MY LIFE: #47 Love Cast Out Fear

The answer for me was not just in accepting the fact that I am loved by God, but rather it is in accepting Christ, who is love, into my mortal being.

TRUE LOVE CAST OUT FEAR

Since I did not understand the true meaning of love, fear began to punish me by forming in me a belief that I had to pay for my own sins. Also, this is why I searched to find “love” in all the wrong places. The end results - my flesh questions humanity’s expression of love toward me.

There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. We love, because He first loved us. (1 John 4:18-19)

LUKEWARM LOVE DRIVES ME ‘CRAZY’

The word “love” is one of those words the emergent Christian world has twisted into being some kind of lukewarm catch-all for acceptance, but 1 John tells us something completely different:

We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. (1 John 4:16)

Since the most accurate definition of “love” is “God,” we can now put the passage of 1 John 4:18 this way:

There is no human forced into alarm or fright through terror in God, but the perfect God casts out phobias and terror of men that derive from Satan. Terror involves self-payment of sin, and the one who lives in terror is not perfected by God in Christ Jesus.

One final connection I would like to make – since “God is love” and Jesus Christ is God, we can make a clear statement about 1 John 4:16:

We have come to know and have believed in Christ, which God has for us. Since God is love, and the one who abides in Christ abides in God, and God, through Christ Jesus, abides in the born-again believer.

Let’s review John 15:5 regarding abiding in Christ:

"I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5)

Putting the two passages together in a paraphrase, we can see this:

I am about the Father’s work (ampelos), you are the limb or growth (klema) that comes forth from Me and that places Me in you; because of this, you can bear the fruit of the Holy Spirit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

The answer for me was not just in accepting the fact that I am loved by God, but rather it is in accepting Christ, who is love, into my mortal being - salvation. To many, it is a “play on words,” but to me, it is the difference between Life and selfishly endeavoring to find “love.”

The fear in my life would block Christ from living out His Life through me. This resulted in me loving myself with a selfish love - like having a love affair with myself. Even though I was a born-again indwelt Christian, Satan would use these fears to form in me a covert rebellion that would rise up against the mind of Christ in me. Thus, I found myself “doing the very thing I hate.” The simple fact is that when we put our hand up in resistance (by not allowing the Spirit of Life to renew our minds), we begin doing the things that we “hate.” When we do this, the residue of the Adamic nature begins to bubble up causing our minds to think and act fleshly.

“For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good” (Romans 7:15-16).

The doctrines of identity within this message are critical for the indwelt believer to embrace. Paul is actually telling us that he isn’t the one doing the things that he hates, but it is the sin that is housed in his mortal body (flesh). He is revealing a clear understanding of his identity (who he really is), as well as the residue of sin leftover from the Adamic nature within his body & mind. He is separating himself from his sin in the most literal way possible. God has revealed to him that there is nothing good in his flesh – trash left behind by the old nature. Even though it sounds like Paul refuses to take responsibility for his choices of sin, he is actually confessing one of the most profound Truths of identity – I am not my sin/flesh.

Needless to say, my life became a life of attempting to live up to the standards of the Laws (of God and man), confessing with my selfish behavior that the Law was good - at least in the sense that the Law could be fulfilled through self-effort. The big problem with my “stinky thinking” is that the one who breaks the Law has to be punished with the letter of the Law. This is why “fear involves punishment” (1 John 4:18).

The law of sin (in our mortal bodies) constantly pushes up through the body into our emotions, forcing itself into our will, and ultimately wages war against the law of our mortal minds. By resisting the Holy Spirit (who resides in our regenerated spirit), we thus agree that the law of sin has more power than that of Christ within. This is why it is such a horrific sin to submit to the law of sin and death over the Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.

To be able to say that the reality of two-thirds of our earthly triune is mastered by sin is actually the principle that leads us to be thankful to and through Jesus Christ for understanding the identity war within the true believer.

Once our minds begin to resist the overflow of the Spirit, the human mind will default to inferiority, insecurity, inadequacy, guilt, worries, doubts, and fears, which are quick to dump into the mortal body as “selfish behavior.”

It is the believer’s choice to walk after the flesh or to live in their true identity in Christ! Living Death is a result of walking after the flesh. Abundant Living is the glorious overflow of the Life of Christ by those who choose to walk in and after the Spirit. Walking after the flesh is choosing to believe that our thoughts, feelings, and appearance define who we are – behavior flows from identity. On the other hand, walking in and after the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus is choosing to believe God’s indwelling Word (Life of Christ) to direct the soul and body in living righteously. Once we dump our stinky thinking, authentic supernatural change can take place in the mind - thus, having Christ-as-Life behavior. How glorious is that?

Once I began to appropriate my true identity in Christ, my fears lessened the hold on my daily living. I, we, have to continue to make choices to listen to the voice of the Lord in us and then choose to walk in what He says is true about those indwelt by Him. This is not a one-time occurrence but a daily reckoning to be dead to ourselves, our flesh, and alive unto Christ Jesus.

Coming up next is #48, “Accepting my Righteousness.”

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