FEAR.
The world is a place to fear right?
Fear of sickness. Fear of pain. Fear of death.
Rioting, protesting, racism, murder, hate, adultery, addiction, child abuse, sickness, worry, confusion, and the list goes on. This is what our world looks like if someone were looking down on us. Humans in every country... of every color... all that populate this planet... living in a fearful, sinful marsh... a thick condensed atmosphere of evil. With every breath we pray yet every single person commits sins daily. You do.. I do.. we all do. We take advantage of God’s grace and mercy and only share the word of God that is most comfortable to us or that benefits us the most.
God is forgiving. God is loving. etc.
We pray that God will save us from this fearful world. We put all of our fear in the world and worry what each day holds while asking the One we should fear to save us from what we shouldn’t have feared in the first place. If you were asked to make a list of things you were fearful of, it would most likely be similar to the list I made above and you would have never dreamed of fearing God.
Fear = world.
God = will save us.
But wait, what if we are mistaken? What if the world was like a glass fish bowl placed inside the ocean? A temporary holding tank where fish constantly swim in and out. Surrounded by a vast ocean full of things to fear. While we are in the fish bowl, we are closed minded in our understanding of how far our fear should stretch. What if we broadened our view from earthly boundaries to infinite space? What if we were to fear God more than the world because that’s where fear originated from?
1 Peter 3:12 – “The eyes of the Lord watch over those who do right, and his ears are open to their prayers. But the Lord turns his face against those who do evil.”
Revelation 2:21-23 - “I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. So I will cast her on a bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her suffer intensely, unless they repent of her ways. I will strike her children dead. Then all the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds, and I will repay each of you according to your deeds.”
Ezekiel 25:17 - “I will carry out great vengeance on them and punish them in my wrath. Then they will know that I am the Lord, when I take vengeance on them.” “The Lord is slow to anger but great in power; the Lord will not leave the guilty unpunished. His way is in the whirlwind and the storm, and clouds are the dust of his feet.” Nahum 1:3
Matthew 10:28 - “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”
“Unfortunately, many of us presume that the world is the ultimate threat and that God's function is to offset it. How different this is from the biblical position that God is far scarier than the world .... When we assume that the world is the ultimate threat, we give it unwarranted power, for in truth, the world's threats are temporary. When we expect God to balance the stress of the world, we reduce Him to the world's equal .... As I walk with the Lord, I discover that God poses an ominous threat to my ego, but not to me. He rescues me from my delusions, so He may reveal the truth that sets me free. He casts me down, only to lift me up again. He sits in judgment of my sin, but forgives me nevertheless. Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but love from the Lord is its completion.” William D. Eisenhower, 'Fearing God" in Christianity Today
Please let your fear be of the Lord and fix your eyes only on him. God is to be feared over EVERYTHING and simultaneously He will save us. Today you may be scared but who holds tomorrow? Widen your view and look past the glass around you, God is in control and all you must do is look to HIM, respect Him, fear Him, love Him, seek Him, praise Him and fall on your face in complete humility daily, for we deserve nothing but He gives us all. Every beautiful morning we wake, we should face the shining sun and plan that day to please God and forget the boundaries holding us to earth. For one heavenly day those trumpets will sound and we will face God’s throne where we will be set free from our container only to be surrounded by a sea of glass at our feet.
“At once I was in the Spirit, and there before me was a throne in heaven with someone sitting on it. And the one who sat there had the appearance of jasper and ruby. A rainbow that shone like an emerald encircled the throne. Surrounding the throne were twenty-four other thrones, and seated on them were twenty-four elders. They were dressed in white and had crowns of gold on their heads. From the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder. In front of the throne, seven lamps were blazing. These are the seven spirits of God. Also in front of the throne there was what looked like a sea of glass clear as crystal.” Revelations 4:2-6
Lord, thank you for using me. Thank you for the church’s platform to share what you have laid on my heart. Please continue to shine through me. Help me to speak your truth and light so that people may follow where I am going. Amen.