Listen to this teaching as given on Sunday morning April 9th.

When we are born we instinctively have two fears. The fear of falling and the fear of loud noises. So every other fear you have now is a learned fear. If you are afraid of spiders, you learned that, if you are afraid of the dark, you learned that.

Fear paralyzes us. If we are honest with ourselves we will admit that most of the fears we have learned have stopped us from experiencing life to the extent we want to. It is no different in our walk with God. As we have heard from Pastor Andrew in his series The Lion the Witch and You we know that we have complete access to everything God wants for us the moment we accept Christ. But when we listen to the voice of fear we become paralyzed and shrink back.

Hebrews 10:38

You are sitting in a waiting room and you feel God's prompting to talk to that stranger sitting across the room and ask them to if you can pray for them. So you say "Sure God I want to be obedient to your prompting!" then as you begin to walk towards them then you hear the voice of fear say "They are going to think you're a freak!" so at the last minute you bail and pick up a magazine and turn to go back to your seat.

You are writing out your bills and you sense God is telling you to give an extra $100 in the offering this week and so you begin to write out the check and you hear the voice of fear say "Don't you know how hard it is to get that $100? Give that and you go broke! So you take the pen and write VOID across the check.

Someone had offended you, maybe someone close to you, a spouse or child or maybe even a pastor. God shows you that you are hanging on to this offense and it is becoming bitterness and He tells you to go and settle the matter with this person and ask them to forgive you. Your desire is to obey God so you respond with a Yes! Then as you're dialing the phone you hear the voice of fear say "You don't want to be a door mat do you!" And you slam the phone down.

I wonder…Have you ever been stopped because of fear? Have you ever run away from something because of fear? Have you ever disobeyed God because of fear?

The only fear we are told to have in the scripture is in relation to God. Fear that is the true reverence and respect for our creator. And yet we often listen to the copy that Satan has created, the intimidation of man. His brand of fear takes respect and turns it into intimidation and the reverence into a self-protective ego. It turns this deference to God into a self perseveration of our ego. We have become so fearful of those who will teardown and destroy our ego with out mercy while at the same time we presume upon the great mercy and grace of our God

This sets us up to be intimidated trapped and lead an unfulfilled life. We have, the moment we surrender our lives to Christ, access to everything He has provided for us. We aren't "like" a new creation we "are" a new creation. But to experience everything he has for us we need to walk in obedience. Fear keeps us from being obedient. The life God created for you is bigger than what you are living right now.

God being with you. Regardless of what comes.

Faith has come to mean:
· Surety of Outcome
· Ease of Victory
· Elimination of problems
· Absence of pain

In The Chronicles of Narnia, an allegory by C.S. Lewis, the author has two girls, Susan and Lucy, getting ready to meet Aslan the lion, who represents Christ. Two talking animals, Mr. and Mrs. Beaver, prepare the children for the encounter. "Ooh," said Susan, "I though he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion." "That you will, dearie." said Mrs. Beaver. "And make no mistake, if there's anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knee's knocking, they're either braver than most or else just silly."

"Then isn't he safe?" said Lucy. "Safe?" said Mr. Beaver. "Don't you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? Of course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the king, I tell you!"

We need to be led by our Spirit not by our Soul. Our Spirit will look at the promises and promptings of God and say "Yes and Amen" our Soul will be fearful of the risks and say it's not safe! You'd better not do it, you might get hurt.

Lee Trevino the golfing great raised himself out of poverty and prejudice. He has said of himself that when he started out life he was a poor Mexican now I'm a rich Spaniard. He accomplished this by listening to the greatness that was in him. Once before a tournament he became ill and went to the doctor. The doctor after examining him said "Lee you better not play this week, you might get worse." Less said to himself "Better play, might get better, might win!" And he did.

The key to experiencing your life the way God intended it to be is this:

BE AFRAID, BE VERY AFRAID BUT DO IT ANYWAY!

The word fear comes from the Greek word PHOBOS from which we get the word phobias. Originally the word Phobos meant "flight" from something which caused us fear.

I have never counted them for myself but I have been told that we are told 365 times in the Bible to "Fear Not" If that is true than we have a "Fear Not" for every day of the year. That means every morning we can be reminded, to BE AFRAID BUT DO IT ANYWAY!

This doesn't mean "Don't feel fear". It doesn't say tremble not, Sweat not, shake not, flush not, it says "fear not" don't run! When the fears come and it will - God says don't let it stop you "Be Afraid But Do It Anyway."

Biblical faith goes hand and hand in risk. In fact risk is promised. It is the fear of this risk that stops us from fulfilling our lives. We need to learn to embrace the risk through faith. We need to see every situation which God calls us to risk as an opportunity to live in the freedom. We need to understand we will find the fulfillment of our lives when we stop trying to avoid pain so we can add time to our lives and begin to step out in faith and add life to the time we have here.

1 Samuel 14

Jonathan climbed up, using his hands and feet, with his armor-bearer right behind him. The Philistines fell before Jonathan, and his armor-bearer followed and killed behind him.

Jonathan is realizing there is risk! He doesn't know if God will give him victory or not. He has only the promise of God that the Israelites will eventually win the war. But he decides not to remain in comfort but rather to step out into risk. You can't tell me he wasn't afraid! He has one sword and one unarmed armor bearer against an army that was as many as the sands of the sea. Of course he was afraid but he did it anyway.

We are promised that we have not been given a spirit that cause us to but a spirit of sonship that allows us to be bold. Boldness to approach God as our Father and boldness to accomplish his will. It is a boldness to be obedient to His bidding.

Hebrews 10:35-39

What is we are afraid of?

We could say comes from the fear of man but it is more basic we are afraid of pain and discomfort. We just don't want to hurt. We jump back from the physical pain of something hot. Mothers fearing a child will catch a cold will bundle up a child to the point of him being unable to enjoy the snow!

Emotional pain is often worse than physical pain and the pain avoidance is what keeps us from following our Spirit. We protect ourselves from that emotional pain until we look like a little kid whose mother has bundled him up to protect but now he's unable to move and enjoy the snow.

Sheryl Crowe had a hit single when she recorded "The first cut is the deepest." But we know that all of the cuts hurt pretty badly. Maybe today you have been deeply wounded by someone you love. Maybe your parents didn't give you the love they should have or worse yet maybe they took advantage of your innocence. Maybe you're in a marriage that the love is just gone from.

We get hurt and we put up a shield, a shield of protection that turns into fear of man. Then again and again until while we are protected we have become so fearful that the freedom we once enjoyed is now unattainable.

I think we all have at least a glimpse of the life God wants for us. But fear of man and fear of pain keeps us from discovering it. We see it every week on the television. American Idols has traded on the fact that many people have a dream of being something that is far beyond there reach right now. We laugh at them and watch as they are ridiculed and criticized. We don't want to look like we are crazy! We don't want to sound like a fool. So we remain in our fearful comfort of protection.

Our walk with the Lord has few guarantees. I anyone told you before you came to Christ that the Christian life was free from problems and sorrow you should have been at least a little suspect. Any look through the history of Church will prove that moving out into what God has in store for you is full of risk. But God promises to be with us.

The fact of the matter is that Christians do have problems. Christians get betrayed and unbelievers are married for 60 years. Christian business men go bankrupt and those that cheat succeed. Christians get cancer and die and unbelievers are live. The rain falls on the just and the unjust but only the just have the promise of God being with them.

We need to become a body of believers in the face of great risk begin to say I'm Afraid but I'll Do it Anyway.

If you would like to see previous transcripts or hear audio available you can find them here.:

• Live Now! - Rick Stone & What Do You Burn For? - Daniel Livengood
• The Lion the Witch and You! Series
• Promise Land to Promise Life Series
  
• Discovery.God Series