Not Mine

This is a series of devotions and meditations on scripture that reject fear. Fear is a spiritual force used by Satan to keep people down. We should champion faith as an allegiance to God and trust His word. Mathematics is a natural language and is nothing compared to the spiritual. There is a discussion about artificial intelligence and the possibility of a computer-written Bible. We should choose not to fear and not let anxiety, depression, or defeat control us. We can change our perception by renewing our minds with the word of God. We are encouraged to resist fear and anxiety and rely on the truth of God's word. We can choose not to be troubled and find peace in God. We are reminded that God loves us and we can rest in His love. 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 2 Kings 6.16 He answered, Don't be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them. Math is great when it works. Mathematics is a beautiful language. It has simple rules that combine to produce the most or explain the most complicated things. Some of the most brilliant minds that have walked this earth have been mathematical minds, but they've been natural minds. Mathematics is a universal language, but it is a natural language, a carnal, that means physical with no spiritual element, language. We've used mathematics to build fantastic machines, technology, buildings. We've flown. We've even traveled to the moon and back safely. Math is awesome. Math is humbling. And mathematics is nothing compared to the spiritual. There has been some traction lately in the intellectual community about artificial intelligence. One thinker has even gone so far as to posit that AI could give us the first true Bible of original thought. The whole thing hinges on his belief, widely held, that God is a creation of mankind, and therefore all thoughts and all sacred writings are really just humans writing stuff. Instead of being ideas from outside the experience of humanity, the kind of thinkers who subscribe to this are the ones who believe that God needs us to exist. He does not. God does not rely on our belief, our worship, our existence, or anything of us to exist himself. But if these thinkers get their way, there will soon come a Bible written by a computer. What will it be? Cold like math, and just about as applicable to our spiritual lives. The things of the spirit do not depend on the things of the flesh. Sometimes we even need help to comprehend them in any useful way. In the setting around our verse, the king of Syria was unhappy with Elijah. He sent horses and chariots and a great army there, verse 14. He sent so many men that they surrounded the city. Now granted, this wasn't a thriving, bustling metropolis with millions of people, but there were a fair few. What about yourself? How many people are coming against you? How many people are bullying you, tormenting you, calling names, talking behind your back, making your work life or school life miserable? The people who scorn you or mock you or make you feel like you don't fit in. The ones that kick up your anxiety. The ones that abuse you. The ones who bully you online. The ones that make you feel less. Is there one? A dozen? More? Less? In truth, if there's only one, it's still a fair few to you. Just as you can be lonely in a crowd, you can also be attacked by an army of one. Now the Syrian king did not like that Elisha was connected to the Lord, that he had info that only God would know. Well, not really. The king disliked that Elisha shared that info with the Israelite king and spoiled all the well-laid plans of the Syrian king. So he did something about it. He sent an army to wipe out one man. Does this seem familiar? Saul did the same thing. At one point Saul mustered 4,000 men to chase David. 1 Samuel 24.2 People invested in this world who find themselves up against spiritual reality overcompensate when they try to wipe it out. They send their biggest, baddest, most reliable people to go whoop some tushy. The real question is, what do you do? What is your decision? Do you let anxiety take you? Depression? Sadness? Defeat? Or will you choose not to fear? It's a choice, my friend. A choice. Now that's not a popular truth. But truth isn't popular. There's no my truth, your truth here. This is just the truth. Now you can choose not to fear. You can choose to kick anxiety back down where it came from. You can show depression the door. You can be happier. You can embrace victory. It's not complicated, but it can be hard. The initial thing occurring isn't you. No one wakes up and chooses to be fearful, anxious, depressed, or mentally hyperactive. That's a ridiculous idea. If that was true, you could just wave your hand and it would all disappear. That doesn't happen. Here's the deal. This isn't an only you thing. This isn't a just-be-happy thing. There's no magic words, no magic formula, no way to think happy, joy-joy feelings and make everything sweeter. This is a biblical principle of thought. Jesus used it, Mark 13, 7. John 14, 1, for example. In Mark, we're told not to be troubled when we hear of disasters and wars in the world. In John, he's exhorting his disciples not to let the horrors of the crucifixion overwhelm them. He repeats it in John 14, 27, adding, Thing is, when Jesus used the word, he wasn't saying, Oh, don't let it. He was giving an order. If you look at the original language, it is an order. Do not let it happen. And Paul uses it in Acts 20, verse 10, when he tells them the boy who fell out the window has life in him. Peter uses it in 1 Peter 3, 14, when he quotes Isaiah 8, 12, where it says, Don't call a conspiracy all that this people call a conspiracy. Don't fear their threats or be terrorized. And there's a word for today. All of these instances are bad circumstances being faced. We're facing bad circumstances today. In every single reference here, the people facing the circumstances are exhorted not to grab fear, not to grab anxiety, not to be troubled. And they were up against very real things. Some of them mental, some of them physical, some of them emotional. But they were told not to. It is a choice. Well, what about mental illness? What about my condition? What about this? What about that? What about the other? All of that's in the natural. And you know what? If you don't want to accept the spiritual, then hey, let the Lord lead you to the right doctor to give you the right meds to help you out. All that's part of the human body, the fallen flesh. And that means that if we retrain our minds in the word, Romans 12.2 and Ephesians 4.23, we can change how we perceive things around us. Colossians 3.1-2 says, If then you were raised together with Christ, seek the things that are above where Christ is, seated on the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things that are above, not on the things that are on the earth. When we think on heavenly things, on the word, on the things of the Lord God Almighty, the things of this world lose their luster, their fascination, their ability to prick us. Peter picks up the idea, but in relation to salvation and how to conduct ourselves, not mental attitudes or stresses. In 1 Peter 1.13-16 he says, Therefore prepare your minds for action, that's literally put on the belt of the waist of your mind, or gird up the waist of your mind, which Paul reminds us that is the belt of truth. Be sober and set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As children of obedience, not conforming yourselves according to your former lusts, as in your ignorance, but just as he who called you is holy, you yourselves also be holy in all your behavior, because it is written, You shall be holy, for I am holy. That's Leviticus 11, 44-45. So that God we were talking about, the one who exists outside our reality, not needing us to exist so that He can exist, He wrote that we could and should be holy, because He is holy. We, fallen, earthly, made from dirt people, we can be like Him. He is never fearful. He is never anxious. He is never worried. He is never depressed. He is none of the things we are. He doesn't even get angry like we do. Everything that God emotes is so different from us, our words don't even cut it to describe them. We try, but we fall horribly short. That is why we are exhorted to keep the word before us all the time. That is why we are to think on it, discuss it, pray about it, meditate on it, and make it the primo number one activity of our minds. The more you reflect on the word, the more chance it has to renew your thinking into God's way of thinking. It's a process, and one that is determined by how much or how little you put into it. We will be assaulted with thoughts and feelings. Not only is that how the human mind in its natural state processes the world around itself, it is the only way the enemy has of attacking you, from the outside in. We are citizens of righteousness, not citizens of sin. The things attack us. The words come at us. The strife heads our way. It's all from the outside. What can we do? Say, that is not my thought, and do not accept the reality that is being presented to you in those thoughts. You know all that renewing your mind I was talking about? In place of whatever is coming at you, throw back at it the words of the word, the promises God made to you. The Holy Spirit is there, and one of His jobs is to give us the words to say. He can't give us the words if we're not putting them in our heart. He calls up what's out of our hearts, as long as it's good. Think of the statements the Lord made about you. Even the simple fact that God loves you. John 3.16 and 17. Period. Full stop. If you're assailed a thousand times in a row, tell it you are not thinking that a thousand times right back. James 4.7 says it clear. Submit yourselves to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. The word is truth. The Lord is love. These are what set us free. These are what give us the confidence to not be troubled. If God be for us, who can be against us? Romans 8.31. We can choose to not be troubled. We can have that attitude of world thought, not man thought. Start with a little. Even a little a day will make a difference. Elisha, he had this attitude. He operated on word thoughts. He didn't physically see anything more than his servant. He could see the Syrians. He knew there were a lot of them, but it did not matter. Why? He knew that God had his back. God was with him. God was prepared. He knew that he could rest in God and be safe. Safe from harm. Safe from fear. Safe from anxiety. He could trust God to tell him what to do, and if he did it, get the victory. The scriptures told him that, again and again and again. These were the stories, songs and tales of what came before. This was an entire repository of biblical language, of biblical knowledge. He kept it in his mind. He put it in his heart. It was there, ready when he needed it. His servant did not have it. The servant saw the real thing, but nothing else. He knew what it meant. He was anxious, depressed and fearful, so he turned to Elisha and said, what are we going to do? He did not turn to the Lord. So Elisha prayed. Asked God to show the servant what Elisha knew was there, but didn't physically see it all. He didn't need to see. He believed sight unseen. So God did. And the servant saw chariots of fire and angels all around them, in and over the hills surrounding the valley. Not the city, like the enemies did. The valley. This wasn't a fair few. This was a fair troop of multitudes. It was that way for them. It can be that way for you. It can be that way for you. It can. If you rest in Him, He will rest on you. If God is for you, who can be against you? I'm not promising sunshine and rainbows. I'm saying you can stand on no fear. We're told to take up our cross and follow Jesus, to mindfully and willfully crucify all that doesn't jive with the Word. Our thoughts, habits, problems, issues, conditions, disorders, anything and everything that is not of God. To abide not in our own thoughts, but in Jesus. You may be persecuted, but you won't mind the persecution, because it won't touch you. It will simply be around you. You can not be anxious. You can not be depressed. You can be at peace. God's peace. It defies understanding. You can be calm. You can be whole. You can still be yourself. No matter what is around you, it can be this way. God's Word says so, and He doesn't lie. Do not be afraid, anxious, nervous, sad, depressed, despairing, or any other negative thing. Those who are with you are more than who are with them, no matter who the them is. Make a choice to drive out the unprofitable way of thinking. Meditate on the Word and choose to believe what it says. It's easy in concept. It's hard in action. It takes endurance. But we all have the ability, if we're abiding as Jesus. Is He the lifeline for our spirit? Are we being filled? All else will follow. Daily Affirmation of God's Love is Colossians 1, 9-20. Ever seen an adventure movie? Especially one with a rescue. Oh, my goodness. All the shenanigans they have to go through to accomplish their rescue. And no one attempts it unless there's love at the bottom of it. Either the rescuer loves the one needing rescuing, or Person A pays someone for the rescue because they love the one needing rescuing. How do we know God loves us? One reason is that He delivered us out of the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love. Verse 13. And through that, God reconciled Himself to all creation because the price was paid. Now, that's huge. Are you struggling with something? You can talk to God about it. Not some bearded dude in a robe. Not some petty, changeable, whimsical, benevolent Santa wannabe. No. This is the One who holds everything together. The One who hung the stars. The One who created the visible as well as invisible things. Every scientific discovery of the last forever, He created them. He did it all, and He does it all. This is an active, blessing, powerful God. And this is who is at the other end of our spiritual lifeline. He is the One searching for us before we implode. He is the One who crafts a solution before we know we have a problem. He has it ready. Will you humble yourself today? Will you thank and praise Him for His help? Will you praise Him for the solution before He gives it? Not begging for help. Not demanding their rights. Broken. Humble. Submitting to His plan. His way. Letting Him do the work. That's the only way to approach it. Giving honor where it is due. Leaving our nonsense behind us. Embracing what the Lord has for us. What a great adventure. What a beautiful rescue. In Jesus. By Jesus. Through Jesus. And for Jesus. What love He has for us. What love. As we close, remember that you have earth. 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.