Drawing the line between FEAR and FAITH

Fear versus Faith.

The opposite of Faith is Unbelief

The opposite of Love is Fear.

Only perfect love can cast out ALL fear.

If you fear, you don’t know how much you are loved.

Reminding yourself of God’s love for you, will drive out that fear.

He has that perfect love, but we forget that he does.

Sometimes momentarily when we feel no fear, it’s because we have that revelation of his perfect love fill us at that time, and later we might forget.

KEY: Keep REMEMBERING, you are LOVED.

I’ve been wondering why so many Christians set rules upon themselves to abstain from this and that. Things they believe are “of the world” or under the rule of Satan. Well, it just seems that if you were really to google anything and everything, it had some kind of evil origin because lets face it, we live in a fallen world. So many things that we do and say today was birthed out of some form of religion, culture and history which we do not know and understand a 100% about.

If we were to really dig deep into where things come from, things would get ugly.

Oh, don’t sit with your legs crossed on the floor because that is a yoga pose, and that would invite demons into your body. Don’t close your eyes and relax and breathe deep. Don’t put your hands together in prayer, lift up your hands to the air instead.

Don’t eat pork, because you are going to stumble anyone that doesn’t agree with you about it. Don’t turn on the television, because if other Christians find out that you watch certain programs, they will be stumbled and will turn the TV on too – because some Christians believe that there are demons that will come into you through the programs.

Well, don’t work in a bank too! Because we are now living in the end times and the banks are all part of the bigger conspiracy where it is Satan’s plan to use money to make one currency through the world and control the world through the government, using money! Well, don’t have money and just keep gold in your house!

Don’t eat anything that is not organic. Don’t eat meat that is from companies that kill the animals inhumanely – do your research! How could you as a Christian who claims to love people, support such inhumane ways of animal torture? Don’t stumble your brothers and sister. In fact, just don’t eat at all – you should be fasting.

Don’t wear jewelry or anything above the knee, because that’s what the bible says according to some churches. It’s all about being holy on the outside as well as the inside. Don’t be of the world!! Run away, or just disappear it’ll be easier that way.

The list just goes on and on and on….. Let me ask you, WHERE DO WE DRAW THE LINE???

This issue has been on my mind a lot recently because of the “ YOGA” issue. Really, Yoga is just one of the MANY “DON’T”s in the Christian list of rules.

Again, I’m not talking about things like murder, adultery, pornography, etc, things that are clearly not done out of love. I think the best way to think about what is sin, is what would you do to YOURSELF? If you love someone, would you kill that person? Would you kill your husband, your wife, or your children if you loved them?

Back to the point about Fear and Faith – Let me ask you something and think about it really carefully – when you make decisions and take stands on “Christian views” on what to eat, what to wear, how to exercise, what type of lifestyle to have etc, is it driven by the nagging thoughts of FEAR in your heart, or is it truly because of FAITH?

It just dawned upon me today that so many decisions I had made, and things that I had believed in based on hearsay from other Christians about what I should do or shouldn’t do, was based on fear. It wasn’t faith that drove it but downright FEAR.

If I truly believed that “Christ in me” was the “hope of glory”, and that the same Holy Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lived in me, and that greater things I would do… I would expect that the minute I entered the YOGA class, IF there were any demons around, they would be screaming and shouting and begging the Jesus in me not to cast them into the abyss.

HOW OFTEN have we been more aware and more afraid of what Satan and his demons are doing, than WHO IS IN US and AROUND US?

HOW OFTEN have we made decisions and conclusions because we FEARED SATAN more than we BELIEVED JESUS?

HOW OFTEN have we felt that Satan’s strategy for destruction was bigger and smarter than GOD’S PLAN for SALVATION for all mankind?

Today, I pray that I will be more aware than ever of his love for me - His plans to prosper me, not to harm me, His plans to give me a hope and a future. I pray that every decision I make, every stand that I take and that everything that I do will be driven by faith and his love for me and not fear and unbelief in the authority I have as a daughter of the most high God who is the creator of the universe and all things. Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is FREEDOM!

OH, HOW HE LOVES US SO!