Encouragement

Have you ever had a spiritual "battle" that you were fighting? Perhaps it was or is a sin in your life that is an ongoing battle... one of those ones that seems to tempt you more than any other sin. For me that sin is overeating: gluttony. The habit of eating food in excess of what my body needs to live and minister according to God's word is what I am defining as overeating and gluttony. I have had times in my life when I have been in the battle, fighting to glorify God and bring my sinful desires under the control of the Holy Spirit and for the glory of God (times of victory). More often though, my life has been one of giving in to my sinful desire to overeat and enjoy food more than God, to glut myself on the gift and stop worshiping the Giver.

Well, I am back in the battle. God is faithful and will not let me wander far without using His shepherd hook to grab me around the neck and bring me back to following Him. (Indeed, He's been swatting me with it this whole time; I am apparently a glutton for punishment as well!) So now I'm getting around to the point of this post. I know the truths of scripture: that I am to hunger and thirst for righteousness more than mere food or drink. I know that I am to desire God's glory more than I desire my own way. I know that I am to do all to the glory of God, whether eating or drinking or whatever I am doing. But as I look back over my life and see how I have sometimes obeyed God and then eventually wandered away in disobedience (specifically regarding this issue), I can become very discouraged. I can begin to think that it is a hopeless fight. If I look backwards at my track record, all I can see is inconsistency and eventual failure. I look to my future and judge it by my past, and as such, I lose all hope for victory. And therein lies the problem... I am not looking at this rightly.

God does not intend for me to look at myself, my past or to assess my own strengths when predicting the potential for victory in my future. If I am depending upon myself, my strength to accomplish victory; then I should despair. Why would I think that I can do anything on my own? Why should I even think that I can manage to trust in God and "let" Him do the work in me on my own? I need God in everything and for everything. (Romans 11:36 For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.) I absolutely can't do it on my own. I can't start the work, sustain the work or finish the work. Christ has to do it in me. Ephesians 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

Christ started the work - He has saved me. He sustains the work in His mysterious ways, through the Holy Spirit as He leads me, convicts me, gives me heavenward affections and calls me to follow Him. And I can rest assured that He will finish the work in me, though I will have to participate in the battle until the day of my death unless Christ returns sooner. However, it is God's call to not look at myself or trust in myself, but to look to Christ and to trust in Him to provide me with everything I need to have victory. So here is the greatest encouragement that I have been given and can give to you who are also in a battle of your own (whatever that battle might be): God's promises. He is faithful and able to keep them.

2 Peter 1:2-4 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.

Hebrews 12:1-2 Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Isaiah 40:31 Yet those who wait for the LORD Will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, They will walk and not become weary.

Colossians 3:1-3 Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

Psalm 9:9-10 The LORD also will be a stronghold for the oppressed, A stronghold in times of trouble; And those who know Your name will put their trust in You, For You, O LORD, have not forsaken those who seek You.