“Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to courts and flog you in their synagogues, and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the Gentiles. When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour. For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death, and you will be hated by all for my name's sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next, for truly, I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.” (Matthew 10:16-23 ESV)
Now Jesus gave these instructions to his twelve disciples, but what he instructed them in this section of the Scriptures is not just specific to them, but these instructions are for all the Lord’s disciples (followers, believers in Christ), except in any place where the reference is specific to a particular place or person or group of people. For these same instructions, or others similar to them, are taught in other places in the Scriptures and are intended for the Lord’s followers both for then and for now.
For we who believe in Jesus Christ with genuine God-persuaded faith in him, who are paying attention to what he says, and who are listening to him with our minds and hearts, and not just with ears, who are following him in obedience to his commands, are his sheep, his followers (John 10:27-30). And he is sending all of us out into the world to share the truth of the gospel with the people of the world and with the worldly church, too. And we are being sent to people who may not want to hear what we have to say, too.
Even within the gatherings of much of what is called “church” these days are these wolves in sheep’s clothing, these men who will reject us, and who may put us out of their gatherings, and who may deliver us up to religious authorities just because they don’t like us, or just because they don’t like it that we are teaching the truth of the gospel, or just because we don’t fit with their marketing schemes and goals for how to grow their “churches” (businesses). And they may not like it when we talk about repentance.
And they might pull all kinds of wicked and evil schemes in order to get rid of us in order to silence us because we are not following the ways of man, but we are following after the ways of God and of the Scriptures taught in their appropriate context. And we can see what is going on in many of these “churches” that is not of God, and that is against the teachings of the Scriptures, and so they don’t want us among them for we might tell people the truth that they don’t want them to hear. This is a present reality!!
Another ploy that they may use against us is to bring up our pasts, for we all have a past. And I believe that may be one of the reasons the Lord had me write out my testimony and to place it on the internet, so that if they tried to use my past against me I could tell them that my testimony has been in the public for a long while now, so I have not been hiding the truth of what I did in the past. And the Lord has me frequently share parts of it so that there is no false notion that I have always walked faithfully with the Lord Jesus.
And if we are honest people we should have no fear of what they might bring up against us. But they may also make up things about us, too. And in our day and age everything and anything can be faked and photoshopped and altered and copied and mimicked to make it look and sound like us, or to make it look as though we said things we did not say. Or they may misquote us by taking our words out of context, for artificial intelligence can do amazingly evil things against us. But we are not to fear them.
We must trust in the complete sovereignty of God and in his power and strength to get us through any and every trial that comes our way, and to give us the words that we need to say when we need to say them, or the wisdom to know when to keep silent because we are being set up. For we do have very evil people plotting much evil against us, and that time is fast approaching when Christians in America are going to get to taste what Christians throughout the world have been suffering for a very long time.
But we must not fret and worry about these things or what might be done to us or said about us, because we have not much control over these things at all, but God does. And look at Jesus as our example. They said and did horrible things to him and they killed him as though he was a common criminal, but God allowed it for his purposes, for the salvation of human lives. And sometimes he allows suffering in our lives to motivate us to serve him in ministering to the people of this world in order to save human lives.
But what he promises us who follow him in obedience is not a life of ease, but a life of hardship and suffering and pain, as well as a life of joy and purpose and direction and salvation from sin and eternal life with God. So he promises us that even our closest friends and our family members and even others who call themselves Christians will turn against us and betray us. And they may turn us over to the authorities for them to exact punishment upon us because we hold fast to the truth of the Scriptures.
And if we truly are following Jesus Christ with our lives, as his true sheep who are listening to him, and who are following him in obedience, we are going to be hated, mistreated, persecuted, falsely accused and abused by those who are against us and who are against our walks of faith in Jesus Christ and/or who feel threatened by our walks of faith and our testimonies for Jesus Christ because we are telling people the truth and we are exposing the lies and the deceptions for what they are.
But the one who endures to the end will be saved. And this means exactly what it says. Heaven is not guaranteed us on a mere profession of faith in Jesus Christ. We must be walking by that faith daily in obedience to our Lord and we must no longer be walking in sin, making sin our practice. This doesn’t mean that we will live in absolute sinless perfection, like Jesus did, but that God measures our faith by what we do in practice. If sin is what we practice, we will die. If righteousness and obedience is our practice, we live.
Now sometimes Paul stayed where he was being persecuted, as did Jesus, and sometimes they left and went someplace else. And sometimes they came back to the places where they had been persecuted before, where they knew that persecution awaited them. So our Lord’s instructions to us is not always to flee and to go someplace else, though it may be sometimes. So we just need the wisdom of God to know when he is saying to remain and when he is telling us to leave and to go somewhere else.
[Matt 5:10-12; Matt 10:16-25; Matt 24:9-14; Lu 6:22-23; Lu 21:12-19; Jn 15:1-21; Jn 16:33; Jn 17:14; Ac 14:22; Rom 5:3-5; Phil 3:7-11; 1 Pet 1:6-7; 1 Pet 4:12-17; 2 Tim 3:12; 1 Thess 3:1-5; Jas 1:2-4; 2 Co 1:3-11; Heb 12:3-12; 1 Jn 3:13; Rev 6:9-11; Rev 7:9-17; Rev 11:1-3; Rev 12:17; Rev 13:1-18; Rev 14:1-13; 1 John 1:5-10; 1 John 2:3-6: 1 John 3:4-10]
Why Are You Afraid?
An Original Work / December 5, 2013
Based off Various Scriptures
Do not be afraid.
Your Lord is always by your side.
Serve the Lord in righteousness
Before Him all your days.
Those who hate the light
Will not come to the Lord.
They fear their deeds
Might be noticed.
So, they hate the light,
And they embrace the night.
Do not be afraid,
Although your enemy attacks.
Dare to share your testimony
Of God’s saving grace.
Do not fear their threats,
But honor Christ, your Lord.
Be prepared to give an answer
For the hope you have,
With gentleness; respect.
Why are you afraid?
For all that’s hidden will be shown.
What I tell you, speak in daylight.
Let the truth be known.
Do not be afraid
Of those who’ll take your life.
Fear the Lord with understanding.
Trust Him with your life,
And give not up to strife.
Do not be afraid.
Take courage, it is I, your Lord.
Bow before Me; now adore Me.
Oh, why do you doubt?
Listen to the Lord.
Get up and bear His name!
Run and tell the world He loves them.
Jesus came to save.
Give Him your all today.
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