Jesus and Christianity are built on the premise of forgiveness. And from there, we can only truly forgive when we are done with being angry.
The Bible is not very explicit in discussing fear, but oh talk about fear it does!
Fear was the sudden shame that Adam & Eve felt before their Father, in their nakedness, when they had become of the devil. It was no longer paradise, but a horrible empty illusion of it that they began recreating creation in the image of:
The fear that Cain had in his jealousy of not being enough, and the anger with which he murdered his brother and began taking multiple wives.
The fear that caused Abraham to lie, and have impatience with God’s promise.
Jacob feared his place as 2nd born, that he hated his brother Esau to trick him out of his birthright.
The miracles that God performed right before Moses’ very eyes fell flat because Moses was so afraid, he doubted God. He couldn’t see.
And when he finally could, still his anger overtook him when he came from the top of Mount Sinai with God to find that the Israelites had once again disobeyed God. When he descended to find that Aaron–who had just been appointed as high priest by God, had given into pressure from the Israelites to worship a golden calf, Moses threw the two tablets of the 10 Commandments and broke them. He had to administer them again.
1. ‘You shall have no other gods before Me’
2. ‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image’
3. ‘You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain’
4. ‘Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy’
5. ‘Honor your father and your mother’
6. ‘You shall not murder’
7. ‘You shall not commit adultery’
8. ‘You shall not steal’
9. ‘You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor’
10. ‘You shall not covet’
Whether it be The Ten Commandments, or Lot’s daughters getting Lot drunk to conceive by their father, or Joseph’s brothers throwing Joseph into a pit and selling him into slavery, the Holy Spirit is the spirit of Truth, of God. So that when you come before God, you are telling the truth to Him, about a heart He can already see.
You are not “repenting” sleeping with your brother’s wife, or lying or killing; you are telling the truth about the fear and anger, the hatred in your heart–the spirit of the devil in you that drove you to it, to trick your aged, near-blind husband as Rebekah, that drove you to make your family feel beneath you for what God revealed to you as Joseph. When you begin making a practice of being conscious of this evil spirit that makes you unconscious, with the consciousness of God, and then surrendering it to God, what you are doing is not really repenting, but being born again, of the right spirit. Slowly but surely You are being perfected in God.
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