The Spirit of Fear
Paul reveals the spirit of fear to us in his letter to Timothy. It is the spirit of cowardice.
While phobos is the common Greek word for fear and a deadly foe, the spirit of cowardice contrasts with power, love, and a healthy mind.
For God has not furnished or bestowed upon us a spirit of deilias, but dunamis, agape, and sōphronismou” (2 Timothy 1:7).
- dunamis is the power to do miracles or accomplish with spiritual force;
- agape is passion for purpose that burns like a furnace with pressure to direct the dynamo of power;
- sophronismou is the strength of will to act by principle when burning with passion and empowered by spiritual force.
You receive all three from God by endowment, furnishing, or bestowment. Therefore, they are the elements of our appropriate response. In contrast, cowardice would provide us inadequacy, demanding desires or lusts, and an out-of-control response that lacks principle, purpose, or prudence.
The spiritual condition of fear is broader in scope than this verse, but this is the verse that clarifies the spiritual condition or spiritual source of what comes from the world, flesh, and the devil in direct contrast to what comes from God.
Paul applies what God furnishes us with a “therefore” list:
- The word Paul uses a word that means, “You should not sever in cowardice the alignment you have with our apostolic testimony of the Lord, quitting on your submission because you lack courage, nor of Paul himself, because he is in prison,
- Instead, dare to endure the hardship and pathos with your apostolic father in his ministry, rejection, and assignment for the Message by God’s power.
- And, continue in that assignment because it is as old as Creation, comes with a grace flow given in Christ, for which we were rescued and set aside as holy in calling by God’s purpose, not our entitlement.
The Spirit of Cowardice
The spirit of cowardice, or deilias, says, “Stop.” The spirit of the fear of the Lord, Hebrew word yirah, says, “Flow.”
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”
Proverbs 9:10
The spiritual condition produced by Holy Spirit becomes the passion flow that attracts the grace flow that moves us into the flow of fullness of obedience. The spirit of cowardice produced by hell becomes the pause button that attracts anxiety, fear, dread, and terror.
- Cowardice halts the flow of submission to dam up the flow of fullness of obedience.
- Power, love, and enduring submission from God move us into and onto purpose.
The spirit of cowardice stops us at the point where our trusting faith says, “Go,” and our personal limitations, lusts, and leadership says, Stop.”
- The fear of the Lord motivated David to kill a lion, bear, and giant.
- The spirit of cowardice kept King Saul in his tent where someone polished his armor and sword so he would look good the next time he ventured out to lead the army.
The Stronghold the Protects the Root of Fear
Since fear is a spiritual condition embedded in our souls by satan, believers require deliverance from the spirit of cowardice. The strongholds or fortresses that hell builds to protect the places where fear is embedded are torn down by weapons mighty through God. That exposes the entry points. The exposure pinpoints the application of what God knows to reset our thoughts to “obedience to Christ” mode.
“Now, really listen to me. I confront a deep issue in all of you. I’m making this personal appeal to you by Christ’s meekness and reasonableness. Since you perceive that I am only bold and confrontational from a safe distance. Now I plead with you. When I come, do not require me to challenge you ( I will!) by daring to confront those who mistakenly believe that we apply humanistic principles (We do not.) They judge we do not function by the Spirit’s wisdom and power (We do!).
“For although we live in the natural order, we wage war with natural human armaments. Instead, our weapons are energized with divinely empowered to effectively destroy fortresses.
“We can demolish every deceptive fantasy used as to argue and oppose what God knows. We take into custody every thought and insist that it bow in obedience to Christ. Since we are armed with such dynamic weaponry, we stand ready to carry out judgment any trace of rebellion, as soon as you choose complete obedience.“
2 Corinthians 10:1-6
- The spirit of cowardice, or deilias, says, “Stop.
- Cowardice is a spiritual condition produced by satan opposing the fear of the Lord available in Holy Spirit.
The thoughts of fear are driven deeply into the subconscious, where they freeze the predetermined presets of power, love, and enduring submission.
Attack Dogs and Daughters
A great lawyer I knew had a four-year-old daughter. The neighbor had four German Shepherds he kept locked in a pen because the owner trained them to attack strangers.
One day, sitting at the kitchen table, he heard his little girl whisper, “Daddy,” with a tone that alerted his subconscious mind to courage.
Without opening it, he went through the screen door to find his little daughter surrounded by four attack dogs who had escaped their pen.
He drove his fist into the top of the heads of two and broke the neck of a third before choking the life out of the fourth as it tried to grab him by the throat.
Four dead attack dogs lay at his feet, and he was holding his little girl in his arms before he moved back into his conscious mind.
Dripping blood from torn skin and shaking from the adrenaline release, he realized he had already decided how to respond to that situation before it occurred.
That is courage. A preset of the soul that counts no cost at the moment because power, love, and enduring submission already decided how to respond appropriately.
If you have to struggle to obey God, you are wrestling with a demonically installed and daily updated spirit of fear.
Let’s get free of that root today!
Awakening is Here!
Awakening is a heightened awareness of Providence among the general population arising from manifestations of God’s character or glory through which the fear of the Lord invades the otherwise dominated spiritual arena of satanic fear or the spirit of fear.
Awakening arrives with increased fear of the Lord.
Recognize the application of the fear of the Lord Luke records as Asia Minor enters Awakening:
“Now, this became widely known among Jews and non-Jews so that fear fell upon all those who lived in Ephesus and the Name of the Lord Jesus was magnified.”
Acts 19:17
The spirit of cowardice manifested as blind rage and false prophetic worship when satanic worship of Diane pressed more than twenty thousand worshipers into the arena to appease the goddess lest great harm befalls the city–in the minds of those bound by superstitious terrorism available in idol worship.
- Consider an America or any culture more in awe of the Name of Jesus than a pandemic.
- Consider the uniqueness of a culture dominated by the worship of the queen of heaven suddenly exalting the Name, Jesus Christ, above her name. Revival and riot ensued.
- Consider a kingdom culture empty of the spirit of fear standing against the spiritual terrorism of hell’s great plague against liberty and the agenda of Jesus Christ.
Imagine yourself so free of anxiety, fear, and dread, that the fear of the Lord dominates your thinking, behavior, and communication!
“Through death, Jesus–who shared flesh and blood with humans–might destroy the dominion the devil holds through death so that He might free those who were in bondage by the devil through the fear of death.”
Hebrews 2:14-15
Only a people free of the fear of death can conquer the spirit of fear and lead a nation out of the bondage of the spirit of fear. The words of death spoke by the regime of hell are not the words of Christ.
Jesus says, “Life.” Satan says, “Death.”
The overcomers make the Word the Lord the dominating spiritual condition when they live without the fear of death that wraps them in the spirit of fear.
The world and the kingdom look the same where the spirit of fear dominates. Saints and sinners respond the same when danger arrives if the spirit of fear controls them. If anything should mark the believers–living fearlessly in a world drunk on fear.
