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Sun, May 13, 2024 10AM • 50:47Sermon by Gene SimcoSUMMARY KEYWORDSfear, word, afraid, god, people, bible, lord, translations, today, context, read, Jesus, day, Christian, anxious, talk, church, literal translation, pray, sin
Good morning. Welcome. If you're new here among us, my name is Jean I serve here at seat three church as your pastor. And I heard a story about a guy who had a fear of flying. So he's going to fly. He's at the airport, he's waiting in the terminal with the big windows, you can see the airplanes make him a little nervous. But what makes it worse is he sees these black clouds moving in thunder and lightning, it's getting real nervous. What makes it worse is they delay his flight. So now he's got more time to think about it. So he decides to walk around the terminal, just keep himself occupied himself busy. And what he runs into is a kiosk that sells life insurance. Pretty good deal. $100,000 policy for just $3. So he's looking out the window, thinking about his family, and he says, you know, there were three bucks, right. So he gets the life insurance policy doesn't really make him feel better. So you walk around the terminal, he decides to get something to eat. Now, if you've ever been to an airplane terminal, most of the modern airports have pretty wide variety of food. Well, he decides he wants Chinese food because he wants to eat again in 20 minutes. So he goes and gets a Chinese food, you got that he eats his meal, maybe it's just me, it gets to the fortune cookie, he opens up the fortune cookie. And it says your recent investment will pay big dividends. So in the we talked about, or I talked about fortune cookie theology, that's what I'm calling it. I'm sticking with it. Don't worry, it's not a long series. But anyway, it's kind of like that, right? Like this is the way most Christians read the Bible. Right? So they're fed something. So your app tells you what verse of the day you're going to be reading today, regardless of where you're at, right feeds it to you, you open it up. And because it's a standalone verse, you can just apply it to anything you want, right? Totally void of context. And so this is a problem. And that's why we're in this series. Now, we went through the whole Bible in our last series, and now we're looking at some of the things that people take out of context, misuse, even unintentionally, all over the Bible. And I'm going to give you guys the context, today, we run across one, that doesn't often seem like a big deal. But I'm going to talk about today how the Christian culture has kind of developed around this bad teaching Well, or false teaching. So here's the teaching, I want to illustrate it to you in a graphic that maybe you've seen, so let's just put one of these up. Right? So like something like this, right? So this person clearly had more time to do arts and crafts than read the Bible, because that's wrong. Go to the next one so ingrained in our Christian culture, that even famous people do it. But just because famous people say it doesn't mean it's true. So this is Toby Mac, he owns it. He put his name on there. He did that after he sold the stock graphic. Another problem there, but whatever. The Bible does not say if you're not, don't be afraid, anything like that. 365. But fine. But again, even I've seen pastors espouse this teaching. So today, I'm going to show you how wrong it is. Alright, so how do I know it's not true? So here's basically like, on the backend, I've had people come to Bible studies and stuff, and they're like, I'm a word search person. And the Bible says this this many times, in your version, even across different languages, just in English, I don't know how many verses we have. It's a lot, right? So we have like 30 versions or something like that. And they'll render different words differently, right, it doesn't change the point entirely until you start getting into a deeper theological point. And then what you have to do is go to the original languages. So what you can do if you don't know the original languages, is you can get this big old book called Strong's Concordance, right? You open it up and you start looking at the words fear or fear not. If you're like me, you're old school, you deal with the index card, right? Like you're not what you're not. And I just sat there like a crazy person doing that. You don't have to do it, I did it for you. You can trust me, unless you're him. He went home. Last time I taught on this. He did it. Right. But then you came up with the same mathematical solution was the same. So there you go. So you can get that kind of concordance and just count. The only thing you can do, and I can show you that this is what I did. We've learned a lot like we've been here for a while you've heard this the Bible, the early church is all in Greek, right? So I'm not going to get too much into that not just the New Testament, but they're using the Greek Old Testament too. And so I have a great concordance like that, where I can look at the old New Testament did the same thing. slight variation, but when it boils down to it, basically What you get the word fear appears in the Bible about 500 times. So if somewhere between 500 to 511 Sounds about 500 times, when we look at fear not, it only says fear not about 84 ish times, not even close is not even close. And so this is someone who counted in both languages and had his work check. So just to frame this out for you, then check my work. Even if we bumped up that fear not from 84, it's enrolling 16. So we're bumping up to 100 times, still not even close to 365 times, still not even close, right? But think about the word fear is using most of the time, it's telling you to fear something. Or it's just somebody being afraid, and a lot of times rightfully afraid of something right? 500 times, but only, let's say if we bump it up, like 20% of the time, you're getting this fear not thing when you're looking at fear and its entirety in the Bible. So what I'm going to do today is take you through some of like, the fears people having fear, but just to kind of like, shoot down another bad teaching, because I've heard people say this, which is very strange. But they'll say maybe you've heard it something like you've said it. Something like when the Bible says fear, it doesn't mean fear. It means reverence are all well then how come pray tell the word reference is also used. Doesn't make any sense. And all is used to write because the translators have no idea how to speak English. No, that's not the reason you're wrong. There's a different word for reverence, different word for anxiety, different word for fear. And fear means fear. And I'm going to show you that today. So we're looking at like, if you're reading Greek, it's like think phobia. Think that like but Phobos in Greek. So that's what I mean. That's what you're reading, that's fear. They're different words, reverence are all I'll talk about that a little bit later. Anxiety, nobody knows what it means. And so looked at the original languages, and I can assure you, we're going to get a pretty good count here. So again, we'll start with one of the fear knots, right? So this is this is very early on in the Bible. I want to show you how different people in the Bible have fear. But here you go. Genesis 15. One. So there's Abram after doing these things, the word of Yahweh, just to explain really quick here. I didn't explain that. So normally, I use an NLT New Living Translation, that's the version of the Bible I use keep that version of the Bible I use. Why? Because I don't know who's coming in or what the reading levels of people are. Here we have English as a second language people hear right? So if I want into a Spanish speaking church, I would hope they'd get like easy Spanish for me. And they would talk fast, just like I talk fast. And I'm slowing down either inside language joke, right. But I'd hoped that they were like making it easy for me. So I just make it easy. And if you've been here for a long time, you know, I put like what it says in the Greek in brackets, if it's like, needs to be technical. I'm using an L Ed today. And so when I'm being really lazy, and I don't read Greek, I go to the LED that is the closest you get to work, we would kind of wrongly call a literal translation. No such thing as a literal translation can't be done. So more word for word. So anyway, you're seeing Yawei here, because most translations will render it like Lord, but a really technical it's called a bit technical, a really technical translation or delineator. They'll say no, no, that they're saying Yaqui there. Alright, so it's like a four letter tetragrammaton complicated word. But basically, it's a little more than Lord. It really means more like to be think about the I AM statement. So it's like who God is what he is, it's all that rolled into one. It's more complicated than Lord, right? So when you read that, for simplicity sake today, God or such as you think of God's things, the word of God or Yahweh came to Abram in a vision saying, Do not be afraid, Abram, I'm your shield, and you reward you shall be very great. There you go. But Genesis 22, two, and he said, do not stretch out your hand against the boy, do not do anything to him. For now, I know that you are one who fears God, since you're not withheld your son, your only child for me, so I'm going to contextualize this for you. That's most of you know about like him being willing to sacrifice his son. And he gets stopped because what he fears God he goes through with it, because he fears God. So now, we're going to go through just a bunch here, Genesis 26, seven, when the man of the place asked concerning his wife, he said, she was my sister, who's afraid to say, My wife thinks this place will kill me. On account of Rebecca for she was so beautiful. So this is Isaac. Isaac feared a feared event. aleck, that's kind of funny because his dad did the same thing with about the same excuse, but she really was his half sister. In this case, he's just lying. So Isaac has two problems there. He's a liar.
But he has fear which we'll see isn't always a problem. Genesis 2017 There was afraid and said, how awesome is this place? This is nothing else in the house of God. So it's Bethel. And this is the gate of heaven. So that's Jacob. And we have like, some people call it Jacob's Ladder, Genesis 37. Again, Jacob was very frightened as Esau, and distressed. So he divided the people, flocks, cattle, camels that were with him into two companies. And he thought, if he saw comes to one company and destroys it, the remaining company will be able to escape. And Jacob said, Oh God, my father, Abraham, and God, my father, Isaac, oh, Yahweh, who said to me, return to your land and your family, I will do well with you. I'm not worthy of all the loyal love and all the faithfulness that you've shown your servant for with only my stuff. I cross this Jordan and now I become two camps. Please rescue me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau for I fear Him, lest he come and attack mother and children alike. So he kind of like stole his birthright and everything. He's always mad at him, so he's afraid of him. So remember, Jacob here, Joseph, then he gathered them in a prison for three days. So he's playing with his brothers, if you remember, the Joseph account is going to mess him up. On the third day, Joseph said to them, do this and you'll live I fear God. So it's important here, because you have Abraham, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph so these are some really key figures in the Old Testament having fear so there they go. Exodus so if you remember ship, Ron Paul, you know, that is the midwives right? So they're saving all the babies so when they want to kill in Egypt, all the firstborn and all the all the male children there, so they're the midwives aren't doing it. Right. So about them, Exodus 117, but the midwives feared God, and they did not do as the king of Egypt sets and like the kill the boys, they let the boys live. If you keep reading, I think around verse 20, it actually says, because they feared God, like, they were blessed. They were blessed. Because if you've got Exodus 214, and he said, Who appointed you, as a commander and a judge over us? Are you intending to kill me? Like you killed the Egyptian? And Moses was afraid? And he said, Surely this matter has become known. So remember, he murders one of the Egyptian slave drivers, right? So that's what they're talking about there the context, Exodus 2020, wrapped with the giving of the 10 commandments. And Moses said to the people, do not be afraid, God is going to test you so that his fear will be before you so that you do not sin almost like a paradox, right there. So fear what keeps you from sitting here? So interesting here, a man of God, we talked about that the only one in the Torah, listen is a man of God. Having fears a man of God can up here, Joshua is probably the most popular book that you get to when it comes to like, SEO, do not be afraid, be strong and courageous. So a lot of this is taken from the book of Joshua. Yes, it says that redundantly. So. Do not do not commanded you be strong and courageous. Do not fear be dismayed for Yahweh your God is with you wherever you go. Yep, so that's one of the many right but you also see Joshua for 14. On that day, Yahweh exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they feared him as they feared Moses all the days his life. So remember, David. So First Samuel 20 ones Well, David took these words seriously as you put these words, so even on led sometimes will give you a footnote there, so nothing's really literal here. Obviously, he was very frayed of the face of anguish game gap, no right soldier who he was crazy pretended to be crazy. And let's fiddle come down his beard and scratch it and these guys are we're scratch on doorposts because he was afraid like, you know, Saul's killed his 1000s David has killed his 10 1000s and so he runs to the Philistines and realizes bad plan, sir pretends to be crazy. He has fear of Achish. Second Samuel 114. David said to him, how is it that you are not afraid to stretch out your hand destroy your ways anointed ones is the killer guy finished off King Saul? They've been talking to and then he kills him. Second Samuel 619. But David feared Yahweh on that day and said, how can the Ark of Yahweh come to me so he had moved the ark COVID Eden's house because member burst out against Uzza touched the ark, he died and David had fear because of this, Solomon, bringing the Ark into the temple and dedicating the temple. So part of this kind of prayer here First Kings 840 Do these things so that you may fear so that they may fear you all the days, that they live on the face of the land that you gave our to our ancestors also, for the foreigner, who is not from your people, Israel, and he comes from a distant land because of your name for this shell here of your great name and your powerful hand and your outstretched arm. And he's you'll come and pray towards this house, and you should hear in heaven, the place of your dwelling and act according to all of the foreigner calls you so that all the peoples of the earth may know your name, to fear you as your people Israel and to know that your name has been invoked over this house that I have built. So we see it there. Solomon's prayer, Elijah, another man of God, First Kings 19 Then he became afraid. Elijah got up fled for his life. He came to Beersheba which belongs to Judah. Left us over there. He's over. Running from Jezebel after killing the 450 prophets of Baal. So when you look at the Psalms, tons of fear knots in the sub tons, all over the place, but just to acknowledge a few different ones here, Psalm 2512, who is the man that is figuring out what he will instruct him in, in the way he should choose his solo Lodge and prosperity in his offering in the promise. possess the land sorry, in fellowship with Yahweh is for those who fear Him, and He makes known his covenant to them. So in fellowship is for those who fear God, Psalm 3119, how abundant needs your goodness that you have stored up for those who fear you, they perform, for those who take referred refuge in you before the children of humankind? Clearly, I don't read the literal translation aloud a lot. But it means your goodness that you've started up for those who fear you right? So can it be done here? God will bless us and all the ends of the earth will hear him Psalm 85 Nine, surely the salvation is nearer to those who give salvation is nearer to those who fear him. Psalm 145 19 fulfills the desires of those who fear him. He also hears their cry for him so he hears you and saves you if you fear him, right. So now they may kind of start to seem like okay, I get it, James. It's fear the Lord. That's the only fear we're supposed to have. Well, yeah, you go to the Proverbs, Proverbs one seven. Fear of Yahweh is the beginning of knowledge, wisdom and instruction fools despise right. So he probably that's very literal, right? But you've probably heard a variation of that. But then you get to Proverbs 1416. The wise fear is what it says this one drives me nuts, because even the literal translations will say cautious. And I'm like, why? It just says fear. I'll tell you why later, and turns me over the fool throws off restraint and is confident. Right, so the wiser, cautious, doesn't say anything about the Lord right there. Proverbs 2421, fear Yahweh, my son, and the king. Oh, we those who change do not associate. Right. So the wise fear, as opposed to fear, the king too, clearly says that. Now we get to the New Testament, probably the most famous one. In the midst of the sermon of the mount, you see this Matthew 625. For this reason I say to you, do not be anxious for your life. When you eat, and not for your body. Are you aware? Is your life not more than your food or your body or more than clothing? Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, clearly now, this is the problem when we stop reading, love here, we'll just That's it. That's the verse of the day. And we're not. Because you see, Jesus says and does some other things. So here we go. Jesus will tell us clearly that there's more to fear be anxious about here, Luke 12, four, I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body. And after these things, do not have anything more to do. They can't do anything more to you after that. But I will show you whom you should fear. Fear the one who has authority after killing to throw you into hell? Yes, I tell you, if you're this one, that's like never going to be the verse of the day guaranteed. Guarantee right? So now Jesus Agony in the Garden, right, he knows he's going to be taken off and crucified, Luke 2239. And he went away and proceeded according to his Gustin, to the Mount of Olives. And the disciples also followed him. And when he came to the place, he said to them, pray that you will not enter into temptation, and you withdrew from them about a stone's throw, and knelt down and began to pray, saying, Father, if you are willing to take this cup from me, nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. An angel from heaven appeared from strengthening him. And being an anguish, he began praying more fervently and his sweat became like blocked drops of blood falling down to the ground. Now, interesting to note, Dr. Luke wrote the Gospel of Luke where this appears, and he notes that unlike the other gospel writers, because he's a doctor, and he knows about this condition, I got to read it hematidrosis. If I said that wrong, I'm not trying to be a doctor. And that's a good thing. So right, so this is an actual medical condition, you can go and Wikipedia it or whatever you want to do, right where you get so stressed out, so anxious that you sweat, blood that says extreme anxiety can cause this and that's what Dr. Luke is noting. Now, if we go to Matthew's account, Matthew 2637, same backdrop here, same context, and taking along Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, James and John, he began to be distressed and troubled, saying he's distressed. Let's just look at the English language for a second. Let's put this up from the dictionary. Right? Distress means suffering from anxiety. That's what the word means, right? So clearly, Jesus suffered from anxiety now, in case you didn't believe Dr. Luke, or the English language is an interesting word. And we're going to kind of tie this in a second here. Flavio, so
it's not exactly fear, and it's not exactly or kind of his reverence is very difficult to translate. Now something very interesting happens here, which I'll get to. So what you do, if you're trying to make a translation, you can't always translate it based on language today, right? Because language is kind of evolved. And certain words might mean different things. They take on different meanings. So all you have to do is go back to other writings around that time in history, not that we need the word of God validated by something else. It's just that we're doing translating. So we need the language validated. And we do we go to Josephus and other authors that time Plutarch, we look at that word, and it's usually always fear or a godly type of fear, it's a little bit different. So it's almost like this reverential fear, but it's fear, nonetheless. Now, this gets very interesting, because I'll talk about it a little bit later. What a lot of people don't understand is, not only is church kind of influenced by the outside culture, I would say a little too much. But our translations are, and people don't realize that once you like me, like people say, What's your favorite version, because all of them, I read all the versions of the Bible. So like the study, like how they might change during time, or why people are using different words at different times. And you kind of noticed something very interesting. When you look at like even older English translations of the Bible, like real old ones, you have like 1611, King James, before that you have like 1516, Geneva Bible, the Matthews Bible, and 1525 26. So that you look at these translations, and you just kind of see sometimes much more matter of fact, type language, and you look at our translations, and they kind of tiptoe around certain things a little bit, and fears, one of them, fears one of them. Because when you look, so I take you to Hebrews five, seven, we'll put it up here, when you look at all the older translations. You may have never read this, because your Bible if it's modern, you won't translate it this way. But when you look at all the older English translations, for example, the King James, when the days of the flesh, the talking about Jesus, and the gardens of the context is what I just told you, right. So it's just, it's basically being a good commentary on itself as the word of God, commentating on itself, who in the day, Jesus and David Fleshman, offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears onto him that was able to save him from death. He was heard in that he feared really interesting. And so when you look at the original languages, or Bible translations that are older and so you got a whole bunch of them there the literal standard version Webster's you heard of him, wording was Bible, Young's Literal translation. So when you get really hyper literal translations, older one, they're just going to say fear. Because they're not worried about certain things. And I'll tell you why. They won't translate it like that now, because we've kind of got our culture stuck in there a little too much. So again, we have a cross section here. The English language, Dr. Luke, And the Word of God itself, says Jesus feared if we're reading it correctly. Very interesting to tell it just give me a nerd moment. Okay, just going to take like two minutes for me to do this 1560 Geneva Bible. So what'll happen is, if we get a picture of it up there, you know, give this little commentary in the columns. They did this a lot. So we have a common Terry Bibles, because usually on the bottom, and the real old ones, so this is the scripture I just read for you really hard to read. But this is what the commentators who translated it says, they tell you why they translated it that way. So it's olding was he mean is, I mean, is that most earnest prayer in Christ prayed in the garden where He sweat drops of blood, being in perplexity and fearing the horrors of death, not fearing death, right? That he's not faithless. But fearing the pain, the way he's going to die. So here you have one of the earliest English versions saying, This is why we're saying Jesus feared putting Luke together for you. So it's all together right here, right brings it together for us. Now, if we keep reading, it comes up in the New Testament a lot. And I'm just going to kind of fire through just a bunch of them so you can see him in case you hadn't before. So if we just look at the Romans 1121. Paul's talking about its fellow kinsmen, and giving that beautiful olive branch analogy here, well said, they're broken off because of your unbelief. But you stand firm because of your faith, do not think arrogant thoughts, but be afraid. So this is context your salvation. We'll see that more. First Corinthians two, three. And Paul, I came to you in weakness and in fear with much trembling. Why is this a terror there? Because if you showed the word thrombose, to a Greek speaking person, they were translated as terror that caused you to tremble but we're nice and English language so we just say trembling because they think you can handle the terror. Second Corinthians seven, five, for even a Week, Paul and Timothy arrived in Macedonia, our body had no rest but we were afflicted in every way quarrel is outside. Fears within Paul and Timothy had fear. Second Corinthians 715 talking about Titus and his affection for you. is all the more when he Titus remembers the obedience of all of you as you welcomed him with again, there it is, Titus we just fear and terror Galatians four Allah When Paul is afraid for the church because they're following a different gospel, and that's perhaps I've labored for you in vain. Paul has fear. He also has fear for the church, we're going to see that later. Ephesians 521 being subjected to another in the fear of Christ, Ephesians six, five slaves, you can think of it as employees, right? obey your earthly masters, your employers with fear and trembling. There it is, again, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ. I've used that one, right, so as an employer, to Philippians 212. Therefore, my dear friends, just have you always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and terror. There it is, again, Colossians 322 against slaves obey your human masters and everything, not while being watched as people pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord, First Timothy 520, my favorite, prove those who sin in the presence of all in order that the rest may experience fear. Imagine if I took that literally. So the next time you guys come up to me, like, shouldn't we be doing that? I'll be like, shouldn't we be doing that? I knew answer, right? So imagine that, like I read, I just like, rebuke you for your sins, that you're afraid to do it again, or others are afraid. I got way too excited about that. And nobody else is sharing with me in that. Alright. So what's going on here? So what's going on here? Because it seems you saying two things. All right. important word. I've said this before. Paradox. Right. So when two things that seem to contradict themselves can both be true, right, depending on your deck. So what did I do other than just read those verses for you? I tried to contextualize them and told you who is what's going on. You're not getting that right from the Bible app. Because you go and read the rest of the chapter. Right? Okay. People are too quiet right now. So here's a good one like to understand is like, my favorite set of verses here to help us understand this. Right? Proverbs 26. Four, do not Answer a fool according to his folly. Lest if you can like him, even you Answer a fool according to his folly, or else you will be wise in his own eyes. What seems like a contradiction, right? But if you read the rest of the proverbs, you go all the way to Ecclesia. As you get all the way there and Ecclesiastes, you realize that there's kind of a time for almost everything, right? So it depends on the context, right? So the second part of the sentence gives you that right? lest you become like him, right? So don't let them drag you down. Right? Or sometimes they need to be corrected. So it's giving you both but it seems like a contradiction here, because it's two different things. Right? So we see that very famously with this teaching in Philippians. So I'll go backwards. And you probably know this like, this is definitely come up as your verse Philippians, four, six, Be anxious for nothing. but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God, right? For a lot of us heard that word or a different version of that. But if you back up, you realize a couple of different things. Paul's in prison, not a good time. Philippians 228, therefore I'm sending he's talking about Pafford itis, with special urgency in order that when you see him again, you may rejoice. And I may be less anxious Paul's anxious because this guy really likes is going he delivers the gift to Paul and then delivers Philippians back to Philippi. Right. So he's anxious for him. So in the same letter, what, it's a paradox, right? So hey, I get anxious to big hyperbolic statement. The fools boast pawns, shipwrecks beaten over and over again, you know, like three times or five times with rods, right? And then he says Second Corinthians 1128. Apart from these external things, right? There's the pressure, I mean, every day of the anxiety about all the churches, he has anxiety for the church, right? So he has anxiety and he's honest about it. So let's get to the application. So first of all, just to wrap our heads around this why do people insist on this teaching if it's and that's just guys like I just went through it quick. Now you guys kind of like fall asleep a little bit selfie, get some coffee, you can pass rounds of golf, you need it? Right? Because it's a lot. It's and I just wanted to show you guys, boom, here it is. It's not just like a one off. It's saying a lot. It really is those 500 times. Alright, so the first problem. People don't read their Bibles. Right. So the first time I ever saw this, well, they started really reading my Bible
a lot. Because like, That can't be right. Like, there's no way that can that's a lot, you know, right? So it doesn't sound right. And this is a protection and encouragement for you. The best protection against false teaching is to read your bibles not line by line, like but in full context, right? So people take all these lines from everywhere and then like, mash them together, as if they're all set in the same chapter. Then there's a context for everyone else live and you have to go there and separately, but I talked about number Jabberwocky itself Correct. This is what a lot of churches do. And they just take pieces of Scripture and just start mashing them together and rattling them off. And by the time they're done with it, it's like, I do that, if you ever see me look at you and like, that's what that means, like, you don't know what you're talking. You're confusing me with your confusion, right? It's terrible. But this is what happens. And they don't read their Bibles. And so people fall prey to that type of teaching, because they don't read their Bibles. And I give like a music note analogy. So as a musician, you know, I, this resonates with me. But I've noticed that people who are not musicians, like even if somebody covered your favorite song, you would notice that it's not the original band, even if they were really, really good. You'd still notice why, because you listened to that song a lot, right? So even though you're not a musician, you've developed an ear for it, or you notice, maybe they play the solo a little different, something like that, you're going to notice why because you listen to it a lot. Right? So you should probably be listening to your Bible just as much, right? And then you develop that skill set. But again, I'll tell you this, in context, larger portions of it not like one tiny bit at a time, it doesn't work. It just doesn't work that way, larger context. That's the first problem. People are not reading, listening to their Bibles or listening to a lot of other garbage. And they accept that as the truth. It's not another one, like, I'm really going to have to pump the brakes on because I've actually been asked to teach on this broader teaching of it. But you know, if you look it up, you call it Christian nationalism. So this is something like the idea that, you know, America is a Christian nation. It's patently false. Just read the founding documents. And you'll know, this is definitely not a lot of weird stuff in there. That's not Christian who is our Creator. It was Christian, it would say Jesus, like the Bible doesn't say that separation of church and state. There's your clue. Right? They're they intended not to be a religious nation. So I'm going to stop. Anyway, what started to happen in the 1900s is exactly that. They started to try to like, push this idea that we're some kind of Christian nation. So all the phrase, basically, the Presidents become like messiahs, you know. And now the Constitution is on the same level as the Bible is weird stuff like that. Really doesn't make a whole lot of sense. And then you have, for example, these president saying things that also don't make sense Jabberwocky talk, you've heard this one? All we have to fear is fear itself. That makes absolutely no sense. Think carefully about that. Fear, so we should be afraid of being afraid. Smart. Right. So and we're a Christian nation. That's a Christian president. What all we have to fear all is fear itself. First of all, is not logical. That's the first call. Second problem is fear. The Lord is the beginning of all wisdom and insight. Right. Those are fears the Lord has saved like, no. He's this acknowledging the Word of God. Right, but we're so sucked into Christian nationalism that we ignored. We'd give him a pass, whereas good godly men would say, that isn't one Don't listen to him, because he lied to you. We have to fear the Lord. All we have to we talking about, but it sounds great, right? Like the Jabberwocky talk a lot of Christians fall for when someone just starts speaking nonsense. It's nonsense. If he was a real Christian president, he said, Fear the Lord. And that Lord is Jesus Christ. He's coming back, you know, something like that would enter into the speech. It doesn't, right. And I'm done on that point, the hero complex, right? So we're all going to pretend we're not because the hero is never afraid, like Elijah Moses. But they're not heroes. Right? Jesus, the heroes never fight. So he can't be afraid either. Nobody's afraid. So it's this hero complex type of thing. We're all Rambo or something like that. And he's never afraid. So we're all tough guys. Right? So that's another part of our culture. The media. Media is the funniest one meeting the government working together very well. It's not here today, but he can teach you about that. They've got to do like they all do. It's so funny. Like, but actually it's sad, right? But it's great. Because if you step back from it and think for yourself, now like a brainwashed thing for yourself, about everything they're doing on the TV on the phone. They're fear mongering, they're fear mongering. They're trying to get you worried about something that this says, Don't worry about it, which of course you're not afraid. And they'll turn around and be like, well, but don't be afraid. All we have to fear is fear itself. And they just keep you on this hamster wheel of fear. Right and then every commercials about what how you're going to lose your money, right? Where you buy gold, right? Like every single commercial generator, like the patriot and it's the Patriot generator right? Buy gold, everything shoving down your throat, right? Don't be afraid. But you can buy this kneel prep kit for $500. And it's like, or whatever they're called right for your bunker. But don't be afraid. Nonsense. It's just a bunch of nonsense. So be very careful, even ones that claim to be Christian. Anybody fear mongering? That's no good. You don't need to be in that cycle. And here's the sad irony is all of these things have been adopted by your mainstream Christian culture. They've all been adopted. And it's amazing, but the same thing. And so here's what you end up with. What's the big deal? Because what you end up with is a culture of people thinking that fear must be a sin. Roosevelt said, we must be a sin. It's not because fearing the Lord's not a sin must be a sin. So I'm not going to admit to anyone that I'm afraid when I'm afraid, like I should. Like Jesus. I'm not going to be anything like him. I'm just going to lie. And you end up with this country club of liars. Because you're, some of you are liars. But anyway, but you do you go into typically how you do it. Um, great. Great. And then they Jabberwocky talk offs and stuff about the Lord like, okay, you know what I mean? It's like, some stereotype is the day the Lord made, let us rejoice and be glad, terrified on the inside. That's not biblical, but it's not now and it's not honest. It's just not honest. But here's the sin. So we have to pretend Right? Like, dress up nice and pretend. So the big deal, truth matters. I'm just saying, like, like, people kind of forgotten that in this day and age truth. Right? You know, whatever it is, I know, you're going to go back to politics and truth matters, right? But now, especially in this day, and age, truth seems to be irrelevant. Irrelevant sometime. But according to God's word, it's very relevant. So that's the problem, right? We saw it was a serious sin to misrepresent God's word. So we started this series of showed you that both Old and New Testament says do not change this, its meaning that is don't James this. And so if it says you should be fearing more than not, don't change that. That's misrepresenting God's word. And we see it's a trickle of problems. But most of I should be able to just stop right there. See, that's the only reason because God's word says don't misrepresent it. Is that not enough? The truth is important. That's it right? Again, it creates this tragic kind of like, just a cycle of dishonesty and a yoke, right over people, you know, if you don't know if the animals can come together, but it's a burden on people, and they do they get stuck in this fear cycle of being guilty about being afraid, because I'm not supposed to be afraid. But I was told that I'll have to fear periods. You know, it's this this mess. Mess is very, very quickly. Like I've had people like I mean, one of the worst ones, poor woman, get diagnosed with stage four cancer, and she's crying in a meeting with just crying and crying and like, I'm thinking, you know, again, right, like, you know, you may die soon, totally get it. So I'm like, in my head, I'm like, getting ready to go through that type of counseling. Try and like, okay, okay. And she says, Through the tears, she's like, I know, I'm sitting I know, I'm sending him like, smoking cigarettes still, like, you know what I mean? Like, did get you in trouble in the first place. But what was going to go there? No, I'm sitting because I know I shouldn't be afraid. to poor woman. You poor woman. That breaks my heart. And so that's the problem. It's crazy. It's like stops I had to, like, start here like, no, but you didn't read your Bible. So, as we saw, there's some good fear, right? There's fear of the Lord, right? And as Moses clearly says, right, like your fear so you won't sin. So just in case you want to, like maybe that'll help you not. It's a biblical concept, which work out yourself new testament to your salvation with fear and terror. It's very biblical.
Or your fear of the Lord should keep you from sinning. It's a biblical concept. And I think we need a little bit more of that today. There'll be a good thing. There's intelligent fair, Proverbs 14, six. What is it that the wise fair, alright, there's nothing to be afraid of. Right? It's smart. Like it kind of keeps you again, like keeping you from sinning. keep you out of trouble once in a while. kind of helpful. And you know what it says to what fools are overconfident. Little bit too much of that in the world today to a little too much overconfidence. Careful. Be careful. Like no Your place in some circumstances, have some fear of the king here. And Proverbs talks a lot about like, don't just rush and try to sit at the nicest place near the king. Don't do that. Wait for him, Be humble, wait for him to call you up. So there are tons of examples of bad fear, like, obviously. So, you know. And so if this is one of them, let's say you're afraid of alligators under your bed, maybe you're afraid of a monster in the closet. Okay, so for these types of fear, you're going to have to go back to your parents, or an older sibling, and ask them for the therapy money, because Pasadena has nothing to do with that kind of fear, right? can help you there, right? So whatever it is, you got to deal with that right? But bad fear. This is an interesting one. If you're a born again, believer like me, right? It wasn't always a Christian fear of yourself. Maybe people have been Christians, their whole lives, they have fear of themselves. And so for my case, I just got to throw myself under the bus. Like I know, some of the things I did when I wasn't a Christian. I know some of the things I did. I definitely saw wealth and fame and all these different things. And so literally, like, after becoming so bad, when I became a pastor, I didn't even like, like being filmed for the Masters. I like putting anything out there. And I want to do it. So scared myself. I'm like, I don't want to be that person again, you know, because that was terrible, right? So I had to literally be counseled through that. Like, it's like, you can let yourself be film. You can speak in front of people. It's alright, you know, if you're doing it for the Lord, did I get to do all that again? Hopefully not. Right? So if you're really genuine about this, it's not going to come with those things. So some of us are like that, or you're afraid of yourself, you have a past. You're like, oh, man, but that can be crippling. You can you can be halted from your purpose in the Lord that way. Right? So that's a bad fear, you need to get over that, right. So I've said this before, that if you are truly saved, if you have been saved, no, this, that person is dead. That's what that's what the symbolism was of going down the wire you you're dead. That's it. And you rose a new creation in Christ Jesus for the purpose of doing good works. That's what it says Ephesians two if you keep reading past Christ, all right. So that's a really big one. A lot of people need to hear that. And along that line, too, is like fear of failure. They're just afraid of failure, the afraid of making any mistakes, or failing in any way afraid of the judgment, or this and that I can tell you, like, no matter what industry I've been in, there's a big lesson I learned in the music industry. You talk to almost any, like, I don't even know what how good you'd have to be to like, record an album and then not go back and listen to it. And God, I could have could have done that. Right. You know, maybe it wasn't an overt mistake. But anytime I was in the studio or recorded, I'm going to tell you. So first of all, it costs a lot of money. So you are buzzing through your tracks, like you have to be prepared, and you got to go. And if you're going to sit there and try to get it perfect. You're never going to make any money off that record. You're never going to make any money off the record anyway. But anyway, once you figure that out, but you're on the clock, you got to go and it will not be perfect. Ask any musician. They're like, No, you know, I could have done it better, right? And then you get that books. In the publishing industry. I didn't understand this. Like, that's because my stuff was bad in the beginning, because it was like a picture book, but at the same time, and that's in text, and I had dyslexia at that time. The Lord didn't cure it. It was terrible. And I would always apologize to the editors, right? Sorry. And they were like, no, like, even after teams of editors work through your book, there will be typos. Really, like, yeah, it's almost impossible to release something without typing. And I realized that even later, I've seen Bible translations with typos. Pick totally crazy. And I'm like, oh, yeah, that's right. I was told that. It's not perfect. But here's the thing. Here's one thing I learned. First of all, you learn from your mistakes, right? The next album is going to be better. The next books going to be better. Just that's something you need to think it's okay. Right? Now, if you think you can pull something off perfectly. You're crazy. You're nuts. Like, it's important to think about like, Ah, really like you think you can do anything perfectly. I can make pizza almost perfect. Even then, there's a huge sense of reality when I make pizza, right? Somebody say no, it's perfect. Fishing. That's called fishing for a compliment. But you can't, you can't, you cannot be done. As my wife. She lives with someone who's like a perfectionist. It can't be done you can't. So get that yoke off yourself to can't be done. Right? You will learn from your mistakes. And I'll tell you what I've learned if you do if that's crippling for you, and you do nothing you have failed before you've begun. Doing nothing is a worse failure than just doing something trying learning growing up Released from that, that's a bad fear. Get out there still is a Nike commercial. So I thought I was going to get caught in that one but just came out. Here's a really this really where it ties in. And this is this amazing thing in my kind of final encouragement to fear of rejection, fear rejection or learning paths or school that's said to be the underlying fear for like everything. It's like, the fear of rejections, like, here's, and the longer I've been a pastor, the more I will affirm. Yeah, this huge fear of rejection. So you can just tell it, like, Don't post on social media, right? Because what are you doing? Read the comments. People say about me, reject my statement, right? And you get stuck in this. But what's driving those a fear of rejection? They're afraid of what somebody thinks of you. Right? When there's right of course, there's social media, you and then there's really, right, because you're afraid of what everyone's going to think of you. Fear of rejection deepens, it gets worse, it goes back, like maybe music is your thing. You have a talent, you have a gift, you have a skill, and you don't want to share. Why? Well, because you're afraid of rejection, someone's saying, someone else is better, whatever it is. And that happens a lot. And a lot of different things. In different areas, of course, relationships. And so the Word of God encourage us in this area encourages us in this area. And I was talking about it recently the Samuel story, right? And you know, Samuel knows, like, he's, he's a prophet, right? He's a priest, he's a judge, and he knows, so he gets it triply why the people shouldn't want to King like, because he's three, the other parts that now that people reject it, right? What's the beginning of the Bible? they've rejected paradise with God, right? And then they just keep rejecting God. And that's the story over and over again. So Samuel, he's not happy. But God says to him, they're not rejecting you, Samuel. They're rejecting me. So you want to know how I get up here and say crazy things to all y'all. I think I use the Southern Right. I understand that. There was like a day where all that I can just tell you, like people in the audience will tell you like, there was a day just all of a sudden, like, I realized that I realize I'm a pastor here. And I work for the Lord, as the only person like whom I cared, like, thinks about me or anything. And I was like a switch. Like, okay, I'm just going to honor your word, and whatever they think I'm going to remember. They're not rejecting me, they're rejecting you. If I'm true to the word. That's it. So some encouragement for you, when you're devoting your life to the Lord, you don't have to worry about that anymore. That's one type of fear, right? Get the fear of the Lord and you and you don't have to worry about what did Jesus say? Right? Don't fear those who can kill your body reject you, you can add that to it, right? That's supposed to add to the word. But it's the sentiment correct, you're afraid of the people are going to reject you, or kill you or any of that other stuff. Hear him was the power to kill you, and throw you in the hell says Jesus, that's who you fear. And that changes everything. That changes everything. So get out there and do it, especially if you're working for him. It's not a rejection you have to be concerned about. So I just want to encourage everyone today, right? If that's you, or any of those fears resonate with you, first of all, just I'm praying that you just be freed of it, get rid of that. Turn to the Lord. So that's really what I'm praying for. But then I want to encourage you to, this is a place where those kinds of fears you don't have to worry about them. You don't if you have a talent or a gift or something you can do to help come up, be a part of it. Right, get involved here. You
don't have to be afraid of those things. There's not that type of judgment. Doesn't matter where you've come from what you've done. If you heard my wife's story clearly does not matter. We're both pasts. Right? We both experienced that we do experience some of those things, too. So we're right there with you. It's okay. You know, but it's okay to exercise those gifts and be who you are here. At Sea three church, we say come as you offer a reason. Don't stay as you are. But come as you are. And we love you. We'll be patient with you through the process. So just some just simple, practical encouragement for you today. But that's really my prayer. I pray that through God's Word today that you'll be released from any of that fear that's burdening you, or holding you back from your purpose in Christ. Amen. Love you. Thank you
Good morning. Welcome. If you're new here among us, my name is Jean I serve here at seat three church as your pastor. And I heard a story about a guy who had a fear of flying. So he's going to fly. He's at the airport, he's waiting in the terminal with the big windows, you can see the airplanes make him a little nervous. But what makes it worse is he sees these black clouds moving in thunder and lightning, it's getting real nervous. What makes it worse is they delay his flight. So now he's got more time to think about it. So he decides to walk around the terminal, just keep himself occupied himself busy. And what he runs into is a kiosk that sells life insurance. Pretty good deal. $100,000 policy for just $3. So he's looking out the window, thinking about his family, and he says, you know, there were three bucks, right. So he gets the life insurance policy doesn't really make him feel better. So you walk around the terminal, he decides to get something to eat. Now, if you've ever been to an airplane terminal, most of the modern airports have pretty wide variety of food. Well, he decides he wants Chinese food because he wants to eat again in 20 minutes. So he goes and gets a Chinese food, you got that he eats his meal, maybe it's just me, it gets to the fortune cookie, he opens up the fortune cookie. And it says your recent investment will pay big dividends. So in the we talked about, or I talked about fortune cookie theology, that's what I'm calling it. I'm sticking with it. Don't worry, it's not a long series. But anyway, it's kind of like that, right? Like this is the way most Christians read the Bible. Right? So they're fed something. So your app tells you what verse of the day you're going to be reading today, regardless of where you're at, right feeds it to you, you open it up. And because it's a standalone verse, you can just apply it to anything you want, right? Totally void of context. And so this is a problem. And that's why we're in this series. Now, we went through the whole Bible in our last series, and now we're looking at some of the things that people take out of context, misuse, even unintentionally, all over the Bible. And I'm going to give you guys the context, today, we run across one, that doesn't often seem like a big deal. But I'm going to talk about today how the Christian culture has kind of developed around this bad teaching Well, or false teaching. So here's the teaching, I want to illustrate it to you in a graphic that maybe you've seen, so let's just put one of these up. Right? So like something like this, right? So this person clearly had more time to do arts and crafts than read the Bible, because that's wrong. Go to the next one so ingrained in our Christian culture, that even famous people do it. But just because famous people say it doesn't mean it's true. So this is Toby Mac, he owns it. He put his name on there. He did that after he sold the stock graphic. Another problem there, but whatever. The Bible does not say if you're not, don't be afraid, anything like that. 365. But fine. But again, even I've seen pastors espouse this teaching. So today, I'm going to show you how wrong it is. Alright, so how do I know it's not true? So here's basically like, on the backend, I've had people come to Bible studies and stuff, and they're like, I'm a word search person. And the Bible says this this many times, in your version, even across different languages, just in English, I don't know how many verses we have. It's a lot, right? So we have like 30 versions or something like that. And they'll render different words differently, right, it doesn't change the point entirely until you start getting into a deeper theological point. And then what you have to do is go to the original languages. So what you can do if you don't know the original languages, is you can get this big old book called Strong's Concordance, right? You open it up and you start looking at the words fear or fear not. If you're like me, you're old school, you deal with the index card, right? Like you're not what you're not. And I just sat there like a crazy person doing that. You don't have to do it, I did it for you. You can trust me, unless you're him. He went home. Last time I taught on this. He did it. Right. But then you came up with the same mathematical solution was the same. So there you go. So you can get that kind of concordance and just count. The only thing you can do, and I can show you that this is what I did. We've learned a lot like we've been here for a while you've heard this the Bible, the early church is all in Greek, right? So I'm not going to get too much into that not just the New Testament, but they're using the Greek Old Testament too. And so I have a great concordance like that, where I can look at the old New Testament did the same thing. slight variation, but when it boils down to it, basically What you get the word fear appears in the Bible about 500 times. So if somewhere between 500 to 511 Sounds about 500 times, when we look at fear not, it only says fear not about 84 ish times, not even close is not even close. And so this is someone who counted in both languages and had his work check. So just to frame this out for you, then check my work. Even if we bumped up that fear not from 84, it's enrolling 16. So we're bumping up to 100 times, still not even close to 365 times, still not even close, right? But think about the word fear is using most of the time, it's telling you to fear something. Or it's just somebody being afraid, and a lot of times rightfully afraid of something right? 500 times, but only, let's say if we bump it up, like 20% of the time, you're getting this fear not thing when you're looking at fear and its entirety in the Bible. So what I'm going to do today is take you through some of like, the fears people having fear, but just to kind of like, shoot down another bad teaching, because I've heard people say this, which is very strange. But they'll say maybe you've heard it something like you've said it. Something like when the Bible says fear, it doesn't mean fear. It means reverence are all well then how come pray tell the word reference is also used. Doesn't make any sense. And all is used to write because the translators have no idea how to speak English. No, that's not the reason you're wrong. There's a different word for reverence, different word for anxiety, different word for fear. And fear means fear. And I'm going to show you that today. So we're looking at like, if you're reading Greek, it's like think phobia. Think that like but Phobos in Greek. So that's what I mean. That's what you're reading, that's fear. They're different words, reverence are all I'll talk about that a little bit later. Anxiety, nobody knows what it means. And so looked at the original languages, and I can assure you, we're going to get a pretty good count here. So again, we'll start with one of the fear knots, right? So this is this is very early on in the Bible. I want to show you how different people in the Bible have fear. But here you go. Genesis 15. One. So there's Abram after doing these things, the word of Yahweh, just to explain really quick here. I didn't explain that. So normally, I use an NLT New Living Translation, that's the version of the Bible I use keep that version of the Bible I use. Why? Because I don't know who's coming in or what the reading levels of people are. Here we have English as a second language people hear right? So if I want into a Spanish speaking church, I would hope they'd get like easy Spanish for me. And they would talk fast, just like I talk fast. And I'm slowing down either inside language joke, right. But I'd hoped that they were like making it easy for me. So I just make it easy. And if you've been here for a long time, you know, I put like what it says in the Greek in brackets, if it's like, needs to be technical. I'm using an L Ed today. And so when I'm being really lazy, and I don't read Greek, I go to the LED that is the closest you get to work, we would kind of wrongly call a literal translation. No such thing as a literal translation can't be done. So more word for word. So anyway, you're seeing Yawei here, because most translations will render it like Lord, but a really technical it's called a bit technical, a really technical translation or delineator. They'll say no, no, that they're saying Yaqui there. Alright, so it's like a four letter tetragrammaton complicated word. But basically, it's a little more than Lord. It really means more like to be think about the I AM statement. So it's like who God is what he is, it's all that rolled into one. It's more complicated than Lord, right? So when you read that, for simplicity sake today, God or such as you think of God's things, the word of God or Yahweh came to Abram in a vision saying, Do not be afraid, Abram, I'm your shield, and you reward you shall be very great. There you go. But Genesis 22, two, and he said, do not stretch out your hand against the boy, do not do anything to him. For now, I know that you are one who fears God, since you're not withheld your son, your only child for me, so I'm going to contextualize this for you. That's most of you know about like him being willing to sacrifice his son. And he gets stopped because what he fears God he goes through with it, because he fears God. So now, we're going to go through just a bunch here, Genesis 26, seven, when the man of the place asked concerning his wife, he said, she was my sister, who's afraid to say, My wife thinks this place will kill me. On account of Rebecca for she was so beautiful. So this is Isaac. Isaac feared a feared event. aleck, that's kind of funny because his dad did the same thing with about the same excuse, but she really was his half sister. In this case, he's just lying. So Isaac has two problems there. He's a liar.
But he has fear which we'll see isn't always a problem. Genesis 2017 There was afraid and said, how awesome is this place? This is nothing else in the house of God. So it's Bethel. And this is the gate of heaven. So that's Jacob. And we have like, some people call it Jacob's Ladder, Genesis 37. Again, Jacob was very frightened as Esau, and distressed. So he divided the people, flocks, cattle, camels that were with him into two companies. And he thought, if he saw comes to one company and destroys it, the remaining company will be able to escape. And Jacob said, Oh God, my father, Abraham, and God, my father, Isaac, oh, Yahweh, who said to me, return to your land and your family, I will do well with you. I'm not worthy of all the loyal love and all the faithfulness that you've shown your servant for with only my stuff. I cross this Jordan and now I become two camps. Please rescue me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau for I fear Him, lest he come and attack mother and children alike. So he kind of like stole his birthright and everything. He's always mad at him, so he's afraid of him. So remember, Jacob here, Joseph, then he gathered them in a prison for three days. So he's playing with his brothers, if you remember, the Joseph account is going to mess him up. On the third day, Joseph said to them, do this and you'll live I fear God. So it's important here, because you have Abraham, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph so these are some really key figures in the Old Testament having fear so there they go. Exodus so if you remember ship, Ron Paul, you know, that is the midwives right? So they're saving all the babies so when they want to kill in Egypt, all the firstborn and all the all the male children there, so they're the midwives aren't doing it. Right. So about them, Exodus 117, but the midwives feared God, and they did not do as the king of Egypt sets and like the kill the boys, they let the boys live. If you keep reading, I think around verse 20, it actually says, because they feared God, like, they were blessed. They were blessed. Because if you've got Exodus 214, and he said, Who appointed you, as a commander and a judge over us? Are you intending to kill me? Like you killed the Egyptian? And Moses was afraid? And he said, Surely this matter has become known. So remember, he murders one of the Egyptian slave drivers, right? So that's what they're talking about there the context, Exodus 2020, wrapped with the giving of the 10 commandments. And Moses said to the people, do not be afraid, God is going to test you so that his fear will be before you so that you do not sin almost like a paradox, right there. So fear what keeps you from sitting here? So interesting here, a man of God, we talked about that the only one in the Torah, listen is a man of God. Having fears a man of God can up here, Joshua is probably the most popular book that you get to when it comes to like, SEO, do not be afraid, be strong and courageous. So a lot of this is taken from the book of Joshua. Yes, it says that redundantly. So. Do not do not commanded you be strong and courageous. Do not fear be dismayed for Yahweh your God is with you wherever you go. Yep, so that's one of the many right but you also see Joshua for 14. On that day, Yahweh exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they feared him as they feared Moses all the days his life. So remember, David. So First Samuel 20 ones Well, David took these words seriously as you put these words, so even on led sometimes will give you a footnote there, so nothing's really literal here. Obviously, he was very frayed of the face of anguish game gap, no right soldier who he was crazy pretended to be crazy. And let's fiddle come down his beard and scratch it and these guys are we're scratch on doorposts because he was afraid like, you know, Saul's killed his 1000s David has killed his 10 1000s and so he runs to the Philistines and realizes bad plan, sir pretends to be crazy. He has fear of Achish. Second Samuel 114. David said to him, how is it that you are not afraid to stretch out your hand destroy your ways anointed ones is the killer guy finished off King Saul? They've been talking to and then he kills him. Second Samuel 619. But David feared Yahweh on that day and said, how can the Ark of Yahweh come to me so he had moved the ark COVID Eden's house because member burst out against Uzza touched the ark, he died and David had fear because of this, Solomon, bringing the Ark into the temple and dedicating the temple. So part of this kind of prayer here First Kings 840 Do these things so that you may fear so that they may fear you all the days, that they live on the face of the land that you gave our to our ancestors also, for the foreigner, who is not from your people, Israel, and he comes from a distant land because of your name for this shell here of your great name and your powerful hand and your outstretched arm. And he's you'll come and pray towards this house, and you should hear in heaven, the place of your dwelling and act according to all of the foreigner calls you so that all the peoples of the earth may know your name, to fear you as your people Israel and to know that your name has been invoked over this house that I have built. So we see it there. Solomon's prayer, Elijah, another man of God, First Kings 19 Then he became afraid. Elijah got up fled for his life. He came to Beersheba which belongs to Judah. Left us over there. He's over. Running from Jezebel after killing the 450 prophets of Baal. So when you look at the Psalms, tons of fear knots in the sub tons, all over the place, but just to acknowledge a few different ones here, Psalm 2512, who is the man that is figuring out what he will instruct him in, in the way he should choose his solo Lodge and prosperity in his offering in the promise. possess the land sorry, in fellowship with Yahweh is for those who fear Him, and He makes known his covenant to them. So in fellowship is for those who fear God, Psalm 3119, how abundant needs your goodness that you have stored up for those who fear you, they perform, for those who take referred refuge in you before the children of humankind? Clearly, I don't read the literal translation aloud a lot. But it means your goodness that you've started up for those who fear you right? So can it be done here? God will bless us and all the ends of the earth will hear him Psalm 85 Nine, surely the salvation is nearer to those who give salvation is nearer to those who fear him. Psalm 145 19 fulfills the desires of those who fear him. He also hears their cry for him so he hears you and saves you if you fear him, right. So now they may kind of start to seem like okay, I get it, James. It's fear the Lord. That's the only fear we're supposed to have. Well, yeah, you go to the Proverbs, Proverbs one seven. Fear of Yahweh is the beginning of knowledge, wisdom and instruction fools despise right. So he probably that's very literal, right? But you've probably heard a variation of that. But then you get to Proverbs 1416. The wise fear is what it says this one drives me nuts, because even the literal translations will say cautious. And I'm like, why? It just says fear. I'll tell you why later, and turns me over the fool throws off restraint and is confident. Right, so the wiser, cautious, doesn't say anything about the Lord right there. Proverbs 2421, fear Yahweh, my son, and the king. Oh, we those who change do not associate. Right. So the wise fear, as opposed to fear, the king too, clearly says that. Now we get to the New Testament, probably the most famous one. In the midst of the sermon of the mount, you see this Matthew 625. For this reason I say to you, do not be anxious for your life. When you eat, and not for your body. Are you aware? Is your life not more than your food or your body or more than clothing? Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, clearly now, this is the problem when we stop reading, love here, we'll just That's it. That's the verse of the day. And we're not. Because you see, Jesus says and does some other things. So here we go. Jesus will tell us clearly that there's more to fear be anxious about here, Luke 12, four, I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body. And after these things, do not have anything more to do. They can't do anything more to you after that. But I will show you whom you should fear. Fear the one who has authority after killing to throw you into hell? Yes, I tell you, if you're this one, that's like never going to be the verse of the day guaranteed. Guarantee right? So now Jesus Agony in the Garden, right, he knows he's going to be taken off and crucified, Luke 2239. And he went away and proceeded according to his Gustin, to the Mount of Olives. And the disciples also followed him. And when he came to the place, he said to them, pray that you will not enter into temptation, and you withdrew from them about a stone's throw, and knelt down and began to pray, saying, Father, if you are willing to take this cup from me, nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. An angel from heaven appeared from strengthening him. And being an anguish, he began praying more fervently and his sweat became like blocked drops of blood falling down to the ground. Now, interesting to note, Dr. Luke wrote the Gospel of Luke where this appears, and he notes that unlike the other gospel writers, because he's a doctor, and he knows about this condition, I got to read it hematidrosis. If I said that wrong, I'm not trying to be a doctor. And that's a good thing. So right, so this is an actual medical condition, you can go and Wikipedia it or whatever you want to do, right where you get so stressed out, so anxious that you sweat, blood that says extreme anxiety can cause this and that's what Dr. Luke is noting. Now, if we go to Matthew's account, Matthew 2637, same backdrop here, same context, and taking along Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, James and John, he began to be distressed and troubled, saying he's distressed. Let's just look at the English language for a second. Let's put this up from the dictionary. Right? Distress means suffering from anxiety. That's what the word means, right? So clearly, Jesus suffered from anxiety now, in case you didn't believe Dr. Luke, or the English language is an interesting word. And we're going to kind of tie this in a second here. Flavio, so
it's not exactly fear, and it's not exactly or kind of his reverence is very difficult to translate. Now something very interesting happens here, which I'll get to. So what you do, if you're trying to make a translation, you can't always translate it based on language today, right? Because language is kind of evolved. And certain words might mean different things. They take on different meanings. So all you have to do is go back to other writings around that time in history, not that we need the word of God validated by something else. It's just that we're doing translating. So we need the language validated. And we do we go to Josephus and other authors that time Plutarch, we look at that word, and it's usually always fear or a godly type of fear, it's a little bit different. So it's almost like this reverential fear, but it's fear, nonetheless. Now, this gets very interesting, because I'll talk about it a little bit later. What a lot of people don't understand is, not only is church kind of influenced by the outside culture, I would say a little too much. But our translations are, and people don't realize that once you like me, like people say, What's your favorite version, because all of them, I read all the versions of the Bible. So like the study, like how they might change during time, or why people are using different words at different times. And you kind of noticed something very interesting. When you look at like even older English translations of the Bible, like real old ones, you have like 1611, King James, before that you have like 1516, Geneva Bible, the Matthews Bible, and 1525 26. So that you look at these translations, and you just kind of see sometimes much more matter of fact, type language, and you look at our translations, and they kind of tiptoe around certain things a little bit, and fears, one of them, fears one of them. Because when you look, so I take you to Hebrews five, seven, we'll put it up here, when you look at all the older translations. You may have never read this, because your Bible if it's modern, you won't translate it this way. But when you look at all the older English translations, for example, the King James, when the days of the flesh, the talking about Jesus, and the gardens of the context is what I just told you, right. So it's just, it's basically being a good commentary on itself as the word of God, commentating on itself, who in the day, Jesus and David Fleshman, offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears onto him that was able to save him from death. He was heard in that he feared really interesting. And so when you look at the original languages, or Bible translations that are older and so you got a whole bunch of them there the literal standard version Webster's you heard of him, wording was Bible, Young's Literal translation. So when you get really hyper literal translations, older one, they're just going to say fear. Because they're not worried about certain things. And I'll tell you why. They won't translate it like that now, because we've kind of got our culture stuck in there a little too much. So again, we have a cross section here. The English language, Dr. Luke, And the Word of God itself, says Jesus feared if we're reading it correctly. Very interesting to tell it just give me a nerd moment. Okay, just going to take like two minutes for me to do this 1560 Geneva Bible. So what'll happen is, if we get a picture of it up there, you know, give this little commentary in the columns. They did this a lot. So we have a common Terry Bibles, because usually on the bottom, and the real old ones, so this is the scripture I just read for you really hard to read. But this is what the commentators who translated it says, they tell you why they translated it that way. So it's olding was he mean is, I mean, is that most earnest prayer in Christ prayed in the garden where He sweat drops of blood, being in perplexity and fearing the horrors of death, not fearing death, right? That he's not faithless. But fearing the pain, the way he's going to die. So here you have one of the earliest English versions saying, This is why we're saying Jesus feared putting Luke together for you. So it's all together right here, right brings it together for us. Now, if we keep reading, it comes up in the New Testament a lot. And I'm just going to kind of fire through just a bunch of them so you can see him in case you hadn't before. So if we just look at the Romans 1121. Paul's talking about its fellow kinsmen, and giving that beautiful olive branch analogy here, well said, they're broken off because of your unbelief. But you stand firm because of your faith, do not think arrogant thoughts, but be afraid. So this is context your salvation. We'll see that more. First Corinthians two, three. And Paul, I came to you in weakness and in fear with much trembling. Why is this a terror there? Because if you showed the word thrombose, to a Greek speaking person, they were translated as terror that caused you to tremble but we're nice and English language so we just say trembling because they think you can handle the terror. Second Corinthians seven, five, for even a Week, Paul and Timothy arrived in Macedonia, our body had no rest but we were afflicted in every way quarrel is outside. Fears within Paul and Timothy had fear. Second Corinthians 715 talking about Titus and his affection for you. is all the more when he Titus remembers the obedience of all of you as you welcomed him with again, there it is, Titus we just fear and terror Galatians four Allah When Paul is afraid for the church because they're following a different gospel, and that's perhaps I've labored for you in vain. Paul has fear. He also has fear for the church, we're going to see that later. Ephesians 521 being subjected to another in the fear of Christ, Ephesians six, five slaves, you can think of it as employees, right? obey your earthly masters, your employers with fear and trembling. There it is, again, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ. I've used that one, right, so as an employer, to Philippians 212. Therefore, my dear friends, just have you always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and terror. There it is, again, Colossians 322 against slaves obey your human masters and everything, not while being watched as people pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord, First Timothy 520, my favorite, prove those who sin in the presence of all in order that the rest may experience fear. Imagine if I took that literally. So the next time you guys come up to me, like, shouldn't we be doing that? I'll be like, shouldn't we be doing that? I knew answer, right? So imagine that, like I read, I just like, rebuke you for your sins, that you're afraid to do it again, or others are afraid. I got way too excited about that. And nobody else is sharing with me in that. Alright. So what's going on here? So what's going on here? Because it seems you saying two things. All right. important word. I've said this before. Paradox. Right. So when two things that seem to contradict themselves can both be true, right, depending on your deck. So what did I do other than just read those verses for you? I tried to contextualize them and told you who is what's going on. You're not getting that right from the Bible app. Because you go and read the rest of the chapter. Right? Okay. People are too quiet right now. So here's a good one like to understand is like, my favorite set of verses here to help us understand this. Right? Proverbs 26. Four, do not Answer a fool according to his folly. Lest if you can like him, even you Answer a fool according to his folly, or else you will be wise in his own eyes. What seems like a contradiction, right? But if you read the rest of the proverbs, you go all the way to Ecclesia. As you get all the way there and Ecclesiastes, you realize that there's kind of a time for almost everything, right? So it depends on the context, right? So the second part of the sentence gives you that right? lest you become like him, right? So don't let them drag you down. Right? Or sometimes they need to be corrected. So it's giving you both but it seems like a contradiction here, because it's two different things. Right? So we see that very famously with this teaching in Philippians. So I'll go backwards. And you probably know this like, this is definitely come up as your verse Philippians, four, six, Be anxious for nothing. but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God, right? For a lot of us heard that word or a different version of that. But if you back up, you realize a couple of different things. Paul's in prison, not a good time. Philippians 228, therefore I'm sending he's talking about Pafford itis, with special urgency in order that when you see him again, you may rejoice. And I may be less anxious Paul's anxious because this guy really likes is going he delivers the gift to Paul and then delivers Philippians back to Philippi. Right. So he's anxious for him. So in the same letter, what, it's a paradox, right? So hey, I get anxious to big hyperbolic statement. The fools boast pawns, shipwrecks beaten over and over again, you know, like three times or five times with rods, right? And then he says Second Corinthians 1128. Apart from these external things, right? There's the pressure, I mean, every day of the anxiety about all the churches, he has anxiety for the church, right? So he has anxiety and he's honest about it. So let's get to the application. So first of all, just to wrap our heads around this why do people insist on this teaching if it's and that's just guys like I just went through it quick. Now you guys kind of like fall asleep a little bit selfie, get some coffee, you can pass rounds of golf, you need it? Right? Because it's a lot. It's and I just wanted to show you guys, boom, here it is. It's not just like a one off. It's saying a lot. It really is those 500 times. Alright, so the first problem. People don't read their Bibles. Right. So the first time I ever saw this, well, they started really reading my Bible
a lot. Because like, That can't be right. Like, there's no way that can that's a lot, you know, right? So it doesn't sound right. And this is a protection and encouragement for you. The best protection against false teaching is to read your bibles not line by line, like but in full context, right? So people take all these lines from everywhere and then like, mash them together, as if they're all set in the same chapter. Then there's a context for everyone else live and you have to go there and separately, but I talked about number Jabberwocky itself Correct. This is what a lot of churches do. And they just take pieces of Scripture and just start mashing them together and rattling them off. And by the time they're done with it, it's like, I do that, if you ever see me look at you and like, that's what that means, like, you don't know what you're talking. You're confusing me with your confusion, right? It's terrible. But this is what happens. And they don't read their Bibles. And so people fall prey to that type of teaching, because they don't read their Bibles. And I give like a music note analogy. So as a musician, you know, I, this resonates with me. But I've noticed that people who are not musicians, like even if somebody covered your favorite song, you would notice that it's not the original band, even if they were really, really good. You'd still notice why, because you listened to that song a lot, right? So even though you're not a musician, you've developed an ear for it, or you notice, maybe they play the solo a little different, something like that, you're going to notice why because you listen to it a lot. Right? So you should probably be listening to your Bible just as much, right? And then you develop that skill set. But again, I'll tell you this, in context, larger portions of it not like one tiny bit at a time, it doesn't work. It just doesn't work that way, larger context. That's the first problem. People are not reading, listening to their Bibles or listening to a lot of other garbage. And they accept that as the truth. It's not another one, like, I'm really going to have to pump the brakes on because I've actually been asked to teach on this broader teaching of it. But you know, if you look it up, you call it Christian nationalism. So this is something like the idea that, you know, America is a Christian nation. It's patently false. Just read the founding documents. And you'll know, this is definitely not a lot of weird stuff in there. That's not Christian who is our Creator. It was Christian, it would say Jesus, like the Bible doesn't say that separation of church and state. There's your clue. Right? They're they intended not to be a religious nation. So I'm going to stop. Anyway, what started to happen in the 1900s is exactly that. They started to try to like, push this idea that we're some kind of Christian nation. So all the phrase, basically, the Presidents become like messiahs, you know. And now the Constitution is on the same level as the Bible is weird stuff like that. Really doesn't make a whole lot of sense. And then you have, for example, these president saying things that also don't make sense Jabberwocky talk, you've heard this one? All we have to fear is fear itself. That makes absolutely no sense. Think carefully about that. Fear, so we should be afraid of being afraid. Smart. Right. So and we're a Christian nation. That's a Christian president. What all we have to fear all is fear itself. First of all, is not logical. That's the first call. Second problem is fear. The Lord is the beginning of all wisdom and insight. Right. Those are fears the Lord has saved like, no. He's this acknowledging the Word of God. Right, but we're so sucked into Christian nationalism that we ignored. We'd give him a pass, whereas good godly men would say, that isn't one Don't listen to him, because he lied to you. We have to fear the Lord. All we have to we talking about, but it sounds great, right? Like the Jabberwocky talk a lot of Christians fall for when someone just starts speaking nonsense. It's nonsense. If he was a real Christian president, he said, Fear the Lord. And that Lord is Jesus Christ. He's coming back, you know, something like that would enter into the speech. It doesn't, right. And I'm done on that point, the hero complex, right? So we're all going to pretend we're not because the hero is never afraid, like Elijah Moses. But they're not heroes. Right? Jesus, the heroes never fight. So he can't be afraid either. Nobody's afraid. So it's this hero complex type of thing. We're all Rambo or something like that. And he's never afraid. So we're all tough guys. Right? So that's another part of our culture. The media. Media is the funniest one meeting the government working together very well. It's not here today, but he can teach you about that. They've got to do like they all do. It's so funny. Like, but actually it's sad, right? But it's great. Because if you step back from it and think for yourself, now like a brainwashed thing for yourself, about everything they're doing on the TV on the phone. They're fear mongering, they're fear mongering. They're trying to get you worried about something that this says, Don't worry about it, which of course you're not afraid. And they'll turn around and be like, well, but don't be afraid. All we have to fear is fear itself. And they just keep you on this hamster wheel of fear. Right and then every commercials about what how you're going to lose your money, right? Where you buy gold, right? Like every single commercial generator, like the patriot and it's the Patriot generator right? Buy gold, everything shoving down your throat, right? Don't be afraid. But you can buy this kneel prep kit for $500. And it's like, or whatever they're called right for your bunker. But don't be afraid. Nonsense. It's just a bunch of nonsense. So be very careful, even ones that claim to be Christian. Anybody fear mongering? That's no good. You don't need to be in that cycle. And here's the sad irony is all of these things have been adopted by your mainstream Christian culture. They've all been adopted. And it's amazing, but the same thing. And so here's what you end up with. What's the big deal? Because what you end up with is a culture of people thinking that fear must be a sin. Roosevelt said, we must be a sin. It's not because fearing the Lord's not a sin must be a sin. So I'm not going to admit to anyone that I'm afraid when I'm afraid, like I should. Like Jesus. I'm not going to be anything like him. I'm just going to lie. And you end up with this country club of liars. Because you're, some of you are liars. But anyway, but you do you go into typically how you do it. Um, great. Great. And then they Jabberwocky talk offs and stuff about the Lord like, okay, you know what I mean? It's like, some stereotype is the day the Lord made, let us rejoice and be glad, terrified on the inside. That's not biblical, but it's not now and it's not honest. It's just not honest. But here's the sin. So we have to pretend Right? Like, dress up nice and pretend. So the big deal, truth matters. I'm just saying, like, like, people kind of forgotten that in this day and age truth. Right? You know, whatever it is, I know, you're going to go back to politics and truth matters, right? But now, especially in this day, and age, truth seems to be irrelevant. Irrelevant sometime. But according to God's word, it's very relevant. So that's the problem, right? We saw it was a serious sin to misrepresent God's word. So we started this series of showed you that both Old and New Testament says do not change this, its meaning that is don't James this. And so if it says you should be fearing more than not, don't change that. That's misrepresenting God's word. And we see it's a trickle of problems. But most of I should be able to just stop right there. See, that's the only reason because God's word says don't misrepresent it. Is that not enough? The truth is important. That's it right? Again, it creates this tragic kind of like, just a cycle of dishonesty and a yoke, right over people, you know, if you don't know if the animals can come together, but it's a burden on people, and they do they get stuck in this fear cycle of being guilty about being afraid, because I'm not supposed to be afraid. But I was told that I'll have to fear periods. You know, it's this this mess. Mess is very, very quickly. Like I've had people like I mean, one of the worst ones, poor woman, get diagnosed with stage four cancer, and she's crying in a meeting with just crying and crying and like, I'm thinking, you know, again, right, like, you know, you may die soon, totally get it. So I'm like, in my head, I'm like, getting ready to go through that type of counseling. Try and like, okay, okay. And she says, Through the tears, she's like, I know, I'm sitting I know, I'm sending him like, smoking cigarettes still, like, you know what I mean? Like, did get you in trouble in the first place. But what was going to go there? No, I'm sitting because I know I shouldn't be afraid. to poor woman. You poor woman. That breaks my heart. And so that's the problem. It's crazy. It's like stops I had to, like, start here like, no, but you didn't read your Bible. So, as we saw, there's some good fear, right? There's fear of the Lord, right? And as Moses clearly says, right, like your fear so you won't sin. So just in case you want to, like maybe that'll help you not. It's a biblical concept, which work out yourself new testament to your salvation with fear and terror. It's very biblical.
Or your fear of the Lord should keep you from sinning. It's a biblical concept. And I think we need a little bit more of that today. There'll be a good thing. There's intelligent fair, Proverbs 14, six. What is it that the wise fair, alright, there's nothing to be afraid of. Right? It's smart. Like it kind of keeps you again, like keeping you from sinning. keep you out of trouble once in a while. kind of helpful. And you know what it says to what fools are overconfident. Little bit too much of that in the world today to a little too much overconfidence. Careful. Be careful. Like no Your place in some circumstances, have some fear of the king here. And Proverbs talks a lot about like, don't just rush and try to sit at the nicest place near the king. Don't do that. Wait for him, Be humble, wait for him to call you up. So there are tons of examples of bad fear, like, obviously. So, you know. And so if this is one of them, let's say you're afraid of alligators under your bed, maybe you're afraid of a monster in the closet. Okay, so for these types of fear, you're going to have to go back to your parents, or an older sibling, and ask them for the therapy money, because Pasadena has nothing to do with that kind of fear, right? can help you there, right? So whatever it is, you got to deal with that right? But bad fear. This is an interesting one. If you're a born again, believer like me, right? It wasn't always a Christian fear of yourself. Maybe people have been Christians, their whole lives, they have fear of themselves. And so for my case, I just got to throw myself under the bus. Like I know, some of the things I did when I wasn't a Christian. I know some of the things I did. I definitely saw wealth and fame and all these different things. And so literally, like, after becoming so bad, when I became a pastor, I didn't even like, like being filmed for the Masters. I like putting anything out there. And I want to do it. So scared myself. I'm like, I don't want to be that person again, you know, because that was terrible, right? So I had to literally be counseled through that. Like, it's like, you can let yourself be film. You can speak in front of people. It's alright, you know, if you're doing it for the Lord, did I get to do all that again? Hopefully not. Right? So if you're really genuine about this, it's not going to come with those things. So some of us are like that, or you're afraid of yourself, you have a past. You're like, oh, man, but that can be crippling. You can you can be halted from your purpose in the Lord that way. Right? So that's a bad fear, you need to get over that, right. So I've said this before, that if you are truly saved, if you have been saved, no, this, that person is dead. That's what that's what the symbolism was of going down the wire you you're dead. That's it. And you rose a new creation in Christ Jesus for the purpose of doing good works. That's what it says Ephesians two if you keep reading past Christ, all right. So that's a really big one. A lot of people need to hear that. And along that line, too, is like fear of failure. They're just afraid of failure, the afraid of making any mistakes, or failing in any way afraid of the judgment, or this and that I can tell you, like, no matter what industry I've been in, there's a big lesson I learned in the music industry. You talk to almost any, like, I don't even know what how good you'd have to be to like, record an album and then not go back and listen to it. And God, I could have could have done that. Right. You know, maybe it wasn't an overt mistake. But anytime I was in the studio or recorded, I'm going to tell you. So first of all, it costs a lot of money. So you are buzzing through your tracks, like you have to be prepared, and you got to go. And if you're going to sit there and try to get it perfect. You're never going to make any money off that record. You're never going to make any money off the record anyway. But anyway, once you figure that out, but you're on the clock, you got to go and it will not be perfect. Ask any musician. They're like, No, you know, I could have done it better, right? And then you get that books. In the publishing industry. I didn't understand this. Like, that's because my stuff was bad in the beginning, because it was like a picture book, but at the same time, and that's in text, and I had dyslexia at that time. The Lord didn't cure it. It was terrible. And I would always apologize to the editors, right? Sorry. And they were like, no, like, even after teams of editors work through your book, there will be typos. Really, like, yeah, it's almost impossible to release something without typing. And I realized that even later, I've seen Bible translations with typos. Pick totally crazy. And I'm like, oh, yeah, that's right. I was told that. It's not perfect. But here's the thing. Here's one thing I learned. First of all, you learn from your mistakes, right? The next album is going to be better. The next books going to be better. Just that's something you need to think it's okay. Right? Now, if you think you can pull something off perfectly. You're crazy. You're nuts. Like, it's important to think about like, Ah, really like you think you can do anything perfectly. I can make pizza almost perfect. Even then, there's a huge sense of reality when I make pizza, right? Somebody say no, it's perfect. Fishing. That's called fishing for a compliment. But you can't, you can't, you cannot be done. As my wife. She lives with someone who's like a perfectionist. It can't be done you can't. So get that yoke off yourself to can't be done. Right? You will learn from your mistakes. And I'll tell you what I've learned if you do if that's crippling for you, and you do nothing you have failed before you've begun. Doing nothing is a worse failure than just doing something trying learning growing up Released from that, that's a bad fear. Get out there still is a Nike commercial. So I thought I was going to get caught in that one but just came out. Here's a really this really where it ties in. And this is this amazing thing in my kind of final encouragement to fear of rejection, fear rejection or learning paths or school that's said to be the underlying fear for like everything. It's like, the fear of rejections, like, here's, and the longer I've been a pastor, the more I will affirm. Yeah, this huge fear of rejection. So you can just tell it, like, Don't post on social media, right? Because what are you doing? Read the comments. People say about me, reject my statement, right? And you get stuck in this. But what's driving those a fear of rejection? They're afraid of what somebody thinks of you. Right? When there's right of course, there's social media, you and then there's really, right, because you're afraid of what everyone's going to think of you. Fear of rejection deepens, it gets worse, it goes back, like maybe music is your thing. You have a talent, you have a gift, you have a skill, and you don't want to share. Why? Well, because you're afraid of rejection, someone's saying, someone else is better, whatever it is. And that happens a lot. And a lot of different things. In different areas, of course, relationships. And so the Word of God encourage us in this area encourages us in this area. And I was talking about it recently the Samuel story, right? And you know, Samuel knows, like, he's, he's a prophet, right? He's a priest, he's a judge, and he knows, so he gets it triply why the people shouldn't want to King like, because he's three, the other parts that now that people reject it, right? What's the beginning of the Bible? they've rejected paradise with God, right? And then they just keep rejecting God. And that's the story over and over again. So Samuel, he's not happy. But God says to him, they're not rejecting you, Samuel. They're rejecting me. So you want to know how I get up here and say crazy things to all y'all. I think I use the Southern Right. I understand that. There was like a day where all that I can just tell you, like people in the audience will tell you like, there was a day just all of a sudden, like, I realized that I realize I'm a pastor here. And I work for the Lord, as the only person like whom I cared, like, thinks about me or anything. And I was like a switch. Like, okay, I'm just going to honor your word, and whatever they think I'm going to remember. They're not rejecting me, they're rejecting you. If I'm true to the word. That's it. So some encouragement for you, when you're devoting your life to the Lord, you don't have to worry about that anymore. That's one type of fear, right? Get the fear of the Lord and you and you don't have to worry about what did Jesus say? Right? Don't fear those who can kill your body reject you, you can add that to it, right? That's supposed to add to the word. But it's the sentiment correct, you're afraid of the people are going to reject you, or kill you or any of that other stuff. Hear him was the power to kill you, and throw you in the hell says Jesus, that's who you fear. And that changes everything. That changes everything. So get out there and do it, especially if you're working for him. It's not a rejection you have to be concerned about. So I just want to encourage everyone today, right? If that's you, or any of those fears resonate with you, first of all, just I'm praying that you just be freed of it, get rid of that. Turn to the Lord. So that's really what I'm praying for. But then I want to encourage you to, this is a place where those kinds of fears you don't have to worry about them. You don't if you have a talent or a gift or something you can do to help come up, be a part of it. Right, get involved here. You
don't have to be afraid of those things. There's not that type of judgment. Doesn't matter where you've come from what you've done. If you heard my wife's story clearly does not matter. We're both pasts. Right? We both experienced that we do experience some of those things, too. So we're right there with you. It's okay. You know, but it's okay to exercise those gifts and be who you are here. At Sea three church, we say come as you offer a reason. Don't stay as you are. But come as you are. And we love you. We'll be patient with you through the process. So just some just simple, practical encouragement for you today. But that's really my prayer. I pray that through God's Word today that you'll be released from any of that fear that's burdening you, or holding you back from your purpose in Christ. Amen. Love you. Thank you