Transformation: The Servant's Heart--A Life of Faith

By John F. Beer

Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting (Psalm 139:23, 24). This prayer is a humble cry to God from one honestly seeking a transformation. If there is any offense it isnt in this prayer. It is what God yearns for. Verse one of this psalm expresses a sigh of gratitude from the seeker: O Lord, you have searched me and you know me.

God knows us. Do we know Him? Do we trust Him enough to ask Him to examine us for an offensive way in us? If we are satisfied to live according to the ways of the world, we will never ask God to search our hearts. We will never know God or the freedom that comes from His indwelling presence.

Examining ourselves is commendable, but can be deceiving. Trusting God for a true revelation of our hearts condition and asking Him to lead us on our journey is showing wisdom that only He can give. Pleading with God to search our heart is the alternative to claiming to have a fellowship with God but, in reality, are walking in darkness. The apostle John labels such as liars who do not walk according to the truth (1 John 1:6).

Transformation: The Servants Heart--A life of Faith addresses three separate but related issues that challenge every Christian: the slavery of anxiety, hypocritical love, and the pride of life.

Transformation is intended to generate a desire for God to search us, and prepare us to walk with Him in a journey of faith and service.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Sep 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9781490844084

John F. Beer

John Beer has published articles in Alliance Life Magazine and an article in Gifts of Heritage--Pioneer Portraits, published by the Twin Falls Centennial Commission 2004. As a Christian layman he is concerned about how Christians should live in a time of cultural change. He retired from the Air Force and lives with his wife Jan in Twin Falls, Idaho.

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Copyright © 2014 John F. Beer.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Excerpt from Dallas Willard and Jan Johnson, Renovation of the Heart in Daily Practice (Navpress: Colorado Springs, Col.), 12.

Excerpt from Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest (Uhrichsville, Ohio: Barbour) (devotional for May 11).

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CONTENTS

Preface

Acknowledgments

Part 1: Faith, Freedom, and the Audacity of Anxiety

Chapter 1 Anxiety and Anguish versus Faith and Freedom

Chapter 2 What Is Anxiety?

Chapter 3 How Should We Deal with Anxiety?

Chapter 4 Another Argument against Anxiety and Worry

Part 2: The Greatest Is Love

Chapter 5 Defining Love

Chapter 6 Sincere Love: The Foundation

Chapter 7 How Love Transforms

Chapter 8 Back to the Core

Part 3: The Attitude

Chapter 9 A Dire Need

Chapter 10 The Suffering Servant

Chapter 11 Humility in History

Chapter 12 The Humble at Heart in Action

Chapter 13 When Humility Begins

Chapter 14 The Journeys of Peter and Paul

Chapter 15 The Source of Pride

Chapter 16 The Master of Humility: Jesus

Chapter 17 Humility versus Pride and Humility Plus Exaltation

Chapter 18 The Sermon on the Mount—The School of Humility

Chapter 19 Walking the Talk

Chapter 20 The Mind of Christ

The Conclusion

PREFACE

This book didn’t start intentionally, but I believe that it was meant to be because of how it came to be. I don’t put much faith in chance, but I do put a lot of faith in faith—faith in God, that is. The book began as a set of notes for a Bible study in a church cell group. The subject was anxiety from a Christian viewpoint. The study notes grew to a sermon outline when I was asked to preach one Sunday in our church.

A few days later, I received an e-mail from a man who was present that day. He thanked me for encouraging him, since he had been struggling with bouts of anxiety. I was amazed and encouraged more than he was. While I was a layperson, he was the assistant pastor and an employed professional counselor. What is going on? I thought. I admired his candor and honesty. It also verified my belief that too many Christians worry, when the Bible speaks strongly against it. Although I didn’t realize it then, that was the beginning of a long journey through reams of paper, a fair amount of frustration, and a multitude of blessings.

I heard part of a weekly radio lesson addressing Romans 12. The subject was so intriguing that I studied the chapter and became focused on verse 9, concerning sincere love. Well into the process of writing on that topic, the thought of a book came to mind.

I decided to review what I had written on anxiety. It had vanished from the computer and I had no hard copies. However, much earlier I had handed out two copies for people to read and criticize. Somehow both were lost, but I finally discovered the original lesson outline buried in my filing cabinet.

I was able to rewrite the piece and it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. God gave me new ideas and determination. Had I worried? Yes, even though I knew that worry is often for no reason, and it certainly doesn’t solve problems. And, yes, I told myself to practice what I preach and not worry. Yet, there was an inner feeling that God was with me, even if He had to teach me a lesson.

The idea of a book grew, and I considered adding another subject to the book. The issue of pride came to mind. The result covers three subjects: (1) anxiety versus peace; (2) sincere love versus hypocritical love; and (3) humility versus pride.

My hope is fivefold. First, that the Lord will be honored and receive credit for any good that comes from this book. Second, that those believers who struggle with anxiety will find their faith strengthened and their trust in Jesus magnified. Third, that professing Christians who have lost their first love will retrieve it as they consider God’s great love and how it affects our relationship with Him and other people. Fourth, that the vitality of a humble life, understood as it really is, will capture those who have been enslaved by worldly pride. Last is that if any lost souls should happen to read this, they will be motivated to study the Bible and they will be introduced to someone who can lead them to the cross of Christ.

How we contend with these three subjects is crucial to living with Christ. We are all guilty of anxiety, hypocritical love, and pride, and we cannot break loose by ourselves. Only Christ, living in us, can free us. He saved us by the power of His blood in love; is it too much to believe that He will give us strength in our weakness?

I discovered, as you will, that these principles of the Christian life are not independent, but irrevocably joined together. All of these principles are related according to our faith in and our relationship with God. Faith and trust are the keys that open the door to a life with Jesus.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Whatever success this book may have is a gift from God. He has blessed me with help and encouragement in many ways. As I worked through the manuscript, I often found myself chasing after an elusive word or an evasive idea. That’s not an unknown thing for anyone my age, but I discovered that if I paused to ask the Lord for ideas or words, they came. He never failed. I was encouraged to believe that He was behind me on this adventure. Maybe the better word would be ahead of me.

The next and equally encouraging support was an assortment of friends who prayed, edited, advised, and expressed their response to the writing.

I thank my friend Cliff Paine. Without him I wouldn’t have written this. Cliff is the associate pastor and professional counselor who told me that my Sunday sermon on anxiety had encouraged him in his own struggles with anxiety. Cliff’s honesty and candor inspired me to address some other issues, which led to this book.

Also deserving thanks are three special friends who sacrificed much time and effort in editing the work. Substance as well as quality benefited from their effort. My gratitude goes to Suzy Browne, a newspaper proofreader who also is a reader for disability support services at our local community college. Suzy went far beyond my expectations in correcting errors, rethinking ways of presenting ideas, and smoothing out the rough edges. Her husband, Pastor Mark Browne, was a great encourager as he read and commented on the manuscript. My longtime friend Bill McDowell expressed the impact that the book made on him personally. I thank them all for their great friendship and straightforward editing and advice.

Special thanks to my Editor, Chris, who encouraged me through his suggestions and recommendations. You got my brain to rolling. Also thank you to the editorial assistants. You made things so easy in a very patient and kind way.

Most of all, I thank my wife Jan for her constant support and enthusiasm. She studied the manuscript and furnished inspiring, helpful advice. Her patience rubbed off on me during times that seemed to drag on forever. Knowing she was behind me strengthened my determination and confidence.

John Beer

PART 1

Faith, Freedom, and the Audacity of Anxiety

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Peace is hidden here, but free for the taking. Worry never won a war.

CHAPTER 1

Anxiety and Anguish

versus Faith and Freedom

We live in a nervous, anxious world. Fear and worry govern the lives of countless millions of people. The reasons for these circumstances are many and varied: finances, relationships, health, politics, and the complexity of our lives in general. The list goes on and on. Some things are beyond our control; some are not. It doesn’t matter. Either way, it’s impossible for us to live as God intended when we find ourselves subject to constant anxiety or uncertainty. One New Testament writer offers some consolation.

His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness. Through these He has given us His very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. (2 Peter 1:3–4)

These two verses lay a solid foundation for living. Not only that, they also speak about the quality of our lives through the promises God has made to humanity. This chapter in this work looks at a promise that God repeated many times throughout the Scriptures. It is not intended to downgrade or diminish any issues addressed in the field of mental illness and psychotherapy. The focus here is what God has said about our anxiety, worry, and fear. Bible-believing Christians find this a vitally important issue concerning one’s quality of life. To one who does not take the Bible as truth, however, it is foolishness.

The dilemma of worry is not limited to any particular class of people or culture. Amazingly, well-to-do individuals worry just as much as poor people or those in the middle class. The powerful are as susceptible as the ordinary. Actually, those in positions of power may have more to worry about than those who don’t have enough of what we commonly regard as the solutions to all our problems. Unfortunately, Christians are as subject to anxiety as unbelievers. The ideas in this writing are intended to determine why this is so and to offer a solution—the only real and viable solution. It exposes the battle between spiritual folly and redeeming faith uncovered in a question Jesus asks: You of little faith; why are you so afraid? (Matthew 8:26). There is a connection between faith in Christ and fear.

The target of these words is anyone who has been saved by faith in Christ and yet suffers bouts of worry, anxiety, and fear. There is an answer, and all believers need to be reminded of it: I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the words spoken beforehand by the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior spoken by your apostles (2 Peter 3:1–2).

Everyone has experienced anxiety. It all started in the garden of Eden with Adam and Eve when they decided to do their own thing, ignoring God’s truth and believing a lie. Their folly changed the world. One of the changes was the introduction of anxiety. We will look at their dilemma later, but for now, you might ask yourself, Do I do the same thing Adam and Eve did? The answer is unavoidable. We fail to trust the promises of God and we fall into the pandemic of anxiety. Sometimes anxiety controls us for insignificant reasons—more often than not, there is no excuse or reason for our trepidation. You don’t have to be a psychologist or have a specialized education to know that. You only need to be honest enough to admit it. Then we can ask ourselves the question, What can we do about it?

This book will study the problems of worry and anxiety, not from the view of a corrupt world, but from a perspective based on trust in God and belief in the Bible’s witness. It is meant to offer an encouragement for those who find themselves worrying, whether occasionally or day after day. A brief review of how the world views these phenomena will lay a foundation from which to start the discussion. You don’t need to have access to much statistical data on anxiety disorders to know it is a far-reaching and all-encompassing malady. The following are only a few brief examples:

• In the United States, approximately forty million adults eighteen years and older (about 18.1 percent) have an anxiety disorder (National Institute of Mental Health [NIMH]).

• Thirty-five million Americans (more than 16 percent of the population) suffer from depression severe enough to warrant treatment at some time in their lives. In any given period, thirteen to fourteen million people experience the illness (2003 National Co-morbidity Study).

• Some 19.1 million Americans eighteen to fifty-four years of age suffer from anxiety disorders (13.3 percent of this age group) (NIMH).

• About 18.8 million (9.5 percent of the adult population) American adults suffer from clinical depression (NIMH).

• Many who suffer from one anxiety disorder also suffer another anxiety disorder.

• Some 2.2 million Americans eighteen and over (3.5 percent in this age group) suffer from obsessive-compulsive disorder.

There are many types of mental and emotional problems, but six major types of anxiety disorders are recognized in the field. Each of these exhibits its own distinct characteristics.

• Generalized anxiety disorder—the anxiety of chronic worriers.

• Obsessive-compulsive disorder—thoughts, feelings, and actions occur without control to the point of obsession..

• Panic disorder—characterized by unexpected panic attacks.

• Phobia—fear of situations or activities that in reality probably won’t happen, such as worries about Friday the Thirteenth or the prophecy of the Mayan calendar that the world would come to its end in 2012. The NIMH lists ninety phobias that affect the peace of mind of thousands of people.

• Post-traumatic stress disorder—anxiety that recurs following a traumatic situation. We read about or know people who have undergone horrible trauma during war and realize that the cause is real. On the surface, we may conclude that the remainder of the victim’s life will be affected.

• Social anxiety disorder—a degrading fear of being embarrassed by ineptitude, performance failure, or humiliation. Generalized social anxiety disorder may arise from lack of confidence in oneself in a public setting (stage fright).

A reality-TV program demonstrated panic disorder by showing a woman terrified by a snake on her front porch. Even after police removed the threat, she could not stop screaming and wildly waving her arms. In this case, anxiety remained even when a legitimate reason for fear was removed.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt would not travel on the thirteenth of any month.

All of us could fit into one or more of these situations and convince ourselves that our feelings are only normal. It’s what is to be expected, right? After all, the National Institute of Mental Health claims such feelings are normal. I’m not a psychiatrist, psychologist, or professional counselor for people with emotional issues, but I have fought against anxiety much of my life. I know what it feels like and how it affects me. I have observed it in others and have seen how it affects their lives and relationships.

I have also discovered there is an alternative way of thinking that continues to diminish anxiety as I turn that anxiety over to God. I have come to believe that Christians need not and should not suffer from anxiety, fear, or worry. I back up this belief by the promises of a trustworthy God. The remainder of this writing is based on that belief.

Rudyard Kipling once said, Of all the liars in the world, sometimes the worst are your own fears.

Toastmasters International has an amusing saying: The first cause of anxiety is public speaking; the second is fear of death. It seems we would be better off having our eulogy read than presenting someone else’s eulogy.

Joking about anxiety is easy and can be humorous, but in reality it is not funny. Anxiety is seriously debilitating, with some forms of it worse than others. It prevents one from living life as it should be lived, with joy and contentment. It can be dangerous in the workplace because it distracts us from working in a safe manner. Anxious drivers can be distracted as much or more by anxiety than by texting while driving. They don’t pay attention to dangers on the street or road. Anxiety affects the choices we make and can lead to dire consequences.

It’s easy to justify our anxiety and worry by saying, for instance, People just don’t understand my problems. If we believe everything we hear on TV or read in the paper, we won’t have much cause for hope. It doesn’t make any difference to us where the disaster may be—we may be the next target. Expanding forums of social media expose our minds to circumstances that may not be true. Granted, they can seem scary, but they should not cause us to worry. God has assured us that we can live in this worrisome world without being enslaved to it.

I recall some of the things that troubled me in my younger years. One was my physical appearance. My hair never lay down in a suitable manner. My ears protruded too far, and I felt embarrassed by them. My lips were too thick. I was too short and weighed far too little. The humorous results are that my lips now are too thin and rigid. My hair turned out all right after all—on the positive side, I have a full head of hair. Now I wish I could do something about the extra pounds I carry around. In reality, I can do something about it. Anxiety doesn’t take off pounds. Sincere effort on my part does. These insignificant things occupied much of my thinking. They gave way to more upsetting traumas as I made poor choices and established wrong priorities and worried about them. As I look back, I realize how much of my life I literally wasted by harboring anxiety. The ultimate outcome is that today I don’t worry about these things because I know it doesn’t do any good. Excess weight can be dealt with, and I’m sure no one is overly concerned about how my facial features turned out.

Anxiety often prods people to make poor choices because they want to free themselves from the load of worry. Ironically, the consequences of bad choices are fuel for further anxiety. We shouldn’t attempt to escape our anxiety by making decisions when our thinking is not as stable as it should be. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding (Proverbs 9:10). The proper response to anxiety is to rely on the wisdom of God. He has promised to give us wisdom if we ask with the right motivation: depending on Him and not on anxiety to steer us toward a good decision. The fear of the Lord teaches a man wisdom, and humility comes before honor (Proverbs 15:33). Again, holding God in ultimate respect and awe brings wisdom. As we choose this way of dealing with our worries, we find humility replacing the pride of self and opening the door for God to do His work.

Anxiety can be addictive. One worry piles on another until we lose track of reality and become engaged with situations that are nothing more than possibilities, and slim ones at that. Interestingly, the things we worry most about concern events that will never happen. For those worries that are more likely to become reality, we get so caught up in fearful and misdirected responses that we fail to prepare for whatever it might be and what we can do about it. We miss the opportunity to deal with the threat, if or