Invincible and Fearless

Introduction

During the last few weeks many things happened in our community — snowstorms, car accidents, broken legs, surgeries, sickness, people struggling with health and other challenges. And then the world is still as crazy, confused and chaotic as it has been. It is no wonder that feelings of anxiety and fear emerge again. Also, the question has been asked, “Are we under spiritual attack?” 

Sometimes things just happen because we live in a broken world. A car slides off the road because it hits an ice patch. Sometimes we make foolish decisions with bad consequences and the blame is at our door, not the devil’s. Like Haniki and wrong shoes. However, we should also remember that God’s people are always under attack, especially when we live holy as God’s people and fulfill God’s purposes. Our “enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” (1 Pet. 5:8). We must always be vigilant. “Be alert and of sober mind” (1 Pet. 5:8). But our focus must be in the right place, on God, and not on the devil. We must not look for the devil behind every bush and under every stone. Instead, we trust in God. And because we trust in the Lord, in a world filled with evil, suffering, hatred, and persecution we are invincible as we serve God’s purposes. In a world divided by violence, terrorism, and war, we will be fearless. 

1.  We Trust in the Lord.

Psalm 115:1 — “Not to us, Lord, not to us but to your name be the glory, because of your love and faithfulness.” 

Verse 1 tells us what our priority is and where our focus should be. All the worship, glory and thanksgiving belongs to God and must go to God. We cannot do or achieve anything on our own. We cannot claim credit for anything. We give God the glory because of his love and faithfulness. We have experienced his love in Jesus Christ. He saved us and gave us new, eternal life. We have seen God’s faithfulness throughout history. We have experienced his love and faithfulness in our own lives. Therefore, we give him the glory. We trust in the Lord.

Psalm 115:2-3 — “Why do the nations say, “Where is their God?” Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him.”

When bad things happen to good people, and especially to God’s people, the world mocks and asks, “Where is their God?” When the world goes haywire and everything seems to be falling apart, people, including us, ask, “Where is God in all this?” But we know where our God is. He is alive. He is the sovereign Lord of the universe. He rules and is in control. Therefore, we put our trust in the Lord.

Psalm 115:4-8 — “But their idols are silver and gold, made by human hands. They have mouths, but cannot speak, eyes, but cannot see. They have ears, but cannot hear, noses, but cannot smell. They have hands, but cannot feel, feet, but cannot walk, nor can they utter a sound with their throats. Those who make them will be like them, and so will all who trust in them.”

The world and the nations trust in their idols. They trust in their money, businesses, and the stock market. They trust worldly political leaders and military power. They trust their own skills and knowledge. But all these can be taken away in one moment. When these fail, when the stock market crashes, when leaders fail and fall, the nations fear and rage. “How will we survive?” They become frenzied, angry, violent. They trust in idols which are not capable of anything; which are nothing; idols which are not alive. But our Lord is alive! Jesus lives, and we trust the Lord. 

Psalm 115:9-11 — “All you Israelites, trust in the Lord— he is their help and shield. House of Aaron, trust in the Lord— he is their help and shield. You who fear him, trust in the Lord— he is their help and shield.” God’s people fear the Lord. We know the one, true living God, therefore, we trust in the Lord because we know that he is our help. He is our help because he provides what we needs. He enables us to face any situation. He is our shield because he protects us. 

Psalm 115:12-15 — “The Lord remembers us and will bless us: He will bless his people Israel, he will bless the house of Aaron, he will bless those who fear the Lord— small and great alike. May the Lord cause you to flourish, both you and your children. May you be blessed by the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.” We trust in God because he remembers us and blesses us. He remembers us!

He blesses us. This blessing does not mean that when we trust in the Lord we will not experience any problems, pain, hurt, suffering. We know from experience that while in this world we will experience hardships and suffering. But God blesses us by enabling us to be invincible and fearless no matter what happens.

2.  We are Invincible

In Ephesians 1:3-14 Paul explains how God blessed us with every spiritual blessing in Christ. Before creation God chose us to be adopted as his children. In Christ we have redemption and the forgiveness of sins. We received the Holy Spirit. The same power that raised Christ from the dead is available for us. We are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do (Eph. 2:10).

Every believer, every follower of Jesus, everyone of us has a God-given, God-ordained purpose in this world. We are no accidents or coincidences. We are not here to just survive. We are here to serve God’s purposes. And that makes us invincible. We are invincible until God accomplished his purposes through us on earth. Nothing can happen to us as long as God has a purpose for us in this life. God holds us in his hand, shields us, protects us. When a gunman walks into this church and starts shooting, and your purpose is not completed yet, you will not die. 

When we experience danger, persecution, sickness, hurt, pain, or a crisis, God has a plan for us. Times of crisis, times of suffering, are times of great spiritual opportunity. We will not despair, give up. We will not fear. We will choose to be God’s agents within the chaos and crisis. WIGIAT?

Jesus is Lord. He is is our help and shield. Jesus said, “The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life —only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father” (John 10:17-18). Jesus also told Pilate, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above” (John 19:11). In the same way our lives are in his hands. 

God through his Holy Spirit gives us courage, gives us this supernatural sense of invincibility to withstand any crisis. And when we face death, when we have completed our God-given purpose, we will face death with joy because we know what is on the other side, the greatest blessing of all, eternal life with God. We know that because we know the Lord Jesus. We trust the Lord. And if you don’t know that, don’t have that certainty, then turn to Jesus, repent, accept him as Lord, and put your trust in Jesus Christ the Lord, and you will be invincible and you will have eternal life. 

3.  We will be Fearless

We are blessed because in a world divided by violence, terrorism, and war, we will be fearless. It is human to be afraid when we face danger, pain, suffering, or a crisis. But fear can be a powerful enemy of our faith. Fear of war, terrorist attacks, disease, pollution, violent crime can prevent us from trusting in God (NIVSB, 1088). However, we will not fear like the world fears. We will not be consumed or overwhelmed by fear. We will not fear what the world fears. In Isaiah 8:11-17 the Lord told Isaiah, “This is what the Lord says to me with his strong hand upon me, warning me not to follow the way of this people: ‘Do not call conspiracy everything this people calls a conspiracy; do not fear what they fear, and do not dread it. The Lord Almighty is the one you are to regard as holy, he is the one you are to fear, he is the one you are to dread. He will be a holy place; for both Israel and Judah he will be a stone that causes people to stumble and a rock that makes them fall. And for the people of Jerusalem he will be a trap and a snare. Many of them will stumble; they will fall and be broken, they will be snared and captured.’ Bind up this testimony of warning and seal up God’s instruction among my disciples. I will wait for the Lord, who is hiding his face from the descendants of Jacob. I will put my trust in him.”

We will not fear what the world fears because our trust, our security, our refuge is not the same as that of the world. The world and nations trust in their idols as we have seen in Psalm 115. And when these fail as they do, the world is overwhelmed by fear. They lose hope. They give up. They resort to anger and violence trying to overcome their fears. 

We are not slaves to fear because “the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline” or as the ESV says, “for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control” (2 Tim.1:7). When faced with fearful situations and terrifying threats, we will be fearless. We will fix our eyes and hearts on God, on his Word, on the victory of Jesus at the cross, on the future victory of Christ. We know Who will prevail. We know that Jesus has won and is going to win. Therefore, we become fearless. We have a Greater Ruler, Greater Power, Greater Army.

We will be fearless not by our own power. When we are in the right relationship with God, when we abide in Christ, live the deeper life, when we walk in step with the Holy Spirit, it is the power of the Holy Spirit who gives us the courage and confidence to be fearless. 

We know and have experienced God’s love and faithfulness, and that drives out and conquers fear. “If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. There is no fear in love.” (1 John 4:15-18).

We trust God because God looks out for his people. He looks out for those who seek him, obey him, know and fear him. “The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials” (2 Pet. 2:9). The Lord is our help and shield. 

On 9/11 as the twin towers were collapsing there were heroes running up the stairs to save people. The reality of our lifetime is that humanity and the world are burning towers that are collapsing on itself. “And God has placed us here, not so we can criticize [them], not so we can barricade ourselves, [not so that we can hide from the world, not so that we can save ourselves] but so we can run up the stairs into the smoke to find “the least of these brothers and sisters” of Jesus (Mt. 25:40) —the hurting, the bloodied, the bruised, [the poor, the refugees, the oppressed, the homeless, the widows, the orphans, the victims of abuse, the victims of human trafficking — so we can run up the stairs into the fire] and drag them to salvation and Jesus Christ.” (Dickerson, 271)

No matter what happens, no matter what the circumstances, no matter what the danger, we trust the Lord. The Lord Almighty is our holy place, our shelter, our source of power and courage. He is the Maker of heaven and earth. We will wait for the Lord. We will put our trust in the Lord. We are invincible and we will be fearless. We worship and extol the Lord, both now and forevermore. Praise the Lord.