Fear of Injustice

It is starting to become more clear why I feel the increasing impressions about gentleness as well as purity and holiness. It correlates to the growing convictions about withdrawing myself from listening to the news more and more. I have often resisted this conviction because it is so easy to rationalize or compromise and the Spirit seldom argues with me about it but just lets me have my way. My justification is usually accomplished by measuring the after-affects and how much contact with God has or has not been lost as a result of exposure to the world's media.

But I am beginning to realize that intimacy must come at a cost – a high cost if I want to go all the way. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. (Matthew 5:8) This purity is not restricted to sexually-related things. This has to do with everything that detracts from the true knowledge of the Father's heart. The truth in Isaiah keeps coming to my mind as a warning if I am to be serious about coming into the dangerous presence of God. "Who among us can live with the consuming fire? Who among us can live with continual burning?" He who walks righteously and speaks with sincerity, he who rejects unjust gain and shakes his hands so that they hold no bribe; he who stops his ears from hearing about bloodshed and shuts his eyes from looking upon evil. (Isaiah 33:14-15)

To come very close to God's heart I must enter into a level of trust and exclusiveness that others may not see necessary or even right. But this trust is a two-way relationship where God needs to be able to trust me through the work that I allow Him to accomplish in my heart. I have been asking God to draw me closer to Him but resisting that drawing at the same time. I figured that was what was going on but now I am starting to see it more clearly. Unfortunately I am too much like Thomas, wanting to be able to see and understand for myself before I am willing to more fully believe.

Well, last night I saw for myself more forcefully. I was listening to the news again and just after I got home while sitting in the driveway listening to the end of it they relayed the story of an innocent man executed by a policeman in front of a large crowd for no reason whatsoever except apparently from emotions of the moment. The event was captured on several videos and was soon posted on you-tube which is now raising quite a stir as would be expected. But what was not expected was the awakening that this caused for me personally.

The emotions aroused in me were all too familiar. But I sensed the strong impression that I needed to listen more carefully and obediently to the gentle promptings of the Holy Spirit about exposing myself to these kind of strong stimulants. I was reminded of one of my own greatest weaknesses and fears that is starting to surface once again.

Just a couple days ago I revisited with someone the intern scene of one of the deepest roots of my own bitterness which has haunted me for many years and has caused me a great deal of trouble, particularly with policemen. It is a memory that might seem to have nothing to do with injustice and police abuse against me personally, but the perceived effect on my heart was one of the most traumatic moments in memory for me. I have sensed that this memory may contain many of the foundational lies that has allowed Satan to have a stronghold inside of me for all these years. I have been praying for God to deliver me from this stronghold of rebellion, fear and bitterness for a long time and I sense that I am getting closer to that freedom.

But Satan is also aware that I may be getting close to escaping from his diabolical control and he will resist that escape attempt in every way possible. What I am now starting to see is that one of his easiest methods to keep me inflamed with bitterness and locked into his prison is to keep presenting stories of police abuse to me to reignite my anger and frustration, particularly in ways where there is nothing I can do about it but complain. This also accomplishes the goal of training me to remain unresponsive in the face of real injustice should I happen to encounter it first hand. I fear that in my current condition I would be found among those who are too afraid to stand up against injustice and risk my reputation or even my life to come to the aid of someone being threatened or abused.

This too would become another opportunity for Satan to flaunt my misrepresentation of God in His face and attack His reputation. My failures to respond like Jesus while talking much about the growing revelations of the truth about God would be an act of hypocrisy and disloyalty that would bring shame on the name of Christ and on my own soul as well. Then Satan would attack me with that most familiar emotion of depression and despair as I wallow in the shame of my own failure and he might even reinforce it with fear and anger by direct exposure to the very kinds of abuse that I have feared the most all of my life.

This is a very frightening scenario for me right now and would absolutely terrify me if it were not for the fact of God's extreme faithfulness and goodness and lovingkindness. My only hope is to keep focusing on the truth about God that He has been increasingly revealing to me and to more intentionally and consistently withdraw from the sources of fear and depression that Satan uses to enforce the lies buried deep in my heart. I need to follow the example of Enoch who deliberately withdrew from public exposure for periods of time to be purified in the clean presence of God's intimacy before allowing himself to be exposed to the wickedness of the world around him.

If I really want to live in an intimate relationship with my God, I have to be willing to let Him have His ways in how my mind is exposed and shaped and the stories and emotions that are allowed to affect it. I now am seeing more clearly that I am receiving the opportunity to experience Elijah training, learning how to listen to the right source to detect the voice of the Spirit. Elijah was given notice that the true Spirit from God was not discerned in the more obvious ways, the spectacular demonstrations of power. The Spirit could only be recognized when the soul was quiet before God and all the distractions were gone. That was an extremely important lesson for Elijah and one that was sorely needed after he had lost touch with that quiet Spirit-voice only just recently on Mount Carmel. (see 1 Kings 19)

The prophecies of the Bible say that Elijah is going to return again; that is, the spirit of Elijah is going to be clearly manifested in God's true followers in the last days during the closing events of earth's history. We are very clearly in that time, but I sense that very few understand what it really means to have the spirit and power of Elijah. Learning to live life in constant awareness and obedience to the still, small Voice is a most crucial part of being able to live in the spirit of Elijah. But that is what I suspect God is trying to teach me right now.

I still am praying for deliverance from this massive root of bitterness that still remains deeply embedded in my mind and heart. I have no idea how God is going to uproot it, but I do know that He is faithful and He will do it. I want to fully cooperate with the preparation for that painful operation so that I can get through it as quickly as possible. I am going to need much prayer, much encouragement, much accountability and much joy-strength to face this trauma. And that joy can sometimes come from others who are willing to enter into the experience alongside of me and experience the emotions with me while emotionally guiding me to the way through this trauma when it seems like only hopelessness to me.

I can say all this right now from the seeming safety of an armchair and the quiet peace of an early morning time alone with God. But when all hell breaks loose and my heart is stirred up and my emotions overwhelm me and the lies are activated that cause my perceptions of reality to be terribly skewed – well, that is what I don't know about at this point. The only hope I have is to continue to trust the One who is drawing me, who is in charge of my repair, my surgery, my purification. And I can listen more carefully and obey more instantly the still small Voice that is still broadcasting instructions yet today for anyone ready and willing to listen.

God, I am not even sure what to pray right now. Keep me fixed on You today. Teach me the lessons of obedience in the little things that I have been ignoring. Keep me away from dogmatism and fanaticism, but also keep me away from the blindness of rationalization and compromise that has kept me in Satan's prison for so many years.

I give you full permission to proceed with Your surgery on my heart and mind. I don't understand what that even means or will involve, but I do know very clearly that I need radical surgery and that it will be extremely painful. Yesterday when I sensed this coming I asked if you use anesthetic when you do heart surgery. But I sensed You responding that if I didn't feel the pain while becoming free of the lies that it would leave me vulnerable to being reinfected with that cancer again. The pain experienced during the extraction of deep roots of sin is the very process needed to inoculate me against reinfection.

So I pray for deliverance from my fear of pain. That has been a handle that Satan has had access to in my heart for most of my life. By manipulating me through that fear he has been able to steer me and intimidate me much of my life. But Your Word says that this is one of the things You came to give me.

Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives. (Hebrews 2:14-15)

Father, that is the freedom that I claim from You right now. I want to live in that experience of total freedom from fear that has kept me and everyone around me in slavery all of our lives. I trust You to accomplish this in my life however and whenever You choose. I am Yours – save me.