In episode 239 of the No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast, host Greg Ryan delivers a devotional teaching centered on overcoming the fear of man through a biblical perspective. He begins by sharing a statistic that only about 10% of people will love you, 20% will hate you, and 70% are indifferent, urging listeners to invest their time with the supportive 10%—fellow believers who encourage and empower one another. Ryan stresses the necessity of daily immersion in the Word of God, likening Scripture to spiritual food that sustains the soul, and cites Proverbs 29:25 and Psalm 91 as key verses that promise safety and protection when trust is placed in the Lord rather than in human approval. He delves into theological concepts about the flesh versus the spirit, the promise of a future resurrected, immortal body as described in 2 Corinthians 5, and the certainty of standing before Christ at judgment for those who have accepted Him. Throughout, he emphasizes that fear of man is a snare, that the Holy Spirit guides believers to truth, and that faith is activated by speaking God’s promises. The episode concludes with a heartfelt prayer for listeners, a call to continue seeking the Word, and an invitation to future episodes that will further address fear and encourage believers to live fearlessly.
Welcome to episode 239, In the Beginning Was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Spending time in the word of God is the best way to spend time with God. Welcome to No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast, where we will encourage, inspire, and empower you to live your best life in Christ. Here's Greg.
Welcome to episode 239. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, I am going to continue to talk about being fearless, and I'm going to specifically talk about the fear of man. And I'm not talking about when you walk down the street and you're scared of people. I'm talking about the person that you have no idea who they are, and you're doing something or not doing something. My example from my life is that I won't do something because I don't want to offend anybody. I heard a statistic, and because I've got my degree 100 years ago in quantitative management, statistics still mean something to me. And I know you can manipulate the numbers, and I know you can make the data look like whatever you want it to look like, but this guy was a businessman, and he said there is approximately 10% of the people that are gonna love you. There are 20% of the people that are gonna hate you, and then there are 70% of the people that don't care one way or the other. He suggested that you talk to the 10% of the people. You spend your life visiting with and talking to and surrounding yourself with the 10% of the people that love you. And that's what I'm gonna do. I am gonna go all in on this thing. I am gonna start positioning myself to be around believers. That want to get better. And I'm talking about hot and cold Christians. I'm talking about people that have been in the Word of God and they're still in the Word of God and they just want to be encouraged, empowered, and inspired. And they just want to be lifted up and they want to know that they are loved. I'm for that. God loves you. I'm here to tell you that God is no respecter of persons. You are God's favorite. God loves you. And for the person that has, quote, "tried Christianity," maybe just a little cold on the whole idea, don't understand it, I want to encourage you that I believe, and this is just me talking, this is Gregology, but if you will look back at your life, the reason that it got cold, one of two things: it was either unreal expectations or you got out of the Word of God. And here's the soapbox moment. If you are just getting into this podcast, if you're coming in at episode 239 and this is your first episode, I talk about you have to get into the Word of God daily. Jesus said, "Give us this day our daily bread," and he was talking about the spiritual food. You don't have any problem, and I'm making an assumption, I can tell you for certain, I don't have any problem feeding myself every day. In fact, I do it multiple times each day. So if I can feed my flesh, which is just here for a little bit and will one day wash away and go away and be changed, hopefully in the twinkling of an eye at the Rapture— if I'm very good at feeding this, the Bible says that your flesh is in enmity with God. Your body is never going to be redeemed. That's pretty much what it's saying. That's why you got to get a new body. You are going to get a new body. You're going to put off mortality and then put on immortality is what Paul says. And we are going to do that, but right now we are in this body. This is our vehicle. This is our tent. Peter talked about he was going to put off this tent. This was just where his soul and his spirit were housed. That's where he was living. And this may be a little deep for the first of the year, but the flesh that we have is not who we are. This body that you and I have— I got no idea what a new body is going to look like, but this body right here, it's not going to be the same body. So I don't know what that means. I don't have any idea. I'm not here to start any new immortality body following. Don't know, don't care. I just know that I'm going to have a new body, and I'm going to spend eternity with Jesus with that new body, and there won't be sickness, there won't tears. It's going to be a wonderful, wonderful time, but we have got to start digging into the Word of God. Jesus says, "The words that I speak, they are spirit and they are life." The words that Jesus speaks, the Word of God— Jesus is the Word of God— but when he speaks, it is spirit and it is life. The Word is alive. The Word feeds you. And it feeds your spirit man. We've got 3 enemies. The punk comes only to steal, to kill, and destroy, and he uses it with deception. He fights you getting into the word of God, because if you get into the word of God and you know the truth, then the truth is what's going to make you free. Knowing the truth, and you can't do that without just getting in and staying in. And I'm telling you, I don't think most people, most Christians, have a true understanding of the Bible. Now, they may have a great understanding of a part of the Bible, but the whole Bible and all of God— I think that's what we're going to be doing in eternity, is God's just going to continue to show us different facets of him. I think we're going to see just his goodness, I think we're going to see his mercy. I think we're going to see his love. And I think it's going to take forever to get all of this done. And that's why we're going to live forever. And I know, I know, some of you, if you just stumbled onto this podcast, you're probably— the eyebrows going up and your head's cocking. But I'm telling you, I believe every word in the Bible was divinely inspired word of God. I believe that the Holy Spirit had men write down what he wanted— the Holy Spirit wanted them to say. And I believe that if you read that and you just meditate on that and you start digging it out and digging it out and meditating and seeking and asking God and say, God, what is this you want me to understand? I believe you will have what God wants you to have. And because this podcast is all about the word of God I need to give you Proverbs 29:25, is what I started this podcast off. The fear of man brings a snare, but whoever puts his trust in the Lord shall be safe. And a lot of people are looking for safety. A lot of people are running around fearful. A lot of people are wringing their hands. And we talked about on a previous episode about Psalm 91. Where you have to say with your mouth, "I will say of the Lord, he is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in him will I trust." When you say that, then all of Psalm 91, all those protections, all of those securities, all of the stuff most people, I would argue, in the world are searching for, you've got as a Christian. All you have to do is activate it. Again, Faith is voice-activated, and it's impossible to please God without faith. And that's not because God is mad. We've talked about this multiple times. God is not mad. He's not angry. He's not even a little bit upset. He put all of that anger, all of the sin, everything on Jesus at the cross. It was nailed, buried, and Jesus rose again. He left all that garbage in the grave—sin, anger, All of that is no longer even an issue. It has been paid. That is the wonderful good news of the gospel, is that Jesus took everything. He owed nothing, but he took everything, and he did it for you and I. He did it to restore the relationship that was broke when Adam and Eve ate from tree of knowledge of good and evil. They broke the law. There was one rule, and they broke the one rule, I'm not going to go back and rehash that. We don't understand all that we have, and then we start trying to please people, and the world is not looking to be pleased. The world wants to condemn you. The world wants to punish you. The world wants to get you to not read the book. Satan, the punk, the world system, it has absolutely nothing to do with the Bible. And your flesh. You're never going to get your flesh to fall in line. It's never— your flesh, your skin, and your five senses are never going to get to heaven. Now, your soul and your spirit are going to get to heaven, and I pray in Jesus' name that you've accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, because it says in the Bible, to be absent of the body is to be present with the Lord. I believe everybody who dies stands before Jesus. I believe that's scriptural. And I was gonna edit out what I just said, but I just want you to see that sometimes as you read the Bible, you want to let the Holy Spirit speak to you. And I'm not sure that everybody that dies stands before God right when they die. 2 Corinthians 5:1, for we know 2 That if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. 3 For in this we groan earnestly, desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. 4 For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed but further clothed. That mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now he who has prepared for us this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased, rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad. Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men: but we are well known to God, and I also trust are well known in your consciences. Now, I know I've got superior reading skills, and I know that was wonderful to listen to on this podcast. I'd want to show— sometimes I'm always thinking that I've got all of this figured out. For whatever reason, I was thinking that everybody is going to stand right there at death to be absent with the bodies, to be present with the Lord. I believe we're all one day going to stand before God, but there is a great white throne judgment and there is the judgment seat of Christ, and only those who have accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior will stand before God in the judgment seat of Christ. And that is what Paul is talking about in 2 Corinthians 5, and it's talking about when we die, there's going to be a judgment, and it says to be absent from the body and to be present. What we are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. You can be well pleased that if I die, I'm going to be standing before the Lord. If, if I die, I will be standing before Jesus and I will be in his presence. Now there's no way to know how all this is going to play out. I just look at what the word says and then I use my spiritual eyes to kind of see that and try to imagine what it's going to be like. But I know as a Christian, I'm going to stand before the Lord when I leave this body. I want to encourage you, and I don't want you to be fearful. And I am going to continue to talk on fear and being fearless. And part of it is we can't fear death and all that Satan's got. You know, one of the scriptures we'll talk about in the next episode where Jesus said Don't fear the one— and I'm gonna mess this up, I'm paraphrasing because I don't have it memorized— don't fear the one that can kill the body, but fear the one that can kill the body and the soul. I'm going to continue to dig in, and I'm going to keep talking and keep encouraging believers. And if you are a believer, I want to encourage you, I've got a lot of things coming up that I'm working on and I think will be exciting if you want to dig deeper into the word of God. But let's pray. God, I thank you so much for this listener. I pray in Jesus' name that you would encourage them with your word. Holy Spirit, continue to lead and guide and direct them, and continue to lead and guide and direct me. I thank you for your guidance. I thank you, Holy Spirit, that you would never leave us nor forsake us. Lord, we thank you, we love you, we ask it all in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, thank you for being a part of this, and I look forward to visiting with you on the next episode.
Thanks for listening to the No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast at www.nodoubtonlybelieve.com.
