Topical Studies
What the Bible says about
Fear of Sacrifice
(From Forerunner Commentary)
|
Exodus 14:10-14
In this wilderness account, Israel is shown fearing many things, but most of the time it was other people, hunger, and thirst. This is not unusual but natural, as it is natural to you and me to fear what is going on around us—to fear those who have the power to hurt us or to take our lives. It is natural for people to fear. Nonetheless, it has to be dealt with and overcome. Fear has been called the most self-centered of all emotions because it is generated by a perceived high degree of threat to what we believe is our well-being. What we believe is what we have been instructed in, accepted, and practiced. The solution to fear is to eliminate what we perceive to be threatening us. It is right here that the crux of the problem exists, because the perceived threat to our well-being forces choices about what to do. Our choice in these circumstances may indeed involve sin, and with that choice we run the risk of exposing the depth of our divided loyalty. Fear is a powerful producer of conduct, for good or bad, depending upon who or what is feared and the direction of our response. Psalm 111:10; 112:1 show the right One being feared, and this fear is directed positively toward the Kingdom of God and the glorifying of God. On the other hand, the fear of the wrong things will produce bad results for the Christian—perhaps not immediately, but eventually and always. We must realize this. The fear of the wrong thing can never produce good things for the Christian, except temporarily. In the long run, it will always produce bad things. The fear of the wrong things, and then submission to the wrong things may reduce the pressure. It gets us off the hook but only for a while. The chances are great that the choice that led to us submitting to the wrong thing will, in the long run, actually make the pressure and the pain more intense. A specific, powerful, and motivating negative fear inhabits every one of us. It must be confronted and overcome in this time of preparation because it destroys trust and inhibits our preparation for the Kingdom of God. It specifically inhibits growth of trusting God. It is the fear of sacrifice—the fear of denying the self.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Does Doctrine Really Matter? (Part Four)
|
|
2 Timothy 1:6-7
The apostle writes of a spirit “given [to] us.” He identifies it as a “gift of God” that can be “stir[red] up.” It is bestowed through the laying on of hands, as we see throughout Scripture. Paul says that God's Spirit is not about human fear. Later in this letter, he reproaches Timothy for being ashamed of the gospel message and of Paul. The younger man seems to have been in some danger of letting down and needed to be admonished to be strong and to endure hardship. All of this is part of the fear to which Timothy was apparently inclined. Paul contrasts the frame of mind—the spirit—that would curtail Timothy's effectiveness with the Spirit given by God. The apostle calls the latter “a spirit . . . of power and of love and of a sound mind.” As in I Corinthians 2:12-16, God's Spirit is linked with mind. If we yield to His Spirit, then our minds will be sound; they will be disciplined and self-controlled. Our minds will be sensible, sober, balanced, and restrained, and we will have wisdom, discretion, and solid judgment. Through the guidance of God's Spirit, our minds will operate in a way different from, and often incomprehensible to, those in the world because we are being impelled by the essence of God's own mind, which is the absolute epitome of sound-mindedness and the opposite of the course of this world. The Spirit of God is also a spirit of love. We can combine this with Romans 5:5: “. . . the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.” Along with that, the first element of the fruit of God's Spirit is love (Galatians 5:22). Godly love is an action—doing the right thing toward God or another person regardless of the personal cost involved. Its foundational definition is in God's commandments. A fear of sacrifice—a fear of giving up what is valuable to us—comes from the spirit of the world, but God's Spirit enables us to love through doing what is right and trusting that God will work things out. The remaining attribute listed here is power. It is the Greek word dunamis, which can also be translated as “ability,” “strength,” or “mighty works.” Dunamis is the capacity for achieving or accomplishing. The Holy Spirit gives an individual the capacity for God's will and work to be done through him. But this is not a personal power. Even the miracles associated with Jesus Himself were actually performed by God the Father (John 5:19; 8:28; 12:49; 14:10). Thus, the Holy Spirit's power is the outworking of the Father, rather than something we can use for our own ends. It is critical to understand that the power of God's Spirit is under the constraint of the love and sound-mindedness of God's Spirit. In other words, it is not simply power for the sake of power, nor for self-gratification or self-glorification. The evident power in the Acts 2 account of Pentecost has given rise to churches seeking similar supernatural displays, yet those displays are entirely divorced from God's love and sound-mindedness. People can seek this power for the wrong reasons, and it can be misused. Simon Magus tried to buy God's power to use for his own ends (Acts 8:9-24), and Paul had to admonish even the congregation at Corinth because they were not using their spiritual gifts to benefit the Body (I Corinthians 12). In the midst of his discussion of God's various gifts, which are simply the outworking of God's power, Paul spends a whole chapter explaining godly love (I Corinthians 13), implying that the Corinthians' approach to those gifts did not include enough love or sound judgment. He spells out that anything they received—such as spiritual wisdom or the ability to heal, to do miracles, to prophesy, to discern spirits, to speak in tongues, or to fulfill the office of apostle, prophet, or teacher—whatever the spiritual ability, God's Spirit is the source of it all, so there is no ground for boasting. The use of God's power must be constrained by the love and sobriety befitting the Most High God so that He is the focus, not the individual.
David C. Grabbe
What Is the Holy Spirit?
|
|
Revelation 21:7-8
God declares that He will cast the cowardly into the Lake of Fire. This should give us pause because few of us are the kind of people who "run to the sound of the guns." For most of us, we have sometimes been brave, but perhaps many other times we have been timid and fearful. So what can we do to avoid being a coward when it matters most? We will start with a definition. Webster's American Dictionary defines a coward as "a person who shows shameful lack of courage or fortitude." Fortitude is "mental and emotional strength in facing adversity, danger, or temptation courageously." The root of the word "coward" derives from the Latin word coe, which means "tail." Obviously, it comes from the common sight of an animal "turning tail" and fleeing "with its tail between its legs," metaphorical expressions still in use today. An Old English word for "cowardly" is earg, which also means "slothful." This brings to mind Matthew 25:24-30, where the slothful servant (KJV; the NKJV calls him "lazy") is sentenced to "outer darkness" for failing to carry out the job he was given to do. The servant justified his lack of action, saying, "I was afraid, and went and hid your talent in the ground" (Matthew 25:25). Examples of cowardice are found throughout the Bible. The first is that of Adam and Eve, who hid themselves from God, and then, after he was caught, Adam attempted to shift the blame for his actions onto his wife. As the old joke goes, "Adam blamed Eve; Eve blamed the serpent; and the serpent, well, he didn't have a leg to stand on." Later, both Abraham and Isaac called their wives their sisters to save their skins. In Moses' day, the ten spies sent into Canaan were afraid to challenge the inhabitants of Canaan, and their cowardly actions dispirited the whole nation. The New Testament contains examples of cowardice, too: the parents of the blind man whose sight was restored feared the Jews, the rich young ruler feared the loss of his wealth, the disciples feared the storm on the sea, and, of course, Peter denied Jesus rather than die with him as he had pledged. In Galatia, Peter and others played hypocrites because of fearing the church's Jewish leadership (Galatians 2:11-14). The common thread in these occurrences is self-preservation; we all want to continue as we are without sacrificing anything. But God owns us heart and soul, and because of that fact, we need to consider the end toward which God is leading us. Jesus says in Matthew 16:25, "For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it." Jesus set us the perfect example of self-sacrifice and boldness, as His crucifixion was only the culmination of a lifelong example of dedication and sacrifice. So we, too, must deny ourselves and follow Him regardless of the cost to us (Matthew 10:39). An old adage says, "Sow an act and reap a habit; sow a habit and reap a character; sow a character and reap a destiny." Human experience shows it to be generally true. If a person does something repeatedly, even if at first it is against his will, it will become a habitual practice, especially if it turns out to be a pleasurable experience. If the person continues in his habit until it becomes a necessity to him, it will engrave itself on his character, and at that point, his destiny is pretty much set. So it is with cowardice, running away in fear of hard choices and sacrifice. We cannot allow fear and flight to become our necessary, habitual reactions to difficult situations lest they become set in our characters. As we have seen, cowardice is related to self-preservation, laziness, faithlessness, and the wrong kind of fear. In I Corinthians 16:13, Paul exhorts us, "Watch, stand fast in the faith, be brave, be strong." Deuteronomy 11:8 informs us that being strong comes from obeying God's commandments. Moses exhorts the Israelites in Deuteronomy 31:6, "Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the LORD your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you." Paul encourages us in Ephesians 6:10-17 to take the steps now to dress ourselves with the proper battle gear so that, when we must face the enemy, we will be ready to stand rather than run.
John Reiss
Fear Not (Part Two)
|
|
 |
The Berean: Daily Verse and Comment
Sign up for the Berean: Daily Verse and Comment, and have Biblical truth delivered to your inbox. This daily newsletter provides a starting point for personal study, and gives valuable insight into the verses that make up the Word of God. See what over 150,000 subscribers are already receiving each day.
Email Address:
|
We respect your privacy. Your email address will not be sold, distributed, rented, or in any way given out to a third party. We have nothing to sell. You may easily unsubscribe at any time. |
|
|
