Don't Fear Tests

This is a series of devotions and meditations on scripture that reject fear and champion faith. Fear is a spiritual force used by Satan to keep people down. Instead, we should have reverence, trust, and loyalty to God. The fear of the Lord is not about being scared, but about reverence and worship. We should not dwell on fear, but on what God says. We can overcome fear by believing in Jesus and inviting God's strength and glory into our lives. We need to position ourselves in God's ways to receive His protection. We should not test God or rely solely on Him to solve our problems. We need to test ourselves and be prepared with faith, prayer, and obedience. Our ways should be aligned with God's ways. We need to spend time in the Word, let the Holy Spirit guide us, and be confident in our faith. There are consequences when we disobey God's commands, as seen in the story of Aaron's sons. We should strive to be obedient Welcome to Fear No Fear. Grace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. May the Holy Spirit embrace you today. This is a series of devotions and meditations on scripture. We reject fear in any and all forms. Fear is a spiritual force, the currency of darkness and ignorance. It's what we inherited when Adam gave up his faith and Satan uses it to keep people down. His only weapon is words. If he can get you believing or looking at words of fear, he's got you. Instead, we champion faith as an allegiance to God, as a belief and trust and loyalty to the Lord God Almighty. We accept the evidence of his word as unvarnished truth, as is, just as it's written. We get close to his perfect love through the word, and perfect love casts out fear. 1 John 4.18 All scripture is taken from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Visit eBible.org Exodus 20.20 Moses said to the people, Don't be afraid, for God has come to test you, and that his fear may be before you that you won't sin. I feel this verse sums up what should be our strategy for any bad year. Don't fear so that you can reverence the Lord. Reverence is how the word fear in relation to fear of the Lord should have been translated. It was a mistranslation to use fear. It is reverence. It's caused so much confusion over the years with people. Fear the Lord. It's not talking about fear fear. It's talking about reverence, awe, worshipful affection. So don't fear so that you can reverence the Lord. No scary, fearful, terror-inducing worry taking up your thoughts about what your situation is because reverence, respect, and holy awe are before you. The reverential fear isn't even something that's on us. It isn't laid on us as a punishment or a, you better do this or else. It's before us. It's in front of our eyes like glasses so that we can see clearly what we should do and what we should avoid. God isn't about us experiencing fear. He is about freedom. Giving us strength in our weakness so that the impossible gets accomplished. 2 Corinthians 12 9. He knows things are hard. He knows that we get weary and weak. Jesus got weary when he was here on earth. Why was he at that well? To talk to the Samaritan woman. Because he was weary. He stops to rest. But these things that are hard and wearisome, these aren't things for us to struggle with. These are opportunities to let his spirit, strength, and glory to dwell inside us. You will be totally renewed if you dwell in him. Isaiah 40 30-31. Just believe that Jesus did it for you. Decide to believe. Make your faith be about that decision. Through faith, all things are possible because if we believe God and we have faith, if we have eager expectation, then we're inviting what God has already accomplished into our lives. And that is world-changing stuff. This is essentially the test that Job failed and the test that Adam didn't even get to. Fear approaches and they're dwelling on it instead of on what God says. Job said what he feared had come upon him. Adam hid in the bushes. Neither of these guys had their eyes on God. Neither of these guys were prayed up and ready to stand. Matthew 4 5-6 tells us this. Then the devil took him, Jesus, into the holy city. He set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, If you are the son of God, throw yourself down. For it is written, he will command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up, so that you don't dash your foot against a stone. Jesus was up high. Satan could have pushed him off. Also, Jesus was pretty weak at this point. He'd been fasting a long time. He was at the end of his physical run. He could easily have been depressed. He could have given in to that. He easily could have been anxious about what was before him. He could have given in to that. But Satan left out some details. Funny how he does that, huh? The scripture he quoted actually says, For he will put his angels in charge of you to guard you in all your ways. They will bear you up in their hands so that you won't dash your foot against a stone. Psalm 91, 11-12. That's a little different. This isn't blanket, you'll be saved stuff. That's, you're doing something you're supposed to and they'll guard you stuff. Now don't think of it as they are going to ignore you if you're not accomplishing something either. This isn't performance based. This is simply that if you're in the right place, they are able to bear you up. If you were in the wrong place, they will be unable to bear you up. Your mindful positioning is either putting you under God's protection or preventing God from protecting you. Matthew 18-18. But what are we supposed to be doing? Where is this position that we should be in? Walking in God's ways. We'll be guarded in our ways when we aren't the focus. Our ways are supposed to be His ways. Look at how Jesus answered Satan in verse 7 here. Jesus said to him, Again it is written, You shall not test the Lord your God. We shall not test God. When trouble is around or worry or anxiety or depression or fear, we don't throw it on God and beg and yodel and wail. We don't throw ourselves on the floor of the prayer closet and kick up a fuss. 2 Corinthians 12-7-8. We've been told what to do. We're supposed to be doing it. 2 Corinthians 12-9. But that isn't how the human mind always works because we're housed in this flesh. And flesh is selfish. And we're selfish. We're childish. We're almost automatically in the position of lifting up our arms to the Heavenly Father and asking for uppies, for sucker, for Him to do all the things. But we are new creatures in Jesus. In Jesus we can do the things we need because it is Him doing it through us. That requires action on our part. Surrender. So what's our road map when trouble comes? Examine your own selves. Whether you are in faith, test your own selves. Or don't you know about your own selves that Jesus Christ is in you? Unless indeed you are disqualified. For we can do nothing against the truth but for the truth. For we rejoice when we are weak and you are strong. We also pray for this. You're becoming perfect. 2 Corinthians 13-5 and then 8-9. God doesn't test us to see us fail or to ramp up our stress. We're supposed to test ourselves to make sure that we believe what we say we believe. And what do we mean when we say test? This isn't an exam. Instead of a trial or a pass-fail scenario, think of cooking. You want to fry something in a pan. The pan goes on the stove and you turn on the heat. When do you put in the food? When the pan is preheated. If you're going to bake something, you preheat the oven. When do you know it's preheated? Well, in both cases, you test. With baking, our modern appliances do the test for us. It beeps and tells us the internal temperature we wanted has been reached. With pan frying, we hold our hand over it and feel the heat. We test it to see if it's ready to receive food. This is what the Word is referring to. God knowing that the spiritual temperature that He wanted in us has been reached. Us testing to see if we're ready to receive from Him. You won't defeat an attack of the enemy if you aren't tested up, knowing what you believe and standing on the promises of God. Diving into the Word every day and thinking on it, renewing our minds with His Word. Then when attacks come, they fizzle out. We have our armor on, we have our faith ready, and we stand and are able to enjoy the victory we have in Jesus. God won't pour into us the next thing He has if we're not ready to receive it. If we're not worked up, faithed up, prayed up, developed, matured, obedient, and praisey. In both cases, our actions in developing ourselves and His pouring. In both cases, our ways need to be firmly established. Jesus quoted the first verse of a section of Scripture that talks about just what our ways are supposed to be. Deuteronomy 6, 16-19. You shall not tempt Yahweh your God as you tempted Him in Massa. You shall diligently keep the commandments of Yahweh your God and His testimonies and His statutes which He has commanded you. You shall do that which is right and good in Yahweh's sight, that it may be well with you and that you may go in and possess the good land which Yahweh swore to your fathers to thrust out all your enemies from before you as Yahweh has spoken. So we follow that which the Lord has put before us. Psalm 119, 105. We behave and obey 1 Samuel 15, 22. We fill up on the Word and meditate on it, Joshua 1, 8. We let the Holy Spirit teach, lead, and guide us, John 16, 13. And we test ourselves so that we have confidence that we are prayed up, fasted up, and word walking so that the type of faith we need will come out of us, Matthew 17, 21. Now way back when Moses gave them the law that God gave him and they built the tabernacle, Exodus 25-30, there were instructions given to Aaron and his sons who would be priests. They were consecrated inside the tabernacle and then, Leviticus 8-33, they were to sit in the door of the tent of meeting seven days. This was part of their consecration for seven days. Now what were they to be doing? It does not say specifically. But later, when two sons of Aaron went and offered to the Lord where they weren't supposed to and what they weren't supposed to, they didn't go well. Leviticus 10, 1-3 tells us that Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered strange fire before Yahweh, which he had not commanded them. Fire came out from before Yahweh and devoured them, and they died before Yahweh. Then Moses said to Aaron, This is what Yahweh spoke of, saying, I will show myself wholly to those who come near me, and before all the people I will be glorified. Aaron held his peace. They did wrong, and Aaron knew it. How? Well, they just spent seven days thinking on and meditating on the Word of God, the instructions that Moses handed down from the Lord. Now, whether they were reading the words Moses had written down or whether they were remembering them or whether they were reciting them to each other, they spent seven days being focused on what they were to do and not do, to be focused on the Lord. They were being consecrated, built up, readied. They were to be testing themselves. But not all of them did. Not all of them were ready. Nadab and Abihu did what they wanted, not what they had been told God wanted. They failed their testing. Now, if we teach a child to ride a bike and they tell us that they have it, we believe them, we stand and watch them, ready to leap in if there's a problem by giving them space. We let them test their abilities. We let them show us what they've learned, what they know and what they can do. We don't make demands on them and insist on a certain speed or jump or maneuver. We let them show us what they have practiced. And don't we puff up and tell everyone about it, look at that, see what my kid did. And if they fail and fall and injure themselves, we're there to comfort them, tell them we're proud of them and their efforts and help them to go again. The God is no different. He is our loving parent. We say we have it, He gives us space and we test ourselves to see if we do in fact believe. Unlike Nadab and Abihu, we are in the new covenant with the Lord. We are abiding in Jesus and Jesus is in us. We are not a sinful people trying to get a covering. We are children of the Lord, living in the righteous spirit of Jesus, able to deal with our Father face to face. We have no penalties waiting for us. We have intimacy or we have no intimacy. Our tests are tests of the strength of our faith, the depth of our believing. When we pass the test of believing, God celebrates, He praises us. How much easier it becomes to do it again and again, keeping our tremendous awe and reverential respect for Him in front of us so that we will not choose sin. By choosing the fear of the Lord, by choosing the reverence of the Lord, we can choose not to sin. We may stumble, but we'll rise up again in His grace and mercy again and again, as long as it takes. This isn't about perfection. Jesus is perfect. He's the only perfect one. In Him, we can walk in His perfection. But we will miss it at times, 1 John 1, 8-10, and need to actively repent. Jesus will be right there to correct us, help us deal with the consequences of our actions, and get us walking on His path once again. Read what the Word says. Learn it. Say it and think on it. Decide to believe it. Let it get inside you and then claim it. Pray it according to the Word and will of the Lord. Let those words become part of who you are. Don't waste your times of consecration. Think on His ways. Make them yours by keeping them before your eyes. Walk in faith, not in fear. As you build up your faith, that fear will recede. Perfect love drives out fear. Keep your eyes on the Word. Keep your ears on the voice of Holy Spirit. Let your shepherd lead you to quiet water, green pasture, and true rest. Fear of the Lord, as the word should be translated, reverence. Reverence the Lord. He is worthy of it. Psalm 111, 10 says, The fear of Yahweh is the beginning of wisdom. All those who do His work have good understanding. His praise endures forever. Our daily affirmation of God's love is Romans 5, 1-11. God loves us so much. He gives us the grace to believe. He pours His love into us through His Spirit. And He did it all before we wanted Him. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Before we were worthy, He died for us. Which is awesome because we are never worthy. He died for us anyway. Before we cared, He loved. We tend to love people as we get to know them and then withdraw our affections as we are hurt by them. That isn't real love. That's just human affection. God shows us real love. He loved us before we existed, loves us no matter what, and in fact, pours out more love the more we have weakness. Why? Because Jesus' blood justifies us and saved us from God's wrath. Sin has been paid for, period, thousands of years ago for all of time. Peace on earth, good will to mankind. All that is left after we are saved is love. No punishment, taken care of. Just hugs. He's got a lot and they are free. God loves us so much. As we close, remember that you have birth. You are precious and valuable. Declare this. Today, God loves that I... Now you fill in the blank. Was it a meal you made? A smile you gave? Did you get out of bed? Read? Put on socks? There's no wrong answers here. There is no end to God's love and no end to the things about you that he loves each and every day. Pick one. And remember, the Lord loves you just because you're you. 1 John 4, 9-10 tells us, By this, God's love was revealed in us that God has sent his only born son into the world that we might live through him. And this is love. Not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. His perfect love turned away God's wrath because of sin. And it casts out our fear too. See verses 18 and 19. We love because he first loved us. He just loves us. Can't get enough of us. And that is wonderful. See you next time.