Devotionals: fruit of the spirits and how to overcome fear

Devotionals: fruit of the spirits and how to overcome fear

Posted on December 18, 2008 Updated on December 18, 2008

Memorise: “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13)

Read: Mark 3:13-19

 Pastor E. Adeboye 

A hunter went out for gaming and killed a big leopard. Then he discovered its prey had a small baby. Out of sympathy, he took it home. When the chief of the community saw the baby leopard, he asked the man why it was spared and domesticated, and he replied it was only a little innocent and harmless creature. The little leopard began to grow, and played with children in the neighbourhood.

 The son of the hunter could even take a ride on its back. With time, the community dwellers had lost all sense of danger posed by the young leopard. After it had grown into a big leopard, the son of the hunter was taking a ride on its back when he fell and bruised his legs against thorns. He began to bleed. The leopard licked the blood and suddenly the leopard instincts that had been sleeping, woke up. The hunter’s son became its first victim!

If you do not destroy the little leopard in your life, it will surely destroy you. Now is the time to tame and mortify anger, lust for strange flesh, love of money, love for worldly things. Whenever we talk of purity, we also mean that contamination has been removed.

One way suchcontamination can be removed is through fire because of its ability to purify. Peter was a beneficiary of this. He was number one among those called by the Lord. He had great potentials. But then he had one little problem – fear. Satan discovered it the day Peter walked on water, hence after the arrest of Jesus, a little girl confronted him and he denied his Lord three times.

Fear could have robbed him of his destiny, but for the intercession of the Master. On the day of Pentecost when the fire fell, it roasted fear out of Peter’s life. From that moment, Peter moved from fear to faith, cowardice to bravery (Acts 4:13).

Is fear lurking somewhere in your heart? Ask God to consume it with His fire. Fear is one enemy that overcomes its host. You cannot accomplish much for God if you have fear. It will always come between you and your tasks. It will also come between you and your glorious destiny.

Is bitterness in your life? It will stop you from tasting the joy of the Lord. It can prevent you from sweetness. Has anyone offended you but you have not forgiven him? Arise and forgive the fellow now. Do not allow any contamination! Don’t become the victim of your passions!

Anyone in bitterness cannot know the taste of sweetness because even when sweet things come, they will mix with bitterness in the fellow and the end result will be bitter.