Fear Not part 3
When you afraid, you are not made perfect in love. Which is to say you don't fully understand love. I think a lot of the fear, and the misunderstanding, comes from being afraid to put ourselves out there. When you reach out your hand and someone slaps it away... that's excellent incentive to never reach it out again. When you touch the fire and get burned... that's a good way to stay away from the fire. But the fire is what MAKES us perfect. The fire is what purifies us. The fire is... God. Literally. "For our God is a consuming fire" (Hebrews 12:29). And what we see about this fire from the picture of the burning bush that spoke to Moses... is that the fire burns but isn't consumed. The fire consumes everything BUT itself. The finished work of the cross was the Messianic rebrith of the world. Stripping away--BURNING away--everything but Jesus Himself. Everything but LOVE Himself. Which means on this side of the cross there is nothing but love. Look at another passage in Hebrews, "Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man" (Hebrews 2:8-9). As He is, so are we in this world, right? So if everything is under His feet that means everything is under our feet. We are overcomers not because we can (maybe) overcome some day. We are overcomers because HE overcame. In us. And through us. And as us. The problem is that we don't always see everything under our feet. We don't always see things the way they are. BUT. We see Jesus. His strength is made perfect in our weakness. When we see Him--when He appears (again) in us, and through us, and as us--we see ourselves as we truly are. When we look in the mirror we see the beloved Son of God in whom He is well pleased. And we know that we are connected to that unlimited source of love. We know that we don't have to be afraid of anything. Certainly not of losing what we've got. We were given what we've got SO THAT we could give it away. If you don't use it, you lose it. But in this sense you use it BY losing it. By giving it away. By sharing it. Because love IS giving. Love is a love feast that everybody is invited to. Receiving and releasing the love of God is how we are perfect in love. Mature in love. Full to overflowing with love to the point that it comes out with every move we make and every breath we take. And that, friends, is why we're here. Not to fear an angry God who is out to get us. We are here to live! And to live is to love. To love is to live. They aren't just connected, they are the same thing. Giving what you've got will not leave you with nothing. Giving what you've got is how you experience and enjoy what you've got. A feast is best enjoyed when it is shared. When it feeds everybody. And that's what God is all about. That's what love is all about. Seeing a need and meeting it. Giving what you've got without being afraid that you'll lose it. Experiencing God's love... by giving it away!