No Room for Bullies

*No Room for Bullies*

"For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God; not selfwilled, not
soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre."
Titus 1:7

There's a long list of bullies in the Bible: The brothers who bedeviled
Joseph, the Pharaoh who bullied Moses, those foreign invaders who
threatened Judah, Haman who hated Mordecai, Jezebel who threw Elijah into
fits, the Pharisees who tried to intimidate Jesus, and Alexander the
coppersmith who did harm to Paul. Bullies can show up anywhere, even at
home or church. At some point, we have to take a stand in the name of
Christ and resist bullying.

Bullies don't always come in human form. The devil sends doubts, fears and
worries to beat us down. He places stumbling blocks in our way, tempts us
every day, and takes every opportunity to hinder our Christian walk and
silence our Christian talk. The apostle James encourages us to "Submit
yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you" (James 4:7-8). This
principle holds true physically as well as a spiritually - stand up to a
bully and they will flee. Think of these verses in the context of a little
child whose older brother (in this case, Jesus) stands at his side while he
stands up to and resists the bully (Satan). When we stand in Christ, the
devil will always flee - that is a promise we can always count on.

So don't be bluffed, buffeted, or beaten into silence by the threats of
bullies. With God at our side and the power of His Holy Spirit living
within us, we have nothing and no one to fear. Jesus spends a considerable
time in Luke 12 talking about bullies and encouraging His disciples (and an
innumerable multitude of people) not to scared of them. "In the mean time,
when there were gathered together an innumerable multitude of people,
insomuch that they trode one upon another, he began to say unto his
disciples first of all, Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is
hypocrisy ... And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that
kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do" (v.1-4). The
psalmist David knew what it meant to be bullied and this is his advice,
"The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the
strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked, even mine
enemies and my foes, came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and
fell. Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear:
though war should rise against me, in this will I be confident ... Wait on
the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I
say, on the Lord" (Ps. 27:1-3,14).

*The fear of the Lord tends to take away all other fears ... this is the
secret of Christian courage and boldness. (Sinclair B. Ferguson)*