What is the mindset of fear?
What is the mindset of faith?
What does God think?
Fear versus faith.
In every decision of life, there's a savor of fear or a savor of faith.
If faith is the ultimate attitude that God wants from His children, then fear is the ultimate position of cowering that the demons want us experiencing.
Torment, fear, curled over in a ball, shivering, unable to function.
If trust in God [and dependency on Him is most pleasing to the Father], “for without faith it's impossible to please Him” …
Faith is pleasing to the Father and the Son and the Spirit.
If that be true, then our lack of confidence in God …
And instead, our fear, which is self-confidence; trust in myself instead of trusting God, is the exact opposite of God's desire for a fulfilling life experience.
In fact, fear opens the portal of infectious demonic spiritual influence.
Just as faith opens the portal of divine guidance and the presence of God and welcomes-in His thoughts and spirit, so likewise fear invites hell into the home.
It just brings on a burden of acid in the soul that gunks up our decision-making process to make fear-based choices.
Fear is a mindset of singular self-defense.
“I'm the only one who can defend myself.”
“I must be responsible on my own to win this street fight against life and every little happening in life.”
Fear perceives almost everything as a threat, a personal threat.
Therefore, I must ferociously overreact against every potential enemy.
Are you my enemy?
Are you my enemy?
Are you my enemy?
Stop right there.
Don't come any closer.
So I'm on level 9.5 high alert, freaked out of my gourd 95% of the day.
And therefore, I gouge people in the eyeballs when they ask me basic vanilla, no animosity questions like, “How are you doing today?”
Well, fear assigns a motive.
“That person must be trying to do something.”
Fear invents a problem.
Faith is too busy focused on the object of our faith, which is properly placed in Christ and He provides great confidence.
Naturally, humans walk in the flesh and we behave like animals apart from divine infusion of the Spirit.
When we're not walking in the Spirit, we're walking in the flesh and then we allow our choices to be driven by the operating system of fear as our natural default frame of mind for how we process all of life's information.
Enough of philosophy.
What's the Bible say?
Fear is mentioned in 385 verses.
However, more than half of those times, and I haven't done exact research, but on a cursory view, which I went through hundreds of them, it appears as though half of the mentions of fear or more in Scripture … are positive.
It's a positive fear focused on the Lord as if an admiration or a proper mindset acknowledging who God is, good awareness.
Or, the word fear is mentioned in a phrase like, “I will not fear.”
There will be no fear.
So it's either a God-focused attention or it's an anti-fear message.
So, negative fear is mentioned not as often.
However, faith is mentioned 231 times.
Trust, 134 times.
Believe, 131 times.
Believed, 111 times.
Believeth, 39 times.
Crushing it out of the park.
Bringing that message home.
I sought the Lord and He heard me and delivered me from all my fears.
That's the chorus of the song.
That's pretty awesome.
Psalm 34 has three verses that lead up to that chorus.
The result is deliverance from fear, which we daily need to seek that, right?
David starts off Psalm 34.
We don't know the song, the music notes of it until we get to heaven, but until then we'll just hope and guess … “I sought the Lord and” … actually back it up sorry “I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall continually be in my mouth, my soul shall make her boast in thee Lord, the humble shall hear thereof and be glad …
Oh magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt His name together.
I sought the Lord and He heard me and delivered me from all my fears.”
How'd he get deliverance?
He got close to God.
So fear versus faith.
Round one.
Ready?
Boom!
Let's see what happens.
Faith:
erases shame and replaces shame with strong confidence.
Where do we see it?
Romans 10 11.
For the Scripture saith, whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed.
I'm going to add a phrase.
Shall not be ashamed of the fact that they put their trust in Him.
The results will be a positive outcome.
They're not going to be ashamed of Him and they're not going to be ashamed of the choice that they made to put their Faith in Him, whereas the opposite is also true.
Isaiah 45:16, they, we'll find out who they are, shall be ashamed and also confounded.
That's a Bible word for scramble-brain, confused.
All of them, they shall go to confusion together that are makers of idols.
What's an idol?
It's a replacement for God.
Do you know what I become when I push God out and I'm not trusting Him?
I'm my own idol.
I'm trusting myself.
“I gotta protect myself.
God won't protect me.
I gotta take care of myself.
God's not doing a good job.”
That's fear-based thinking.
Results in shame, confusion.
Isaiah 44:11.
“Yet they shall fear, and they shall be ashamed together.”
Who?
Anyone that was believing in something other than God.
Fear causes shame and confusion.
When someone says, “I'm so confused”, there's usually an element of fear in their mental processing.
Isaiah 44:8, “Fear ye not, neither be afraid.
Have not I told thee from that time, and have I declared it?
Ye are even my witnesses.
Is there a God beside me?
Yea, there is no God.
I know not any.”
God's like, is there anyone else out there worthy of trusting?
I haven't met anyone.
So why are you afraid?
I'm right here.
I am the option, there's one option, or you can reject Me and resist Me.
Anyway, Psalm 56:11, “In God have I put my trust.
I will not be afraid what man can do unto me.”
So the opposite, we eradicate and evacuate the fear by placing our trust in the proper object.
God.
Fear is the result of intentionally avoiding God.
It's evidence of resistance.
I don't need Him.
I've got myself.
Okay.
Isaiah 66:4, “I also, {this is God speaking}, will choose their delusions.
{These people are deluded.}
I will choose their delusions.
{I'll select and push play and their delusions will come to reality and will bring their fears upon them.
Oh, you're afraid of that?
Okay, you can experience that now because here's why.}
Because when I called, {ring ring, ring ring,} none did answer.
{They saw my caller ID.}
When I spake, they did not hear.
But they did evil before mine eyes and chose that in which I delighted not.”
So God's a gentleman.
He says, I also.
You hung up on Me?
I hang up on you.
You won't hear My voice?
I won't hear your voice.
You do evil?
Mmm.
Mmm.
You're not going to do the thing that I delight in?
Well, you're not going to enjoy life very well.
But God does bring the fear of the wicked upon them.
Proverbs 32:6, “For the Lord shall be thy confidence, and shall keep thy foot from being taken.”
Confidence comes from who we know is with us and who we have decided to believe.
I know whom I have believed.
Whereas fear grows in the soil of unrighteousness or self-righteousness, pride.
Isaiah 32:17, “… and the work of {true} righteousness.
I added the word true, I'm sorry.
“And the work of righteousness shall be peace and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever.”
It sounds awesome.
Quietness and assurance.
Strong confidence.
Super calm.
That's the work or the result of true righteousness. Brings peace: the opposite of fear.
The dismissal of fear.
True righteousness is partnering with the only Truly Righteous One. We can do no righteousness on our own, adequately or for long. All of our righteousnesses is tainted …
unless it's infused with power from on high.
Jeremiah 23:6, “In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely.
And this is His name, whereby He shall be called, {comma, all-caps.
God hit the all-caps button super loud.
Here it is.
Ready?}
THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.”
That's His name.
Not the Lord, you know, it's not about my righteousness.
It's the Lord, our righteousness.
He gives us power to do right.
He assists us in the accomplishing of that rightness.
And it's all about Him.
Really, we're just kind of the tag along, you know.
Wow, they shall dwell safely, they shall be saved, why? Because His name, His reputation whereby He shall be called in that Day, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.
Fear, when we're not operating righteously, when we're living in unrighteousness, that generates the opposite.
Fear-based religion is “I wonder if I've done enough good things, I wonder if I've said enough Hail Marys, I wonder if I've pleased God?”
Fear brings torment, whereas proper belief with our eyes fastened upon God
Brings Deliverance.
Psalm 34:7.
“The angel of the Lord.
{The word angel means messenger and protector.}
“The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him and delivereth them.”
Boom.
Our eyes are on the right prize.
Our confidence is not in self.
It's been transferred onto the truly worthy Recipient of our faith and that is
The Lord, and God in response sends his angel to encamp round about all side, full spectrum protection and delivereth them.
Psalm 34:9 two verses later “Oh fear the Lord ye His saints for there is no want to them that fear Him.”
He's protecting, He's providing, He's satisfying because He's the receiver and responder to our faith.
God does not enjoy His children being tormented by fears.
He wants to replace those fears with Himself, His presence.
How do we know that?
Proverbs 14:26, “in the fear of the Lord is strong confidence.”
I want to trust God.
“and His children shall have a place of refuge.”
Are we going to believe it or are we going to reject it?
“In the fear of the Lord is strong confidence and His children shall have a place of refuge.”
One verse later, “The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life to depart from the snares of death.”
See, the fear of the Lord is actually faith in the Lord.
It's looking to Him, trusting Him, acknowledging Him, welcoming Him, inviting Him, wanting to be around Him, trying to receive His perception, His perspective.
You know, David said, “I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”
I wanted to believe that God would do something, and I just got to give Him time to work.
Anyway, fear affects all of our relationships.
When I'm filled with fear, unable to see the future, figure things out, or make sense of
anything, fear impacts everyone around me, but when I'm filled with trust, belief, confidence, wanting to believe God, asking God to work, trusting that He will, calmly, confidently relying on Him, that likewise is a spirit that everyone can sense.
Fear vs Faith