How to Kick Fear in the Teeth

Sermon Notes: 16.01.23

We desire change… dream about it… document it… detail it… but it takes a while to DO IT!

Fear is often responsible for the delay between between dreaming and doing.

Hippopoto-monstroses-quippe-dalio-phobia is the fear of long words.

What is your greatest fear?

There are Three Types of fear

• Good Fears, Ones to keep you alive

• Godly Fears, awesome, terrifying, respect, reverence

  • Proverbs 1:7 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge;

  • Philippians 2:12b work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

• Bad Fears Ones that hold you back, limits you

  • Failure

  • Who You Really Are (Imposter syndrome)

  • Rejection

  • Shame /Fear of Being Judged

  • Fear of Losing Control

  • Fear of Loss

Which is your most limiting fear? This may be different to your greatest fear!

• Romans 8:15 15 For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear. Instead, you received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father! ”

• Hebrews 2:1,14-15 1 Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it…14 Now since the children have flesh and blood in common, Jesus also shared in these, so that through his death he might destroy the one holding the power of death ​— ​that is, the devil ​— ​ 15 and free those who were held in slavery all their lives by the fear of death.

• 2 Timothy 1:7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but one of power, love, and sound judgment.

Our default is to slip back into slavery, that is our starting point. We need to be REMINDED of who we are. The Gospel proclaims "You are not a slave anymore."

The most limiting fear, the biggest issue - is spiritual

The antidote, is the work of Jesus, which destroys the one holding the power of death and releases the Spirit of adoption. That means a new family, new cultures, a new way of thinking

FEAR = Face. Examine. Apprentice. Repeat

1. Face: You won't change what you won't confront

“Are you paralyzed with fear? That’s a good sign. Fear is good. Like self-doubt, fear is an indicator. Fear tells us what we have to do. Remember one rule of thumb: the more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.” Steven Pressfield’s The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles

2. Examine: Focus on the cause, not the symptom. Figure out what’s holding you back.

3. Apprentice: Be With Jesus, Become Like Jesus, Do What Jesus Did Being a Christian is not just believing what Jesus said, agreeing with his teachings and his doctrines, but actually doing the stuff he says to do. This is where the transformation happens.

4. Repeat: There is no formation without repetition (James KA Smith)

There is no problem in human life that apprenticeship to Jesus cannot solve Dallas Willard

Face and examine your fears, kick them in the teeth, and start to move forward. You’re not a slave anymore.