In this enlightening episode, Rick Hughes unravels the profound relationship between faith and fear in the face of life’s uncertainties, such as global crises and personal trials. Discover how essential biblical virtues like love, peace, and patience can transform your perspective, offering peace and contentment regardless of external circumstances. Listen as Hughes articulates how God’s everlasting love and wisdom pave a clear path to spiritual growth and resilient living.
Welcome to The Flatline with your host, Rick Hughes. For the next 30 minutes, you’ll be inspired, motivated, educated, but never manipulated. Now, your host, Rick Hughes.
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Good morning and welcome to the Flotline. I’m your host, Rick Hughes, and for the next few minutes, you have an invitation to stick around. 30 minutes of motivation, some inspiration, a whole lot of education, and always without any manipulation. Remember that God gave you two ends, one of those ends you sit with and one of those ends you think with. And success in your life will depend on which one of those ends you use. Heads, obviously you’ll win. And tails, obviously you’re going to lose. So here’s the good news, that everyone listening to me has a brain. Some people have super high IQs, that’s not me. Some have middle-of-the-road IQ, but however, in God’s wonderful plan, human IQ is not the issue. It can be supplemented by learning God’s Word and developing these 10 problem-solving devices in your life that we talk about called a flotline, and this gives you a spiritual IQ, spiritual IQ, totally different from human IQ. Spiritual IQ is the ability to have the invisible ministry of God the Holy Spirit take the power of the living word of God in your life and place it into your soul where it becomes wisdom. And from there, wisdom gives you tremendous, phenomenal discernment and insight through the eyes of the scripture. We call it spiritual x-ray vision. And by having wisdom, discernment, and insight, you can save yourself a lot of trouble and a lot of mistakes. And so as we go into perilous times in our country, a lot of weird things happening where you live and where I live, people have to wonder about what’s going on and what’s God saying to us. The Bible talks about the fruit of the Spirit, and we’ll mention a little of that today. But as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, the most important thing is you develop a And that is so you can stop the outside sources of adversity before they ever become the inside source of stress. That’s why we say adversity is inevitable and stress is optional. Stress is what you do to yourself. Adversity is what circumstances do to you. When we have national emergency, as we have in this country today, there’s a lot of people stressed out. There are a lot of people afraid, and there are a lot of people that don’t have a peace in their life. That doesn’t mean that we don’t all face perilous times. It means some people face it with a different attitude, a more relaxed mental attitude. And that’s the mind of Christ. That’s the relaxed mental attitude that goes with what the Lord Jesus Christ said, my joy I give unto you. So even in the fiercest battle of life, we can have joy and a relaxed mental attitude by leaning on the flat line in our soul. Remember, the Flotline is made up of 10 unique problem-solving devices, and we teach these constantly on our show. And if you have never heard them, we have a book called Christian Problem Solving that we will give you free. We also have three books that you can have free, which are the recordings of all the radio shows of the year 2019. We have the transcripts now put into print, and every radio show we produced, 52 shows, are in three volumes, and you can read it word for word, just as if I was speaking it to you. And that’s free. If you’d like to have those three books, just write to me or call me on the internet, rickhughesministries.org, rickhughesministries.org. And you can order the books there, or you can order some of the other material that we have there that’ll help you in your Christian life as you grow in the grace and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So remember, that flat line starts off with rebound. That’s confessing any known sin to God. The reason that has to be done is the Holy Spirit cannot help you develop wisdom when you have sin in your life. Sin in your life, the Bible says, quenches the Holy Spirit and grieves the Holy Spirit. Thus, the believer has to have a way to get rid of sin. And the Bible says in 1 John 1, 9, And it also says it in the Old Testament in Psalm 32, 4, and 5, if we confess our sin, then he, that’s God, is faithful and just to forgive us of our sin and to purify us from all the wrongdoing. Sin quenches the Holy Spirit. Paul talked about it when he said, I don’t understand myself at all because I don’t want to do some of the things that I do, and I hate doing them. But it’s sin inside of me. Yes, there is a sin nature inside of all of us. And that sin nature can be controlled or it can be manipulated. Satan is a master at manipulating your sin nature. But the word of God gives you control over the sin nature by means of the filling of the Holy Spirit and by means of the residence of Bible doctrine of the word of God in your soul. That gives you discernment and that gives you insight and that gives you the power to live it. You know, we’re all under a strange virus. Not the coronavirus, I’m not talking about that, the virus of sin and death the Bible talks about. For by one man sin came into the world and death by sin, and now death has passed upon all, for all have sinned and the wages of sin is death. Strangely enough, that’s the very thing people fear with the coronavirus today is death. And death is something to be feared because after the death comes the judgment. The Bible says it’s appointed unto man once to die, and after that, the judgment. And even with no coronavirus, we will die. We have to die because that’s the way we’re made. We’re going to die, and we’re going to face the judgment seat of Christ, the great white throne, one of the two. You’ll be at one of those two judgments. If you’re a believer, then you’ll be in 1 Corinthians 3, the judgment seat of Christ. If you’re not a believer, you’ll find yourself in Revelation 20 at the great white throne of judgment, and that’s where you don’t want to be. So the Bible goes on to talk about if the Holy Spirit controls your life, some of the wonderful things you can have. In Galatians 5, it says the fruit of the Spirit is love and joy and peace and longsuffering and gentleness and goodness and meekness and mildness and et cetera. These are all wonderful Christ-given assets that we can acquire. through the filling of the Holy Spirit. These immutable assets of our Lord Jesus Christ are ours to use as well through the filling of the Holy Spirit. That’s the second problem-solving device. Rebound is the first, filling the Holy Spirit is the second. The filling of the Holy Spirit handles the problem of the sin nature. We don’t have to live under the sin nature. We don’t have to be dominated by the sin nature. Even though we’re infected with it, we’ll get rid of it when we do die and when we get a resurrection body. It will be a sin-free body like the body of our Lord Jesus Christ. So as we learn these things, we learn about the faith rest drill. That’s another problem-solving device. This is where we can use the Scripture to stand behind and act as a shield to deflect the fiery darts that Satan may throw your way to intimidate you, to move you into fear, to depress you. You don’t have to live like that. So using the shield of faith is a wonderful thing to do. Those are the first three problem-solving devices. Rebound, the filling of the Holy Spirit, and the faith-rest drill. Then we move to grace orientation. You’re saved by grace. You live by grace. You die by grace. They’re surpassing grace in heaven. All of these things are wonderful, wonderful things to study and learn. But then there’s biblical orientation, and where the Bible says, grow in the grace and the knowledge of your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. It’s there for a reason, so that in times just like these that we face today, in crisis living like we have today, There’s strength to be found in the Scripture. There’s comfort to be found in the Scripture. There’s confidence in the Scripture if you believe it and if you use it. So it’s important that you have some biblical orientation to know where you go. Where do I go to get that peace? We’re going to talk about that here in just a second. So from biblical orientation, we move into a personal sense of destiny. God has a plan for your life, and that begins when the moment you believe in Christ and ends when you move into heaven to be face-to-face with your Heavenly Father. All of this is motivated by your personal love for God, a great virtue in your life. It motivates you to be obedient, and then you use it for those that you have a hard time dealing with, and that allows you to love them based on who you are, not based on who they are, because that’s exactly the way God loved you, with his impersonal love. Remember where the Bible says God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. You were a sinner when he did that, and he wasn’t in love with you when he did that. He used his impersonal love. Once you believed in Christ and you moved into the royal family of God, become a child of God, then we have personal love of God applied into your life. So we have personal love for God, his love for you and impersonal love for others. But there’s also your love for God. That’s reciprocation. He loves you. You love him back. And by loving him back, that’s your personal virtue. That’s the greatest virtue you could have to love God because the greatest virtue he showed was loving you. And then they’re sharing the happiness of God. Wonderful thing to understand when Christ said, my joy I give to you. It’s the ability to be happy regardless of the circumstances because you have something called contentment. And Paul said it didn’t make any difference whether he had a lot or whether he had a little. He was content at all times in his life. And finally, there’s occupation with Christ, which is what we’ll talk a little bit about today, reflecting the character essence of the Lord Jesus Christ through your life. You are to be a representative of Jesus Christ by representing his life to your friends. And when you’re filled with the Holy Spirit, that’s exactly what you do. You represent the mind of Christ, and that’s why the Bible says we are to be filled with the Holy Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is love, the Bible says. God loves us. And if we are filled with the Holy Spirit, then we can love as well. Just love right back. That’s a wonderful thing. I can love people that don’t love me. If you’ll think about the worst person in your neighborhood that you don’t like, you’re mandated in the Bible to love that person, not with a physical love, not run down there and throw your arms around his neck, but to be relaxed, to have a relaxed mental attitude, to be helpful, to pray for them if they need prayer, to assist them if they need assistance, because you’re loving them based on who God is in you, not based on who they are. They might not have anything worth loving in them, but you do because you have Jesus Christ living in you, and he died for them just like he died for you. So you have no right to be prejudiced. You have no right to have hatred. You have no right to have bitterness towards any person, any race, any individual. Now, love, joy, peace. Peace is a wonderful asset of the Lord Jesus Christ. It’s a divine characteristic, and it’s developed in your life when you are filled with the Holy Spirit. How do you get filled with the Holy Spirit? Well, you’re born into this world, and when you accept Christ, you’re indwelled by the Holy Spirit and filled with the Holy Spirit and sealed with the Holy Spirit. But when you sin, you quench the Holy Spirit and you grieve the Holy Spirit. So what do you do? You go to God and admit your sin. Problem-solving device number one, Rebound. Now, Jesus Christ, our Lord, promised the Holy Spirit to the disciples. He told them he had to go away, but he had sent an associate that would help them, a mentor, the Holy Spirit, and he would guide them and lead them into all truth. And whenever the Holy Spirit is leading you, you’re going to be reflecting the life of Christ by having peace, love, joy, peace, part of the filling of the Holy Spirit. It’s a characteristic of divine love manifested in you when you’re filled with the Holy Spirit. Listen to this when I say it’s a characteristic of divine love. Listen to this verse. Philippians 4, 7. And the peace which passes all understanding and all comprehension. The peace of God, which passes all comprehension, all everything, it will guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus. Listen again. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your mind in Christ Jesus. Peace of God. It’s yours. You can have it. Our peace with God is a direct result of accepting Christ, a direct result of receiving him as our Savior, because since he paid for our sin and God redeemed us by his mercy and saved us and forgave us, then we have peace with God. And our peace in the world, dealing with the world and what we’re facing, like with this virus thing we’re facing, That’s a relaxed mental attitude based on you using the word of God in your soul that gives you contentment and confidence. Two key words for you to remember. Being content and being confident in his plan and in his provisions. You see, you can enjoy peace at all times. Because why? Because the Lord Jesus Christ enjoyed peace at all times. This peace I’m talking about is some tranquility in your life. where you’re not overcome with fear, you’re not overcome with doubt, that’s not gonna happen to you. However, there are some people that cannot have any peace. Those are the ones who reject Christ as Savior. The unbeliever who fails to adjust to the grace of God has no peace. His humanistic attitude rejects God’s forgiveness because he deems himself either smarter than God or believes there is no God and his life runs out sooner or later and there is no peace. I call him the delusional daydreamer. He’s mentioned in Proverbs 3, 7, where he is the one who thinks he’s wise in his own eyes. That sort of person who’s wise in his own eyes, who will not defer to the wisdom of God, will never find completeness in his life and definitely will have no happiness in his life or in eternity. In fact, probably the only happiness he could ever discover would be inside of a divine institution called marriage. God designed one man and one woman for each other. And there is happiness in a divine institution called marriage. But the evil of the scoffer, the one who scoffs at God, the one who rejects God, the one who thinks he’s wiser than God, it’ll come back to destroy him eventually. And he will be abandoned alone in the devil’s world. living by means of the devil’s deceit, and he will drift hopelessly in life with no harbor to pull into during the storm. See, that’s the neat thing about you right now. If you are a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, you’re anchored in the harbor of God’s love. You’re anchored in the harbor of God’s peace, and you’re not living in the storm of life. However, the unbeliever has no anchor. He is fearful and running for his life right now. Scared to death. Not you. Because God’s peace is expressed in confident expectation of God’s plan for your life. This is what the Lord Jesus Christ said in John 14, 27. Peace I leave with you. My peace I give unto you. Not the world. Not like what the world gives. I give it to you. So don’t let your heart be troubled and don’t be afraid. Fear, having fear, that’s the expression of anxiety, not peace. And the mature believer who grows in the grace and the knowledge of his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, if he possesses the peace of God, he never, ever fears his time on earth or in eternity because of the confidence that he has from God himself. So we have to have patience, and we have to have a little faith in God’s provisions and protections. After all, you are a child of God. And after all, he loves you in spite of your failures and your flaws and mine as well. He loves us. Just as you lay your children to bed and watch over them, check on them, make sure they’re safe. God the Father is watching over you. He loves you. So in 1 Thessalonians 5, 23, may God himself, the God of peace, that’s our Father, sanctify you through and through, and may your whole spirit, your soul, and your body be kept blameless at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. The God of peace is your God, and his peace you can reflect in your life when you are filled with the Holy Spirit. Another asset that is ours as Christians who grow in grace and allow the Holy Spirit to control our life is patience. That’s a divine characteristic. divine characteristic of God’s divine love, and it’s given to us, God’s patient with us. In 2 Thessalonians 3, 5, may the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and into the patience of the Lord Jesus Christ. So patience is a manifestation of peace. When you have peace, you’re very patient. Let me give you some insight on peace, okay? You may need to hear this today. Maybe this will comfort you. Excuse me. Psalm 4.8, I will both lay me down in peace, there’s your word, and sleep. For you, Lord, only make me dwell in safety. Is that not a good verse for you tonight? When you go to bed tonight, I will lay me down in peace and sleep. For you, Lord, only make me dwell in safety. There are a lot of people that can’t say that. They’ll be watching the news well into midnight trying to figure out what’s going to happen. Are we going to die? Are we going to starve to death? Are we not going to have this? Are we not going to have that? Strangely enough, the biggest fear is running out of some sort of paper product. That’s crazy. This sort of peace I’m talking about is no nightmares. No nightmares due to insecurity. Your father who loves you the same way a human dad loves his children, your father will guard you even in the darkest moments of life. Your father is watching over you right now. You might not feel it, you might not know it, but he’s there. Do you have the faith to trust him? Psalm 4, 8 again, I will both lay me down in peace and sleep. You should have a great night’s sleep and not worry about anything going on in this world. this piece that i’m talking about is a confidence in his provisions and a confidence in his protection this is the basis for this relaxed mental attitude i’m talking about confidence in god’s love and when you show that same love reflecting through your life to your children to your friends when you demonstrate that peace it’s it’s magnetic to them they don’t understand where you get it matter of fact they may think you’re a little strange They may think you’re hard. They may think you’re goofy because you’re not afraid. Like they’re afraid. You’re not taking all the precautions that they’re taking. You actually going outside and walking around. Oh no. The peace of God is reflected by tranquility, being calm. It’s reflected with harmony, which is blending your will and his will together. And your faith produces this kind of harmony. And you know, that’s pretty attractive to the lost person. If he looks at you, if he sees you, if he observes you, the way that you live, this sort of peace, this contentment we call faith rest, is music to his ears. Because he doesn’t see it anywhere else. But if he sees it in you, he’ll be attracted to you. And this is your opportunity to share the Lord Jesus Christ with people like that. Contentment is the reflected love of God in your life, and it’s visible to those who are always watching you. In Psalm 34, 19, many are the afflictions of the righteous. Hang on to this verse now, listen. Psalm 34, 19, many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of all of them. All of them, not some of them, all of them. Afflictions are an opportunity to exercise your faith. It’s an opportunity to demonstrate your confidence in God’s plan for your life. They’re going to come along. They have to come along. This is how we grow, 1 Corinthians 10, 13. Think it not strange, these trials that you face. It’s common to man. And what we’re going through today in this country is nothing different. There have been pandemics before. There have been things before that have killed thousands, hundreds, millions of people. Heck, talking to a doctor the other day, the doctor told me that the common cold is has already killed 11,000 people in the country this year. 11,000 from the cold, and that’s not counting the flu. And here we’re worried about the virus. So afflictions are an opportunity to exercise your faith. Paul’s attitude got a little bit out of sort when he had an affliction that he wanted God to get rid of for him. He wanted a little special attention from God, and we all want that sometimes. And he said in 2 Corinthians 12, 8, I asked God three times to take it away from me. Take it away. Take it away. But the Lord said to him, and I’m sure in his prayers he saw, heard this, felt this, my grace provisions are sufficient for you. for when for my strength is brought forth and demonstrated in your weaknesses my strength is brought forth and demonstrated in your weaknesses in other words you are the strongest when you’re the weakest when you have no resources to fall back on only god’s grace only god’s grace provisions when you have no place else to turn but to god that’s when you’re your strongest. And that’s when your life can turn around. Once everything the devil offers you has been exploited and it’s all empty and you realize it, if you wind up having killed yourself yet, then maybe you might turn to the Lord and you can find the peace you’re looking for. Paul adjusted his attitude about this suffering he had and his words are recorded where he said most gladly, Because of this I’ll take pleasure in my sufferings, so that the power of Jesus Christ may rest on me. and I might add, be reflected through him. He had confidence that God loved him, and he had confidence that the suffering was given to strengthen his faith, not make him weaker. It’s the same thing with you. In this time of national testing, you have an opportunity to accelerate your spiritual growth And reflect your confidence and God’s love to others based on your complete relaxed mental attitude. Proverbs 3, 5. Trust in the Lord with all of your heart. Lean not to your own understanding. And all of your ways acknowledge him and he will direct your paths. That’s a great promise. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. That means recall all the scriptures you’ve learned, all the faith drill rationales you know. And it means this cosmic system has none of this. Thus, the only thing the cosmic system can offer is the fear panic ploy. And that’s an action designed to turn a situation into an advantage by the devil. If he gets you afraid, he can manipulate you. And the thing he wants to make you afraid of most is death. And that’s the thing no believer should ever be afraid of because Jesus Christ, our Lord, conquered death. And he promised you that you would live also as well. So no one suggested we pray for deliverance until our president eventually came up with a national day of prayer. I was glad to see that. But this crisis is an opportunity for evangelism. If there starts to be a lot of death, then people are going to start begging God to deliver them. You can see it coming, can’t you? Please, God, deliver me. Please, God, deliver me. When they have never even been interested in God. They’ve never even been interested in the gospel. They’ve never even taken time to even read the Bible. And now that they’re facing death and maybe facing death alone, they panic and start calling out to God. Proverbs 2 27 when your fear comes as a desolation and your destruction comes as a whirlwind when distress and anguish come upon you then they will call on me but I will not answer then they’ll seek me but they won’t find me because they hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord. But whoever listens to me shall dwell in safety and shall be quiet from fear of evil. There’s the answer. That’s what’s going to happen. I hope you’re listening, and I hope you’re paying attention, and I hope you are the one who trusts in the Lord with all of your heart. You do that by learning his word and applying it into your life through the filling of the Holy Spirit and reflecting the image of Jesus Christ to your friends. Hope it makes sense. This is your host, Rick Hughes, saying thank you for listening to The Flatline.
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Thank you for listening to The Floodline with your host, Rick Hughes. If you’d like to contact Rick, please write to him at P.O. Box 100, Cropwell, Alabama, 35054, or online at www.rickhughesministries.org.
