Pastor Barry's  "Chapter & Verse"  Day 141

May 21;   2 Timothy 1:7;   197/260(I);   ‘No Fear’

2 Timothy 1:7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

Fear is rampant.  People greatly fear so many things.  Those thoughts that make people fearful and cause great turmoil, are not from God.  The Lord clearly tells us in this verse that fear is not of Him.  Our enemy, satan, is the author of fear.  He knows the misery fear brings and he delights to do everything he can to ruin the lives of Christians.  If a Christian is fearful, so much of their time is spent on thinking about that fear.  This obviously minimizes the time they have to do the work of the ministry and live your life as the Lord intended you to.  Ultimately this is the strategy of satan.  Once you are saved, he cannot do anything about your eternal destiny, but he can try to minimize your work for Jesus on the earth.  Injecting fear into your life is a tactic he tries to use on whomever he can.  The Lord Jesus counters the devil’s fear with the power of the Holy Spirit.  The power of the Holy Spirit raised Jesus from the dead, despite the efforts of demonic forces to stop Jesus’ resurrection.  The power of the Holy Spirit is infinitely greater than the power of the devil.  As a Spirit filled Christian you have the authority to command those fearful thoughts to go.  Tell the devil that he is under your feet.  The Bible teaches that God’s love casts out fear (I John 4:18) and to fear not for He is with us..  You are loved by the Lord and knowing this removes any fear the devil tries to bring.  You also have a sound mind, renewed by the Word.  You know those thoughts are from the evil one and you can ignore them or command them to cease.  You are a child of God, have authority over satan, and have nothing to fear.