This Sunday, we had Pastor Dan Belshaw from Light Church, Kirkham speaking to us on Faith over Fear and kicking off our “21 Days of Prayer & Fasting”.
As we start a new year, we want to step into more of the truest version of ourselves. While we journey through life, make a commitment to be the person God has called you to be
At the start of a new year, we can all wrestle with fear. Fear is one of the biggest obstacles that we face when it comes to being who God created us to be.
As we kick off 21 days of prayer and fasting, let’s step into the true person we are meant to be and get rid of fear.
Travelling to Australia is difficult, such a long journey. You feel incredibly tired, yet everyone else at 6am is buzzing in the airport. So Dan and his family went to the humble Greggs, exhausted and not speaking, and Dan spotted a pigeon.
Dan didn’t believe he was seeing what he was seeing. But yes, there was definitely a pigeon in the airport, with people ducking as it flew at them.
There is nothing more unnerving than looking into the eyes of an animal that doesn’t know what it’s doing. As we all know, it’s hard enough for humans to get into an airport, so how did a pigeon get in. Immediately after processing this, Dan realised there were suddenly 2 pigeons! People began to wonder what to do as pigeons started to terrorise everyone, and as the security guards tried their best to get rid of the birds, it turned out that a child was feeding them.
As stupid as it sounds, this is what fear can look like in our lives. These pigeons were hanging around because they were being fed. We make friends with fear sometimes; what starts out as a little problem can make a big mess
Fear will always have a grip on our lives when we’re feeding it. In the midst of this global pandemic, there’s also a pandemic of fear. What will happen in the future? Will we end up locked down again? Will we only be able to see our friends by going on walks?
We have all experienced the grip of fear, the fear of fitting in, the fear of standing out, the fear of being laughed at, the fear of not being enough, the fear of pain, the fear of death, etc. There are so many ways that fear manifests itself in our lives.
If we want to be the people God wants us to be, we need to talk about fear.
Why did fear happen? Where does fear come from?
The Hebrew word for “peace” is “shalom”. This means order, balance and perfect harmony. Initially, creation was exactly how it was supposed to be. Everything was in balance and order, without tension between Creator and created.
Then there came the tree, the fruit and the snake. Humanity turned its back on God and severed the relationship. As a result of this fall of mankind, humanity is now flooded with fear.
Fear is a hyper-focus on oneself, while faith is a hyper-focus on God. There was perfect faith in the Garden of Eden.
Fear will look at our lack, while faith will look at God’s abundance.
When we face certain situations, fear pops its head up because often the thing that we are facing is focusing on ourselves. We say things like “I’m not enough, I’m not good enough, I’m not clever enough” etc.
Fear is a hyper-focus on oneself, whereas faith gets us to lift our eyes and focus on God,
That’s where fear came from. Fear is born in the severance from God, fear was bred in the void between humanity and God, Creator and created.
Fear grows when you feed it
Fear grows when we feed it, when we give it our attention, our emotions and energy.
When we give fear our ability to dream, we can end up facing the future in fear.
Fear grows when we feed it; it doesn’t just grow big, it multiplies exponentially.
When we give in to fear, we can turn around and it’s an infestation. our life is riddled and we become the person we never wanted to be.
Fear causes us to lose our shape
Fear makes us not be the person that we actually are.
Fear takes our eyes off the thing that’s important.
Spend more time with your maker and you’ll know why you were made.
If we want to know who we are and why we are on this earth, we’re not going to find it on Instagram, horoscopes, crystals, vibes or anything.
We will only going to find out why it is we were made when we are in relationship with the One who made us.
Fear causes us to lose our shape because it pulls us away from focusing on Jesus and pulls our eyes onto the thing we are facing.
Fear is one of the primary forces of destruction that people will face. It’s one of the primary things that blocks and is used against humanity to separate us from God and each other.
Fear’s purpose is chaos and anarchy. As said in the Dark Knight movie, “some people just want to watch the world burn.”
Fear’s mission is to separate us from God.
Fear is not something that we want to get comfortable with or let live in our life.
We need to learn to live free from the grip or hold of fear, so let’s strive to live 2022 free from the hold of fear in our lives.
What does the Bible have to say about fear?
6Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.
(Philippians 4:6-7)
If we can get this into us at the start of this year, we can face it free from the grip of fear.
Paul starts by saying “DO NOT be anxious about anything.” This is a really plain command which implies choice and action.
If Paul is saying do not be anxious, then it means we have an opportunity to live free from fear.
If fear is something we just had to put up with, then this verse wouldn’t be there.
“Do not be anxious about ANYTHING.”
The Bible is clear: in anything that we face we don’t have to be anxious.
Fear will cause us to look at things and believe we are not enough, but faith will lift our eyes.
“In EVERYTHING by prayer, and supplication in thanksgiving make your requests known to God.”
We will only combat fear in your life in a posture on our knees before God. The battleground where we will do most of our work dealing with fear is on our knees, praying and fasting before God.
How great it is that we can start the year praying and fasting!
God wants to hear about our fears. Some people like talking about their problems and start to find their identity in those problems.
This is not the dynamic that God is setting up: we shouldn’t just talk to God about our problems, we should talk to God focusing on Him, worshiping Him, rather than just talking to God about our fears.
Fear isn’t a little campfire that you and God are going to stand around. Fear is something that you are going to give to God. You’re going to lift your eyes and give it over to God.
With thanksgiving make your requests known to God.
So how do we combat fear? With prayer and thanksgiving!
“And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
This isn’t peace as society sees it. It’s not an inner peace from us. It’s a peace from outside us, a peace from above.
This peace comes from God Himself.
This isn’t peace from self-help, good vibes, or the universe. This is the beauty of the transcendent peace of God.
What a brilliant place to start this year: on our knees, encountering the transcendent peace of God.
Peace is both a deliverer from fear and a defender from fear.
So how can we fight fear? The answer is to simply pray and be a people in constant communication with Jesus. We need to give fear to Him and trade our anxieties for His peace.
The church is far too significant to be led or governed by fear, so we shouldn’t give fear the satisfaction of governing our decisions.
So what do I shift my focus on to?
Paul finishes the passage with this:
8And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.
(Philippians 4:8)
Focus on the things of God in your life. There is nothing in this world we can go and chase that is better than Him. Lift your eyes and place them on Jesus.
Maybe you feel you have never encountered Jesus before. If not, we encourage you to ask more about Him.
He died on a cross to draw us back into perfect relationship with Him. He beat death at it’s very own game so we could have hope.
Be encouraged make the decision not to live in fear anymore. Be who God made you to be. Lift your eyes and focus on the beautiful, on the true.
Message us if you want to speak to someone about anything you’ve read either on social media or email info@lightandlifefm.com.