How Are We as Christians to Combat Fear?

In order for us to really press forward in our life for God's Purposes, we've got to get free of our fear. Johnson Bowie, at http://www.fusionatl.org/p/12081/Default.aspx, continues his "Know Fear" series, titled "I Ain't Afraid of No Ghosts" by saying that we have to know the stuff that spiritually comes against us. In order for God to set us free, we have to ask God to expose us. Until we know who God is, we will continue to put the approval of man in front of Him. If we know what God says about us (He smiles when He thinks of us and He rejoices over us when we sleep), then we can step boldly into life. (picture labeled for reuse on flickr)

Last year, Johnson went skydiving at a Fusion event. The crazy thing about that is, Johnson was wildly afraid of heights. But he was determined to conquer his fear. In a funny tale about the episode, Johnson talks about the details leading up to the jump, his experience as he jumped and then the slow descent with the parachute. He was connected to a guide, which which made him feel safe, "but then he did one of the top ten stupidest things in my life." The guide reaches back and starts undoing buckles which absolutely freaks Johnson out. Even though Johnson was terrified as the parachute straps loosened, things obviously turned out okay. Johnson says he was not so much afraid of the height, it was fear of what was on the other side of the height, i.e. the fall and the hit after the height. Likewise, it's not so much a fear of the dark, but it's about what's in the dark.

What Johnson is talking about today is a fear of the supernatural. Are angels or demons normal? Is speaking in tongues natural? We're talking about the reality is that there is another dimension. God is with us despite the fact that we can't see Him. The supernatural events happen when the spiritual realm steps into the physical. Demons, weegie boards, bodily possessions, Satan and angels are all real. This isn't just a fluffy world. There are nearly 300 references in the Bible about angels. In Ephesians 6:12, it addresses this hidden world; "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." (picture labeled for reuse at http://www.gallery.mobile9.com/)

Johnson personally experienced this when he was involved in a healing service and six guys couldn't lift a 100-pound unconcious woman who seemed possessed!  When we encounter stuff like this, it scares us because we don't understand it, but the Bible gives us guidance. In Isaiah 14:12, it describes the story of Satan. Lucifer was an angel who wanted all the power of heaven. He attacked the armies of God, but was cast down. Lucifer is but a fallen angel. He is not the mini-me of God. In Revelation 12:9, it again talks about the great dragon cast from heaven. The word demon is a scary word; much scarier than "fallen angel". But if you hear the words fallen angel, it gives you the perspective that Satan has been defeated and we have God on our side. One of the keys to conquering our fears is to demystify the supernatural. Demons and devils were created and, at their core, they want to be worshipped. If we give them fear, we are effectively worshipping them.

 
Have you ever been in a service and someone stands up and screams?  It's because they are trying to pull the attention off Jesus. When we give Satan a foothold in our lives, they hold on to it and torment us with it. "Something inside of me says, 'no'...I will not worship Satan. I will worship Christ." Most of the time, as Christians, fearful things get worse in our lives because of our new power as believers. There's power in the name of Jesus and, when we start talking about Him, the entire world seems to come down on us! There are strongholds everywhere. "When I decided to do this series on Fear, I came down with the flu and Jeremiah, my son, started having nightmares..." Johnson says, "Oh, it's on now, man. You're going in the room of my kid?" When leaders step into their positions at Fusion, there are so many blessings, but at the same time, they get a ton of resistance.
 

New level, new devil.
Johnson Bowie

 
But we are armed and dangerous!  Colossians 2 talks about how we were dead to the sin of the enemy and Jesus went down to satan's domain, took the keys and gave him the Tyson one-two punch. We need to know that God created hell for the demons, not for people. They are going to burn in an everlasting fire, but some of the world actually chooses to go the route of the devil!  Demons are encouraged by this and they are trying to deceive us to burn with them. We need to encounter demons with the knowledge that they are already a defeated foe. Revelation 20:10 retells the fate of Satan.
 
Who then, can be against us? God is omnipresent. He's everywhere. "He's inside your earball." Satan is NOT omnipresent. "He's in Antartica somewhere." God is all-powerful. Satan is finite as a creation. God is everlasting, while we know the fate of Satan. Big God. Little devil (go to your high voice when you say "little devil"). God even assigns His angels to us. When we think about angels, though, we have a huge misperception. "So cute little naked baby angel...thank you for coming off your cloud...play me a song on your harp...But that's not what angels are!...Angels are stinkin' kickbutt warriors." We have these amazing warrior angels assigned to each of us!
 
Genesis 3:24 is the first description of the cherubim (angel). Seraphim have six wings and are covered with eyeballs! "What!! They don't have pictures of those on the front of Guidepost!" The archangel Michael, single-handedly defeated thousands of demons. In Revelation 2, there will be 4 angels on each corner of the earth to hold back the winds. Why is it that whenever people in the Bible encounter angels, the first thing they say is, "Fear not."?  These are unbelievable creatures!


 
Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world.  What we have to grasp is that we, as his followers, have the power of God already in us. In Exodus, Moses comes to the edge of the Red Sea as they are running from the Egyptians. Moses calls on God, but God tells Moses that he already has the power and to use his staff! We can't call the angels down ourselves, but we have authority here. Multiple times, Johnson describes times when he was just minding his own business and this super lustful dream comes or this gory, bloody dream comes or he is scared by an experience. In the dream, he is stuttering trying to say, "Jesus". When he finally says it, everything leaves. There is no power in anything we say alone, but there is power in the name of Jesus. Phillipians 2 says that the name of Jesus is above the name of any other to the glory of God the Father.
 
It is Easter coming up (when Johnson delivered this message) on Sunday, "but I think so many of us are stuck on Friday." Something changed Johnson and the way he thinks about his life. "If you really want to find out about what God says about your power and authority, go through Ephesians a couple of times." God exalted Jesus to the highest place. In Ephesians it says that we are seated with Jesus in Heavenly places!! We are armed and dangerous and we don't even know it! Think about that! We are seated with Christ in the Heavenly realms. Luke 10:19 & John 14:12 tell us about our authority. Isn't it crazy that Jesus actually expected us to do what He did; even greater works!! It's because we are seated with Him. James 4:7 tells us to resist that devil and he will flee from us. Oft times, we only remember the "flee from you" part. But we must resist the devil.
 
One morning, Johnson was coming into a very dark church at night. "The only light I had was the demonic exit signs; you know what I mean?" Here he was, preaching about fear, and he was afraid. Then a little voice in him says, "I called you to flee from temptation, not to flee from the enemy. Johnson had a change of heart; "Armed and dangerous, baby...seated with Christ" Years ago, Johnson had this dream where he is on a mountain top. The wind is blowing and lightning is around him. On the other side of the mountain, there is this huge warlock who is about to fight him. Toe to toe, Johnson remembers how he had just been reading Elijah, so he screams "Fire of God!!" and this tornado comes down and scoops up the warlock.
 
"Stop asking God to rescue you when He gave you the authority." Submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. "I'll give you a double cheese burger promise." Step into who God called you to be!

What Does "Blessed Are the Merciful" Mean?

There are relationships in the scripture that allow us to experience the best in others. The corruption in this thinking though, is that if you have to use mercy to get mercy, it ISN'T mercy. This is the corruption of the church! We are not merciful so God will give us mercy! Jesus is telling us to practice mercy so that it becomes the natural outcome of our lives. In relationships, you will find that if you refuse to forgive, others will rarely forgive you. The more you are embittered, the less you will find grace from others in your life. It is a true human constant. If you withhold love, you will lose the capacity to experience love. Ironically, these are human virtues that you will only experience if you are willing to give them. It's almost as if your soul increase in capacity if you choose to live them out.

What is this thing they call mercy? In Matthew 5:1-11, when Jesus began to paint a picture of what it meant to be truly human, he gave us the "Beattitudes", pronounced (be-attitudes). Erwin McManus studies the fifth of these characteristics, or "the merciful", in his podcast from http://www.mosaic.org/podcast/. Don't forget how counter intuitive these Beattitudes were. Jesus was pulling us towards things that we don't normally think about wanting for ourselves, like "poor in spirit" and "meekness". He says we will find ourselves in these places, but not alone. Why is mercy so important for a relationship with Jesus?

Recently, Erwin was in Beverly Hills meeting with this managing partner of a multi-billion dollar company that did terrific things like focusing on economically sound and green technologies to implement for job creation in highly impoverished countries. The business man invited Erwin to see all that they were doing and he introduced Erwin to his partner as a "faith leader". Erwin reflects on the introduction,"That was like saying, 'Hi, this is Erwin. He's a cannibal. Want to go to lunch?'" Erwin was caught off guard when the partner (not abbreviating) responded by saying, "So, tell me, how is your BS different from everyone else's BS?" But Erwin understood exactly why he asked this question! It was because, in our society, when we get into this conversation about religion, it can becomes a question of how the church will manipulate people to a belief system through guilt and condemnation. Two thousand thousand years after Christ, we are a church that is recognized more for knowing what people are doing wrong and for what we are doing right than by being merciful and forgiving.

"One of my favorite movies was Gladiator...It's timeless... I like Russell Crowe, but I really love Joaquin Phoenix." Erwin took his wife, Kim, to the movie one night. On the way home, Kim told him that she was worried about him and his tolerance for violence. In fact the week before, he had taken her to "The Patriot"! So that night, she even hazed him because she said, in both movies, the wives were violently killed! (Funny side notes.) But there is a line in the movie, "Gladiator", where Joaquin is now emperor of Rome and he tells his sister that if she betrays him, he will kill her son. But because he has chosen not to kill him already, he asks her, "Am I not merciful? AM I NOT MERCIFUL??!!?". Erwin loves that line and kiddingly tries to use it with his kids sometimes. But the rule of thumb here, though, is if you have to ask if you are, you are not.



We, as humans, have the extraordinary ability to take the highest virtues and corrupt them to the lowest low of humanity. Mercy is different from meekness. Meekness is controlled strength. Mercy is when two unique things come together; compassion and power. The word mercy is derived from a word that describes a guilty person before a judge, but gets an out-of-the-ordinary pardon from judgement.

Have you ever been in a relationship where you just blew it? You violated trust you had with someone and you'd give anything to take it back? The consequences can bring more devastation that we could ever imagine. So, if you know that feeling, then you know the power of mercy. People can have compassion, but it doesn't activate mercy if they have no power. There are some who have power, but not the interest or concern; i.e. no compassion. If you need mercy, you are postured such that you have no power. But if you have the power, you can find out how you truly are.

Sometimes we talk to God about how we love Him, sometimes to the exclusion of others. But real love from God ALWAYS involves others. And the moment we go to God seeking forgiveness, He begins a conversation with us about forgiving others. In essence, the moment we ask for mercy, that is the moment God demands we give it to others. It's never just enough mercy for us. The moment we experience the mercy from God, it pours out from Him, through us, to others. It's like love. Love is not a limited commodity and He never gives us just enough for us, He gives us more love than we can handle so that it will flow out to others. God WANTS to give His mercy to the person who will GIVE it away.

When Erwin was getting his Masters, he was taking a course from a world reknown scholar; a brilliant man. It seemed that, after every course, Erwin would see a flaw in his thinking and argue with him in front of the class until he was utterly frustrated. You could see that every time Erwin raised his hand, the professor would slump. Erwin admits he was very curious, but he also very arrogant. One day when Erwin walked into class late, he was surprised to find the whole class taking the mid-term. He thought it was two days later. He looked behind him and there was the professor he had antagonized all year, Dr Brooks. "In the hall, Mr. McManus..." Erwin remembers his heart pounding and how he recalled every smart remark he'd ever said to this man.

This was the moment it would all come back. Dr. Brooks asked Erwin what was going on, to which Erwin sheepishly answered that he had been mistaken about the date of the exam. "So what should we do, Mr. McManus?" Erwin humorously talks about all the answers that went through his mind, but he says this was the moment Dr. Brooks could stamp his head "Guilty" or "Condemned". Instead, his professor said, "You know Mr. McManus, I've learned that every human being comes to a place where they need a moment of grace and mercy. This is yours. So, come on Thursday and take the exam." There was no reason in the world for Dr. Brooks to do that and there was every reason in the world for him not to. Walking away, Dr Brooks stopped Erwin and said, "Oh, and Mr. McManus...You only get one. This one's yours."

We don't deserve even one. Mercy is what you can do when you have the choice to bring judgement or to forgive. You are powerful whenever you choose mercy over condemnation. Why are we so quick to judge and slow to forgive? Do you remember the section in "Schindler's List" where the commander of the concentration camp took pleasure in the suffering of others? He would shoot people from his perch just because he could. Schindler went up and convinced him what real power was. It was forgiveness and grace. The commander, as if introduced to a new toy, played with it and practiced it in front of the mirror saying, "I forgive you." He trolled about the camp telling these people, who had experienced absolute evil from him, that he forgave them, but it was as if he took pleasure in seeing their fear of not knowing what he would do next. But the novelty of his new "toy" soon wore off and he went back to his torturing behavior.



What would happen if we all became merciful? This was not what the disciples wanted to hear. All the people of Israel were slaves to the empire of Rome. They wanted a leader who would bring appropriate revenge! But Jesus tells them that their source of power is in love and forgiving. This is a human narrative that remains rare. But if we will practive mercy, we will stand out from the traditional fabric of society. How often do we look in the mirror and measure ourselves by how merciful we've been in the past week?

Erwin challenges us to use our power to withhold condemnation and choose compassion. Then he wants us to begin focusing on how our lives begin to change as we focus on this attribute. The most powerful and compassionate person in the world was Jesus, who was crucified. Even when he came back, He didn't wipe us out as we deserved, He brought more power and more compassion. He brought mercy.