Fear

I addressed the Getting into Gear conference this morning using Genesis 20 and talked about fear.  As a I was leaving the room, one of the participants whom I prayed with last night thanked me for it. Evidently I hit the right button.

Friends 1st yet again

Friends 1st sent me more literature.   I emailed them and told them that the whole point of paying them was to bring my membership to a speedy end and would they please stop sending me things.  I did not think they deliberately sought to annoy, but they seemed to have an internal issue and to back this up, I returned their literature to them.  I then recieved and email from them stating that this has been corrected and I should receive no more from them.

Just about everything about them did not impress me.  I cannot think of a single thing that I admire and it is evident that the founder has never had a conversion experience. She has passed effortlessly from the Roman Catholic so called church to the Church of England, which in my view is highly unlikely to challenge her by asking for a testimony as all one has to do is be on the electoral roll and turn up as the church and you are a member.  That does not make anyone a member of the real church which is Gods people.  Gods people have all been converted and welcomed into the family.

Genesis 20

Genesis 20

Abraham lies

Abraham lied.  Sarah was a very beautiful woman and Abraham feared that he would be killed for others to have her

SHE WENT A LONG WITH THIS.

In a dream God warned Abimilech about this  and prevented him from sinning.

Abraham was called of God

He was called out of his own land and promised that through him all the world would be blessed.

We are the result of that promise

However even Father Abraham who love the lord, and believed the promise and acted upon the promise had his faults.

He was afraid, and sometimes when we are afraid, we take things into our own hands and do not look to the lord. 

Abram decided to say that Sarah was his sister. 

All the men admired her beauty. She was one stunning looking woman.

When confronted with the lie Abraham said that he feared for his life for there was  NO FEAR OF GOD  there. 

I expect that as he looked around the land, that was largely true, but sometimes even unbelievers such as Abimilech want to do the right thing.

As OM ers, many of us go to places where there is no fear of God. God has told us to go to unbelieving world and preach the gospel to all, and from them, those whom god is calling to himself will as he promised come and some of them will be people whom to our eyes are people who have no fear of God, and yet God still commands us to go.

Abraham even added to the lie by telling a bit of truth

He said that she was his sister

V12, he stated that she was his sister, the daughter of his father, but not his mother.

You can almost hear it now, “Abimilech/ God, I did not actually lie.  I just did not tell the whole truth, and besides this is an ungodly place, I was just making sure I would not be killed”.  So it is not really a lie.

In the dream, Abraham did not lose his place in Gods purposes.  Even in his sin, God said of Abraham, HE IS A PROPHET and HE WILL PRAY FOR YOU. With the understanding that even though Abraham was in the wrong, God would honour Abrahams prayers because God had close the wombs of all the women in Abimilechs household because of Abrahams sin

When we get to our fields, we are full of excitement and enthusiasm and that is good, it is nessessary, it gets us going

However it will not keep us going in the long term

What will we do when it gets tough or we are afraid?

Will that drive us to God, or will we try to solve things our way as Abraham did?

In life and in mission, we are not promised an easy time, in fact we can expect there will be difficulties.

We need to cling to the lord all the more in the difficulties like a child clings to his parents when he is afraid.

If we do something wrong, even when it is for what seems like good reasons, will we try to justify ourselves as Abraham did when he said she was his sister for they had the same father. Or will we own up before God, confess our sin and then let God restore us and use us as he used Abraham?

Next to Love, FEAR  is probably the strongest emotion we humans have. 

However, when we fear and note I said, when not if, because sooner or later we all fear, let us be overcome with the LOVE AND CARE OF OUR HEAVENLY FATHER and trust him all the more, because in doing so, we get to know him and his love for us all the more.

Amen