Facing the Giant of Fear
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Intro
Intro
Morning, continuing on from Tom last week & finishing today a 2 week series on Facing the Giant.
Today fear & fear is a very real thing & it’s not to be laughed at, fear of something can absolutely control someones life, it can decimate the family of a person who is struggling with fear. It can stop you in your tracks, make you never do what you did again for fear of getting it wrong. Which is why we have to look at how we deal with people in leadership, we do not want to grow an atmosphere of fear of leadership in this church or our families but of respect for each other.
It can desimate someones life, our minds, it can make even the smallest thing seem like the biggest thing in the world. Fear can keep us from doing what we are called to do, we might say, if God wants me to do it, He’ll take away the fear, he’s giving you the opportunity to face your fear, what you have to do is trust Him in your fear, knowing He will show up, that he is there with you. kids do the whole i’m not going on that ride unless you go with them, holding their hand the first time on it, after that they fly & we cheer, that’s what God does, even when we have been brave in stepping out & get to the scary bend of the ride seeking Him, He holds our hand, mops our brow, tells us we can do this. God is in the fear, He’s all over it, we just have to trust Him.
Hold on though, what if you don’t know God & the fear you have is that you aren’t good enough, God won’t accept you. That fear can keep you back from an incredibly loving God who wants nothing but for you to trust Him, because He already loves you, He sent His Son Jesus to die on a tree for you too. None of us are good enough for God to do that, i know i wasn’t but He says come as you are let me do the rest, but what about my past, i’ll never be good enough, it doesn’t matter, your past doesn’t have to have a bearing on your future. God says “give it to me & together we will walk into your future”. Our God is a God of your future.
Some fears are just in our mind & there is no rhyme or reason for them. Anyone just woke up sometime in there life feeling fearful? i have.
Ok some questions, lets lighten it for a minute. Whats the funniest fear you have heard of? that’s not necessarily haha but maybe a wierd one.
Pete Jordan & cotton wool. the sound & feel, we laughed but it was real to Pete.
What has been your most irrational Fear?
What is your biggest Fear?
What Fears are you facing today?
Tell me some things about Giants that you know or can you name any.
Let me tell you some things about Giants, if you don’t already know.
Giants are bigger than us, the enemy, the Devil loves Giants & the reason He loves them is that Giants keep you in hiding, in caves of darkness so that you can’t be seen by them.
The Devil calling out to you by your Giants name, keeping your focus on the Giant you face, because if it’s on the Giant that’s bigger than you then you will never see the way out, you will never see the truth & the truth is that God is real, that God loves you & that He has a better way, together you can defeat the Giant.
What we need to do is start to take hold of the promises of God. One of those being that God will never leave you or forsake you.
Iv’e spoken about this before. When we first took on the leadership of this Church, 9 years ago, within the first 2 months of getting here, we had never led a church before but i was confident of what God was calling us too & then one morning i woke up, it was a Wednesday the morning after a Tuesday night Prayer meeting & things fely very different, i felt very fearful, i thought i was losing the plot. At first i thought i was having some kind of anxiety attack. but it didn’t seem right when some friends said that. (explain, school run, hoovering, Tammy making bottles for Eva, Church in Station Street.) & at this moment my focus shifted to my fear. God had given me & Tammy a very clear vision for Church & what it should look like & what it shouldn’t & then a voice kept coming into my mind “This didn’t happen in Lincoln, go back home”.
That’s when i knew what it was, a Spiritual attack trying to take me out, to make me back down, so i had to life my focus of me & my fear & back onto God because who know that our God is bigger than anything. there’s a way to do this ok. Don’t take God to the Giant, it’s the wrong way round, at that moment the focus is still the Giant, what we do is take the Giant to our great big God.
I woke up the next day God said to me purity the house, i went round praying, shabadabadooing putting oil everywhere, doors windows, gateway, driveway, the boundaries of the house.
A few times over the next few months he tried but my focus was on God & i knew what he was up to, fear had no chance, he was done.
We can be aggressive in our prayers with this stuff just as Jesus was agressive in the Temple when He drove out the Money changers.One of the scriptures that helped me the most was:
do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
What Giant is keeping you focused on it today? Keeping you wrapped up in it?
How can you change that so that this Giant doesn’t have a say in who you are? But so that you find out who you are in God.
Some fears: sesquipedalophobia:- the fear of long words
If you can say it, theres no need to fear long words anymore.
Maybe the fear of loss, fear of failure, fear of rejection, fear of the unknown.
The problem with these is that we react before they happen, let me explain.
The fear of loss can mean that we never let anyone in close incase we lose them, family, friends. Sometimes it makes us act in such a way that we actually push those away bringing that fear into reality making it our truth. Our focus is on it.
Failure:- Although we have the gifting & maybe desire in your heart to do something, you won’t because you might fail, so you tell yourself you don’t want to do it anyway & you never walk in the gifting that God has given you.
Rejection:- works in a similar way & anyone that doesn’t agree with you is seen as a rejection of you what happens is that bitterness takes over. your not good enough, another lie believed, God loves you.
Unknown:- Our imagination can sometimes run riot, what’s behind the door, under the bed & it becomes a giant in our life, when it can just be our minds misunderstanding the light or a shadow, or a scary bit in a book or film & our minds have held onto that bit. Pray let Jesus shine His light into the darkness of our mind & the darkness will flee. focus on Him not the Giant of fear.
for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.
What do we need to do, we need to face our Giants.
Story of david & Goliath
Like David we need to convert fear into Faith, when we face the fear we will see it for what it is, a faith killer & our Faith will build & turn us from a can’t do into a can do because God is with us.
So we need a change of perspective. The answer is always in here. Are you ready.
rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.
So how do we face the Giant?
Prayer. Got to start with prayer & reading of His word. Don’t wait for it to be an emergency call, don’t cry out in reaction to what you are facing but seek Him continually
Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his presence continually!
Don’t let your elationship with God become one of crisis management, only going to Him when in need.
Giants are to big to go over or around, you have to go through them, with God it is possible, once through you can move forward, take the Giant down & always trust in God, knowing that He has you, He is always there, never changes, always loves you, always wants the best for you.
As we finish.
Often the emotions that we feel in difficult situations are real but not entirely true. how can you align your feelings with God’s truth?
What one step of Faith are you gonna take this week?
What would you have to trust God with to take that step?
Prayer for people.
Thank you Lord for being so much more powerful than our fears. Thank you that it’s not in our hands but yours & thank you that you have our hearts & minds in your loving hands, taking us through every challenge that we face.
Help us to shift our focus onto you so that we can delight in you & give Jesus the desires of our hearts.
In Jesus name Amen.
Psalm 56:3