sermonette: Courage and Faith

Clyde Finklea
Given 31-Jan-26; Sermon #1857s; 20 minutes

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Did you know that the um The greatest fear for the average. Is the fear of public speaking. And that the 2nd greatest fear for the average American is death. You know, that means that for the average American attending a funeral, they would rather be in the casket. Eulogy. I got one laugh from here in my big crowd. Anyway. Uh, you know, people hold many fears in their minds, and I looked up the word phobia, the Greek word for fear. On the internet and found a site that listed 530 different phobias people suffer from, and this was actually just an incomplete. Uh, incomplete list forms of the word. The words fear and afraid. are found over 700 times in the Bible. Now, this alone should cause us to realize the importance of fear in our lives. I read an article entitled The Worst of All Fears. The author asked the question. Of all the fears, which one would you say is the greatest fear of all? He goes on to say, what fear is most likely to cause us to deny Christ, be untrue to ourselves, and dishonest with others? Then he refers us to Proverbs 29 verse 25 where it says, the fear of man brings us nearer. It continues on. It is a trap, a pit into which many have fallen. If you're honest with yourself, you can think of many times in your life when you compromised yourself out of fear of what others think. How many people have denied God's truth because of the fear of friends? Family, unquote. So, brother, we know that God has not called us, he's not. He hasn't called us to be fearful or to be afraid, you know, over 80 times, we have the words. In scriptures we find the words do not fear or fear not, or be not afraid. In 2 Timothy. You do not have to turn down. I'm just going to read this to you. For 2 Timothy, very familiar scripture, in verse chapter 1 verse 7. Paul admonishes Timothy, he says, for God has not given us a spirit of fear. But of power and of love. And of sound-mindedness. Now The word translated fear is sometimes translated. Timidity. I guess I pronounced it right, meaning cowardice, which is the opposite of courage. The word power means the ability to do what we should do. And the word love, of course, is agape. It's that sacrificial love and concern for others that we've heard a lot, a lot of good messages from my brother Bill on that. And sound mind means discipline or sound mind thinking. Which holds our fears in check and gives us courage and faith. I want to go back to the book of Joshua. And this is where God calls this new leader. of Israel to be strong and to be courageous. Now We know that we too are in training to be reigning priest or ruling priest. And there are going to be some in the kingdom that's going to be raised up to perhaps be kings. So this call. Courage here also applies to us. Notice what it says and we will, we will start here in Joshua the first in Joshua one. And, um, in verse 2. And where it mentions the death of, death of Moses. With, you know, with, with the death of Moses, um, which also reminds us that no one is indispensable, by the way. Uh, I know back in the worldwide, everybody thought that Herbert Armstrong was, we were all going to go into the kingdom, him leading the way. Um, but obviously that that. That did not happen and neither did Moses get to go into the, to the promised land either. So Josh was then told to arise and cross over to Jordan. Now across the Jordan, Jordan. Meant to enter into hostile land. A land that was full of enemies and some of them reported as being giants and lived in strongly fortified cities. Uh, this was no I mean, you can just imagine this was no simple challenge. When God called us to this way of life. We had to cross spiritual Jordan, so to speak, a land full of enemies because we live in a world system. Of course, this is ruled by Satan. Um, that is antagonistic to God, to His word, and to godly living. And we, we understand that this is no simple challenge for us either. In verse 5, Joshua was actually given a promise here. He says, no man shall be able to stand before you. But I want you to think of something here. The promise, this promise is also a warning. While the lamb was theirs for the taking. It would not be taken. Without conflict or battle. So in our life, a life of con, so is our life, a life of conflict with enemies which must be overcome. When we look at Paul's Letter to the Ephesians. In Ephesians 6, he tells us that we, we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. We wrestle against principalities and powers and rulers of darkness. Talking about high ranking. Hierarchy here. We're talking about powers that are also invested with authority and And, and these world rulers against God and spiritual wickedness. Which I kind of think of Satan and his host of spiritual carrots is what they really are. But we all desire, you know, to live. We, we all decide to live in a world where life moves along kind of smoothly, right? Without problems or stress. We do not want anything upsetting our schedules or forcing us. Uh, to get out of our little comfort zones, but there is a reality. Uh, that must be faced, and that is the Christian life is full of battles and conflict. Nevertheless, let's look at the positive side of these words. When he says, no man will be able to stand before you. You see, this is a promise, this is also a promise of continued deliverance. In battle after battle after battle. God promises, just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you. I will not leave you nor forsake you. Just as Joshua had to enter the promised land by courage and faith, Though we too will have to enter in our promised land that is the kingdom of God. By courage and faith. And we know that without faith, it is impossible to please God. So in verse 6, God tells Joshua, we are still here, we are in Joshua 1. In verse 6, God tells Joshua to be strong. And, and courageous. Now, in the scriptures, there, there is actually 5 uses of the word courage. Uh, I should say in the in the Hebrew. Two of them are used here. The word, the word strong is sometimes translated courage in other scriptures. And it actually means to fasten upon, to be or grow firm, be strong, or strengthen. Be of good courage. Well, I think this word closely. Relates to the way we use the word, the way we would use the word courage, meaning bravery. You know, the word that is translated courage in these verses literally means to be alert. So God is telling Joshua and, and to us. To be brave To be alert because the battles are coming. 3 times, he tells Joshua to be strong and courageous. In verse 7. God says it is going to take courage to keep his commandments and not turn from it to the right hand or to the left. That is, we do not add to it and we do not take away from it. He also goes on to say that you may prosper wherever you go. Now this word prosper, is sometimes translated as have success. Or act wisely. I want, I want to take a little bit, a little closer look at this in just a minute, but let's go on to verse 8. God says we are to be in his word constantly, thinking about it day and night so that we may do according to what is written in it. If we do not stay in it constantly or have regular Bible study, We may not do according to what's written in it. He says by staying in his word constantly, it will make our way prosperous and successful. Now, looking at these words prosper and success. Success according to you know, according to God's word is just the opposite of success according to the world. Now, the world thinks of success as someone who has achieved maybe financial status or, or some kind of big position or high power or something, a powerful position or something. Now, most of the men, but you know that most of the men and women of the Bible would actually be called failures today by the standards of this world system. But they were Successful. According to God's standards. Now we have an example of this in Hebrews the 11th chapter. If you would, you begin to open your Bibles there, I'll turn over there, go back to the New Testament here. Hebrews 11, we've got it's known as the faith chapter. We're gonna, I'm going to pick this up right in the middle here of what he's saying in verse 36. It says, um, and now when I read this story, I want you to think of the courage and the faith that these men and women had to have. In Hebrews 11:36. And others. Now, this is not, you know, he already mentioned a bunch of people like Abraham, Sarah, um Joshua, um, who, who else did he mention? I can't even remember now, Samson, I believe one of them, Gideon. Um Anyway, so these others are people that maybe we haven't heard about in the scriptures that were not never mentioned, but he said there were others. Uh, endured the trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yes, and more of of chains and imprisonment. Now we might think of Paul, the apostle Paul, cause he certainly went through that and many of the apostles because we know they were all, all martyred except for the apostle John. They were stoned to death. They were sawed in. They were brutally interrogated and slaughtered by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and in goatskins, being destitute, oppressed, and ill-treated. Of whom the world was not worthy, they wandered in deserts and in mountains, living in caves and in holes or dens in the earth. But it says in verse 39, these all Though they had received a good report through faith. did not obtain the promise. They're still waiting on the return of Christ just like we are, only they are in the grave waiting. Now, even though they did not actually receive the promise, they, they were in God's eyes very successful. So the words prosper and success in the scriptures would be probably better translated as act wisely. In verse 9, Again, back in Joshua verse 9, 1st chapter, verse 9, God commands us to be courageous. And not afraid nor be dismayed, which means do not get discouraged or depressed now. Can you just imagine being imprisoned, stoned, sawed into, slain with the sword, wandering about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented, wandering in deserts and mountains and dens and caves and not getting discouraged or depressed? Sure takes a lot of courage, doesn't it? It takes courage and it takes believing. Believing is what faith is, believing and trusting in God, that he will, that, that he is with you wherever you go and whatever you go through. No matter what your trials are. He never leaves us So it takes these two things, these elements, we could call them courage and faith. These two will deliver us from the destructive fear, whether it's the fear of death, the fear of failure, the fear of people, whoever you fear the most, or whoever you fear the most. Where then does this courage and faith come from? And does it mean the absence of fear? You know, courage is um that quality of mind that, that enables us to encounter these trials and difficulties in spite of our inter fears. In other words, courage is not the absence of fear. Notice what David said in Psalm 56. If you'd like to flip over there with me. Psalm 56, we will, we will read verses 3 and 4. In verse 3 He says, David writes, when I am afraid. I will trust in you. Now you cannot be fearful and trusting God at the same time. Now King David continues here in verse 4. He says, in God. I will praise his word. Now, the word word here in my, in where I, where I got this from was capitalized and that word is of course Jesus Christ. We know that he was the word in the beginning. He was with God, he was God, and he, he, and he came in, in the flesh and dwell among us. He says, and God, I will praise his word. In God I have put my trust, that is his faith. I will not fear what flesh can do to me. That takes a lot of courage and faith to say that. I will not fear what flesh can do to me. We do not have to be afraid. Courage and faith both operate. On believing Trust. Whenever fear grips you, or you must turn to God and faith. It is believing. That God is with us at all times. Wherever we go, whatever we go through. It is believing that God can deliver us in any situation at any time under any circumstance. There is nothing impossible with him. And he can change anything at any moment. It's trusting in God's deliverance from the trials. Even we do not sometimes understand why it's happening to us. It is believing that there is no situation, there is no problem, and there is no enemy that we will ever face alone. And we have to believe that, and that takes faith. Trusting in God. Now, as we begin to Toward the end of this and begin to close, I'll begin to summarize and close here. It says that in 1 John, I want to mention one more thing here, I John 4 in verse 18. Apostle John says, there is no fear in love, but perfect love. Cast out fear. You know, but there, there is not but one perfect love. That's the, that's the love of God, the love that comes from him. So if you go back a couple of chapters into chapter 2 of I John verse 5, he says, but whoever keeps his word. Truly, the love of God is perfected in him. You see, that's why it's so important to stay in his word constantly. So that God's love will be perfected in us through the keeping of His word. Promise. The doctrines of Hebrew 6 begin with going on to perfection, and part of this, brethren means going on to the perfecting of God's love in us. So with our faith in God, and our hearts perfected with His love, We will be equipped with the necessary elements to give us courage and victory over all destructive fears that come our way. Remember, God has not called us to be afraid. are to be afraid of are fearful of the circumstances surrounding it. Our call is to be courageous and faithful. Knowing and believing that he has promised to never leave us nor forsake us, just like he told Joshua. He would never leave us nor forsake us. Also in the book of Heroes Hebrews, excuse me, they were heroes to me. He also mentions in I believe it might be chapter 5, I'm not sure, but it, he also mentions that he would never leave us nor forsake us. Now I want to close now. We'll, we will close with the words in the, the book of Isaiah the prophet. Chapter 35. Anniversary. 35, Isaiah in verse 3. I'll read 3 and 4. Make the weekend strong. And make the feeble knees sure. Say to those of a fearful heart, be strong. Fear not. Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the full recompense of God. He will come. And save you.