1 John 4:18-19 “There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment. So the one who fears is not complete in love. 19 We love because He first loved us.” ~CSB I love my wife. I can stand on everything when I say this because we both have been through so much to be in this love that we have. We’ve been through heartache, deception, dishonesty, (all on my part). Yet, she is still here with me. The pain we have gone through, emotional and physical, was a fire that forged our understanding about each other’s perspectives. Because we stopped trying to run this marriage ourselves and allowed God’s love in, things changed for us. We both individually learned how much He loves us. Then, in turn, we learned how to love Him back. And the results of that, we learned how to love each other. The fact that I know how much she loves me; and she knows how much I love her, formed that ‘spiritual force field’ around us that keeps the enemy’s tricks and illusions out of our relationship. We are now strong like that! Now let’s look at all of us as a whole. Many of us are afraid of what the world shows us on a daily basis. What we see on social media, the news and from straight gossip, these things affect us. We become afraid for ourselves and for our children. This fear can cause us to make bad decisions in our lives. It can definitely keep us from hearing the direction God is trying to tell us to go. What if I told you there was a way to get rid of this fear? Look at fear as a fire. Every day this fire threatens to rage out of control, but before it can, you have to ‘extinguish’ it. Now think of God’s love as that ‘fire extinguisher. His Word is the extinguisher’s trigger. In the book of First John, starting with verse 7, we read how ‘love’ is the foundation of getting rid of fear. It starts with God’s love for us, way before we loved Him. The scriptures continue to talk about how God put this love in us. It talks about how God sent His one and only Son to die for a debt we cannot pay. This love of God in us has all the ingredients to suppress, destroy, and exterminate the fears we have that come from the devil. We must know how much God loves us by believing without a doubt verse 16, “...And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us…” We must allow this love to take us over so that we can pass this love onto others in this world. When we have this love, we release all the fear because, “...perfect love drives out fear…” Let’s learn how to use God’s love, (our very own ‘fear’ extinguisher), and extinguish some of that fear in our lives. May God bless and keep you under his protection of healing, direction and love in His Son Jesus’ name. Amen
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Authors Billy & YolandaThis is the place where we share our heart through God's Word in faith that will inspire and empower you to live in peace. Archives
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