2Sa 23:20 And Benaiah (Jehovah has built up) the son of Jehoiada,(known by Jehovah) the son of a valiant man, of Kabzeel, who had done many acts, he slew two lionlike men of Moab: he went down also and slew a lion in the midst of a pit in time of snow:
How you think about God will determine who you become. You aren’t just the byproduct of “nature” and “nurture.” You are a byproduct of your God-picture. And that internal picture of God determines how you see everything else. Most of our problems are not circumstantial. Most of our problems are perceptual. Our biggest problems can be traced back to an inadequate understanding of who God is. Our problems seem really big because our God seems really small. In fact, we reduce God to the size of our biggest problem. Tozer said a “low view of God . . . is the cause of a hundred lesser evils.”
But a person with a high view of God “is relieved of ten thousand temporal problems.”
. Lion chasers know that their best thought about God on their best day falls infinitely short of how great God really is. “My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are my ways your ways,” declares the LORD. “As the heavens are higher than the earth so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
Sunlight is only eight minutes old. But light from the furthest galaxy takes 12.3 billion years to get here. That distance is virtually incomprehensible! And God says that is about the distance between His thoughts and our thoughts. Your best thought about God on your best day falls 12.3 billion light-years short of how great and how good God really is. We underestimate God’s goodness and greatness by at least 12.3 billion light-years. You know what the greatest tragedy in life is? It is someone whose god gets smaller and smaller with each passing day.
Maybe it’s time to stop putting God in a box the size of your cerebral cortex. Maybe it’s time to stop creating God in your image and let Him create you in His. The more we grow, the bigger God should get. And the bigger God gets, the smaller our lions will become.
Long before God laid earth’s foundations, he had us in mind. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family. He thought of everything, provided for everything we could possibly need. Translation: God planned for every contingency you might ever encounter, before the beginning of time. That is one of the most mind-boggling truths in Scripture.
2Ti_1:7 For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; (faithless timid but of power, (dunamis) and of love, and of a sound mind. Discipline self control
We are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. The word prepared derives from an ancient custom of sending servants ahead of a king to secure safe passage. But God turns the tables. The King of Kings goes in advance of His servants and prepares the road ahead for us. Sometimes His itinerary entails coming face to face with a lion in a pit on a snowy day. But when you find yourself in those challenging circumstances, you need to know that God is ordering your footsteps.
You can have a sense of destiny because you know that God has considered every contingency in your life, and He always has your best interest at heart. And that sense of destiny, rooted in the sovereignty of God, helps you pray the unthinkable and attempt the impossible.
Second Kings 6 records what may be the most ridiculous prayer in Scripture. A group of prophets are chopping trees near a river and one of their iron ax heads falls into the river. The prophet who lost the ax head said to Elisha: “Alas, master! For it was borrowed.” Notice the verb tense. This apprentice uses the past tense. As far as he’s concerned, this ax head is as good as gone. This apprentice regarded his loss as final. He had no expectation whatsoever that the ax head would be retrieved. I think he wanted a little mercy or a little sympathy, but he wasn’t expecting a miracle. He didn’t even have a category for what was about to happen, and there is good reason. Iron ax heads don’t float. Or do they? There is only one way to find out: Pray a ridiculous prayer! Now here is what I love about this story. If I’m Elisha, I feel bad for the guy who lost the borrowed ax head. Maybe I let him borrow mine. Maybe I drive him to the hardware store to get a new one. But it doesn’t even cross my mind to pray that it would float. But you can tell the wheels are turning in Elisha’s mind because he asks where the ax head fell in. If I’m the apprentice, I’m thinking, What difference does it make? But he shows Elisha where he lost it. Elisha cuts a stick and throws it into the water, and something happens that had probably never happened
And the iron did swim. , this isn’t a life-or-death situation. Yes, it’s a borrowed ax head. Yes, he lost it. But if that is the worst thing that’s ever happened to you, you’ve led a pretty sheltered life. You know what I’m saying? It’s an ax head. This may sound crazy, but doesn’t it seem like maybe you ought to save an amazing miracle like this for a little bigger tragedy? God is great not just because nothing is too big for Him. God is great but because nothing is too small for Him either.
These kinds of miracles help us redefine reality. And the reality is that nothing is too difficult for God. We tend to rank miracles. We have big requests and little requests. We have easy requests and difficult requests. But that is a false construct. The truth is this: To the infinite all finites are equal. There is no big or small, easy or difficult, possible or impossible.
When it comes to God, there are no degrees of difficulty. There are no odds when it comes to God. What were the odds of Jesus feeding five thousand people with five loaves and two fish? Let’s just say each loaf of bread or each fish is equal to one meal. Then I’m guessing the odds were approximately five thousand to seven. And to the disciples, that seemed like an insurmountable problem: “Eight months’ wages would not buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” You can almost see the disciples trying to crunch the numbers, but any way you slice five loaves and filet two fish, you still come up 4,993 meals short. It just doesn’t add up. 5 + 2 = 7. Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were seated.
He did the same with the fish. When they had all had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, “Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted.” So they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten. In God’s economy, 5+2 = 5,000 with a remainder of 12. They actually end up with more than what they started with after feeding five thousand people. And God is glorified because He defied impossible odds. It honestly doesn’t matter how many Moabites you’re facing. It doesn’t matter how tall the phillisitine giant is. And the size of the lion isn’t really the issue. The issue is this: How big is your God?
Because we know the outcome of the lion chase, we fail to appreciate the way it looked to the average bystander. What if Benaiah had been killed by the lion? Let’s just say it like it is: He would have looked completely ridiculous. Can’t you hear people whispering under their breath at the funeral? What was Benaiah thinking? But lion chasers aren’t afraid of doing something that seems ridiculous to others—because they know anything is possible
Psa_37:23 The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD: and he delighteth in his way.
Psa 119:133 Order my steps in thy word: and let not any iniquity have dominion over me.
A request can never be too ridiculous when you’re asking the One who knows no limits.
“Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” We underestimate how much spiritual authority we have when we pray in accordance with the will of God. The word bind means “to prohibit or to fasten with chains.”
Don’t let mental & spiritual lions keep you from experiencing everything God has to offer. The greatest breakthroughs in your life will happen when you push through the fear. The defining moments will double as the scariest decisions. But you’ve got to face those fears and begin the process of unlearning them.
Almost like a hard drive with a computer virus, our minds have infected files. Irrational fears and misconceptions keep us from operating the way we were designed to. And if those fears and misconceptions aren’t uninstalled, they undermine everything we do. Half of learning is learning. The other half of learning is unlearning. Unfortunately, unlearning is twice as hard as learning. It’s like missing your exit on the freeway. You have to drive to the next exit and then double back. Every mile you go in the wrong direction is really a two-mile error. Unlearning is twice as hard, and it often takes twice as long. It is harder to get old thoughts out of your mind than it is to get new thoughts into your mind.
If you study the teachings of Christ, you’ll realize that He was reverse engineering religious minds. And those can be the toughest minds to change. That is why two phrases are repeated over and over again in the Sermon on the Mount. “You have heard that it was said...” “But I tell you...” What was Jesus saying and doing? He was uninstalling Old Testament concepts and upgrading them with New Testament truths. “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’
But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Half of spiritual growth is learning what we don’t know. The other half is unlearning what we do know. And it is the failure to unlearn irrational fears and misconceptions that keeps us from becoming who God wants us to be. The invalid in John 5 is a great example of the importance of unlearning. He had been crippled for thirty-eight years when Jesus asked him if he wanted to get well. But the man believed there was only one way to be healed: “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred.
While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.” This man made an assumption that may have cost him thirty-eight years! He only had one category for healing. He assumed, based on ancient superstition, that he had to be the first one into the pool of Bethesda when the water was stirred in order to be healed. In a sense, he was imprisoned by what he knew. But Jesus uninstalled that mistaken belief with one sentence: “Stand up, pick up your bed, and walk!” Now, here is what you need to see. Jesus didn’t just set this man free physically. He set him free cognitively. Faith is unlearning the senseless worries and misguided beliefs that keep us captive.
Faith involves synaptogenesis and neurogenesis. Faith is rewiring the human brain.
Rom 12:2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind,… an-ak-ah'ee-no-sis renovation: - renewing. Refreshing rebooting
Neurologically speaking, that is what we do when we study Scripture. We are literally upgrading our minds by downloading the mind of Christ. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Just as a computer hard drive needs to be defragmented to optimize performance, our minds need to be defragmented.
So how do we defragment our faith? How do we renew our minds? How do we get ourselves out of the mental pit we’ve gotten ourselves into? The way to upgrade your mind is to download Scripture. Let me put Paul’s instructions in neurological context. Doctors Avi Karni and Leslie Ungerleider of the National Institute of Mental Health did a fascinating study asking subjects to perform a simple motor task—a finger-tapping exercise. As subjects tapped, the doctors conducted an MRI to identify what part of the brain was being activated. The subjects then practiced the finger-tapping exercise daily for four weeks. At the end of the four-week period, the brain scan was repeated. In each instance, it revealed that the area of the brain involved in the task had expanded. That simple task—a finger-tapping exercise—literally recruited new nerve cells and rewired neuronal connections.
When we read Scripture, we are recruiting new nerve cells and rewiring neuronal connections. In a sense, we are downloading a new operating system that reconfigures the mind. We stop thinking human thoughts and start thinking God thoughts. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. How do we accomplish that command? Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly. When we read Scripture, we engage in spiritual tapping. Our brains are rewired in alignment with the Word, and we develop the mind of Christ. We think His thoughts. Facing Fear Unlearning requires more than just rewiring our brains. We have to use our new knowledge to face our fears—and conquer them. According to psychiatric reference books, there are approximately two thousand classified fears. everything from photophobia (the fear of never looking good in pictures) to arachibutyrophobia (the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth). There is even a phobiaphobia—the fear of phobias.
What’s interesting is that psychiatrists theorize that we’re born with only two innate fears: the fear of falling and the fear of loud noises. That means that every other fear is learned. And more importantly, that means that every other fear can be unlearned
But you can’t reason with irrational fears. I think most of us are shaped, for better or for worse, by a handful of experiences. Those defining experiences can plant a seed of confidence or a seed of doubt, a seed of hope or a seed of helplessness, a seed of faith or a seed of fear.
First John 4:18 describes the end goal of our relationship with God: “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear.” The goal of love is fearlessness! As we grow in a love relationship with God, we unlearn the fears that paralyze us and neutralize us spiritually. That is the essence of faith. Faith is the process of unlearning your irrational fears.
The only God-ordained fear is the fear of God. And if we fear God, then we don’t have to fear anyone or anything else. Unlearning our fears is really a process of learning to trust God more and more. Lion chasers experience the same fears as everyone else. lion chasers have learned to face those fears. They have unlearned the fear of uncertainty, the fear of risk, the fear of looking foolish, and the countless other fears that could hold them back. Their faith has been defragmented. They don’t necessarily know more than other people. But they have unlearned the fears that kept them captive. And they all did it the same way: by chasing their fears instead of running away from them. They exposed themselves to the very thing they were afraid of.
Abraham led Isaac to Mount Moriah and placed him on the altar. Moses went back to Pharaoh forty years after running away as a fugitive. And Jesus went into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan himself. Is there an Isaac you need to sacrifice on the altar? Is there a pharaoh you need to face? Or maybe God is calling you into the wilderness for a season? Lion chasers don’t hide from the things they fear. They chase lions into pits. They expose themselves to the sources of their terror because they know it is the only way to overcome them. Exposure therapy
Lion chasers have a high threshold for fear because they have built up fear immunity
The cure for the fear of failure is not success. It’s failure. The cure for the fear of rejection is not acceptance. It’s rejection. You’ve got to be exposed to small quantities of whatever you’re afraid of. That’s how you build up resistane.
So what are you afraid of ? What allergens trigger a fear reaction? Those are the very things you need to expose yourself to. One of the greatest things that could happen to you is for your fear to become reality. Then you would discover that it’s not the end of the world. Your fear is worse than the actual thing you’re afraid of. And if you learn from every mistake, then there is no such thing as failure
Do you remember the way Scripture describes Satan? Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Satan has two primary tactics when it comes to neutralizing you spiritually: discouragement and fear. He wants you to focus on past mistakes you’ve made. That is why he is called “the accuser of our brethren.” And the end result is a loss of courage. The other tactic is fear. Satan wants to scare the heaven out of you. He wants to put you on your heels so you become reactive and defensive. That is why he is described as a prowling lion.
What we need is a little Christ-like courage to chase the lion. Jesus never ran away from anyone or anything. He wasn’t afraid of walking into the temple when he knew people had a plot on his life. He wasn’t afraid of the lunatic with the legion of demons. And when the lynch mob came to arrest him, what did Jesus do? He didn’t run and hide. Scripture says he “stepped forward” and identified himself. Jesus never ran away from his detractors or persecutors. He chased them. Even when his life was on the line, Jesus refused to defend himself before the judicial authorities. If he had decided to defend himself, I’m convinced he could have and would have talked his way out of the cross.
Because he never lost an argument. But he chose instead to close his mouth and go to the cross. He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb before the shearer is silent, so he did not open his mouth. That is the essence of courage, isn’t it? Courage is putting yourself into defenseless positions. Isn’t that what landed Daniel in a lion’s den? Isn’t that what Esther did by defying royal protocol and approaching the king without being summoned? And isn’t that what Jesus did on the cross? The people mocked Jesus. They hurled insults at him. And they challenged him. “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself.” Can you imagine how difficult it must have been to hear those words?
Because Jesus could have saved himself! “Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say crucifixion must happen
Right before his epic battle with Goliath, David connected the dots between his past problems and current opportunity. He reviewed his résumé so that Saul would let him fight Goliath: “When a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock, I went after it and struck it and rescued the sheep from its mouth. When it turned on me, I seized it by its hair and struck it and killed it. Your servant has killed both the lion and the bear; this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the armies of the living God. The LORD who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of the phillisitne
It’s our past problems that prepare us for future opportunities. So someday we may be as grateful for the bad things as the good things because the bad things helped prepare us for the good things. At face value, landing in a pit with a lion on a snowy day is a massive problem.
But sometimes the biggest problems present the greatest opportunities for God to reveal his glory and work His purposes. No one likes being in the pits or put out to pasture, but maybe God is developing character and honing skills that will serve you later
We pray for comfort instead of character. We pray for an easy way out instead of the strength to make it through. We pray for no pain, when the result would be no gain. We pray that God will keep us out of pits and away from lions. But if God answered our prayer, it would rob us of our greatest opportunities. Many of our prayers would short-circuit God’s plans and purposes for our lives if He answered them. Maybe we should stop asking God to get us out of difficult circumstances and start asking Him what He wants us to get out of those difficult circumstances. Most of us blame our circumstances when things aren’t going well just like we blame the ref when a game isn’t going well. We look for some external scapegoat. But maybe our problem isn’t our circumstances
God has a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree perspective on everything. He considers every contingency. He sees all the way around everything—every issue, every person, every experience, every problem. Most of us see a very narrow slice of reality. It’s like we are looking through a peephole. So why do we assume that what we pray for is always what’s best for us? If we could see what God sees, we would pray very different prayers.
According to legend, Midas loved gold so much that when Dionysus granted him a wish, Midas asked that everything he touched would turn to gold. At first, Midas was delighted with his request, but when he discovered that his touch made food inedible and that his embrace made loved ones lifeless, he stumbled upon what sociologist Robert Merton called the law of unintended consequences. Like Midas, getting what we want can result in unforeseen and undesirable consequences. So much for the Midas touch. Sometimes an unanswered prayer is God, in His sovereign wisdom, sparing us the pain of unintended consequences. Sometimes God allows what His power could prevent. Most of the time that causes us a great deal of temporal angst, but someday we will owe God as many thank-yous for the prayers He did not answer as the ones He did. Maybe prayer is less about changing our circumstances than it is changing our perspective. Most of our problems aren’t the byproduct of our circumstances but of our perspective on our circumstances.
