Fear Not - Protection
Scripture Reading - 2 Kings 6:14-18 KJV
(14) Therefore sent he thither horses, and chariots, and a great host: and they came by night, and compassed the city about. (15) And when the servant of the man of God was risen early, and gone forth, behold, an host compassed the city both with horses and chariots. And his servant said unto him, Alas, my master! how shall we do? (16) And he answered, Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them. (17) And Elisha prayed, and said, LORD, I pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see. And the LORD opened the eyes of the young man; and he saw: and, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha. (18) And when they came down to him, Elisha prayed unto the LORD, and said, Smite this people, I pray thee, with blindness. And he smote them with blindness according to the word of Elisha.
Greetings fellow believer in the Awesome Name of Jesus may God’s Grace smile upon you this day while he fills you with all Peace. Today we will continue in our “Fear Not” series. In a previous lesson we highlighted the fact that worry comes from fear. If we can remove the fear from the situation, event, circumstance, sickness, government, person, etc. . . we will also remove the worry associated with that fear. Thank God through Jesus Christ we can remove the fear. According 1 John 4:18, “There is no fear in love but perfect (mature, sincere, untainted, pure) love casts out fear. Notice the verse didn’t say faith cast out fear, faith is good and we (ihlcc) firmly believe in faith along with the many benefits and blessing that come from using your faith but faith too works by love. This is why we understand that almost everything on God’s Heart (His Plan) functions on the never-failing Love of God. Remember, God is Love and God’s motives are based off of His never-ending Love. Yes, God’s Love is not just for a few devoted ministers but rather God so loved the world that He gave his only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish (sentenced to Hell), but have everlasting life (born of eternal life). Moreover, operating in the Love of God is our key to be free from all fear, worry and anxieties. In this lesson we will focus on “God’s Protection”. The story of Elisha is very encouraging to the Believer for several reasons that we will mention in the following sentences. First, we mention in this context that the servant of Elisha represents us the Christian who believes in God and is following God’s Will to serve the Lord continuously on a daily basis, Elisha represents the Lord Jesus full of wisdom and understanding, clearly seeing spiritually exactly what is going on in the natural realm in the midst of the natural circumstance that could overwhelm the common man. The LORD in conversation with Elisha is our Loving Father God who is harkening to (listening and answering) our prayers and petitions. With that being said, we can relate a little bit better because the principles of this real experience still apply to us today. Immediately we notice there is an enemy arrayed against us and this enemy has an army of evil ones following his commandments. We also notice his strategy was to kill the Man of God (the shepherd) so he could harm the sheep. Therefore, we must remember to pray for all those in the full-time ministry because the enemy is planning and trying to sift them as wheat. We pray that their strength fails not and that they walk in boldness proclaiming the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice he only focused on the minister of God because Elisha was working against the plans of the evil one (2 Kings 6:8-13). The King of Syria was warring against the whole nation but he couldn’t get to the King of Israel and the people until he could get pass the minister of God. Remember that when praying for your nation because we have awesome power when using the Word of God in the Name of Jesus. Thank God the King of Syria (representing the evil one, Satan) couldn’t get pass the Man of God but rather was defeated according to verses 18-23. This victory for the Man of God, the Believers, the King of Israel and God shows us that even when the enemy starts a war the Man of God with the aid of God’s weapons was more than enough to win that war without the loss of life. We also notice the Man of God prayed to the Lord for the eyes of his servant to be opened. So we learn that many believers are only seeing the natural side and what they see is a large (sometimes insurmountable) problem. I think we can all agree that two men whom typically minister to people standing against a large host of trained fighters is probably a victory for the evil one, if you consider only the natural circumstances. Therefore, we must keep our eyes on the spiritual to fight with our spiritual weapons of warfare known as the Word of God with the guidance of the Spirit of God. We also notice the Man of God representing Jesus had a plan that wasn’t revealed to the Believer so the Believer must walk by faith and just follow the leading of the Man of God (The Good Shepherd). Of course in the due process of time the Believer did see the whole plan and enjoy the benefits of victory. Please recognize that The Lord harkened unto the voice of the Man of God so be sure you always include the Word of God (His promises) when praying to God for help. This lets us see we are always prepared for victory when we follow the instructions of God’s Word. We spoke earlier about God’s Love so notice that this victory was a victory of faith but more importantly it was a demonstration of God’s great Love. Who do you know apart from God that would feed a whole army of soldiers that came to you with a plan to kill you and your people. No one, we repeat, there is no one like the Lord. Yes, not only did God bless the enemy army but He still sent His Great Angelic Host to ensure nothing evil happened to His People. Certainly greater is He that is in me (inside-spiritually) than he that is in the world (outside-naturally) according 1 John 4:4 If God would take care of His servants on this high level of protection just think of His Will to take care of you. Yes, our enemy will try to use whatever he can to hurt us and He focuses on bringing us fear but we must not focus on the workings of devil to fear but rather focus on God’s Love, His Goodness and His Word to keep our hearts full of peace giving no place to fear. Yes, the Lord said, “I will never leave you, nor forsake you, so fear not what man (or any ungodly enemy) can do to you.”-Hebrews 13:6 Dear fellow believer don’t think for one moment that this divine protection is only available for the few strong saints that are ministers because that would be incorrect. No, this divine protection is available to all God’s Children. Yes, even the unbelievers have a way into divine protection when they call upon the Name of Jesus and confess Him as their personal Savior and Lord. God’s Divine Protection is always available to us but we must purpose, participate and plan on using it whenever we need it while here on earth (which is all the time) because we (ihlcc) are pretty sure in Heaven it is all automatic because we have no enemies in Heaven, friendly family only. Amen!