Chapter 1: Introduction and apology

Well, hello Shabbat family and thank you for coming to our discussion this morning on fear. I wanted to take a moment at the beginning of this video to express my apologies to those of you who joined us via Zoom uh on our discussion this morning only to be uh abruptly and grossly interrupted by an uninvited guest. uh displaying pornographic images on his or her background along with some vile language. My only recourse at that time was to abruptly end the call which happened in our fellowship discussion afterwards. I wanted to apologize to you because that is uh something that you never want to see, especially when you’re trying to seek out the father and especially what he has to say about fear. I’ll make another few comments at the end of this

video, but today we discuss fear in a very real and important way. And I believe the enemy wanted to disrupt us and attempt to show us that who he really is. Uh so um unfortunately uh that happened and fortunately you the viewer are not going to see that. Obviously I’m editing it out. But I wanted to give you just that update real quick. Especially to those people who joined us live. Sorry you had to see that. And uh I am taking measures to uh identify who this person was. I will be contacting Zoom. I will be sharing uh what happened with them in an effort to get this individual banned from Zoom

forever if we can do that. Enjoy our discussion on fear. Amen. Thank you,

Chapter 2: Defining fear and faith

brother Paul. Here we are at the lesson entitled fear. And uh Glenn number two says, “It looks ghoulish.” And you know, I wanted it to look a little ghoulish. I wanted to look a little scary because fear can be scary. Why am I doing this lesson? Well, Christine suggested it a couple of weeks ago, I think, uh in response to what was behind, you know, Charlie’s death and and other things like it. It’s it’s fear. And first thing I wanted to look at this morning is all of its synonyms. All of the other words we use in the course of our daily lives that in one way or another mean fear,

dread, insecurity, confusion, worry, anxiety, panic, terror, uncertainty, cowardice, dismay, doubt, trepidation, timidity, stress, The these are all another way of expressing fear. And as I was going through this lesson, I was just sharing with Glenn number two here before we started. Fear is a topic, a biblical topic that I thought I had a pretty good beat on that I understood it pretty well. But that’s just pride because when I started getting into this and breaking down the verses as we do in our class, I started being challenged in my own understanding and in my own life as a as an example that I’ll share with you. On Sunday when I sat down and began

working on this, I took a look at my business calendar appointments of jobs that we have, you know, coming up in the following week. And normally on any one Sunday, I have a week’s worth of jobs. And sometimes in in busy uh months, we have two weeks worth of jobs. Last Sunday, we had zero jobs scheduled for the week. And that was a huge temptation for me to fear. And I’m as I’m going through this lesson and looking at these verses, I told myself, I will not fear. I I’m here I am preparing this lesson on fear and now I am personally being faced with the opportunity to do so and I just said I I

won’t I will not and by Tuesday morning my week was full you know he he he provided for us he as he always does and he always has there’s been many times in my business life when I’ve had weeks like that. But as I look back and I remember, he’s never let us fail. And he’s not going to let us fail in the future. But I’m saying all that to say this, that your teacher this morning was challenged with fear before I even finished this lesson. And I know that you all as you look at the list on the screen can look at some of those words and relate to them even as recent as this morning or yesterday.

And I think that this lesson will probably land in the lap of the women more than the men because we process fear differently. Uh women are naturally insecure. that’s the way God made them. And uh and so it’s going to hit you a little differently. But men, we still fear and we still face some of these things. And so I I’m hoping that this lesson will not only help us deal with the things that we face on a daily basis, but ultimately the future, our future as believers and what we know is coming on the world. But let’s start here. I went back and I I I tried to find some

notable quotes by uh people important people in history and and what they had to say about fear. Fear is the this is Augustine the Hippo. Fear is the response of the weak but love casts out fear. It’s better to fear God in order not to fear anything else. And that’s a huge statement right there because we’re going to talk about not fearing anything else. Martin Luther, this is profound. You have as much laughter as you have faith and as much fear as you have unbelief. John Calvin. Our faith is proved genuine when it drives away fear. Faith relies upon God’s promises so firmly that it cannot be shaken by the terrors of the world.

Charles Spurgeon. Faith by its very nature must be fearless for it deals with a faithful God. Fear is born of looking at circumstances. Faith is born at looking at God. Ponder. You should ponder on these things for a while. I did. Awtoer. The man who fears God will fear nothing else. The man who does not fear God will fear everything else. There very profound statements.

Chapter 3: Law of first mention

And then of course I wanted to look at the law of first mention. You guys know what that is hopefully because we’ve talked about it many times and our times together. First time that the word fear is mentioned in scripture is in Genesis 9 where he’s talking to Noah and it says the fear of you and the dread of you shall be on every beast of the earth on every bird of the air on all that move on the earth and on all the fish of the sea they are given into your hand. So, I found it interesting as I looked at this lesson or this verse rather. I wanted to talk about the word fear because that’s the first time it’s mentioned in scripture. But instead, I

think I wanted to focus more on the word dread in in this verse. Uh the word ha, is that how you say that, David? Ha. Ha. Hot describes a sudden overwhelming dread that quote seizes the heart and alters conduct. It is never a casual uneasiness. It is a visceral visceral reaction that drives creatures to flight, animals to run and in fear of a human being. I know that if I get up and walk out my front door, the squirrels in my yard will flee. The birds in my yard will fly away. If I’m walking through a forest and happen upon a deer, he won’t approach me. He will run. We all know this to be true.

I thought about that for a moment. The animals, the birds, creeping things flee from our presence because they instinctively know that they are prey. They know that they have been quote given into our hands from birth. But instinctively they have this fear that we are a predator, the greatest predator of all. And it’s not something a mother deer or a mother bird or a mother squirrel teaches its young. They’re born with this fear. they because they have been given into our hands. So the question is this is what fear in all of its manifestations does to us. The question is whose hand do we believe we have been given when we respond like they do? When we respond with dread and uncertainty and insecurity

and doubt and and dismay and timidity, that’s a profound question that we need to answer in the course of this lesson and I hope that we will. Fear defined.

Chapter 4: Psychological definitions

There is a psychological definition of the word fear. It is an emotional and physiological response to a what, David? Number one? Perceived. A perceived threat characterized by heightened arousal of the autonomic nervous system leading to behavioral changes aimed at avoidance or self-preservation. It is considered one of the basic universal emotions and is often studied alongside anxiety. And though fear is typically linked to an immediate and identif identifiable threat, anxiety relates to anticipated or diffused threats. So that is a psychological definition and within it is some very interesting things. Fear versus anxiety. Fear is what happens when your body and mind react to something that feels dangerous. If a car suddenly swerves towards you, your heart races, your breathing speeds up, your muscles tighten, your brain

screams, “Move!” That’s fear. It’s your built-in alarm system designed to keep you alive. The difference between fear and anxiety is timing. Fear is like seeing a bear in front of you on the trail. It’s immediate, specific, and sharp. Anxiety is more like lying awake at night worrying that there might be a bear somewhere out there. [Laughter] It’s vague. It’s future oriented and often lingers even when nothing is happening. So in simple terms, fear is the body’s emergency response to a real present danger, while anxiety is the body’s anticipation of danger that may or may not happen. One could say that anxiety is irrational. Thank you. But fear or anxiety both are controllable by you

or not based on the one thing that the Bible says triumphs over fear. Glen number two, what is the one thing that scripture tells us triumphs over fear? Love.

Chapter 5: Love as an antidote

Love. Love. which I thought was interesting. I’ve heard and I’ve read that scripture a thousand times, but I I I wasn’t quite sure how to explain how love triumphs over fear. 1 John 4, love has been perfected among us in this that we have boldness in the day of judgment. Stop. What is another way of saying that you have boldness in the day of judgment? Security. Confidence, security, courage. Or another way of saying all that, no fear, forward, right? Yes. All all of your answers are right. We have boldness in the day of judgment. That means we have no fear because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love. But

perfect love casts out fear because fear involves torment. Hm. He who fears has not been made perfect in love. Fear involves torment. As I was reading this again, I had to ask the question, what is the source of the torment? If fear involves torment, what is the source of that torment? Your word. Dread. My word. Okay. Dread. What else? Glenn and Joanne, do you have an answer? If fear involves torment, what is the source of the torment? Satan. The devil. The devil. The lack of faith. Okay. Well, let’s let’s let’s look at it in the context of this text verse that we just looked at. The fear is about judgment, right? Um the first the verse that we just looked at in Timothy.

However, for a moment, I would like to explore another kind of torment as it relates to fear. In the definition of fear, the psychological definition of fear, it says it leads to this thing called behavioral changes. Okay. What kind of behavioral changes? In what ways does fear, when it feels like torment, alter our behavior? Think of the squirrel. Think of the bird. Think of the deer. We have paralysis of action. That’s our response to fear sometimes. And it’s different for everybody. One person has so much fear they actually do nothing. They just are paralyzed. Irrational decisions come as a result of fear. Some people completely withdraw and isolate themselves. My sister as a therapist can probably speak to this a great deal. Everyone responds to these kinds of things differently.

Others respond with aggression or defensiveness and still others just a loss of peace. They are despondent. They are depressed and maybe frozen, maybe paralyzed, maybe withdrawn. My point is, as deer and squirrel and birds have a visceral instinctive reaction to fear, so do we. So can we in in these ways. And I don’t know about you, but if you’re going through these things, if you are responding and or reacting in any of these ways and the others that I don’t have listed here, does it not feel like torment? It does feel like torment. So I want to explore that. We are going to look at the torment that comes as a result of fear of the the end, fear of judgment. But I wanted to address this here very

quickly. First, these reactions are tormenting to experience in the moment. As humans, they can be involuntary. But as believers whose hope lies in another, we have the supernatural ability to be different because of the spirit that is in us. We can choose to love in those moments. And we’re going to understand how how that works in a second. We can choose to love or not to love. We have that ability. We can choose to be at peace in our soul or not based on that love. But again, as I’m going through this and I’m wrestling with this personally, I ask the question, love for what? Love for who? Because if someone looks at you and says, you just got to love.

Okay, that that’s kind of a nebulous thing to say, you know. I my my analytical mind says okay but love for what and love for who? How does show me the connection? Show me the the mechanics here so I can understand what that means. And so as a result I I wanted to just dig deeper into this verse. So here it is again. 1 John 4.

Chapter 6: Fear, love, and hatred

He starts off by saying love has been perfected. Perfected. Okay. perfect love among us and this that we may have boldness in the day of judgment. So to me I’m seeing a connection. The connection I’m seeing here is that perfected love whatever that is equals boldness or no fear in judgment. Now I said at the beginning that this particular text the word the the fear we’re talking about here is in the context of judgment. However, it can be applied with every other fear that we feel and experience in the day days of our lives. Perfected love according to John means boldness or no fear in judgment because as he is so

we are in this world. There is no love in fear, but perfect love casts out fear. What is another way of saying that? To me, fear and love cannot exist together. Look at that verse. There is no fear in love. Why? Because love casts out fear. It makes me think of the Holy Spirit and demonic uh possession. When the hol if a person who is possessed by a demon is saved by Yeshua and he’s filled with the Holy Spirit, you cannot have both of those spirits there at the same time. The Holy Spirit casts out the demon. They they they are inconsistent. And so in the same way, fear and love simply cannot exist

together. But saying that opens up a big can of worms, doesn’t it, Glenn? Number two, it to me it does. It brings up a great deal of problems because how many of us would say this morning that in the course of the last seven days or 30 days that we’ve had nothing but love and peace. We experience no fear whatsoever. None of us can. That’s the problem. That’s the That’s the can of worms that a statement like this opens. If I am in fear, if I am insecure, if I am stressed, if I am struggling with anxiety, there is an absence of love. You are filled with one or the other. So why can fear and love not exist together?

The answer is simple. You cannot say that you love and trust God. Yah while at the same time be living in fear. Look at the example that John offers to make his point. He goes on to give us an example in that verse. If someone says I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar. Why? Because fear and love cannot exist together. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he’s not seen? And this commandment we have from him that he who loves God must love his brother also. Okay. Well, I I don’t know about you, but when you read that in your Bible, we can read this and think that John has switched topics on us.

Even in your English translations, this last verse is most likely under a different heading because the tr that the publisher has made it so. Why? Because he thinks John is changing topics here. But that’s not the case. John is talking about fear here as he’s talking about brotherly love. He has not moved on to something new. And that made me scratch my head. Why does one hate his brother? Fear. Fear. Fear. It It could be argued that Jacob hated Esau, not because he had this disdain in his heart for his brother, but because he feared his brother, because of what had happened between them. Right? So, hatred toward one’s brother

flows from unperfected love and unperfected love is controlled by fear. Therefore, hatred is a fruit of fear. So, no, John has not changed topics on us mids sentence. John’s example of brotherly love reinforces the fact that one cannot love and be in fear at the same time. But you know me, I still want to know why. Why do I want to know why? Well, because I struggle with this. Well, hate when you look at the word Christine’s asking what hate means. When you look at the word hate in the Greek, it basically means to uh to love somebody less than you ought. So that would be hatred. Okay. Yeshua uses the word hate in a pretty profound way in Luke 14, right? Unless you hate your mother and your father, your

brother and sister, you cannot be my disciple. So is there anything that we should not love at all as in people? Yeah. No, everybody we should we should there should be some measure of Yeah. There should always be some measure of love. But I I still have to answer the question, why can’t I be in fear at the same time that I love? And of course, the scriptures answer that with this. Because fear destroys what the Bible calls a sound mind. Okay. So let’s explore that for a moment.

Chapter 7: The sound mind

Consider for a second for a moment what you fear every day in life. Debt, bills, kids, issues with your kids. How are they doing? Are they doing well? Are they not doing well? Family, health, am I dying of cancer? Do I have this problem? Do I have that problem? Am I in shape? politics, watching the news, regardless of your affiliation, you fear based on what you see with who’s in charge of the United States, who’s in the office, who’s not, the news, danger, earthquakes, tornadoes, things that are happening around the world. Time. Do I have enough time to finish this, to finish that? I’m running out of time, deadlines, careers, conflict, weather,

death. Of course, I didn’t put that in here, but yes, death. But then I put this one here, the end. The end. Eternity. But we all know what’s coming. If you’re a student of the scriptures and you’re not misled by those who want to allegorize everything in the book of revelation, then you know what’s coming and we can have fear of that, right? Second Timothy 1, God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and of a sound mind. I looked at that verse for what felt like hours. It’s a verse I’ve read a bazillion times. I could have probably quoted that verse. But for some reason, as I’m going through this lesson, I looked at it a thousand times and I I came up with

this. When you meditate on this verse long enough, you’re faced with the question, if I wasn’t given a spirit of fear, then whose spirit is it that I have that I am listening to, that I am obeying because we do have fears and we do listen to something or one when we are in the middle of experiencing those fears and in some case we are obeying the voice the whisper the big question is am I saying that you have the spirit of Satan in you no for the very reason that I just expressed expressed earlier you have the Holy Spirit in you so you don’t have his spirit in you but

you could be listening to it because it is in your moment of fear that you lose this thing called your sound mind and therefore become susceptible to the lying whispers of the enemy. I give you Matthew 5, I’m sorry, Mark 5 verses 2 and verse 15. We know the story about the man possessed. When he had come out of the boat, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit. We know what happens. Yeshua frees him from that spirit. Come out of him. It goes on to say in verse 15, then they came to Jesus and saw the one who had been demonpossessed and had

the legion sitting there enclosed in what? in his right mind. Which means what? That before he didn’t have a sound mind. He was not in his right mind. But now he does. His unsound mind was linked with demonic spiritual activity. In his case, actual possession. In our case, spiritual oppression. But the outcome is the same in that when we fear we like him give into behavioral changes in one way or another. So is your daily fear, your daily anxiety, your daily stress, your momentary insecurities, are they a spiritual issue? 100% it is a spiritual issue. Notice in 2 Timothy 1 how power, love, and a sound mind are nearly synonymous in the way that he uses them.

We’ve not been given been given a spirit of fear, but power, love, and a sound mind that encompasses all of that. We have been given the power which is another way of saying ability to love which means the absence of fear that we’ve already determined and thereby possess possessing a sound mind which means what? We’re able to keep our heads when all others around us are losing theirs. We’re able to be fearless, reactionless, darn near responseless in these moments that we are tempted to be fearful, to be anxious, to be stressed. I hope you’re following me along. What does losing a sound mind look like? It looks like this. Look at the image.

Yeshua on the boat with his guys. Look at every one of their faces. What do we see in their eyes? Fear, stress, terror, anxiety, uncertainty, dread. All the things that we looked at in the very first slide, what do you see in Yeshua’s face? He’s at peace. So, what is losing a sound mind? Look at Let’s look at this verse in Mark 4. And a great windstorm arose and the waves beat into the boat. What does that mean? H how can the waves beat into our boat in our daily life? Look at the list to the right. That list to the right is the waves that beat into your boat. So that there was already filling.

That means that the water has gotten into the boat. That means that the things on the right here have already gotten into our boat. Why? Because we let it get into the boat. Right? But he was in the stern. Where what was Yeshua doing in the stern? Asleep on a pillow, right? In other words, seemingly absent from the situation. Asleep on a pillow. In other words, not paying attention to your needs. Would it be safe to say that these guys have needs at this moment? Yeah, they’re freaking out, right? They have needs. But Yeshua is appears to be not paying attention to those needs. They awoke him and said, “Teacher, do you not care that we’re perishing?” In other words, why doesn’t y’all care

about my fill in the blank? Then he arose and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Be still. Peace, be still.” And the wind ceased and there was great calm. Can you imagine that scene? a huge storm, waves coming over the bow of the boat, rocking back and forth, wind blowing. And then Yeshua says three words and it completely ceased and there was a great calm. There was a great peace. What happened to the fear in these guys’ eyes and face and heart at that moment? In the snap of a finger, everybody changed. They were in peace. And then he said to them, “Why are you so fearful? How is it that you have no faith?” Do you see the connection there? That’s

two ways of asking the same question. No faith. Fearful. fearful, no faith, no trust, no peace. Right? So we can define an unsound mind in our hearts this way. Like them, you think God is absent. You think he is somehow not paying attention to your needs. and you think and sometimes even say sometimes even accuse him of not caring. That’s an unsound mind. The Greek word for sound mind here is safismos which carries the idea of self-control, discipline, right thinking and balanced judgment. That is the definition according to Strongs at least of a sound mind. What is the opposite of a sound mind? No self-control, no discipline, stinking thinking, and unbalanced judgment.

And we wonder why in moments of intense fear or anxiety or stress that things just seem to go from bad to worse. We can all share moments in our life when we were dealing with all this unrest and it just seemed like things went from bad to worse. And it seems that way because it was that way. You lost your self-control. You lost your discipline. You were filled with stinking thinking. You lost your balanced judgment. You were making decisions that you shouldn’t have made. What did Job say? What did Job say, Glenn? Number two, what I fear the most has come upon me. What I fear the most has come upon me. That is so true.

Because we lost our sound mind because we gave into fear.

Chapter 8: Peace versus fear

So here we have an image on the screen and this is how we can or cannot respond, right? What’s the background? Things are coming apart, right? The world is coming. That’s how we see it. When we have these issues in our daily lives, we can feel like everything is burning down. Well, there’s going to come a time when that’s actually true. And we’re going to explore that in a moment. But you have one of two options here, right? And I want to explore them. The question I want to ask is which one is you physically and or emotionally in times of despair? On the left hand side, we have this person called the prince of peace. That’s our Lord.

That’s one of his names and that’s who we are hopefully following. What does the scripture say? Isaiah 26, you will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you because he trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever. For in Yah, and by the way, if you ever wonder wondered whether or not the word Yah was in scripture, there it is. In Yahw the Lord is everlasting strength. Do you see the connection between perfect peace and trusting in the Lord and everlasting strength? Yes. Psalm 4. I will both lie down in peace and sleep for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety. If you’re wrestling at night just to sleep because you’ve got so much stuff on your mind.

I I I’m hoping this is hitting home. It hit home for me. Psalm 29, the Lord will give strength to his people. The Lord will bless his people with peace. It’s a promise. Psalm 85, I will hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace to his people. Psalm 119, great peace have those who love your law, and nothing causes them to stumble. Now, in context, this stumble isn’t just sin. That’s how I look at it. That’s how we’re all tempted to look at that word stumble and automatically think sin. But no, in context, it is the opposite of great peace. So great peace have those who love your law and nothing

causes them to fear to not have that great peace. But again, remember, go back to my very first slide. We have the ability to control this or not. Let’s look at the other side. The father of lies and accusation. He is the prince of fear. Isaiah 57. The wicked are like the troubled sea when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. Remember the verse we looked at in Mark with the brothers and Yeshua. The wicked are like the troubled sea. Proverbs 28, the wicked flee. Why do they flee in fear? He doesn’t say that. The words in parenthesis are my words. But the wicked flee. They flee because they fear. The wicked flee when no one pursues. That also could be anxiety, couldn’t it? Job 15. The wicked man

writhes with pain all his days and the number of years is hidden from the oppressor. Dreadful sounds are in his ears and prosperity the destroyer comes upon him. What are these dreadful sounds that Job is talking about? Spirit of fear. Yeah. Whispers of torment, whispers of dread, whispers of fear, whispers of failure. These dreadful sounds are always there. So how we respond matters. It matters. And I want to continue to point you back to the reality that you have the ability, the quote unquote power to respond appropriately. And how we do that matters not only in our daily lives, but if we live long enough to see the day of the Lord, even more so.

Now, I want to make a shift here as we finish the lesson from the daily stuff that we’re tempted to fear and kind of focus more on what’s coming and whether or not we struggle in fear of that because we must not fear. What’s what’s going on here? Glenn number two on the screen. Not Sinai, right? It’s not the perfect, you know, depiction. But, you know, I didn’t take a picture of it or anything. But it’s Moses. It’s Israel. It Sinai and we know kind of what happened there, right? I want to look at this in Hebrews 12. You’ve not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire and to blackness and darkness and tempest and

the sound of a trumpet and the voice of words. So that those who heard it did what? Dartanian begged that the word should not be spoken to them anymore. Why did they beg that the word of God not be spoken to them anymore? Because they were in fear. They could not endure what was commanded. And if so much as a beast touched the mountain, it shall be stoned or shot with an arrow. And so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I am exceedingly afraid and trembling.” This is the writer of Hebrews hearkening back to the moment when this all happened.

Chapter 9: Godly fear versus terror

Deuteronomy fi five. The Lord talked with you face to face on the mountain from the midst of the fire. I stood, Moses stood between the Lord and you at that time to declare to you the word of the Lord. For you were afraid because of the fire, and you did not go up the mountain. Now therefore, why should we die? For this great fire will consume us. If we hear the voice of the Lord our God anymore, then we shall die. What’s happening here? These people that the writer of Hebrews is talking about, Israel, feared that moment when God delivered to them his ways, his commandments. He rested on the mountain.

His glory was before them. And they turned away from him. They were in fear of him. He goes on to say, “You have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable innumerable company of angels, the general assembly in the church of the firstborn, who are registered in heaven, to God the judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better than that of Abel. See to it. See that you do not refuse him who speaks. Who is the himymn he’s speaking about. The very same God that we will see at the end of days when he returns.

See to it that you do not refuse him who speaks like Israel did. For if they did not escape, who refused him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape, if we turn away from him who speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth. But now he has promised saying, “Yet once more I shake not only the earth but also heaven.” Now this yet once more indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken as of things that are being made that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. What’s he talking about there? There’s a prophecy in Haggi and in other places. This is not the only place that it’s found

that says that as God shook the earth aka Mount Si and the area surrounding when he came the first time. He’s going to do it again but on a much larger scale. Thus says the Lord of hosts, once more, if it’s a little while, I will shake heaven and earth, the sea and dry land, and all nations, and they shall come to the desire of all nations, and I will fill this temple with glory, says the Lord of Hosts. The silver is mine, the gold is mine, says the Lord of Hosts. The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of hosts. And in this place I will give peace.

So the writer of Hebrews is hearkening back to this prophecy that when Yeshua returns, it’s not just going to be the general area that is shaken. It’s going to be everything that is shaken. the heavens, the earth, the nations. And so he says, “See to it at that moment that you do not refuse him who speaks.” You don’t fear him who speaks in the same way that Israel feared the Hovah at Si. And then he finishes by saying, “Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire.” So I ask, what’s the difference

between what Israel did in fear and this godly fear that the author of Hebrews is saying that we should have number two? Well, the beginning of wisdom is fear if you hold on. Yes. And that’s a different kind of fear than the self-centered terror, selfpreservation, which respect. Absolutely. Absolutely. Ungodly fear arises from unbelief, lack of trust in God or the influence of evil. Remember, ungodly fear is torment. The fear of God, however, is reverent awe and recognition of his holiness, power, and authority. When you fear him with faith and trust, you fear nothing else. I want to say that again calling you to remember the quotes we read on the very first slide. When you

fear him with faith and trust, you fear nothing else. Not the dailies and not what’s coming in the end. And what’s coming in the

Chapter 10: Faith in the end times

end? Well, he is. He’s coming in the end. We must not fear, but look up in joy. Again, I call you to the image on the slide. You see two different types of people. On the left, you see those who like Israel in at Si turned in fear of the one who spoke. On the right, you see those looking up in joy with no fear of what’s happening around them. Luke 21. There will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars, and on the earth, distress of all nations. That’s the shaking that Haggi was talking about with perplexity. the sea, the waves worrying, men’s hearts failing them from fear. What’s another way of saying that?

Heart attacks. Would that be a safe assessment there, Glenn? Number two, men’s hearts failing them from fear. When a man’s heart fails him from fear, he’s just he’s having a heart attack. And the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be what? Shaken. Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. And when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads because your your redemption draws near. I couldn’t help but notice the striking difference in that verse between these two peoples. On one hand, men’s hearts are failing them in fear.

On the other hand, those who know, those who understand, those who have learned the lesson of peace, look up with their heads and their hands in joy of the coming redemption. In that day, some like Israel will turn away and un god ungodly fear of his voice and in terror of his presence. Why? Well, the scripture tells us there in Luke 21 because of fearful expectation, fear of what’s happening on the earth and fear of him who is causing what is happening on the earth. And why do they fear? They fear because they did not know, nor did they care to know what the Holy Spirit warned them of in scripture.

What scripture am I talking about? Matthew 24. But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage until the day that Noah entered the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away. So also will be the coming of the son of man. They did not know men’s hearts failing them from fear. Who were these people? Who were these men’s hearts? Will that be us? Would that be you and me? I hope not. Those men whose hearts are failing them from fear are going to be the ungodly men, the unprepared men, the men who knew but

weren’t prepared, who weren’t paying attention. How about the pre-tribers? That sect of believers who think that before the you know what hits the fan, we’re all going to be taken away from here before all that happens. Bible doesn’t teach that at all. Those people will be shocked. Those people will be surprised when this stuff starts happening. They because they didn’t know. And of course, those who believe tribulation is allegory. There’s another sect of believers. And when I mean sect, I don’t mean an individual cult. I mean sects of people within evangelicalism who look at that and go, “Ah, yeah, that’s just allegory. Yeah, it’s just it’s not real. No, it’s very real. If it’s not real, we have to invalidate a great deal of scripture.

Okay, but we must not fear at this moment. There is no escape route. And that’s something that I want to talk about very briefly. I think this is my last slide so we can have some great conversation. There is no escape route through this end. the only way out is through. And I love that statement, but that’s true for us. There there is no there is no way out of of what’s coming. Matthew 24, we see, therefore, when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet standing in the holy place, whoever reads, let him understand. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Okay, we’ve touched on this verse several times in several different lessons. Uh, and I’ve had some rebuttal. I’ve had some people say, “Ed, look at the verse.

It says those who are in Judea.” Doesn’t mean me in America in Los Angeles or Dallas. He’s talking about those in Judea. Okay, stop. Stop and think about this for a moment. Whoever reads, let him understand. There is a reason that that phrase is there because when tribulation comes, what happens to Judea happens to the world. We just looked at the prophecy from Haggi and Hebrews that every nation will be shaken. So Yeshua is telling his eklesia when you see this happen, that’s your cue to go to the mountains. What what is going to the mountains mean for us? It’s no different, absolutely no different than Israel fleeing Egypt. They went to the desert. And in this time, we will flee to the mountains.

If you live to see these days, it will be an exercise in faith and fear in ways that you’ve never experienced before. Some part of me wants to live long enough to see this. Another part of me doesn’t. If I’m honest, if I’m real. 1 hour, But if we do, if you do, this will be a moment of faith in your life that you will have never experienced before. Why? 1 hour, Well, if Yeshua is telling you to flee to the mountains and he’s telling you later on in this verse, don’t go down and get your belongings. 1 hour, Don’t go back into the house and retrieve this or that. Go. Why?

1 hour, because he wants to be your source for everything as you flee. 1 hour, You have to have the faith and the fearlessness to believe that 1 hour, at that moment you must remain faithfully fearless during this time. 1 hour, again if you live to see it. Why? 1 hour, We look at the verse we just looked at in Hebrews 12. You should do not refuse or fear him who speaks. The shaking the shaking of the nations, the world in the heavens that we’re looking at here in scripture, it happens when biblically it happens after our flight into the wilderness. When we’re there intense, huddled together like the image in our screen, that’s when the earth and the heavens begin to shake.

But we have these verses here in Revelation 12 that encourage us. The woman who fled into the wilderness, she’s going there to a place prepared by God. that they should feed her there. Who is the they? Well, speculation abounds. It’s probably angels, but no one knows for sure. Revelation 12, the woman was given two wings of a great eagle that she might fly into the wilderness to her place where she is what? Nourished for a time and time and a half from the presence of the serpent. Okay, so we have these verses and others like them. I I could have put probably a dozen different verses here, Old Testament and New, that talk about this phenomenon.

We are fleeing. We are going to be putting our faith and our trust, our fearless faith and trust in him to take care of us in that wilderness. And the promises are there. But hopefully you caught in Revelation 12 this verse. This is Exodus 19 where the father told Israel, “You have seen what I did to the Egyptians and how I bore you on eagle’s wings and brought you to myself.” So just like he bore them on eagle’s wings, then he will bore us on eagle’s wings in the future. We have to have the faith and the fearlessness to embrace that. It’s important because when you look back at Israel, how many of the first generation made it to the promised land?

Caleb and Josh, two people of the first generation of Israel that left Egypt, two of them made it to the promised land. Why? because they did not fear. So how important is it that during this time if we live to experience it that we are fearless? Hebrews 12 g2 that you don’t refuse him who speaks. I found this very interesting here in this latter in this verse. I love it. Matter of fact he says uh see too that you don’t refuse him who speaks. Now this yet once more indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken as of things that are made that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. Okay, this is why I

think Paul wrote Hebrews because it’s full of things like this that you have to slow down and go, whoa, what what’s he saying? What did he just say right there? He He’s saying that he’s going to shake things to do what? to to kind of identify those things that cannot be shaken. Which makes me think of this image. Imagine the whole world, the whole universe for that matter being the the sifter and the father is sifting. He’s shaking. And what’s being revealed as he does that? those things that cannot be shaken. Those nuggets of gold that we are in his sight. The heavens and the earth will be shaken as if sifted to see what remains.

To see the nuggets that remain fearlessly standing, to find those who do not refuse the one who speaks. Those who run toward the sound and not from the sound. Ephesians 6. Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and the power of his might. Stop there for a moment. Be strong in the Lord and the power of his might. Not yours. His. Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the ws of the devil. When do the ws of the devil come? Every single day. In the list of things that I offered earlier. We don’t wrestle against flesh and blood. We wrestle against spiritual beings, spiritual powers, the rulers of darkness and of wickedness.

Therefore, we must require the whole armor of God that we’re able to withstand the evil day. What is the evil day a reference to? Every day that we live pretty much in this worldly system. And having done all that to stand. Stand therefore having girded your waist with truth not opinion not church doctrine truth as it’s spoken in scripture. Having put on the breastplate of breastplate of righteousness to shodd your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace above all above all the shield of faith. Because if you don’t have the shield of faith you can’t really have anything else. If you don’t have the shield of faith, you can’t be fearless.

If I’m in a battle with a guy and I have a sword and he has a sword, I have a big shield. He has nothing. Do I feel safer? I do feel safer. Do I feel more fearless? Yes, I do. Because I have this shield. And that’s what our faith does. It shields us if we allow it. Because we have the power and the ability to do it. from the things that will assail our sensibilities every day and to stand fearless. He goes on to say because he’s an ambassador for Christ that I may speak boldly. And of course, we already know that boldly is fearless. So I finish with this.

Your flight in in the future again if you live to see it will be the ultimate freedom from slavery and everything that you once feared because none of it will have any meaning then. So we must ask ourselves why does it have so much power over you now? Imagine you’re in that image. Imagine that you saw the abomination of desolation on Tik Tok, on the news, on Facebook, or you were there, and your family knows it’s time to go. At that moment, how much of what you are anxious about today will matter. How much will your bills matter and your debt matter and whether or not you could pay the electricity bill matter? None of it will.

So why does it have so much power over you now? Well, it’s because we allow it. Isaiah 43. I want to end with this verse because it’s one of my favorites. But now, thus says the Lord, who created you, oh Jacob, and he who formed you, oh Israel. Are you Israel? Yes, you are. Fear not. For I have redeemed you. I have called you by name. You are mine. If I’m standing alone against an army of thousands, I will fear. But if I look before me or behind me and I see Yeshua standing there, I fear not. Why? Cuz I’m his. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you.

For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. At the end of the day, what does this all mean? Fear not. Not now, not then, not ever. Just make the decision because you’ve got the power to do so. Thus ends my thoughts on fear. Thanks guys for listening. I know it wasn’t so

Chapter 11: Closing discussion

much a discussion thing as as it normally is, but I wanted to get that out. We finished with some great time. So, um, let’s hear from you. Let’s see. Let’s start from left to right and go with Jeff Miller. Um, I have a question for you. I believe everything that you said in there, and I hate to sound like I’m the exception to the rule, but there’s a lot of us that have unwarranted fears that were not in control of because of years of VA medicating my brain and PTSD and other things that I go from zero to 11 for no reason whatsoever. And I am so afraid. Am I not am I not doing

something to have the the love of God in me? I mean, you know, you question yourself at these times. If perfect love casts out all fear, I must not have perfect love if these things in my mind can cause so much fear. How would you respond? Uh, well, I would say a couple of things. The point of a lesson like this, Jeff, is to acknowledge that many of us, if not most of us, don’t have a perfect love. I would love to be able to say that I have a perfected love. Wouldn’t we all? But that’s just not true. So, first and foremost, I want you to be able to recognize that, yeah, you more than likely don’t have a perfect love.

What does that mean for you? Well, that means you need to work towards it. He’s using the the concepts here that we talked about today. The second thing I would say is yes, sometimes because our bodies are broken, we can have involuntary reactions, fearful reactions uh to certain stimuli or certain events that happen. um PTSD for example, you know, someone who struggles with that, might see something on TV or hear something spoken and have a a visceral reaction. Those are involuntary things that we don’t always have control over because we we live in these broken bodies. It’s up here and what’s in your heart that we need to master despite what our bodies are doing. I have a friend, a

very good close friend of mine, his name is Keith Brown. He was a marine. Uh he is a believer and has been his whole life. He was a marine and forced to take part in certain things uh back in his day uh that um hurt him physically. He exposed to certain chemicals uh experienced a helicopter fire where he was exposed to all type of fire retardants and other things. Anyways, it severely affected his livelihood. Now he’s like 65 years old or something like that. And the guy is barely hanging on, but he has managed to put under uh servitude those weird feelings, those weird memories, those fears of the past. and the things that he struggles with today.

And he lives as a great example of of fearlessness in my mind. To me, he’s a great example of it because he’s doing things at his age and in his condition that I simply can’t believe. And I think it’s because he is getting control of his of his heart and of his mind in regards to these things. Anybody else want to share anything? Glenn, number two. Yeah, I I just want to u point out the fact that u the the fearful instinct, the self-preservation instinct is baked in to our reflexes. So that’s that’s going to be there and that’s not a bad thing. That’s what can save our life and and get us out of danger on that trail when we see a bear.

Yeah. So, so you know that’s that’s good. However, um love is outgoing concern where fear is self-preservation and and so we can decide when we recognize we’re in self-preservation mode, we we can ask the questions, you know, is it real? Is is this what I ought to be doing? And we, you know, it’s it’s like starting with any new habit. You kind of suck at it at first, but then after you practice, you get better and better. And you know, at some point uh you cross that line and you experience a peace. I think it’s uh Philippians 4 somewhere around six or so that that talks about peace that passes understanding.

Yeah. a peace that passes understanding. Uh so anyway, I I just also want to say that u this was the most thorough coverage of the subject that I’ve I’ve ever seen. So I want to congratulate brother Ed for for doing a fantastic Job. Thank you, brother. Thank you. I appreciate that. Okay, brother Samuel. Shabbat shalom. Shabbat shalom. Um, there’s a scripture that I read and I’m not certain if it’s in Proverbs. It’s it’s possibly in the Apocrypha in the book of Sarah or Ecclesiasticus, but it says something to the effect that a wise man hides himself from danger. And you know, I I when you mentioned the scripture, I believe it’s from Matthew, but I know it was the Messiah saying

that there will become there will come a time when we are to flee to the mountains. um and we pray that our our we don’t flee um during winter. And the first thing that came to mind immediately to me was what happened with Lot when the when uh when the angel Yhovah and the other messengers um came to take him away. They woke him up and he terried as opposed to just grabbing his household and running. And when they told him, hey, go to the mountains, instead he he tried to bargain him down to go to another town that was just on the outskirts away from Sodom and Gomorrah. And then I think about Elijah who ran for his life from Ahab and Jezebel. And in that instance, he was provided for by

the ravens. So I see the the connection with respect to all that that scripture that you shared and it’s very important. When I saw that you were going to have this, you know, this very enlightening and and and edifying um teaching. I did a little word search because I start going back to your teaching on the book of Job and when he expressed his fear that came upon him upon hearing that his sons were killed at a feast and I’m looking at the word that is associated with the fear of Jehovah and I’m looking at the word fear that is associated with what happened to Job upon hearing what happened to his sons.

And they’re two separate words in Hebrew. And I’m looking at, you know, the the more um modern Hebrew. And then I’m looking at the PaleoHebrew, especially, you know, the pictographs. And I’m seeing that with the fear that’s associated with the reverential fear of Yhovah. It begins with the alle. And imman saying the left is representative of the father the most high the silent power with pad which is the other word because this there are two words that are related. So you have y and mo and I’m not going to get too deep into it but it’s a different word that’s used with with respect to the fear of yhovah and the fear that fell upon um upon Job.

And to me within the fear that’s involved in the fear of Yhovah, it’s it is reverential, but it’s also with the understanding that this is the the mighty power of the source that if it wasn’t there, we would be gone. And that source is not to be disappointed. is not divorced from the love because my understanding of of how the Hebrew concept um works is that it’s all integrated into that word. So the love is not separate from the obedience. The obedience isn’t separate from the healthy fear or the reverence. Um and lastly, I’ll say this. I it reminds me of a childhood friend of mine and his father was a very stern father.

The father provided. He worked. He did everything for his family, but he was a strict disciplinarian. And when my friend would get into fights with bullies and he would come home beat up and frightened, and I’m not saying that anybody should do this, but his father told him, “If you don’t go back out there and whoop that child, I’m going to give you a spanking yourself.” and his fear of his father overruled the fear that he had of those children. And my friend became one of the toughest children and toughest men I’ve come to know. I mean, I I I wouldn’t want to tussle with them. So, the the fear of the father that we have is supposed to be more than the fear that we have of men

and what men can do. Because with the father and with the son is not just the power to destroy the body but also to destroy the spirit. It’s not just the soul that’s in peril is more. But our love and obedience is what overcomes the fear of men and the fear of bearing the testimony and walking in righteousness to the best of our abilities. Thank you for allowing me to share Shabbat Shalom. Amen. Always, Samuel. Thank you. Okay, Chris, please. Chris Merrell. Yeah, thanks. Uh, great teaching this, uh, this week. I enjoyed it. Uh, I was actually going to hit on the same thing that Samuel just hit on, uh, because I,

I started going down a rabbit hole of like, well, there’s a bunch of different fears. Are they all the same words? So, I was looking at uh, Strong’s concordance trying to figure it out. And it was it was just interesting to see that that there are so many different words that we just associate with fear as if it’s all one word. Uh, it kind of reminded me of how how love is like four different meanings. uh completely different um levels or grades of love, I guess. Um so he kind of hit on the Hebrew, but in the Greek it was interesting because like one of them is phobos, which is where we get the word phobia from, and then do which is more of that reverence and holy holy respect.

So I just thought it was interesting. I I had stepped away and I wasn’t sure if you had like covered any of that, but um no, it was it was an awesome teaching. Thank you. Thanks, Chris. No, I didn’t. But thank you for for bringing it up. That’s why we love comments. Uh, Brother Snow, I wanted to say something to Jeff. I think he might have just dropped off. Uh, my dad’s a combat veteran. I’ve had to watch him go through this journey. Anyway, he’s not I don’t think Jeff’s available right now. So, I But, um, I’ll say this. Um, I think with the conscious part of fear or with the conscious part of of like how yes, there’s involuntary fear that we just don’t even know. We’re not consciously

competent. We don’t even know that what we don’t know that we’re going through it. But on the conscious part, you know, David David says in Psalm 42:1, and I’ve been working on this myself, and he’s he’s talking to his soul, and he says, “Why are you downcast, oh my soul? Why are you so much in turmoil within me? And then he says, put your hope in God. So take action. Put your hope in God for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. Uh I find it really interesting. You know, we do talk to ourselves. Um we do need to uh fix our our our eyes and our hope on God. Um I was going to talk to Jeff about that. Um but I do think that it’s

it’s like lifting weights. It’s hard to do it. We don’t even know we’re not doing it. It doesn’t even matter how long we’ve been in the Lord because God’s going to take us to new levels. Um so, um that’s all I wanted to say since he is not available. Um oh yeah, excuse me. There was one last thing is I we didn’t really touch on worry and uh I believe for me worry, you know, you know, and for us worry is sin. Uh worry is fear, the root of it. And for me it can get in our way. It can manifest itself in just even I remember like I used to have like s like breakouts on my

skin and I was like oh I’m worrying I you know. So I think that you know it’s really really important to uh pray. I also think um by being open um we can bring light in on our own fear. Being open with God first cast all your cares on him for he cares for you. Peter says, but I also wanted to say that doing that brings objectivity and helps us to uh keep our eyes on God. That’s all I want to say. Thanks, Tim. Yes, appreciate that. Yeah, worry is kind of like anxiety, right? You’re you’re worried about things that may or may not uh come to pass. But uh thank you, brother. Uh okay, Emily.

Shabbat shalom. I um just wanted to touch on the fear of Yahw um and knowing that Yeshua is our mediator. And I’ll have to go back through your slides. I don’t know which verse you were reading, but when you were um talking about how the people were afraid because of the great fire. Um so in Deuteronomy , the people are speaking to Moses and they say, “But now why should we die? This great fire will consume us, and we will die if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any longer. For what mortal has ever heard the voice of the living God speaking out of fire as we have and survived? Go near and listen to all that

the Lord our God says, “Then tell us, whatever the Lord our God tells you, we will listen and obey.” The Lord heard you when you spoke to me. And the Lord said to me, “I have heard what this people said to you. everything they said was good. Oh, that their hearts would be inclined to fear me and keep all my commands always so that it might go well with them and their children forever. So, and here is where we were rudely and abruptly interrupted by demonic activity. I also want the person responsible for doing this to know that despite your actions, we have been praying for you and praying that you yourself would overcome your own fears and uh and hopefully in in in some way

or fashion in the future be able to join this group uh once whatever demon is floating around in your heart has been purged by the blood of the lamb. Guys, thank you so much. Uh, and we’ll see you next time. Have a great weekend.