CSN - LightWing Messages - 10/16/2022
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell the Israelites to turn back and encamp near Pi Hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea. They are to encamp by the sea, directly opposite Baal Zephon. Pharaoh will think, ‘The Israelites are wandering around the land in confusion, hemmed in by the desert.’ And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will pursue them. But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.” So the Israelites did this.
When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, Pharaoh and his officials changed their minds about them and said, “What have we done? We have let the Israelites go and have lost their services!” So he had his chariot made ready and took his army with him. He took six hundred of the best chariots, along with all the other chariots of Egypt, with officers over all of them. The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, so that he pursued the Israelites, who were marching out boldly. The Egyptians—all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots, horsemen and troops—pursued the Israelites and overtook them as they camped by the sea near Pi Hahiroth, opposite Baal Zephon.
As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord. They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!”
Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still. Exodus 14:1-14 (NIV)
FOUNDER’S MESSAGE:
This past Sunday, we offered a portion of a sermon by Dietrich Bonhoeffer as the LightWing message of the week. As the signs of the times are upon us, at least for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear, it is almost as if there is a repetition of history, as the rise of tyranny in America appears similar to the rise of tyranny in Germany in the time of Bonhoeffer. The pastor knew the signs of the times and attempted to take a stand and to be a rock for others who were wavering in their faith, many who were severely challenged by fear.
Now in America, there are many pastors and prophets who are witnessing the signs of the times, and they also are attempting to take a stand and to be a source of stability in such a time as this for others now wavering in their faith, who are challenged by fear. Especially, as America moves closer to Election Day, there is a very substantial understanding that the nation is nearing a threshold – a crossing point. There is uncertainty, and great anxiety due to the lack of confidence in a system that was supposed to be “unsinkable.” And, just as uncertainty births anxiety, it is anxiety that breeds fear. Uncertainty is a form of ignorance.
As I have mentioned before in my role as a history teacher, fear and ignorance have been the two handmaidens of tyranny throughout the course of history, consistently. So, fear could be a ‘natural’ consequence of studying history as this truth becomes clear as the evidence unfolds. Yet, fear does not always flow from the study of history if one remains oblivious to its purpose, or if the students remain as detached observers, studying history only as an intellectual exercise and ignorantly assuming they are not participants in the flow of history themselves. So, we can also ignore fear due to our ignorance Yet, Bonhoeffer was appealing to a fear that people have difficulty ignoring. The Hebrews faced such fear in the wrath of a tyrant, as countless billions have faced tyranny throughout human history.
Bonhoeffer was aware of this fear in 1933, or he would not have so insightfully addressed it. Our Founding Fathers had to deal with the fear of provoking the tyranny of Great Britain in their time. And, as I mentioned in my introductory message last week, “the time is upon all of us, and it matters not whether we are ready or whether we are oblivious, or if so many could care less…
And in such a time as this, there is a great amount of fear present across the nation. It has been planned and predetermined as a force to intimidate and regulate all of the people.”
Although Bonhoeffer was writing about Germany in 1933, his words echo up through the historical depths today. His words are very appropriate for our time and for this world today -- especially America. Much of what he had said at the time of the rise of Hitler can apply to today. It applies to many people I know. Whether we like it or not, Americans are facing this reality in such a time as this. It is a time when all people of faith, as well as those of little faith are facing judgment from Heaven. It is our time to choose how we want to live upon our planet. We either accept the designs of the slave masters, as the Hebrews were ready to do, as they trembled in fear near the shores of the Red Sea, or we confront tyranny.
The essential question is whether we will face tyranny cowering in fear or armed with faith and of good courage with absolute trust in God. Bonhoeffer made his choice as he left a haven in the United States and went back to his home in Germany. I believe that it is exactly what Jesus meant when he said if you seek to gain your life, you will lose it, but if you seek to lose your life you will gain it.
Again this week, due to the main message, among the various aggregated features we offer the video of a presentation of Eric Metaxes, who has written a biography of Bonhoeffer: Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy | Eric Metaxas We also add an interview he gave with Pastor Allen Jackson. The two videos are highly recommended among the other items that could attract raiders’ attention. Eric Metaxes has a very appropriate message for our time in a new book he has written, A Letter to the American Church.
As always, we hope our readers would consider all the messages in this edition relevant or meaningful, and if readers know others who might value them as well, consider becoming one of our official LightWing messengers and please pass this newsletter on to those whom you feel would be able to welcome it. Or simply, please receive it yourselves. May God bless all of our readers and all of their loved ones. May God bless America!
“Overcoming Fear” (Part 2)
By Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Berlin, January 15, 1933
The following sermon is taken from “The Collected Sermons of Dietrich Bonhoeffer,” edited and introduced by Isabel Best. It is the second part of a single sermon because the original sermon is over 3,000 words. Part I was posted in a previous edition of the LightWing Messages, yet there is some overlap into the second part. However, for readers who want to read the entire sermon, a link to that can be found at the bottom of this message.
Note of Context: In January 1933, shortly before Hitler came to power, Bonhoeffer preached this sermon at a vespers service on the evening of the second Sunday after Epiphany. It was a time of great tension in Berlin, and of widespread fear. The Hindenburg government was tottering, indeed was about to go under, and with it Germany’s fragile first republic, created at Weimar after World War I. There was fear of Communism—the “Red Tide from the East”—and other extremist movements, and danger from open fighting in the streets… Introduction by Isabel Best.
Matthew 8:23–27: And when he got into the boat, his disciples followed him. A windstorm arose on the sea, so great that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but he was asleep. And they went and woke him up, saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, you of little faith?” Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a dead calm. They were amazed, saying, “What sort of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him?”
The overcoming of fear—that is what we are proclaiming here. The Bible, the gospel, Christ, the church, the faith—all are one great battle cry against fear in the lives of human beings. Fear is, somehow or other, the arch-enemy itself. It crouches in people’s hearts. It hollows out their insides, until their resistance and strength are spent and they suddenly break down. Fear secretly gnaws and eats away at all the ties that bind a person to God and to others, and when in a time of need that person reaches for those ties and clings to them, they break and the individual sinks back into himself or herself, helpless and despairing, while hell rejoices...
Those who would try to keep up their pride, as if all this had nothing to do with them, as if they didn’t understand what it’s all about, would hardly be human. No one human could fail to understand what the people of the world have to be afraid of today.
But look here, right in the middle of this fearful world is a place that is meant for all time, which has a peculiar task that the world doesn’t understand. It keeps calling over and over but always anew, in the same tone, the same thing: Fear is overcome; don’t be afraid [John 16:33]. In the world you are frightened. But be comforted; I have conquered the world! Christ is in the boat!
…You of little faith, why are you so fearful? In these words we must hear all the disappointment of Jesus Christ in his disciples and all his love for them. Do you still not know that you are in God’s hands, that where I am, God is? Why are you so fearful? Be of good courage, strong, firm, adult, sure, confident, not shaking with fear. Don’t hang your heads; don’t complain about what bad times these are . . . I am in the boat. And Christ is here, too, in the nave of this church. So why not hear him and believe him?
We have come here, very probably, because somehow or other we know that something in our lives needs to change, and because we think perhaps the church can somehow help us with this. We are aware of how meager, how poor, how petty and short-sighted our lives have become. All of us see only our own worries and difficulties and no longer those of others that may be a thousand times worse. Our affairs seem so enormous and infinitely important to us that we have become dulled toward anything else. This is the work of fear in us. And now we sense that we can’t bear to be hemmed in like this anymore; it’s suffocating. The call of the church cuts through this questioning and foreboding. There is one thing we are lacking: to believe that the Almighty God is our father and our Lord.
To believe that for God, our greatest cares are like the worries of small children in their parents’ eyes; that God can turn things around and dispose of them in no time at all; for God it’s easy, not hard at all. We must believe that a thousand years in God’s sight are like a day [Ps. 90:4], that God’s thoughts are higher than our thoughts [Isa. 55:8–9], that God is with us in spite of everything. Let us receive the call of the church once again: You of little faith, why are you so fearful? In the midst of the storm, Christ is in the ship. Away with you, Fear! Let us see you, Lord Jesus, strong helper, Savior!
But now comes a host of objections and excuses. We say we would like to believe, but we simply can’t anymore. The suffering is too great. Oh, but let’s not take this kind of talk too seriously. You cannot believe? Well, neither can we. Do you want to believe?—in that case you already do, in a way, perhaps not very strongly, only a beginning, but perhaps a thousand times stronger than many others who think they are able to believe. Don’t worry about your faith, whether it is weak or strong. Just look to him in whom you believe, and speak to him: Lord, increase our faith! [See Luke 17:5].
We say that it is not life’s misery that frightens us, but rather our own sin that we fear; and that we need to fear it, so we won’t be overcome by it! Again, that sounds so right, but it is really only a trick of fear itself. No, it is not true that we must be afraid of sin. Those who are afraid of it are already up to their necks in it. Fear is evil’s net, spread to catch us. Once evil has made us afraid, confused us, we are in its clutches. Don’t be afraid, be of good courage . . . How can you meet the enemy with fear in your heart? You of little faith, why are you so fearful? Isn’t God greater than your sin? Let God grow strong in you; then sin is knocked down. Believe in God . . . Lord, strengthen our faith!
Now, finally, let the most depressed and despairing people speak, those who ask: Isn’t our time up? Aren’t the years of catastrophe, of utter decline and breakdown, the chaos of our lives in both great and small things, which no one can ignore, the sign that God has let us go? God doesn’t want us anymore. There’s no more mercy coming our way from God. God is against us, and we have to accept it. It won’t do to keep clinging if we aren’t wanted. This is the cry out of the very depths of despair. There is only one thing that helps, and it is what the church does with any of us who thinks and feels this way. It takes the cross and places it before our eyes and asks: Did God abandon him? And since God did not abandon Jesus, we will not be abandoned by God, either.
Learn to recognize this sign in your own life. Learn to recognize and understand the hour of the storm, when you were perishing. This is the time when God is incredibly close to you, not far away. Right there, when everything else that keeps us safe is breaking and falling down, when one after another all the things our lives depend on are being taken away or destroyed, where we have to learn to give them up, all this is happening because God is coming near to us, because God wants to be our only support and certainty. God lets our lives be broken and fail in every direction, through fate and guilt, and through this very failure God brings us back; we are thrown back upon God alone. God wants to show us that when you let everything go, when you lose all your own security and have to give it up, that is when you are totally free to receive God and be kept totally safe in God. So may we understand rightly the hours of affliction and temptation, the hours in our lives when we are on the high seas! God is close to us then, not far away. Our God is on the cross.
The cross is the sign that stands in judgment on all the false security in our lives and restores faith in God alone. Be of good courage, be valiant, be confident, be certain—that is what it says. Yes, but everything depends here on making sure that one last, terrible misunderstanding does not arise. There is such a thing as false courage, false confidence . . . and this false confidence is itself only the most subtle form in which fear disguises itself. Let us return to our story.
When the disciples were climbing aboard the boat, they seemed quite confident; they seemed not at all afraid. Why were they confident? They looked at the lovely calm sea and saw no reason to worry. But as the wind and waves increased in force, the disciples lost their calm and fear grew in them. They gazed apprehensively at the wild sea. Its appearance had made them feel safe, but now fear was gaining the upper hand. The story says that Jesus was asleep. Only faith can sleep without a care—that is why sleep is a reminder of paradise—faith finds its safety in God alone. The disciples couldn’t sleep; their security was gone; their confidence had been misplaced and now was lost. It was a false sense of security—it was only fear in disguise. This sense of security does not overcome fear and soon breaks down. Only the faith that leaves behind all false confidence, letting it fall and break down, can overcome fear. This is faith: it does not rely on itself or on favorable seas, favorable conditions; it does not rely on its own strength or on other people’s strength, but believes only and alone in God, whether or not there is a storm. It is the only faith that is not superstition and does not let us slip back into fear, but makes us free of fear. Lord, make this faith strong in us who have little faith!
But the other side of the coin is also true. When Christ is in the boat, a storm always comes up. The world tries with all its evil powers to get hold of him, to destroy him along with his disciples; it hates him and rises up against him. Christians surely know this. No one has to go through so much anxiety and fear as do Christians. But this does not surprise us, since Christ is the Crucified One, and there is no way to life for a Christian without being crucified. So we will suffer and make our way through together with Christ, looking always to him who is with us in the boat and can soon stand up and rebuke the sea, so that it becomes calm.
However, it does seem to be true, what you have surely all been quietly wanting to say for some time, that today Christ is no longer doing such amazing things. He is so strangely hidden away that we often think he is no longer there at all! Dear brothers and sisters, what do we know about what Christ can do and wants to do for us, this very evening, if we will only call upon him as we should, if we call out, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” That was fear all right, but it was faith in the midst of fear, because it knew where help comes from, the only place. We say there are no miracles anymore . . . but what do we know really, you and I? We will certainly be ashamed of ourselves if one day we are allowed to see what God can do.
They were amazed, saying, “What sort of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him?” We can well understand their amazement. What sort of person is this on whom fear has no effect, who overcomes the fear in human life and takes away its power? By asking this question, we are already on our knees before him, praying to him, pointing to him, the wonder worker, and saying, This is God! Amen.
Click here for the link to the entire sermon - "Overcoming Fear"
Onward and Upward!
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What affects one, can affect all!
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Recommended Resources - follow the links…
Excellent Election Education Resource: US 2020 Election Fraud at a Glance
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Excellent Citizen-Patriot News Resource: Steve Bannon's War Room
Excellent Citizen-Patriot News Resource: From Frank Speech - the Home of Free Speech
Excellent Citizen Comprehensive Resource: David Horowitz Freedom Center
Excellent Expose’ of Political Prisoners within the US: American Gulag
Excellent Source of CRT information for parents: Moms for America
Excellent Christian Homeschool Resource:
https://ed-exit.com/
Excellent Citizen Activist Resource: Precinct Strategy: Home
Excellent Guide to Protecting Families: A Guide to Protecting Your Family From the Coming Insurrection and Violence 1 ARE YOU SAFE?
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