MY QUIET TIME ON FEAR

Though a lot has happened in the past two months concerning my health issues, as I have shared my heart about my concerns, others have shared their struggles with their lives as well. It has produced some additional fears and anxieties in my heart, so I decided to dig deeper about fear. These are some thoughts including some of my notes that I recorded during my Quiet Time with God during these past few days:

Exodus 14:10-14 (NIV)

10 As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord. 11 They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? 12 Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” 

(Hmm, the Israelites at first were crying out to God because of their fear, but then their fear quickly turned into grumbling and complaining to Moses about what they believed their future held!)

13 Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. 14 The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.” 

(Then God parted the Red Sea and delivered the Israelites completely from the hand of the Egyptians as he had promised.)

I guess whenever I am terrified and things are definitely beyond my control—there is nothing that I can do about it—I must cry out to God and then beg him that I will not be afraid but ask him to help me to trust totally in him, standing firm and just be still and watch as the HS fights the amazing battle for me and for my loved ones.  I must cling onto what God promises.  God does not promise an easy life, clean bill of health, monetary gains, a safe and clean place to live, people to always love and support you (wow look at David with Saul—ugh!), people to respond to my needs or to what I think is important and should be done, everything to all work out, no more tears, no more persecutions, no more suffering, no more wars, etc. while we are here on this earth.  In fact, he promises the exact opposite. 

Acts 14:21-22 (ICB)

21 Paul and Barnabas told the Good News in Derbe and many became followers. Paul and Barnabas returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch. 22 In those cities they made the followers of Jesus stronger. They helped them to stay in the faith. They said, “We must suffer many things to enter God’s kingdom.” 

John 16:33 (HCSB)

(Jesus told his disciples) 33 I have told you these things so that in Me you may have peace. You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous! I have conquered the world.”

I always need to remember as Guy Hammond said in his Tempt Away book: What satan intends for evil and chaos, God turns it all into GOOD, the very best for us.  

Romans 8:28 (NLT)

28 And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them. 

God’s focus is not on me living a sinless life.  He desires for me to go through these trials with him so that our relationship with one another can grow deeper and that I can experience the need to trust him and then eventually feel his peace which passes all understanding.  Lord, help me see this because it is difficult as I watch how my loved ones also suffer. 

Scripture of the day October 10, 2023

Proverbs 19:20-21 (NIV)

20 Listen to advice and accept discipline,

    and at the end you will be counted among the wise.

21 Many are the plans in a person’s heart,

    but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.

Exodus 14:1-4, 8-9 (NIV)

1 Then the Lord said to Moses, 2 “Tell the Israelites to turn back and encamp near Pi Hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea. They are to encamp by the sea, directly opposite Baal Zephon. 3 Pharaoh will think, ‘The Israelites are wandering around the land in confusion, hemmed in by the desert.’ 4 And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will pursue them. But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.” So the Israelites did this. 

(God is telling Moses what he is going to do.  He is asking Moses to lead the Israelites in this way to taunt Pharaoh.  God’s plan is always to glorify himself and this also allowed Moses to witness God’s power and his control of all things.  What God said would happen happened thus helping Moses to believe and trust more in God and God’s work within Moses.  God is setting the stage to have the Red Sea parted here so that the Israelites can see how he will make certain that these Egyptians will never bother them again.)

8 The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, so that he pursued the Israelites, who were marching out boldly. 9 The Egyptians—all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots, horsemen, and troops—pursued the Israelites and overtook them as they camped by the sea near Pi Hahiroth, opposite Baal Zephon. 

(God’s purpose prevailing. It is more than just our little lives. It involves all people.)

The Israelites were terrified and rightly so because here comes Pharaoh in hot pursuit.  Pharaoh allowed all the millions of Israelites to leave his service.  Even his people gave the Israelites all sorts of things to get them to leave immediately so that the plagues would leave the Egyptians.  Now, the Israelites see that oh man Pharaoh has changed his mind and now he is after us to cut us all down.  He has reneged on the agreement.  Fear does that.  It just makes you focus on what is seen, what is of the earth.  It does not make you focus on the potential of watching God do his amazing things.  Fear is a natural response with a normal reaction of either flight, fight, or freeze.  The Israelites noted that they could not go any further and had to turn back so flight was not an option.  With the military might of the Egyptians, there was no way that they could fight them.  But what of the pillar of fire and the cloud were still there in front of them?  The Israelites still thought that they were being led to their doom.  They were still new at knowing who God is, and to learn to trust him with their own lives.  They heard the stories of old in how God had saved his people, but they were living in captivity and being oppressed for so long that they had forgotten about God.  They lived in Egypt for 430 years but there is no time frame as to how soon after Joseph and his family had died that a king who did not know them came to rule (Exodus 1:8) so it could have been hundreds of years since any of them had witness God’s last miracle.  

It is easy when you don’t know someone to assume that they will renege on you. You base your assumption on your past experiences, and your past experiences if you have not ever known God are based on humans who are imperfect and renege all the time. People are fickle. God is not, but unless you have that personal experience as to how God is not fickle, you will make that assumption. The other thing too is that it is not all about just the Israelites. Just like, it is never all about me. It has always been and always will be about glorifying God.  

So, the difficulties in life, the sufferings, the hardships, the things that make us so terrified all happen as a means to complete God’s purpose of things. He has the world that he thinks of constantly. He has all people who inhabit the earth that he thinks of continually and not just the small handful of us. So it is never about my comfort or the Israelites comfort in avoiding all hardships and having an “easy” life because having it easy is never what God intended, look at what Jesus faced in the wilderness (3 temptations: 1. to rely on self to meet your own needs—I can do it myself, 2. to worship your possessions—thinking that I am the one who earns these possessions, and 3. to believe that I can be all powerful and in control of not just myself but others as well—everyone will listen to me because I am that important as I am a god.). Also, God repeatedly keeps saying in his Word that he is discipling those he loves and that he is building character in us, exercising our spiritual muscles.  

Discipline:

Hebrews 12:4-11 (MSG)

4-11 In this all-out match against sin, others have suffered far worse than you, to say nothing of what Jesus went through—all that bloodshed! So don’t feel sorry for yourselves. Or have you forgotten how good parents treat children, and that God regards you as his children?

My dear child, don’t shrug off God’s discipline,

    but don’t be crushed by it either.

It’s the child he loves that he disciplines;

    the child he embraces, he also corrects.

God is educating you; that’s why you must never drop out. He’s treating you as dear children. This trouble you’re in isn’t punishment; it’s training, the normal experience of children. Only irresponsible parents leave children to fend for themselves. Would you prefer an irresponsible God? We respect our own parents for training and not spoiling us, so why not embrace God’s training so we can truly live? While we were children, our parents did what seemed best to them. But God is doing what is best for us, training us to live God’s holy best. At the time, discipline isn’t much fun. It always feels like it’s going against the grain. Later, of course, it pays off big-time, for it’s the well-trained who find themselves mature in their relationship with God.

Perseverance:

Romans 5:3-5 (Phillips)

3-5 This doesn’t mean, of course, that we have only a hope of future joys—we can be full of joy here and now even in our trials and troubles. Taken in the right spirit these very things will give us patient endurance; this in turn will develop a mature character, and a character of this sort produces a steady hope, a hope that will never disappoint us. Already we have some experience of the love of God flooding through our hearts by the Holy Spirit given to us.

Father God, I beg you to help me to embrace when I am afraid and to just go to you about what I feel and not jump to those conclusions that satan continuously tempts me with.  You are not just powerful and in control of all things, but you are full of great love and mercy.  You decided when you sent your son Jesus that I would not be given what I truly deserve.  Jesus has served as my atoning sacrifice for all my sins, even ones I have no clue about that I will commit in the future.  I understand nothing, but I am confident that as you are always there helping me go through these different trials and my different emotions surrounding all this suffering.  Your great love for me in being my eternal Comforter is all that I really need.  As David said in Psalms 73:6 “My body and my heart may grow weak.  God, you give strength to my heart.  You are everything I will ever need.”  In Jesus’ name, I beg you, God, that you will help me to continue to always surrender to your perfect and pleasing will and to remember that Jesus is the one "Who Got This!"  Amen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGqDoD4JJyU 

Rizon's performance of his song: "Who Got This?" I love how he has the whole audience, swinging their "slings" to throw their rocks at their Goliaths!

COMMENTS WHEN BLOG WAS FIRST POSTED ON CARING BRIDGE SITE:

Jennifer Lambert: Thank you for sharing your thought process. Col. 3:1-4 is such a wonderful reminder to set our hearts and minds on things above for our lives are now hidden with Christ, and He is our life! You are already a winner! And so am I. No matter how many days we have left on earth, our futures are secure.