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 Anatomy of Fear
(Continued)
Howdy!
G’ mornin’! Sleep well?
Took off on that fear anatomy yesterday, and kind of got carried away. What we’ve talked about thus far, however, is only a proverbial drop in the bucket. We’re just skimming things lightly.
Went out and bought some of that expensive Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee the other day. Yikes! Whatever they’re calling Jamaican in the stores here sure doesn’t taste like the Jamaican I remember. Not that it’s all that bad. It’s pretty decent. Just not worth $50 bucks a pound.
Unfortunately, Eileen lives in Canada, and her cinnamon rolls aren’t too accessible, so we picked some buns up at Mrs. Cinnabon’s. Not bad, but they sure aren’t Eileen’s.
Poured your coffee, yet? OK. Tea, anyone? Then let’s get started.
Like I said yesterday, the Fear of Man is a liar.
Consider the first thing that happened to Adam and Eve when they were cast out of the Garden.
The Lord had said to Eve, "I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children....."
Now we are told that the very first thing which happens when they are cast out of the Garden is,
"And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain....."
This is not to take away from the intimacy intended by the Lord between husband and wife, but the very first thing Adam and Eve did was to seek after an intimate relationship with one another. Why? They had "known" the Lord intimately. They were now told by the Fear of Man that they had been rejected by the Lord.
Adam and Eve believed that lie because it was easier to believe that God had rejected them than accepting the truth that they had rejected Him, choosing instead to be "in control" of their situation through the knowledge of "good" and "evil." Thus, they tried to fill the gap created by the "rejection" by turning to one another -- in the midst of a sexual relationship. They tried to compensate for "rejection" with sex.
And Cain was the product of that "compensation for rejection." Conception was multiplied. Not only was a human being conceived, The Fear of Man was conceived, and he brought with him -- into Cain -- the Spirit of Rejection, and The Fear of Rejection.
How do we know this?
It's quite easy, actually!
What happens to Cain when a brother -- Abel -- is born? He is vying for the acceptance and approval, not only of his father, but of the Lord. When Abel's sacrifice is found acceptable and Abel finds the approval of the Lord, but Cain's sacrifice is not acceptable, and Cain hears the reproof of the Lord, he buys into the lies of "the Fear of Rejection." (The Lord wasn't rejecting Cain: it was just the sacrifice he was attempting to offer.) There is no way he is going to stand by and allow Abel to be accepted while he is "rejected," so he finds Abel and murders him!
And murder becomes one of the first visible evidences of the Fear of Man.
Now, there will be no one to stand in the way of Cain's receiving the approval and acceptance he was demanding of God! So there!
Well, yes there was! It was an entity who was conceived at the same time he was -- an entity who was alive and well, and operating through him: the Fear of Rejection, who like his father, was also a liar. And this liar was going to make certain that Cain would never really hear the truth of what the Lord was communicating.
The Lord speaks to Cain, following his murder of Abel, and says, "And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand; when thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth."
Listen to Cain's response: "Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid...."
No He hadn't. The Lord had not driven Cain out from the face of the earth. The Lord had not chosen to hide His face from Cain. Those were lies told by an unrepentant Spirit of Rejection, whose whole purpose was to make Cain believe that he was being rejected by the Lord. All Cain had to do was to fall on his face before the Lord and repent, and he would have experienced acceptance, forgiveness, and approval from the Lord. But Cain believed the lies.
So did Pergamos. Remember Pergamos from yesterday’s discussion? One of the seven letters?
Not only was "Satan's seat" in their midst, they allowed him to dwell in their midst. That's a nice, poetic way of saying that they permitted him to speak in their midst -- and they listened to what he had to say. The letter to Pergamos begins with,
"These things saith He which hath the sharp sword with two edges...."
So where was this sword? In the mouth of the Lord. (See Revelation 1:16)
The Lord, therefore, was addressing with His mouth -- with the sharp sword which came forth from His mouth -- the lies being perpetrated in their midst by the mouth of Satan who was dwelling in their midst. His sword was the sword of truth, as opposed to the mouth of lies, and that sword was going to cut to the truth in their situation!
That sword cut to the truth that they were listening to, and being manipulated by, The Fear of Man -- and the sons of The Fear of Man: The Spirit of Rejection, and The Fear of Rejection, as they were embodied and perpetuated in the doctrine of Balaam.
Pergamos not only had those who promoted the doctrine of Balaam, but also those who promoted the doctrine of the Nicolaitans. In articles I have published throughout the years, I have discussed at length this doctrine. “Nicolaitan” was a unique contraction of two Greek words, nicos and laos. Nicos meant “power.” Laos meant “the common people.”
“Nicolaitan” was a rather clever way to describe “power to the people,”
or “power over the people,” depending on the way the words were contracted.
When you boil it all down, however, the doctrine (singular) of the Nicolaitans was one: Power to Man. It was manifested in those two variants: namely,
"Power over the People," and "Power to the People." Which ever variant you choose, it still had only one root: The Fear of Man.
If you want authority vested in a few, you fear the multitudes. Hence, you fear man.
If you want authority vested in a "democracy," you fear central authority in a man, or a group of men. Thus, you fear man. (Hence, what we see as much of modern church structure.)
The doctrine of the Nicolaitans was to take the authority away from the Lord and vest that authority in a man, or a few men, or a lot of men -- but still, man!
Got the picture?
It is still precisely the same thing which happened in the Garden when Satan deceived Adam and Eve into eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. They took the decision-making authority away from the Lord in their lives, and vested it in their
"knowledge of good and evil."
The doctrine of the Nicolaitans was to take the authority away from the Lord in the governing of the Ekklesias (they weren’t churches in those days – nothing whatever like what we call a church today), and vest it in apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers -- at first. All under the guise of the governance of the Lord, you understand. And then in episkopos, presbuteros, and diakonos. And then in bishops -- and what have you -- with so many tiers of
bureaucracy it just became ludicrous.
Any semblance of personal intimacy with the Lord was gone completely. Above and beyond this, it robbed those who were serving as apostles, prophets, pastors, etc., of the intimacy in their relationship with the Lord by creating a false responsibility for a false government with a
bureaucracy within the Body of Christ.
Is it any wonder, therefore, that the Lord repeatedly said, "which thing I hate!"
See what the Fear of Man does to a person?
And so, the Lord says to Pergamos, "Repent! or else I will come unto thee quickly, and I will fight against them with the sword of My Mouth!"
O.K., then! Where does this take us?
Look at the promise made to Pergamos. "To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it."
This is a humdinger of a promise! This is a promise designed to woo those who struggle with the Fear of Man, and to make clear that the overcoming of this fear will take one right to a phenomenal invitation from the Lord.
So, let's take a closer look at this promise.
"To him that overcometh will I give of the hidden manna." The
"hidden manna" is the promise to those who cease to get their knowledge from the Tree of Knowledge. This is the promise of direct revelation from the Spirit of God – the Paraklete – to those who cease to respond to the Fear of Man.
Remember! The Fear of Man causes people to eat things offered to idols. This is demonic knowledge. This is knowledge which comes from the mouth of Satan. This is knowledge which is designed to make one feel "superior." This is knowledge which is designed to cause man to feel like he is the final arbiter of his destiny, like he is in control, like he is -- at the very least -- equal with God. This is a perversion of the real truth.
The real truth is that we are being groomed and prepared within the processes of Ekklesia to become the co-equal counterpart of the Lord Jesus Christ. While this puts us on a par with Him -- in a sense -- it is only by virtue of our being joined as one with Him. We are not, and never will be, His separate equal!
To yield to the perversion which is a lie from The Fear of Man is to be cheated out of the reality of what the Lord is accomplishing in our lives. That reality is revealed only by the Spirit of God. It cannot be ascertained through the study of the Bible, or other books. It cannot be obtained through fellowship with other brethren and sisters. It cannot be had by attending church services, or being active in various ministries.
It can only be revealed as a part of an intimate relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ; and that revelation comes as the "hidden manna" when we reject, in toto, everything which is a product of The Fear of Man.
"And (I) will give him a white stone." This is a clever Hebrew metaphor which comes from the classical Jewish wedding. During Biblical times, when an invitation was sent to those whom a wealthy bridegroom desired to have at his wedding feast, because of the chance that uninvited guests would show up to "crash the party" and create a disruption, the guests would be given something which would serve as a pass. Normally, it was a white stone. It went even further, however, with certain royal weddings. On the white stone would be written a name. Sometimes that name would be the name of the Bridegroom, and sometimes it would be a special word which would serve as a code to the gatekeeper of the wedding -- a code which signaled the gatekeeper to allow the guest entrance to this most auspicious and exclusive event.
The implications of Jesus promise, therefore, are crystal clear. By His addition of the phrase within the promise,
"and in the stone a new name written which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth
it," He signals the overcomer that an invitation is being made to His wedding. The phrase, "a new name written," is a conditional promise. Let me explain.
The Greek word for "name" is onoma. We have previously discussed this word at length, but let me remind you that it means: one's nature, character, makeup, personality, position, power, rank, and authority; in other words, all that one is, or will be.
What the Lord is saying, therefore, is that those who overcome the Fear of Man will receive the invitation to His wedding. Those who receive that invitation have the promise of a change of nature, character, makeup, personality, etc., by the time they enter the wedding.
The essence of this promise, then, is that those who have previously yielded to the Fear of Man – those who have been manipulated and ruled by this spirit – will have undergone a complete change within themselves. So long as they overcome the desire to yield to this fear, the Lord will effect such change in their beings that they will be welcome. He will have changed them – conformed them to His image!
Incredible, isn’t it?
Didn’t mean to turn into an expository preacher or teacher this morning. Kinda looks like I did, though. I wanted to finish our anatomy of the Fear of Man and got a bit expository. Preachers sometimes call that “being homiletical or hermeneutical.” Heavens! Such sixty-four dollar words!
Thought maybe I was going to get to share with you some of my own personal experiences in overcoming this fear, but I guess it will have to wait. Maybe we’ll do it tomorrow, and maybe it’ll hold for a few more days until we get to a wrap-up on these families of fear.
Let’s see where tomorrow takes us.
Meantime, finish that cinnamon bun and coffee. Enjoy your day. And….whatever you do, stop being afraid of man (men).
Blessings on you!
Regner A. Capener
CAPENER MINISTRIES
RIVER WORSHIP CENTER
700 South 6th Street
Sunnyside, WA 98944-2113
(509)
837-4657
Music-Hide
Me in Your Holiness-Words & Music By Steve Ragsdale,
1986
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