Speaker 2
0:20 Welcome to day three of week two of the 23rd Psalm. 0:23 We're going to start from the beginning again. 0:25 The Lord is my shepherd. 0:26 I shall not want he makes me lie down in green pastures. 0:29 He leads me beside still waters. 0:30 He restores my soul. 0:32 He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake, and even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death again. 0:39 Yesterday we covered this, 0:48 in fact, fellas, if you know somebody walking through the valley of the shadow of death, this is part of what's great about the Daily Blade. 0:52 Maybe you should send them yesterday and maybe even today's content. 0:53 He says I will fear no evil, for you are with me, your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 0:57 You see, fear is a very, very dangerous thing. 1:00 You see, fear is a tool in the hands of the enemy. 1:04 I don't know if you realize this, that there are some people that are wired just differently. 1:08 Okay, I'm not a super fearful guy. 1:10 If you know anything about Kyle, he's not a super fearful guy. 1:13 Some people are more prone to worry and other people are not. 1:16 Okay, but according to the Bible, fear is not a feeling, fear is a spirit that does not come from God. 1:25 Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 1, these words he says God has not given you a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of self-discipline. 1:36 And so if there is fear in you, then that does not come from God. 1:41 Now let me distinguish. 1:41 There's a difference between being afraid or being full of fear and just being scared. 1:47 Scared is a feeling. 1:48 Scared is a physiological reality that God has given us so that we know that we can either fight or flight. 1:54 If the bear comes, it's okay to be scared, so you run away. 1:57 If there's lightning outside and you're scared, so you can go get in the house. 2:00 Scared is a feeling, and when you feel scared, then what you do is, by faith, you cowboy up and you take a step forward, and that's called courage. 2:08 And we need some more men of courage in the church, no problem. 2:12 But fear is something different. 2:15 Fear is when we are so gripped by our circumstances that it paralyzes us. 2:22 David doesn't say I will fear no evil, because there's not evil to fear. 2:25 There's all kinds of people out there that want to kill him, but he refuses to be paralyzed by his circumstances and instead, by faith, he's going to move forward. 2:35 I don't know if you've ever thought about this. 2:36 But the opposite of faith is not doubt. 2:40 That's right. 2:40 The opposite of faith, 2:45 no problem. 2:46 If you've got unanswered questions, great. 2:48 If you've got things about the Bible and about theology and about the reality of God and suffering, or God and lost people or whatever it is. 2:55 If you've got unanswered questions and doubts, great. 2:58 You could make a great disciple. 3:00 And you say, pastor, where do you get that? 3:01 I get it from the New Testament. 3:02 Have you read the Gospels Matthew, mark, luke and John? 3:06 They had all kinds of doubts, they had all kinds of unanswered questions, and Jesus chose these ordinary, uneducated men to turn the world upside down. 3:15 What do you do? 3:16 You just pick up your doubts. 3:17 You pick up your unanswered questions and you follow after Jesus and one day all of your doubts will go away. 3:24 One day you will be in heaven and you don't even need faith anymore. 3:28 You will have proof. 3:29 You just open your eyes and there he is, sitting on the throne. 3:32 So the opposite of fear is not doubt. 3:35 The opposite of fear, excuse me, the opposite of faith is not doubt. 3:39 The opposite of faith is fear, because faith produces action and fear paralyzes. 3:47 And the reason that King David will fear no evil is not because he's good enough and strong enough, not because he's powerful enough, not because he says I got this, one of the most dangerous things you can say as a grown man. 4:01 The reason that he has no fear of evil is because God is with him, 4:08 and where there is light, no darkness shall prevail. 4:13 Where the truth stands up, the lie has to leave. 4:16 Where the presence of God is, the presence of evil cannot be that. 4:20 Perfect love casts out fear. 4:23 Listen, when my little girl was that, when she was a little girl and I would tuck her in and sometimes she would be afraid of the dark, she'd be like daddy, I'm scared, I go, baby, why are you scared? 4:33 And she would say cause there's monsters under my bed. 4:35 And the last thing I did is tell her that there weren't monsters. 4:37 That's a terrible thing to tell your kids Cause there are monsters in this world. 4:41 And so I would get her down with a flashlight and she and I together would look and say see, baby, there are. 4:46 Like look and say see, baby, where this light goes, they've got to flee. 4:49 But know this, know this 4:57 I am here with you, and when I am with you, you have nothing to be afraid of. 5:01 And so, even though King David was walking through the valley of the shadow of death. 5:03 The reason that he would fear no evil is because the almighty, sovereign king of the universe was with him. 5:08 And the reason you and I don't have to fear is we have one up on King David. 5:13 If you were a follower of Jesus Christ, the moment you put your faith in Jesus Christ, the spirit of God is not merely with you, he is in you. 5:21 So what have you been afraid of? 5:23 What do you need to take courage in and, by faith, step forward where previously you have been paralyzed by fear. 5:32 Go and do walk through that valley, knowing that God is with you.