The Faith Beyond Trauma Podcast

The Spirit of Fear

• Pastor Reggie

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We draw a bright line between fear as a normal emotion and the spirit of fear as a controlling mindset, then show how Scripture leads us from dread to courage. Stories, passages, and prayer help us check emotions early and choose power, love and a sound mind.

• fear as immediate response, anxiety as future-focused
• when emotion becomes expectation of evil
• reading 2 Timothy 1:7 through the fruit of the Spirit
• Timothy’s pressures and Paul’s reminder of authority
• Joshua 1 on courage, obedience and focus
• practical steps to check fear quickly
• guarding thoughts with Philippians 4
• story of a child’s nightmare and parental prayer
• authority of believers to resist fear and act in love
• guarding the heart so emotions do not take root


SPEAKER_01:

Hi, this is Pastor Reggie. Welcome to the Faith Beyond Trauma Podcast, where we equip you to live healed, liver, set free of the fresh limitation of traumatic experiences by grace through faith. Or, as we like to say, we empower people to live the transformational life. On this episode, we're going to talk about the spirit of fear versus the emotional experience of fear, the similarities and the differences that are very important for our walk by faith. Last time we spoke, we talked about, we we ended with the simple question What is the spirit of fear versus the emotional experience of fear? We talked about how fear is an emotion. It's an emotion. It's an internal response to an external threat. This is where you get your fight, flight, freeze, or faint. This is your body's response to what it's experiencing in that moment. Anxiety differs in that anxiety talks about what could potentially happen or what is coming days, years, months from now. You fill the blank. But it's future-oriented. And typically doesn't always hit the way it could be. Fear, something's there. You walk outside the you walk outside your house, you're going down a dark alley, fear is typically there. Because people could jump you. You feel the blank, so on and so forth. Fear. Tangible things that are in the moment. So fear is an internal response. Emotions typically internal response to external stimulus. When we it's human to have those type of responses. Where it becomes problematic, very problematic, is when it shifts from an internal response to something external to an external response to something internal. What do I mean? I mean that if you have a situation to where you have an experience, it produced fear. So now when you move forward, you have expectations of evil. One definition of fear is the expectation of evil. So now you begin to maneuver, operate your life with the expectation of evil happening, lurking everywhere. That's when you are becoming or have become controlled by the spirit. Or your emotional response has shifted to spiritual control. Because fear, when it's allowed, when it moves from an internal response to external stimulus, when it shifts to become your modus operandi, that's when you notice a spiritual thing. It's not just fear. Oh da da da da. No, this is a thing. Couple examples. One is found in Job chapter one. I mean not Job. Joshua chapter one, the other one is in 2 Timothy. 2 Timothy is where we get the verse, 2 Timothy 1, verse 7. But God's not getting up the spirit of fear and timidity, or spirit of fear, but of power and love and sounds and mind of self-discipline. So we know the last three manifestations, the last three things that Paul was writing to Timothy about, that's what the Holy Spirit produces according to Galatians 5, verse 22 and 23. Fruits of the Spirit, we call them, or manifestations, external manifestations of the indwelling presence. Are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, fruit, faithfulness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control. Reggie, how can you say that? It causes fruit. Yes, we we may know how a tree looks, but if you have two trees that look the same, you won't know what type of tree they are until you see its fruit. Right? If you have seeds, unless you know what you're doing, know what type of seed it is. A lot of seeds look very similar. Put in the ground, you cultivate it, it produces fruit. Manifestation, external fruit of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. Galatians 5, 22 and 23. So Paul pulled this from here until he reassured Timothy because at this time, Timothy was pastoring one of the largest churches in the known world. And the church was experiencing great persecution. Great persecution from political pressure. A lot of different things was going on. So he's writing to his mentor, Paul, and Paul responded back. Hey, don't forget. Don't forget how things were. Don't forget your genuine faith. Don't forget the faith of your mother and your grandma. Don't forget what I deposited and laid my hands upon you. Let up a hand, transferring what's in and upon me onto you. Paul, I put my hands on you so I know what I deposit inside of you. And remember, God does not give the spirit of fear. The Holy Spirit does not produce fear. The Holy Spirit produces power, love, soundness of mind. And in that moment of persecution where he felt powerless, God is like, hey, you have the authority. You have authority over the situation. Yes, it may not appear as such, but by faith, not fear, expectation of good. That could be a rudimentary 19 definition of faith. A rudimentary in this context, expectation of good. We expect it to turn out good. So external stimulus, persecution, things are going crazy. My members, what's going on? I'm the lead. They look into me. I don't know what to do, Paul. Remind you, the Holy Spirit produces power. Love. Perfect love cast out fear. Sound as a mind of self-discipline. To where we do Philippians 4, 6, 7, 8. As you do Philippians 4, tell God what you need. Thank him for what he's done. Peace come. Peace guides you to move forward. Because peace connects you back with the power. Shows you how to navigate forward. As you're navigating forward, now we have to fix our thoughts. Keep it fixed. Keep it here. It's not the absence of contradictory stuff. You're gonna have stuff that contradicts what you're standing in faith for. That's the primary job of the adversary, D. Avalos adversary. He's doing his thing. He's sending contradictory facts to what the word of God is saying. And so now the question is: will we be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding what the word of God is saying? Or will we let go of God and change what we speak, change what we say, change what we do based on what we experience our five senses? But God not giving us a spirit of fear. So that's the context. Another one, Joshua, chapter one. Joshua, this is after the death of Moses. Bible says he's one of the most humble, men, powerful men that lived on a planet that in this day. Done great miracles. He was a type of deliverer of the people. So these people looked up to him, millions of people looked up to him, but now he's gone. And it's time for Joshua to leave. So God tells Joshua, look, verse 3. Yeah, I promise you, I promise Moses. Whatever you set your foot, wherever you set your foot, you will be on that land. I have given you from the Negab in the south to Lebanon Mountain North, from the Euphras in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the west, including all the land of Hittites. No one will be able to stand against you as long as you live. For I will be with you as I was with Moses. I will not fail nor abandon you. Not only that, you got all these people who are mourning. Joshua was close to Moses himself, so you know he's mourning. It's almost like Paul and Timothy, but Joshua couldn't write to Moses now. So we have a situation where God is telling Joshua, I'm gonna be with you like I was with him. And if you hear stuff like that, like, man, particularly if you reverence somebody, they were great people. You I can't, and you begin to see yourself a little bit different. God, another time. Next verse. Be strong and courageous. For you are the one who will lead these people to possess all the land. I swear the answers I will give them. Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the instructions Moses gave you. Do not deviate. Stay focused from the turn to the left or to the right. They will be your then you'll be successful. Everything you do. That promise still stands to this day. Focus on the word of God. Focus on the word of God. Do what the word of God tells you to do. You'll have good success. Study the book of instruction continually. Meditate on it day and night. So you'll be sure to obey everything written in it. Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do. Promise still to this day. Verse 9. This is my command. Be strong or courageous. Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. So we see this. We see this. Two men, they were battling with fear. And the response was in that moment, check it. So we're seeing that fear as a natural response to what's going on. The human experience of fear must be checked in this help in its proper place. Or if allowed to linger, it opens up the opportunity for spiritual possession and domination. It must be dealt with in that moment. Now we're not saying that just because you know you experience fear because hey, there's people down the street, they might beat me up. If not dealt with, if not if the emotions are left unchecked, they be they shift from internal response to external stuff to external responses to internal stuff. So now instead of fear being out there, it becomes in here. And when it becomes in here, that's what the enemy wants. He wants to control you inside out. Because now if I can get here, then what I can do, I can control your responses. So now, as opposed to not going here, not doing this, da da da. Well, now what you're gonna do, you're gonna go nowhere. You're gonna isolate yourself, you're gonna run deeper and further from places. And most importantly, I can get you to obey and stand against the word of God, the power of the Holy Spirit's ability. So as opposed to operating in power, love, soundness of mind, or self-control, you're gonna operate direct opposite. As opposed to the power that God gave you when he resurrected Christ from the grave, and Jesus said, All power is given. Here, you go take the power of go. We're gonna not operate in it. And things that we were meant to dominate, to rule and reign from, you will sit beside and get defeated and live lives bound, live lives impoverished. Why? Because you're separated from the promise of the provisions of God. I never said anything about physical resources. I'm talking about the star of spiritual resource, spiritual connectivity. Power. You have power. You've been given power. How do I know? Matthew chapter 10. Matthew chapter 10, Mark chapter 16. I like Matthew 10 because a lot of times people skip over two commissions. Jesus is called the 12, verse 1 together, gave him authority to cast out evil spirits to heal every type of disease and illness that never stopped. We have power. We have power. We have power, same power. Power, love, second, I mean, first of all 13 4 through 8. It's interesting because like we know that unchecked emotions, unchecked, undealt with, unchallenged. Because like think about it. I mean, we're going into Halloween season. How many people to enjoy a hunting house have to be outside in natural mind? A lot of times they're inebriated or under the influence of something. But if you saw it clear, you can okay, see what it is. And so it's these unchecked emotions, these unchecked, undealt with things, if not properly dealt with. What happens is that as opposed to being seized or sacrifices or offerings unto the Lord, they can become open doors to the enemy to bash still key understanding. Look at where it started. Just an emotional response situation. My wife told me a story recently about her son came into our room. He's five. And he had a bad dream. Natural. You know, may have seen something and thought, ah, you feeling the plane? Bad dream. Came into the room, went to his mom. She comforted him, led him in the prayer, showed him his power and authority over the situation. He experienced that moment, hour that he had with that collective prayer, love. He able to go to his mom, who loved him, held him up on the girls supporting him, and reminded him and encouraged him that he had soundness of mind. He didn't have to settle for that dream. Of course, in the natural, like most parents, okay, with it, watching what you watch, watching what you eat. I think this was about bugs. He had read a book about bugs in his class. But so now you deal with it, you check it in the moment. You go to God because what happened is if this stuff is allowed to linger, or we bury it as opposed to lift up as an offering. God, I'm this, I'm that. This is what's going on, that's what's going on. Or go to people of God, men and women of God, who can direct you, who can undergird, protect you, who can intercede for you in that moment. If this is not dealt with, these things can be used by the enemy to steal, kill, destroy, undealt with, unchecked with. If not dealt with, so please hear me when I say emotions are just that emotions. Okay, cool. Deal with it. Deal with it. Don't let it go unchecked. Because if unchecked, would they become planted? What fruit would they produce? What fruit do you want to produce?

SPEAKER_00:

Take care without cat. Guard your heart. Present it to God. Father God, this is on the beginning.

SPEAKER_01:

Yep. Feel it. I really believe. About to go there. Thank you for your promise, Father God, to be strong and courageous. Most important, I thank you for your divine ability to do what you say that we can do. If you tell us to be strong and bear courageous, not be afraid. We can do it. We do not have to be afraid, Father God. Even if that means that we have to unlearn some things, that we have to learn some new ways. We do not have to live in fear. Especially we do not have to let make ourselves open to the spirit. I bind every attack of the enemy that's still can destroy us. I bind every spirit, every demonic influence, every demonic word, action, thought that is not the word of the Holy Spirit, the words of God, the life-giving seeds of faith over my brothers and sisters right now. But God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and soundness of mind. So as we enter into this season, going to the holidays, we know, Father God, that so many people are living in Halloween all year long. So we just thank you, Father God, we command the blessing. Heal, deliver, and set free, that thou worry restriction free. That they will be able to walk by faith, not limited by what they have experienced. Not only that, Father God, I just thank you that in the season that you are given new, renewed visions of their power that you have given them, Father God. And most important, I pray for a great awareness that you are near them, that you are with them, and that you are for their success, that you want to do empower to turn the situation around for them good, whether it's the individual situation, dear God, the family situation, Father God, the institutional situation, dear God, our country and our planet, Father God, all it takes is one. But we thank you that we got more than one ready to go. We say yes to your will, yes to your way, Father God. We will no longer be bound by the presentation of traumatic experience, but we declare we are healed, lived, set free by grace through faith. We will manifest your good, please, and perfect with our spirit. So, Father, in Jesus' name, we pray, God all done. Amen. And so be it. Oh yeah. It's about to get good until we meet again.