Facing Down Fear: Battles in the Mind

Facing Down Fear

This is a brand new battle council. This is not uh one that we've had here before on fighting against fear. And um so we are praying that it's a Good time for you guys today to learn some steps to have victory over fear in your lives. Um I'm gonna pray to get us started and uh we could actually so is Erica still in here or did she run away All right. All right. Well we've got help. All right, there we go. So we'll uh get those hand out and we'll pray while we uh get that done. Heavenly Father, thank you for Just a chance to talk about uh some of the amazing ways that you give us to fight back against fear, Lord. We ask that this would be a time Where we find a lot of joy and peace because we know that you are in control and that we can take hold of some of the things that have just been hard for us in our lives, Lord. And we uh invite you into the conversation and into this room here today. Um and I just pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. You have chosen a great battle council, I can tell you that. Because we're giving stuff away. All right. That's right. We're giving away Walmart gift cards. We didn't even put that in the book. Like we could have used it to bribe you to come, but we didn't. Um so Uh but are you guys ready?

Because we're gonna we're gonna get to that really soon.

Fear Is All Around Us

But um the reality is for us fear is all around us, guys. Uh no doubt about it, that this world has got a lot of different fear things in it Some is kind of thrust upon us and it starts at an early age. Maybe I'm the only one that had parents that did this, but did anyone have ever tell you that if you sat too close to the TV, what would happen? You go blind. It's not true, is it?

It you got glasses. Maybe it is true. All right. So they say If you know sit close to the TV, you're gonna go blind. Um uh it don't make a weird face. It'll Stay that way. P I mean maybe that's what happened. I don't know. Um they say that they say that and then of course the line that people love to point out If you break your legs jumping on that bed, don't come running to me. You know, that's I they they just try to install well my legs could break if I jump on the bed. Um I jumped on lots of beds. I think I did get injured, but I I didn't break legs. Um But then you have some of the more serious stuff. Um kind of the things that uh happen around us. Um We even know that in some, for those who don't know, we lived on a reservation for about 15 years.

And I can tell you that I know from just driving home some of the young people from our events That fear was very real to them. That they would tell stories of man this thing tried to get me. I was told if I don't do this, that this creature is going to come get me. And so there's that kind of fear too, where it is very prevalent, where it's very real, where it's kind of all around us, and we're left kind of figuring out, what do I do?

with all of these feelings. How do I fight back against this fear? Because it takes hold really fast. Now we do want to do some prizes here real quick. So are you do you doing the mic or do you want me to do the mic? I'm going to run around. Okay, all right. So um we need to know if someone knows, because this is a what is this a fear of question. These are fears that are documented. in some textbooks in uh you know psychology and things like that so who can tell me what a blutophobia is a blutophobia come on someone's gotta take a all right Scared of the color blue you know that is that's pretty good. Well uh but but it's it's not that. I like that. What else?

What come on, someone else a guess. What is a blutophobia? Scared of balloons! That probably is a fear, let's face it, but uh that's not this one. Any others? Um it won't help, trust me. Uh it has nothing to do with this word that I can figure out. Um All right, I think we'll give it to the fear of blue because it relates to water. So uh we'll go with that. A blutophobia is the fear of washing or bathing. You may be staying in a room this week with someone who evidently has that fear. I don't know. Um it'll be pretty evident pretty quick. Um but that is a blutophobia. So uh what about, his one's a more common fear. I'll give you that hint. What is acrophobia? Good guess. It's not that. What else? Someone else Acrophobia Fear of spiders close. I think that's arachnophobia, so it sounds like that. What is acrophobia Intense fear of heights. There we go. We have a winner right there. Very nice. Um, this is one of my favorites. You'll notice on these, I wrote these down and I didn't even get very far in the alphabet. So there are a lot of fears. Um we have Electorophobia. It's not the fear of elections, all right?

Which most of us probably have at this point, but electorophobia. Who's got it? No, good guess, way off. I'm just gonna be honest. Uh I I'm gonna give you uh one hint. It is a fear of a certain animal. What was that? Erica has a good thing. Gotta go a little louder. It's that's not it, that's not it. What else? Not dogs. Erica. Not butterflies. What what was that one?

Eels? I can see alright. Parrots? We're getting closer to the right family, I guess, but Birds, um, we'll we'll go with that one. I mean, uh it's chickens. It is chickens. It is a fear of chickens. Anyone got that? People like diagnosing now in the room. They're like, that's me. Um and uh All right. Um arachabouterophobia. I really helped with that, didn't I?

Um who's got it? Just it a it has to do with the food. We'll go with that. It's a fear of something. Fear of pasta. I like that. I like these answers. That's not a what else. Spam. Who's afraid of spam? No, all right. Um Olives, that's good get these are foods that people actually probably are afraid of. Fear of vegetables. No, but that's Kevin from the office. That's not all right. So not that, but um We're getting closer. We might have to go with that one. That's a really good guess too. Not that one. Seafood, not that. Meat. What is it?

Not kiwis. We're gonna go with the the mushy, squishy, or whatever, because it has to do with peanut butter, but it gets very specific. This is a word that has actually been attributed to people of a fear of getting peanut butter stuck on the roof of their mouth. That's right. Everyone's I should write that one down. So there you go. And then we'll go with one more. Pantophobia. Who's got it?

Panzophobia. I'm gonna give you a hint. If you've seen the Charlie Brown Christmas special, you know this one. All right Getting pants, okay, best answer, but no, but that is great. Alright, pantophobia. No, not that, not fear of pants. What do we got? No, that's good, but uh yeah. Fear of snow, not that people racking their brain. I'll just give you this one. This is the fear of everything. Pantophobia is the fear of everything. Now, I hope that none of you um are struggling with those things. I'm gonna be honest. We know about claustrophobia, fear of confined spaces, we know about those things But there are also fears that we choose. So there are all these things that are diagnosed as fears and things that we struggle with.

But what do I mean by fears we choose? I'll ask it in one question. Do you like scary movies? I mean, we know there's a whole series just built on that question. We choose to invite fear into our lives. And people right now are like This guy doesn't like the movies I watch. I'm out of here. That's not what we're getting to today. But we do invite fear into our lives. Those franchises wouldn't make billions of dollars If they weren't selling fear and we weren't buying fear. You don't go to those movies for the good acting, let's face it. It is because man, I I want to be terrified for a little bit. So we have these different things.

We have fears that we choose, places we go into.

Understanding Fear and Anxiety

So what's the big deal? Why does fear matter? Fear goes deeper than some temporary emotion. Fear isn't just that. In fact, Sarah, can you give us there there's a we people talk about anxiety and talk about fear? Can you go over those real quick? Just a couple of different emotions. Sure, but before I do that, I wanted to share just kind of along with the line of what he was saying, um, who likes twenty-one pilots?

He's wearing the shirt. Um their latest album has a song called Raw Fear. Um and I just wanted to read some of the lyrics because it's been running through my head while I've been preparing for this. Raw Fear Moves Me, Sounds of Empty Oozies Which I just like that line because it's so descriptive of what fear really is. Life is just forever nipping heels, never slowing down. And then later it says, you know what scares me?

Not stupid. You've met my fears. They're all regulars And that also like we have that common bond of many of the same fears affect us. Some of them is peanut butter, maybe that's different, but a lot of we we have a lot of the same fears. So we wanted to kind of define the word anxieties everywhere in our culture right now. Um so just to Give us definitions of words, anxiety is defined as a present emotion of inner turmoil produced by uncertainty about the future. And fear is emotion caused by the belief of looming potential loss. So they're a little similar, but we were talking about it and realized anxiety is what often leads to fear.

It's often a more temporary emotion, but can lead to a more rooted fear that's ongoing. And so as we are talking in this battle council, we'll be focusing probably more on fear. Um but we know anxiety is a real thing and something that a lot of people struggle with as well and often can lead to a deeper rooted fear. They are very related. Those two are very related and so You when we look at some of the things the Bible has to say, it really addresses both sides of that, anxiety and fear. Um yeah. Do we?

Julie. Oh, there we go. I think the answer is yes. Julie's getting those. Um I'm not gonna try no, I'm gonna try. Why not? Uh you guys know one of the Good definitions of fear comes from a little green guy. Yoda. That's right. Yoda, the great philosopher, says Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. We can delete this later. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. He's not all that wrong. He's really not. Fear leads to a lot of darkness in our lives. It leads to a lot of dark things in our hearts, in our minds. that are very real. So this isn't uh a battle council that is to say fear's not real.

Uh quite the opposite. It's to say we know that fear is real. So how do we handle that in our lives so that it doesn't have to consume us, so that we can be free from those things. It's so we can fight back. against the fear in our lives. Because when we let fear get a root in our lives, the darkness becomes even more bold. becomes more bold in attacking us and going after us. So great news. Whatever your source of fear is, whether it's of chickens Or peanut butter or something that is much more real and harmful in your life, including of certain people. in your lives, you can fight back and you can start finding freedom from fear this week. So let's dive into some real talk about fear.

Do you want to take that first or Sure.

The Source of Fear

So the reasons for fear are real. We don't wanna over-spiritualize things and say just don't be afraid. We know that there's more to it than that Um there are legitimate reasons for fear. Um terrorist attacks, major illnesses, watch the news for five minutes, you'll have a list of things that you might be like, oh my goodness, what if that happens? What if you and you can start to go down that road really, really fast. um losing a loved one. Our hearts seem to always find something new to worry about, fear from. Um fear four. Um so the source of fear is clear. Joshua, can you put up first Peter five eight The devil seeks to devour.

Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. John 8 44 says the devil is the father of wise. And I'm just gonna read through these verses um just to kind of give us a little foundation of where this is coming from. And again, not to over-spiritualize, but just to identify there's a source of a lot of this fear. Some things maybe come from just the world around us. But there's there's there's that source in us that's causing us to feel that way sometimes. Um John eight forty four though says the devil is the father of lies. You belong to your father the devil and you want to carry out your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him.

When he lies, he speaks his native language. So he's the source of the fear, but he's also a liar Isn't that interesting? And then if I can do this next one, um the so if you're looking for the blanks, because they're not all up on the screen there, reasons for uh fear are real or legit. Uh reasons for fear are real. And the source of fear is clear. 1 John 4. 18. It's really interesting to me because it says there's no fear in love. No fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

So when you look at this, some people think that uh God is up on a cloud somewhere. He's got angels around him just playing harps and things like that. And he's just going around like, hey, you know what? There's Nakota. He is having fun No, no, that's not. God is not this big bad meanie that is just looking to punish us. God does discipline us. And I learned this growing up. Let me tell you, I learned the difference growing up because I had friends who I it was it was hard to hear sometimes because they were making choices and I mean they were getting beat. I mean they were getting hit around at home. And that was hard to hear because that's not the love approach. My dad, now yes, my mom and dad, especially my dad, when he would say these words "come to my study."

That wasn't usually for like cake. All right. It wasn't because we had done awesome things. The study was a place where we're like, we're going to have a serious conversation about something. Usually it's around at the time report cards came out. Don't know what that was about. But uh so we would go in there and What my dad would do is he would talk with us. He would explain why the punishment, but we say discipline was about to happen. He was disciplining us in whatever way it was, maybe we were grounded, whatever it might be, because he cared about us. He loved us. He didn't want to see us keep making the same mistakes. Maybe you've grown up in a family where there's punishment that you have been afraid of because it hasn't been done out of love.

It's just been punishment because something had to be done. And that's left a lot of scars on you. I want you to know that God, your heavenly Father, who loves you, is not that. He loves you and what he does shouldn't strike fear in us. His discipline for us should make us see that our Father cares about us. We had a young person that came to uh our events on the Hopi reservation and they would come out to things and we asked them because they were as uh we would say this one I'm gonna Um they would kind of come uh to our events and they were, as they said, naughty. They were uh they were fairly naughty at the things they would come to and we said why do you keep coming back?

What like why do you like coming here? You know, do do you enjoy coming here? And she would just tell us, she said, I see that people care about me here. I see that people love me here. That's what God wants to do for you. He wants to say, keep coming back. Yes, we're gonna have to have some conversations. Maybe you'll have to go to my study sometimes. But it's because I love you. And so I love that verse. That's why I linger on that one. There's no fear in love. We don't have to fear our heavenly Father because the things he's doing for us are out of love, which shows The devil's all about the punishment side.

All about getting you to make these bad choices and then hitting you hard with those, hammering them, addiction and the different things that we face. It's like I'll just let me get you to take a taste. And then I'm going to trap you, and you're just going to be in this life of punishment from whatever this choice is. God is saying, I've come to set you free because I love you. So the devil sews through lies and deception, especially in darkness. How many horror movies have you seen that are in broad daylight?

Fear is not from God. So that's the next villain. Fear is not from God. Horror movies would be a lot less scary if they all just took place in bright daylight and didn't have the scary music I was just walking through the woods like gone. I mean, you know, that would be I want to see one like that. So fear is not from God and victory is possible. Victory is your next fill-in. And so we want to share some scripture and some personal stories, even from our own lives. There are a lot of ordinary people. who have overcome extraordinary fear. And one of the beautiful things about the Bible, one of the things I love so much about reading scripture, is how real it is. These guys weren't trying to paint themselves in any like I am the hero.

Um they were real about their mistakes, their faults, and their fears And so if you look in your Bible, you'll see Moses who was scared of talking, and you'll see David who was scared of things, um, Daniel. Gideon. Gideon was so scared he was threshing his wheat in an underground hidden place because he was scared of the people around him and God raised him up to be a great warrior. Shadrach, Meshach, and Nebendigo, they had a lot to be fearful of. Mary, think if Jesus or God came up to you as an angel and said you're going to have a baby. It's not going to be with a guy and no one's going to believe you. that would cause a lot of fear. Um Esther, um that was talked about today in the session a little bit about Mordecai, that story with um Mordecai.

Esther had fear for her life So there's so many stories. Did you want to say more about Shadow? Uh no, I was just gonna say if you check this out, now there I I had to look up a fact. because uh it's been I've sat in a lot of messages and I think I've even said this sometimes that the Bible says do not fear or do not be afraid 365 times and so there's one for every day of the year. I really want that to be true. I really do. You gotta stretch to make that happen. All right. I it's uh it that number isn't necessarily spot on, but I can tell you this That the Bible says to fear not or do not be afraid over a hundred times. Easily over a hundred times. God wouldn't ask us, we wouldn't give us a directive we can't do.

So victory is possible because the Bible says fear not. So God's saying, I'm giving you a goal And now I'm going to help give you the things to help you meet that goal. So fear not is very real. It's in the Bible over and over. And the ones that you just mentioned i love that because all these characters you need to read up if you think the bible is boring start reading it again Because the characters in the Bible and even the ones we're talking about this week, they went through some intense things. Some of them hid from God. It doesn't work very well. He's the master at hide and seek. I mean, God will find you wherever you are hiding. He is there. He's everywhere we are. But there are people who tried to hide from God because they were just chickens.

And God changed chickens into tigers. He took some of those same people that were afraid and said, I'm going to set you up for victory. And all of a sudden, these are some of the blanks there. They were fearless when everyone was afraid to stand. They were fearless when the peer pressure was on. They were fearless when there was every reason to be afraid. The good news for us It didn't mean they didn't have questions for God. Read the Bible. You will see there are conversations with God. There are, why would you do this?

How is this happening? What's going on, Lord? I've had some very honest conversations with God even recently where it's just like, Lord, I don't get it. I don't understand what's happening right here. Why? And God is there to listen to those conversations and then to speak into you and say, you may not understand everything. But know that I am here, that I am with you, that I'm giving you the strength, and you don't need to be afraid. And yes, Sarah, you mentioned that we've got stories of fear in our own lives.

A Personal Story of Fear

So I'm gonna get real with you guys. I grew up in Africa, for those who don't know, I lived a pretty um full life. I had a lot of adventures, a lot of experiences. I loved adrenaline. I loved great opportunities to do anything. I didn't really feel fear much. Looking back, I can identify now times in my life that triggered a feeling, and it was like Satan was planting little time bombs. throughout my life at different points and I didn't realize it until 2006. I had my first baby. And something happened that year. It was like Satan snapped his fingers and all those time bombs went off. And I started to get consumed by these feelings of what if. What if Brad drives someone home and has an accident on the way back?

I would have a funeral planned in my head before he got home that night. I would go down that road And think about what if this happened, how would I feel, how would it look, how would it seem, what would I do, and I would try to create a plan Because I thought if I could prepare myself emotionally for any bad thing that might happen, I'd be prepared, I'd be ready when that bad thing happened. And um So I tried to control my environment. Brad was extraordinarily patient with me. I mean roads and driving and was at semi-too close. There were so many things around me. I was constantly on guard. and constantly trying to control everything I could to keep my spirit feeling safe. I thought that was up to me.

And that was my my biggest and first mistake was thinking that I had to fix it. And I had to be in control. And it just it led to panic attacks. It led to, I mean, I remember one day feeling I had bugs crawling under my skin. It led to all these heightened um emotions and and the adrenaline and on and all these emotions that just tried to undo me and my world became smaller and smaller. And I can see now also, and this is something that follows us through life, if Satan can't take your your Jesus from you, he'll try to take your effectiveness and he'll try to make your life small and he'll try to keep you quiet and all those things are happening to me during those years and so I'm stubborn which is good in this case and I kept doing things.

But I did them smaller and quieter, and I did them with a lot of fear and trembling. I mean I had a l a lot of anxiety, even helping lead on eagle's wings. I was hiding all this stuff inside of me because I mean how do you talk about this? And um and it was hard. Life was just really, really hard. Um And then I realized all these and what Brad referenced before was also really it would make me a little bit mad when I would read the do not fear verses because fear is an emotion And how can you control that?

How can you obey an emotion? Um, an emotional like appeal. So if Jesus says don't fear and I feel fear, well how do I stop that? And I would get a little mad about that because I'd be like, well, I can't do that. So I'm just going to keep controlling it. I'm just going to keep trying to to make this go away. And um it was when I started really reading these verses about what Jesus says about today and tomorrow. Um in Matthew 6 he says, do not worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. And I don't know how many of you guys know the whole story of the Israelites in the wilderness and how God fed them. He fed them manna, bread from heaven. He gave them just that day's amount.

And he said, don't collect even for tomorrow. And when they did, it rotted because he wanted them to just rely on what he gave them for that day. Matthew 611 says, give us this day our daily bread. And I started to realize that when I would start to follow the what ifs, I would step outside. of the the daily bread, the provision God had given me for that day. And if I really trust Jesus, I know that this day he'll take care of me. And when I wake up tomorrow morning, Lamentations 3 says his mercies are new every morning. And that day, he'll be there taking care of me with my daily bread for that day. And so I was stepping out of his promises. I was running ahead of what he had provided me. And so I was carrying all that emotional burden on my human shoulders that I was never intended to carry.

And that's what was undoing me emotionally, and that was what was wiping me out. And so we put ourselves in vulnerable situations of being exposed to these raw emotions without the strength he has to offer in that moment. And I think that's why we live so vulnerable, so wrecked emotionally sometimes. So I had to back up and basically I told I told Jesus, okay You said don't worry. You said don't fear. I worry and I fear and I don't know what to do. So you gotta show me. And I just started digging through scripture and we're gonna share some of those scriptures with you here. And um He may have different scriptures for you than he had for me. He knows your vulnerabilities and your uniquenesses, and so ask him, have that conversation with him if this is something you struggle with. Ask him to show you how. And it's a journey. It's not like a moment. And I'm still on it. And I still have to stay on guard. I still have to stay close to Jesus. I still have to do these things. Or my my human spirit will start to to to get louder than the voice of Jesus.

The Road to Victory

So how do we fight back? We're gonna look at that. So here we move to the road to victory. We're gonna spend the rest of our time just looking at the road to victory, some very practical things that um we uh prayer and encouragement to you guys and things that we think you could start putting into practice even today. I the first one it's pretty straightforward but it's really the most important it's stay close to Jesus.

Stay Close to Jesus

Stay close to Jesus. That's number one. Um, do you want to tell them about our pup? Our dog? We have a little puppy. He's so cute. The morning we were leaving to come here, we were bustling around the house trying to get the RV loaded, trying to think through everything we had, and there was a thunderstorm Thunderstorms and our puppy rowdy are not friends. He thinks he is going to die in that moment. Quite literally, and the only thing that will keep him from dying is being in your lap. So does he look scared?

Does he look like he thinks he's about to die? No, he looks so happy because he was in my lap. So I had to sit in the middle of all that chaos. I just sat on the couch with my blanket and held my puppy so that he would feel safe And as I'm looking at that picture, it's striking me twofold. He feels safe because he's close to me, but I stopped to hold him. And what Brad said about Jesus loving you, that perfect love casts out fear, that's the image of Jesus with you too. He's never too busy for you. He's never too worried about the affairs of the world to see you and your fears and what you need from him and he'll he'll sit and he'll hold you So Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

They are three guys. You're going to hear about them later this week. So I won't go into the whole thing. But they wind up in this fiery furnace. I'll tell you that. And uh they, it's like spoiler alert, but um they wind up in this fiery furnace because they wouldn't do what the king told them to do because it went against what God told them to do. So there's three guys in the furnace, and all of a sudden the king looks in there, his men are just like, uh, how many do we put in there?

And they're like, three. And there's four guys There's four guys in the fire, and it is a fire that is consuming people who just even tried to put them into this furnace burned up. They died immediately. So it wasn't like it wasn't hot enough. There's three guys, then four, that are just standing there and they come out not even smelling of smoke. because of the fourth man that is in the fire with them. Jesus was there with them. You need to know that Jesus, when you have chosen, you said, Jesus, I want this relationship with you and you are his. No one's going to take you away from him. No one, the Bible says no one can pluck you out of his hand. So once you have that relationship with him, you are his.

No one's gonna pluck you out of his hand. He is with you. And when he's with you in even the hardest things you're going through, it helps you know I can take that extra stand against those things. I don't have to fear them because He's there with me. Find specific ways to keep your eyes fixed on Jesus. The Bible says he's the author and perfecter of our faith. Here are just a few common ways that you've probably heard from your youth group leaders. And I'm going to tell you if you have, well, they're right. So these are important things.

Praying. Talk to Jesus. Tell him what you're feeling. He wants to know. He's not going to be scared about what you tell him. Talk to Jesus. Let him know. Bible study. It means reading the word of God, looking into what it really says. Taking time, there's so many apps now for I went to college and I took three semesters of Greek because I was a Bible major and I'm studying that and everything. And now people can like open up an app and they're smarter than I am all automatically. They're like the Greek word is this. And I'm like, that's just not fair. But um and it cost them a lot less to do that than it did me. But um the look at what the Bible has to say. What we watch and listen to matters as far as keeping our eyes on Jesus.

Is it pulling you from Jesus or getting you closer to Jesus? And I love this. We uh our family jokes about this, our kids know this, everyone who knows my dad, every student from the leadership center, probably every OEW team member knows when my dad is pulling up somewhere in his car. Because the music is really loud. I mean he is blasting it and it's not 21 Pilots. Uh it is It's the Gathers. You may not know who they are, but the Gaithers are an old Southern gospel group that talk a lot about Jesus. And it's not about the style of music. It's that he is Filling his heart with praise. He's filling his heart with praise, which helps him take his stand against the attacks that might come. Be that person, you don't have to make it the Gathers, all right, but be that person that when people know you're coming, it's like that's a person of praise.

That's a person that's been with Jesus and it shows different in how they interact with the world, how they interact with the fear and everything else. So that's the first one is stay close to Jesus. Um yeah 22? Yeah, I'll take the and then all right. So second is cut off streams of fear that you allow in. And this kind of ties to what I was just saying there, but cut off the streams of fear you allow in This does go to those scary movies. If you want to fight back against fear, stop watching those. You may say they have no impact on you, and that's just not true. The things we watch, the things we listen to.

It impacts us. So make choices that draw you closer to Jesus. Now I'm not saying you have to go watch all uh movies about Jesus. That's not what I'm saying, but I'm saying the entertainment choices you make matter. So if there is fear in your heart, don't fuel it. I I can tell you from my perspective, for me it was anger. In high school, it was anger, and I was dealing with that. And people who know me now don't always believe that. They're just like, don't seem that I'd be an angry person. But I was dealing with a bunch of stuff in high school and I loved Jesus, but I really struggled with that. And I played football and all these things and so what would I listen to to to calm me down?

Metallica. I mean because obviously That'll calm me right down. I mean all of a sudden it's like no I'm gonna take this anger and I'm gonna feed it. I'm gonna feed that anger so that I'm ready to do whatever I need to do on the football field, everything else And then I was like, man, I've got to stop fueling the thing that is dragging me down. So stop fueling the fear by what you watch, what you listen to. And this one's a little harder. But by the people you hang out with. If they are fueling the fear because of how they act, it may be time to at least pause and be around other people who won't fuel that If there's someone who has done something to you in your life that is still in your life and they cause fear for you because of how they act and what they do and how they've hurt people physically and emotionally.

You need to talk to someone about that. Maybe it's at home and you're like, well, I can't just leave home. You need to talk to someone. Don't let people tell you that you shouldn't talk about it. Drag that out into the light and find someone you trust that can help you through that. Otherwise, that fear is just going to keep growing and growing inside you. So you need to deal with the people in your life That are fueling that fear. Yeah I think it a lot of it first of all depends on the age, because if you are still dependent on your your mom or dad or auntie or an uncle that you need that that they're providing for you or whatever. It gets more challenging. And we realize that. We've walked through the that with a lot of young people who it's like, well I can't leave home.

But That's where you do need to find someone to talk to. Even if you're here this week and you're like, I need to have a first conversation, talk to Kelly, talk to Rod. Their pictures are in the back of the book. Talk to them. I know there's other people. I look around the room right now. And I know there's other people. I look at Nick over here. And I know people trust him to talk with the talk with him and share things with him. Find a lead your leader that brought you here Trust them, talk with them. They uh in most cases, they know this is confidential and they're not just gonna, you know, fly off the handle about it, but At the same time, if they know you are truly being abused, they may have to say, I need to bring this to.

official people to authorities. It's kind of the job for those of us who care for people to say, I get that you don't want people to know, but if they don't know, there's no way this is gonna stop So just know that you may trust them, but part of that step may be that they need to tell someone else About what is happening to you because they care too much about you to let that keep happening. And then if it's further in life, if you're like growing up and everything, then it becomes boundaries. It really becomes boundaries of saying, hey. This person is not just that they're we go we're around people let's face it we're around people that we just don't get along with sometimes. We don't always get along with all our family members and sometimes people like so I just need to cut them off and all that.

There's a lot of that going on in today's world. That does need to happen sometimes if it's a toxic person. All they do is instill fear and trigger hurt and trigger anger and trigger all these negative things in you. You may need to say, hey, I'm gonna come around some, but you may not see me around as much anymore because I just need to take care of some things personally for me. You don't even have to like yell at them and and get into all that with them, but to start drawing boundaries and explain in a way that's not angry doesn't throw them under the bus, but allows you to get some space, I would say. And then That's about like eight battle councils that you could go to on these topics, just so you know, this is surface stuff that we're getting to, but it's some maybe first steps you can go through.

Want me to? All right.

Don't Fight Alone

The third one here, don't fight alone. Don't fight alone. Ephesians 6, 10 through 18 talks all about the armor of God. Putting on the armor of God. I'm going to give you a little secret about that. There's a lot of people like. Every morning get your armor on. It's important. But there are pieces of the armor of God that are meant to always be on. Soldiers, Roman soldiers didn't like sleep defenseless. When they're talking about the armor, it's like man, these pieces I'm keeping with me. I'm making sure that I'm ready to defend myself. So read these verses and check these out because it talks about being strong in the Lord and his mighty power.

Put on the full armor of God so you can take your stand against the devil schemes. If my dad was here, he'd be acting this out right now He's done verser size, as he calls it, with OEWT members on this. Take your stand. All right. But hit this goes on for our struggle is not against flesh and blood. It's against the rulers, the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil. Sorry, I'm just picturing him doing this in the heavenly realms. Therefore, put on the full arm of God, stand firm. All these things. And it talks about the different pieces of the armor, the breastplate of truth, the the the sword of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, all these things, the uh belt of truth buckled around your waist.

Um your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. Um and all these things. Take up the shield of faith. When you put the armor on, you're realizing that God has given you The tools. He hasn't left you to fight alone. He's given you the things to fight back with. It's the battle is not about people. You may think that that person that is in your life that drives you nuts is the problem. It's not about people. It's a spiritual thing that happens. It's against a dark spiritual force. Now don't go home and be like, you are dark spiritual force.

That is not. I will not respond to those emails. All right. But we're just saying that these attacks that come, that the enemy, the devil, tries to get at us. So Why would we not fight with the one who is stronger than anything and anyone we would face? Nothing, nothing, no one, no situation is bigger than Jesus. I guarantee it, it is truth. It's in the Word of God. I've lived it. No situation is bigger than Jesus. Jesus can help you fight. He wants to help you fight. I don't think this verse is uh in your handout there. Write down this reference. Isaiah 41, verse 10. Isaiah 41, 10, because this is the one that really I needed to remember when I fought a very real battle with fear. It says, fear not.

For I am with you. Not fear not because you got this going on or whatever else or in the we stay in an RV every summer with the OEW team and I'm gonna tell you we park where we can park. We're on the reservation. Some of you have seen us roll into town and we've slept in some pretty sketchy parking lots. I'm gonna tell you that. And there's stuff going on. We had one guy that almost rammed into our R V at like 3 a. m. and Someone asked me, they're like, so do you carry a weapon in there?

I'm like the the Bible. No, I I mean I'm like No, what am I supposed to do? I'm like, am I gonna pull out a gun on the res as a white missionary that's visiting? I'm like Well that's some headlines right there. Um OEW is no longer. I so and I don't need it. That's the key. I don't need that. I but I learned that Sarah mentioned Carissa being born, our first child being born, 2006, we go out to one of these communities, and it was a tough place. It was one of the tougher places we've been. Which shall not be named. But we I go there and we're sleeping outside this church and all of a sudden just we start hearing these really hard things pelting the RV Middle of the night, they're pelting the RV and it sounds like rocks and and we're like man this is really not good and we didn't know what was going on out there and then all of a sudden we see.

The shadow, uh just this head walk by our window and our bedroom window, and we hear a gunshot from right down the street. I'm like, I gotta call the cops. I gotta do something here. And I it why was that? It w when I was a bachelor and just going out on these trips alone, I didn't care. It was just like Whatever, bring it on. And then all of a sudden, I have my wife and I have my little girl right next to the bed. And I'm like, I'm scared. I'm walking in fear right there And all of a sudden God challenges me in that and he's like, Brad, I protected you through all of these things before. Do you really think that I'm gonna leave you now?

Do you really think that I can't protect Sarah? That I can't protect your children that I've blessed you with? And it made me realize that I thought I had conquered this kind of fear, and all of a sudden I had more work to do, realizing that I was not fighting alone. Jesus was still there with me. And the summers and the times in the RV have been so much more peace-filled ever since. In fact, I will tell you this. Sarah, a couple years ago, we uh we didn't need our baby monitors anymore. Um our youngest, Joshua, is uh 15 and uh so don't really need the baby monitors anymore. And we have this video one and it connects to our phones and Sarah was like, hey, do you want me to set this up so like if we hear stuff at night, we can see what's going on out there?

I was like, no I'm like, I don't want to know what's out there. I'm like, I know God's protecting us in here, and he's done that faithfully. I don't need to know from what. So anyway, there you go Later today go read Second Kings 6. This I was looking it up on my phone because I couldn't remember where it was. While he was talking about we don't fight alone, there's a crazy story in there with Elijah and they're like s being attacked. They're like their city they're in is surrounded by this like enemy force and Elijah's just chilling in the house and his servants freaking out like Elijah, like why aren't you scared?

So Elijah prays and he asks God Just open up my servant's eyes. And he says, go look. And the servant goes out and looks, and he sees all around them, between them and the enemy, is the forces of the angels of heaven standing around them protecting them. Elijah knew they were there. He wasn't scared. The servant got to see, and we don't often get to see But they're there. Know that they're there. Being confident of that. I have a a verse I'm putting up in the RV. I'm not done with it yet. Um before we head out for the summer. It just says I will lie down and sleep in peace For you, O Lord, make me dwell in safety. And just those reminders are so good to surround ourselves with because sometimes our eyes just stop seeing or our heart stops believing.

It's in Psalms. I don't know where it is. I'll look it up. 44? 44. Psalm 40. Psalm 40. Psalm forty verse four. Chelsea for the win. Go check out the battlefield. Psalm forty verse four. So the next point is keep fighting It's not just a one-time thing. I referenced this earlier. It's a journey. Sometimes it's hour by hour. One huge verse that is still an anchor verse for me was 2 Corinthians 10:5. We demolish arguments, demolish, I love that word, and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ If you have a brain even similar to mine, you can think all kinds of crazy things. Like they just pop up. It's like, where did that come from?

That happens. Sometimes it's a commercial. Sometimes it's a breeze. Sometimes it's the enemy himself. Planting thoughts, they just come up. That happens. But the second thought, that's up to you. Like that's where your choice and your discipline kicks in. So for me, this verse, I mean, it got exhausting because when I asked Jesus to show me how to be obedient, how to be how to fight this fear. This was the verse he brought me. Take captive every thought. So the thought would hit, I identify it. Is this fearful?

Is this we know fear is not from God So, no, that's not from God. So, what do I do with it? How do I take captive this thought? I recommit my mind to Jesus. Learn the verses. This is where putting scripture in your heart matters. Claim those verses for your mind. Sometimes it's hour by hour. Sometimes it's minute by minute. But I would do it over and over and over again until the thoughts got less and less and less. They got less strong. And every time you make a decision out of fear, that fear grows more roots So why are you making your choices and why are you doing the things you do?

If it's prompted by fear, you're feeding that fear So these verses, they give us power. Take captive every thought in obedience to Christ. It's how we claim our mind and our thoughts for Jesus and we redirect them. And I love this verse, 1 Peter 5. 7. If that's not in there, write that down. 1 Peter 5. 7, cast all your anxiety on him. Why? Because he cares for you. He cares for you. So that is uh first Peter 5 7 if you missed that. Um the last one here, last filling, and we'll wrap up in just a minute here.

Be Ready

is be ready. Be ready. You know, I also have written down here, be wise. And what I mean by that, be ready, be wise is Decide ahead of time what you're going to do when the fear hits because guess what? The fear is going to hit. It doesn't just go away. But the more the enemy knows you're ready and are going to respond the right way, the less he's going to try to push that button. He might try to push others. He might try to get you in other areas. But the less he if he if it's not effective with you, he's not gonna keep after that as much. So decide about your boundaries, about how you'll respond when fear creeps in.

I'm just gonna give you a couple of things that are practical here as far as being ready. Don't go to the places where you know there's going to be triggers. That could be whatever. But don't go to the places you know where fear is going to be fueled. Learn some key Bible verses that you can say. If these today aren't the ones that you think are the right fit, just Google what does the Bible say about fear?

And start reading through and choose one and memorize it or write it on your phone, put it on your lock screen, whatever it is, where you can say, I got it. I've got the word of God here. Remember the power of Jesus' name. You may not have learned that yet in life, but when you are a follower of Christ, It's not like a magic eight ball or something like that where you're just like Jesus and everything's fine, but when you claim the power of Jesus' name and the power of his blood, the darkness can't stand against that. It just can't. The the Bible, actually Seth will talk something about it tomorrow.

Even demons are terrified of the power of Jesus. Doesn't mean they don't try to mess with you. But it does mean that they are scared because they know that all the power resides with Jesus, although true power, the ultimate power. And the other thing I said, this is a practical one that goes beyond just the memorizing scripture. A friend of ours in law enforcement taught us this. Breathe in. Hold it for five seconds. Breathe out again. Do that three times in a row in a challenging situation. You're gonna feel your heart rate lower You're going to be able to look at things a little clearer. So even physiologically, God has made us.

We're just built into us. There's simple steps we can take to try to reset. And reassess the situation. I'm going to wrap up with this there, and then whatever you might want to conclude with. Your nation, your people. are looking for someone who is fearless and won't give in. They may not phrase it that way. But they are looking for someone who is fearless and who will fight. I talked about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. That group of three, they changed so many things in that nation. How much greater impact can a fearless group of hundreds of young Native warriors who love Jesus and are sticking close to him, how much greater difference can you have for your people?

And maybe you've arrived here coming off of a hard year, maybe you've arrived here saying I've got more going on than you know, and I'll guarantee that's true. Each one of us has more going on than the person next to us probably knows. But there is one who loves you enough to die for you, and he is there next to you. And when you have that relationship with him, he will always be there. He will always be there. He will never leave you nor forsake you, as the Bible says. So I'm gonna say this. I know my dad mentioned this last night. He went through the gospel And gave you a chance to respond to that. But if you were like, man, I wasn't ready then, but I do want to do that now. I'm just going to pray with you guys.

And if that is something you want to do, you feel today is the day for that because you're tired of doing life alone without Jesus. I just ask you to do, I'm not going to ask you to look up or come forward or anything else. This is just a moment between you and Jesus. So let's pray together. Dear Jesus. We just come before you and we know you will hear our hearts, you will hear our words, you will hear what we are saying to you. So for anyone in this room right now, these aren't magic words, but If you're ready to have this relationship with Jesus, just pray something like this. Dear Jesus, I'm sorry for running my life my way. Please forgive my sin. Help me turn from it and move towards you.

Jesus, please come into my heart. I believe you died for me and that you rose again. So I don't have to face death And I don't have to face fear alone. Jesus, come into my life. From this day on. I'm yours. If you prayed that you are Jesus' child, you are his son, his daughter. Child of God. Heavenly Father, I do also pray for anyone that is in here dealing with fears in their lives that they would Talk to people that they need to, that they would take the steps they need to, whether simple or more complicated, to be free from that fear. And we pray they'd send you send some people to them that are trustworthy and they can talk with even those that brought them here this week. We pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.