2002-01-01
Good Morning Faithful Ones,
Jehovah Raah, God Who is my Shepherd, is an ever-present comfort to anyone who believes. I don’t want to imagine what our lives would be like without Him. Yesterday, He led me to speak about how he nourishes us and keeps us from spiritual hunger. Next, He leads me to look at citations that reveal how He protects us from fear [fright, not reverence]. There are several stories in the Scriptures where Jehovah Raah protects people supernaturally from physical threats, wild animals and marauding enemies for example. The story of how God shut the mouths of the lions so they didn’t kill Daniel in the lion’s den [DN 6: 22] and that of how Samson was granted the strength to overcome threats to him from the Philistines [JG 15: 16] are examples. David’s presence of mind as he faced the giant, Goliath and felled him with a slingshot [1 SAM 17: 49] is another example. All of these are cases where there was supernatural intervention. This not only occurs in cases of physical fear; it can be seen in cases of spiritual fear too.
1 JN 4: 16, 18 demonstrate this kind of shepherding we receive. “And we ourselves know and believe the love God has for us. God is love, and whoever lives in love lives in union with God and God lives in union with him…There is no fear in love; perfect love drives out all fear. So then, love is not made perfect in anyone who is afraid, because fear has to do with punishment.” This concept is very important to us, because many of us have the habit of worrying out of fear that something terrible is going to happen. I am taking a course that deals with “Telling Yourself the Truth” written by a pastor who is also a psychologist, Dr. William Backus. It is his idea that a large part of the problem we have is negative self-talk, a problem which can be solved by 1) relying on a good knowledge of the Scriptures, and 2) learning to recognize how to change negative self-talk to positive self-talk. A lot of the problem comes from the kind of conditioning we received as our parents raised us, but Dr. Backus makes the salient point that it is time for us to take responsibility for our own thoughts and actions. In other words, we shouldn’t spend our lives playing the role of the victim. I have to agree with this entirely, as I feel it is a sign of maturity when one is willing to take responsibility for his own thoughts and actions.
Placing God’s perspective on the matters of our lives really does help us to deal with fear and worrying. A good example is the trials and temptations which God tells us are a part of the spiritual warfare which we must face. RO 5: 3-4, “We also boast of our troubles, because we know that trouble produces endurance, endurance brings God’s approval, and His approval creates hope.” Without God’s perspective on this, we throw up our hands and exclaim, “Woe is me! Why me! It’s hopeless; I’ll never get out from under my problems!” You can really see the difference that putting God’s view of things in our lives can do to make them bearable. We might also like to see this in the view of the bigger picture. Paul puts God’s perspective on it in RO 8: 18, “I consider that what we suffer at this present time cannot be compared with the glory that is going to be revealed to us.” These are not just words to placate us or to set up a smoke screen to cover some awful truth God is trying to hide from us. They are the truth!
God in any of His roles in our lives is always about telling the truth. Dr. Backus takes this fact and applies it to his theory about learning to tell ourselves the truth. The fact is that we do have internal self-talk, and that it often leads us to spiritual fear when it’s negative, fear of worthlessness, and other inappropriate ways of looking at the situations of our lives. These are the negative messages that lead people to hold grudges, feel depressed, imagine catastrophes, and miss out on hearing God’s comfort in prayer. Let me give you an example from Dr. Backus of how self-talk can be taken from wholly negative to realistic (truthful). The problem: “If someone criticizes me, I get terribly upset; I can‘t get it off my mind. I even lose sleep over it.” The past cause: “When I was a child, whatever I did, no matter how hard I tried, Dad would find fault and criticize me. Nothing I ever did was good enough. I always had to be the best.” The present cause: “I’ve got to be perfect. I just can’t handle criticism. If I’m criticized for anything, I always fall apart.” New truth-filled self-talk: “If my work gets criticized, so what? My work is the issue, not my value as a person. I might learn something from the criticism.” Now, you might wonder: what does this have to do with sharing Jehovah Raah’s attributes? A lot, would be my answer. What Dr. Backus is pointing out here is that God has given us two important weapons in dealing with the fear that negative self-talk propagates. He has given us His perspective and encouragement in His word. He has also given us the intelligence and ability to examine our self-talk and revamp any of it that doesn’t deal with the truth.
Two more citations can really help to seal God’s ability to drive fear out of our lives in our minds. 2 TIM 1: 7, “For the Spirit that God has given us does not make us timid; instead, His Spirit fills us with power, love, and self-control.” PS 56: 3-4, “When I am afraid, O Lord Almighty, I put trust in You. I trust in God and am not afraid; I praise Him for what He has promised. What can a mere human being do to me?” Jehovah Raah really does offer us encouragement through the Scriptures. We really can measure the amount of worrying we are doing even when we know we have obeyed God’s commands and see how much trust we are willing to put in Him. We know God by experience when we obey Him. When we really know God well, there is no reason to be afraid, because we will know that we have been obeying Him.
PRAYER: O Lord, living in union with You means living with love, without fear, and without condemnation. You, in Your infinite compassion, have caused the work of the cross to be done and have gifted us with the indwelling of Your Spirit. By this means, You have made it possible for us not to spend our lives on earth in fear. When we dedicate our lives to humble and reverent obedience to You, we have a peace that can come from no other source that is beyond our understanding [PHIL 4: 7]. We are often faced with challenges to our faith. Some comes from without, like the lions about to attack Daniel. Some comes from within, like the devilish, negative self-talk that keeps us from having peace of mind. In Your perspective and by Your willingness to give us the ability to change that self-talk, You empower us to overcome this fear and demonstrate to us that we really are equipped to be victorious by You in spiritual warfare. That makes us a truly blessed people, people who must humble themselves before You, acknowledge Your supreme Lordship over our lives, and people who should always know that we can rely on You. Today, we seek You out to offer You the adoration, worship, loyalty, trust, obedience, honor, glory, praise, and thanks that You so richly deserve. We do this in Christ’s holy name, amen.
Tomorrow, we will examine how Jehovah Raah grants us freedom from friction with others when we place our obedient trust in Him. The love of our Lord is a great blessing and a privilege in our lives. How we respond to that really matters. He does not want us spending our lives worrying or feeling guilty. When we listen to Him and obey Him, He shows His love for us by freeing us of those things. Jehovah Raah is our Shepherd seven days a week, fifty-two weeks a year. Bask in that love, Dear Ones. Peter and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn