Stand Your Ground

Are you battle-weary? Does it seem like the storms keep raging one after another? Or, are you in a time of peace but have friends with battles raging?

As disciples of Jesus, it matters how we handle the battles that arise in our lives and in each other’s lives. Ephesians 6:10-20 implies that every follower of Jesus is a soldier, and we have to outfit ourselves with the armor he has provided in order to “be strong in the Lord” and to “stand our ground”.

Why fight? What is our ground?

In the Old Testament the ground was the Promised Land. Israel was promised Canaan, but they had to fight to obtain it.  As you know, for forty years they wandered in a wilderness due to lack of faith. After the forty years, they learned Who God was, and that obedience to His word would enable them to do His will. So with Joshua leading them “carefully doing everything the Lord commanded”, they were given their first victory at Jericho. They fought for their ground that they had already been given. Once obtained, they had to keep it by “standing their ground.” After taking the Promised Land, they had times of peace and times of fighting in order to take more or keep what they already had conquered.

Similarly, we have been given ground. Jesus obtained it when He conquered our enemies, Satan, sin and death at the cross. Our ground is the spiritual inheritance we have in Christ. That inheritance is our own salvation and those whose eternal destiny we influence through our ministry to and through Jesus. We, like the Israelites, have to fight to take the ground that the Lord has given us. We advance against the enemy in establishing the Kingdom of God. The works that God has planned for us here, if done faithfully and in obedience to Him, will be rewarded in Heaven. Sometimes we work peaceably, and other times we will have to fight.

The wonderful news for us is that we always fight from a place of VICTORY. That is what it means to STAND OUR GROUND. It’s wearing the armor provided for our protection, and advancing against the enemy or standing in what we have already conquered.

As with any army, communication with the commanding officer is essential to victory: And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for the saints. Ephesians 6:18

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Colossians 3:23, 24

A Time To Contend

Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt I had to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints. ~Jude 3

Contend:

1. to strive in combat; fight.

2. To strive in debate; argue.

3. To strive in competition; compete; vie. v.t. to hold to be a fact; assert.

God’s Word is Powerful and Timely

Does it delight you when you hear a message, or when you read devotions, or when you see in God’s word exactly what you need to hear for this time in your life? Does it surprise you that when you see or hear a message in several places that you find God working that very thing into your life?

That is how it’s been for me with our Pastor's current sermon series from the first four verses from the book of Jude.

 I have been given an opportunity to contend for the truth in a situation at my son, Ethan’s college. This opportunity has also been a call to lay down my son; to surrender him again to the Lord for His purposes. On top of that, it has served as a catalyst for Ethan to search his own heart and choose to surrender his life to being a “contender for the faith”.

What God does with our obedience is out of our hands when we are called to take a stand for truth. But stand we must.

The Lord has given me a clear message to go along with the battle that we find ourselves in. That message is that we do not retreat; we need to advance against the enemy. For too long we (Christians in general) have just let “little” things go and the result is a vast sea of lukewarm Christians. If we do not contend for the truth when we detect error, Satan gets the upper hand. He wants to distort and twist the truth so that it loses its power for salvation and for setting us free.

Satan’s goal is to corrode our conscience and destroy our discernment in order to keep us bound. Look at how he communicated with Eve…and then Jesus…trying to trick them with subtle questions and suggestions that would appeal to human reason. Sadly Eve fell into his trap, but Praise God that Jesus did not! Jesus used the TRUTH to oppose the Liar and won the victory for us! Halleluiah!

We need to be so soaked in, familiar with, and filled up with the word so that we can distinguish the lies. Remember they are subtle… and scripture says that Satan masquerades as an “angel of light”, which means he appears to “make sense” or “look good”…Only those close to Jesus who have His living word filling them will be able to contend for the faith for ourselves and our families.

Consider what the Bible says about the Word of God: John 1 talks about Jesus being the Word, so changing the word is equal to changing Jesus. We also read that the Word is...Living and active (Hebrews 4:12), a Light, a Sword (Ephesians 6), a surgical instrument separating what is true from what is not (Hebrews 4:12), a revealer of God, and Truth (among other powerful things) our defense against the enemy (2 Corinthians 10:3-6). To change the Word of God is to take away its Living Power and dim or snuff out its light.
 

Fire Up!!!

Here is a list of several books that I believe God is using to call His church back to sold-out devotion to Him:

• “Crazy Love” by Francis Chan

• “Radical” by David Platt (taking back your faith from the American dream)

• “Sun Stand Still” by Steven Furtick (dare to ask God for the impossible)

• “The Bravehearted Gospel” by Eric Ludy (reviving the dormant masculine side of Christianity-the truth is worth fighting for)

• “Wrestling Prayer” by Eric and Leslie Ludy (a passionate communion with God)

• “One Million Arrows” by Julie Ferwerda (raising your children to change the world)

Don’t allow yourself or your children to be lazy in your devotion to the Lord and His word. Don’t let the enemy distract you with temporal things when eternity is at stake…