2 Tim. 1:7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.

Fear is one of the most crippling effects in life that can wreak havoc in anyone’s life. When fear sets in you can at times be so overtaken by it that you can feel as if you are helpless and have no way out. I want to share with you a personal experience I had when I was younger that describes how helpless fear can make you feel.

I was with my father years ago and we were in northern Arizona at a mine that he at the time was involved in. We went deep down into this mine that had shafts going all different directions. After getting down into the deeper part of this mine we turned off our flashlights. We stood there for several minutes with no light at all. If you have ever experienced something like this it is certainly an event you will never forget. It was so dark you could not see your hand in front of your face. I had never been in such darkness before.

Within minutes my mind began to panic. All of a sudden I had lost all sense of direction and became totally disorientated. I understand how a pilot in a plane without proper instruments could get caught in a bad storm with no visual line of sight and how they could become so disorientated that they could be upside down and not even know it. I began to think about what would happen if our flashlights did not work. How would we get out of this mineshaft with no sense of direction at all? It was a fearful feeling to say the least. It was an awesome feeling to turn those flashlights back on and even better as we made our way out to eventually see the light coming from above as we finally made our way back to the surface.

Fear is designed by the enemy to do the same thing to a believer. It causes them to become totally disorientated where they lose all sense of direction. Thoughts begin to flood the mind that make things even worse as you begin to think about what may or may not happen in any given situation. Fear enables satan to do his work in our lives. What is that work? He only has two primary weapons, deception and seduction. Fear opens the door for satan to begin to lead us into one or the other, primarily deception. He will begin to flood your thoughts with all kinds of defeat, destruction, depression, etc. But today I have some good news for all you believers who have received Christ into your hearts. You do not have to ever allow fear in your life, and as a matter of fact once born again that fear is not in the real you.

In our foundation text this week I want you to look closely at the first part of this verse of scripture. God has not given you a spirit of fear. Why is this so important? Because when we allow fear in our life we are cutting off from within our spirit man the power of God that is available to us, and the ability to maintain complete control of self, which includes your thoughts. God has given us a spirit of power, love, and self-control. So if we have not been given a spirit of fear then why do believers often battle with fear? There are several reasons why, which I am going to cover this week. When we are not in fear we are in faith, which is how every believer is to be living on this planet. We are to walk by faith and not by sight. Faith empowers God to work in your life; fear emboldens the enemy to do his work.

First and foremost when this verse says God has not given “US” a spirit of fear what exactly is He referring to? You are a spirit, you have a soul, and you live in a body. You are not a soul you have a soul. You are not a body you live in a body. You are a spirit being that will never cease to exist. Every spirit birthed will live forever. Some will live eternally separated from God their creator in a place called the lake of fire. The rest will live eternally in the presence of God. Before you were born again you had a spirit of fear because of the fallen nature of Adam. That is why Paul writing to Timothy inspired by the Holy Spirit states that you, the spirit man inside, no longer have any fear.

The more we relate from our soul with what we see on the outside, the more we allow fear to enter our soul, which is made up of our mind, will and emotions. But the more we begin to develop our spirit man, the real you on the inside, to where he dominates our life and that is what our soul is looking to, then fear cannot enter the soul. Within our spirit is power, love, and the ability to maintain control of your entire being. So the first thing we must get revelation of is the fact that when you say or even think that you are afraid, the real you is not afraid. Your spirit man has no fear in him. We get in fear when we don’t see ourselves as a spirit but instead relate to the old fleshly nature.

Paul goes on to state that we have a spirit of power. The word power here is dunamis in the Greek and it is defined as: inherent power, power residing in a thing by virtue of its nature, or which a person or thing exerts and puts forth, power for performing miracles, moral power and excellence. You have in your spirit the same miracle working power that Jesus used. It is no different. When satan gets us in fear he blockades that power from coming forth out of our spirit into our soul and into our body. When we are in fear we have no ability to release that power through us. Fear is like turning off the power switch to God within. That power resides right now in every born again believer.

Jesus said in John 14:12 the very works He did we can do also, if we believe in Him. When we are in faith we believe in all He has done, but when we get in fear we stop our faith from releasing our God-given ability to do the works Jesus did. Those works include raising the dead, healing the sick, casting out demons for we have freely received the same ability within us and we are to freely give what we have freely received. We did not earn this power. It became a part of who we now are when we were born again. When we put our faith in Christ, repented of our sin, and made Him the Lord of our life that old you died. The new you came alive, filled with the dunamis power of God. Most believers don’t even realize that they have such power. Others don’t believe it’s true, but it is right there in 2 Timothy 1:7. I not only believe in this power I have seen it work in and through my life. When it does it always brings glory to God, because it is His power working through us.

You must understand that when you got born again you are the breath of God. In Genesis God breathed into man’s physical body the breath of life, his spirit and soul. In John 20:22 Jesus after being raised from the dead breathed on His disciples and said to receive the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit not only entered those disciples, the Holy Spirit, the breath of God, created within them a brand new spirit, a spirit of power, love, and self-control. We are told in 2 Corinthians 5:17 that all who are in Christ are a new creation. That word means something that never existed before. Your born again spirit is literally the breath of God Himself.

1 John 4:18 No fear exists where his love is. Rather, perfect love gets rid of fear, because fear involves punishment.

When you got born again Romans 5:5 says the love of God, who He is for God is love, was poured out into your heart, your spirit man. You like God don’t have love you are love. You are a spirit not of fear but love. Where His loves is no fear exists. So another powerful key to walking in faith and free from fear is to walk in the love of God. This is why Jesus tells us the commandments we are now to walk in is to love the Lord our God, and love our neighbor as ourselves. When we get out of love we open the door for fear to enter our souls, (mind, will, and emotions). But when we walk in the light of God’s love for us and we exercise that love toward one another we eliminate fear from our lives. We slam the door to satan and we open the door for that dunamis power within us to work in our lives and through our lives.

Gal. 5:6 …the only thing that matters is faith working through love.

Faith works through love. Romans 12:3 tells us we were given a measure of faith. The opposite of faith is fear. If we walk in love our faith can now work through us for faith works through love. Both us knowing the love God has for us, and we obeying Jesus’ command to love our neighbor. Romans 13:10 tells us love does no harm to a neighbor. Isn’t it obvious why satan works so hard to get us out of walking in the love of God? It gives opportunity for him to get our souls filled with fear. Walking in love does not mean we condone wrong living, but we don’t condemn people for it either. Ephesians 4:15 tells us to speak the truth in love. If you love someone you will tell them the truth. Again not condemning them to damnation, but not condoning the behavior.

When we walk in the love God has for us, and we exercise the love we now have and have become, faith can now be released. The power of God within you can go to work through that faith. Jesus Christ in making us brand new within freed us from fear to live a life of faith. Faith that brings God’s supernatural power alive in and through us to live victorious, and to help others be set free. If you are a child of God you have not been given a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and self-control. Walk in love and you won’t lose control of your senses, and you will keep the door closed to fear.

See You Again Next Week For More “Weekly Wisdom”

May God’s Best Be Yours!

Pastor Darryl Baker