PRÉCIS ON OVERCOMING THE FEAR OF SPEAKING TRUTH: THE MAKER OF MOUTHS SHALL BE OUR VOICE – (WITH VIDEO)

SCRIPTURE. “Then Moses said to the Lord, ‘Please, Lord, I am not a man of words (eloquent, fluent), neither before nor since You have spoken to Your servant; for I am slow of speech and tongue.’ The Lord said to him, ‘Who has made man’s mouth? Or who makes the mute or the deaf, or the seeing or the blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now then go, and I, even I, will be with your mouth, and will teach you what you shall say.’” – EXODUS 4:10-12, AMP

KEY TERM: “MADE.” ‘Sum’ [שׂוּם]: “A verb meaning ‘to appoint, to bring, to call, to put, to change, to charge, to commit, to consider;’ the primary meaning of the verb is a reference to what God puts or sets in place on the earth indicating His absolute sovereignty over all Creation, especially Humankind; a reference to God’s unique ability to establish the Order of all things [including the charge given to individuals to accomplish some God-ordained task].”

A  QUOTATION. “But I have learned in the last year, more than ever before, that ‘sometimes we have to be loud.’” ― ATIA ABAWI,Hope Nation, 2019

COMMENTARY. “‘Moses continued backward to the work God designed him for.’ There was much of cowardice, slothfulness, and unbelief in him. We must not judge of men by the readiness of their discourse. A great deal of wisdom and true worth may be with a slow tongue. God sometimes makes choice of those as his messengers, who have the least of the advantages of art or nature, that his grace in them may appear the more glorious. ‘Christ’s disciples were no orators, till the Holy Spirit made them such.’

[But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence.” ] – 1 CORINTHIANS 1:27, NKV

‘God condescends to answer the excuse of Moses.’ Even self-diffidence, when it hinders us from duty, or clogs us in duty, is very displeasing to the Lord. But while we blame Moses for shrinking from this dangerous service, let us ask our own hearts if we are not neglecting duties more easy and less perilous. The tongue of Aaron, with the head and heart of Moses, would make one completely fit for this errand.

God promises, ‘I will be with thy mouth,’ and with his mouth. Even Aaron, who could speak well, yet could not speak to purpose, unless God gave constant teaching and help; for ‘without the constant aid of Divine grace, the best gifts will fail.’” – MATTHEW HENRY, Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, 6 vols., 1708-1710; edited

1. FIRST THOUGHTS

It has been said by many wise people over the generations that ‘the best leaders are the ones who do not want the job.’ Moses was, by that standard, a most brilliant choice by God to be His historic Messenger who would deliver The Law of God to all Humanity.

While I am certainly no Moses, put me at the head of that class, beloved. Doing what I do today was the very last thing I had ever desired as one who has always ‘loved Truth,’ but who also ‘loved the approval’ of the leaders of my disciplines. To the extent that it very nearly became idolatry as I too often trembled before my audiences, wanting far too shamelessly to please ‘them’ more than God.

‘No longer!’

Through a thousand errors and accommodations and frights over three decades, God has implanted in me an aggressive desire, indeed, a veritable ‘Fire for His Truth.’ It’s been there for a long time but was covered up by spiritual pollution and my shameful fear of men.

Too, I cannot say it is all His Fire, since my temperament is often a challenge for me when I see the abominations of His Name and Words taking place every day in our many Churches.

THREE YEARS OF HELL. I use that phrase to describe what I experienced beginning in March 2016, when I was fired by JERRY FALWELL, JR., from the faculty of Liberty University in Lynchburg Virginia for refusing to sign on with DONALD TRUMP’S presidential campaign – as was the entire campus ‘ordered’ to do.

From June 2017 when my contracted pay ran out, through March 2020, my family and I went through the loss of pretty much all we had: House. Salary. Insurance. Reputation. Joy. And very nearly, my family.

I had always been a teacher and simply didn’t know anything else. Several efforts at commercial positions over my lifetime convinced me (and many others!) that I was perhaps the worst business professional God had ever allowed to walk the planet. Applications for telemarketing, truck driver, Greyhound and City Bus service, airport shuttle operator, and Uber hack all failed, leaving me bereft of any professional identity.

Rightly or wrongly, I no longer knew who I was or my purpose in life. I can tell you there is no worse feeling in the universe than that. For me at least, it felt as if ‘Dr. Cliff Kelly had died.’

II. THE TURN

Then one Fall afternoon (October 2019, ’40Year Anniversary’), I received my Third Firing from an international Christian Mission organization. Partly due to my poor administrative record keeping skills, but also, significantly, for my refusal to stop writing commentaries critical of Donald Trump.

“What you are writing, Cliff, is not helpful to us.”

As I walked down the stairs from my former office loaded down with a box full of my personal items, having been escorted from the premises within a couple hours of my termination, I leaned up against my car somewhat forlorn (understatement) and inquired of the Lord with a simple, plaintive question:

“Father, what was that all about?”

To shorten the saga just a bit, He said to me, clearly: “I’m proud of you.” “What?” I retorted not too respectfully. “I just lost my third job in three years, and You are proud of me? This cannot be You!”

I then climbed into my car trying to figure a way to tell my wife and family I had failed again and somehow decided to go to a Christian movie just out back then called, ‘Overcomer’ (2019) produced by ALEX KENDRICK.

The story line was about a coach who had lost his job as basketball coach and was being asked to supervise a sport he knew nothing about, Cross Country, with a single member of the “team,” a young lady who was equally inexperienced in that sport.

A totally impossible situation!

It may be important to note that Track and Cross Country were my main sports in high school, a fact that pulled me into the story as I watched the film from the very last row of the Regal Movie Theater in a dark, nearly empty auditorium. As the 90-minute film proceeded as both coach and athlete learned the ropes bit by bit, the script had the coach say, not once, nor twice, but five times to the valiant young lady:

“I’m proud of you.”

Stunned by what I recognized as a much-needed Divine Approbation, I then drove home, quietly buoyed and certainly humbled to relate the entire matter to my family, who listened compassionately. After which my wonderful wife said something like: “Well, it sounds like the Lord to me, so we’ll just have to trust Him to see what’s next.”

DIGITAL CIRCUIT RIDER.  I had been praying for a couple of years about a contemporary iteration of the old Circuit Riders of the 18^th Century when Christian men would travel by horseback from town to town to encourage the faith of the settlers. According to historians, the New Americans were enjoying unprecedented success and affluence, turning them away from God in record numbers.

Spiritual indifference, drunkenness and other worldly replacements for Christ had taken hold and were it not for the Circuit Riders and the fiery preaching of men like JONATHAN EDWARDS in his epic, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” (1741), a Constitutional America may never have been born.

Then came “Priscilla” (March 2020). When ‘she’ arrived upon the financial scene, my little enterprise was almost overnight enabled ‘to oppose the emergence of Donald Trump’s Maga Christian Nationalism movement.’ And my life – and my theology – would execute a 180-degree turn, when my life took on more Excitement and Vision and Purpose then ever before.

To the extent that I wake up most mornings, despite many setbacks and dozens of death threats, with a single thought and praise in my heart and mouth:

“Best job I ever had!”

III. LAST THOUGHTS

God has transformed me from a somewhat fearful people pleaser to, well, to use a name He once bestowed upon me around 2021: “BOANRÉGES!” (Βοανεργές: The sons of Zebedee regarded by the Lord as ‘Sons of Thunder’ – commotion, impetuosity, and zeal, ready to call down fire on all enemies of God!’).

Pretty much.

April of 2024 thus finds me some several hundred commentaries, dozens of YouTube videos, two books and some 30,000 Circuit Ride miles later, during which He graciously gave me both ‘a mouth and a pen’ to declare His Warnings to a Reprobate Church and countless lost young people.

Though my footprint be tiny, and my resources limited, I have never been more profoundly grateful for an assignment that has become my very Center, my ‘Raison d’etre,’ for the days remaining to me.

‘I now understand who I am.’

CODA. So may I never again Cower in Silence as before. Indeed, may we all aspire to the Prophet’s Magnificent Obsession:

“If I say, I will not make mention of [the Lord] or speak any more in His name, in my mind and heart it is as if there were ‘a burning fire shut up in my bones.’ And I am weary of enduring and holding it in; I cannot [contain it any longer]!” – JEREMIAH 20:9, AMPC

Such Fire brings the Blaze of ‘Christ’s Select Arrow’ to all this Darkness, beloved. For such a Time as this, before Night fully comes, when no one can work.

SELAH.

YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/dQ9NWBQi5Hg