is no other path. There are no other ‘secret ways’. There is ONLY Jesus. God is working hard to get us to see this, to accept this, and to walk in this. To be obedient children. To live under grace, not a set of rules – though if we accept grace, we’ll keep the rules. To repent and rely on HIM for our salvation, not look to the keeping of the rules to be what saves us. To accept His gift and seek to live in it, letting Him call the shots, and worshipping Him with our words, thoughts, and actions on a daily basis as we rely on Him for everything we need. To be filled with Him and to grow His fruit in our hearts.