Wage War

"I make war! / Cause sin never sleeps / It's got me in a trance / You can see it in my dreams / I make war! / Man i beat my flesh / To the death / Every breath / Like i beat my chest / I make war / Sun up / I make war / Sun down / I make war / Time in / I make war / Time out / I make war / Against lust / Against pride / Against me / Until i die"

 

These are lyrics from Tedashii (ft. Flame) Make War. I am blown away with how easily I retreat and succumb to gratifications of the flesh and mind. Life is viewed as a bike ride through the mountain trails. Once you get going downhill you pick up speed, and it becomes impossible to slow down until you hit the bottom. Then comes the climb back up, and it is hard but its worth it because the beauty in the summit is ample motivation to keep going. We allow ourselves to get tossed around by the winds of Apathy, Self-Destruction, Pleasure, Pride, and Greed; and they all work together to derail us. 

Why do we not fight?

Life is war. The essence of Christianity is the antithesis of our human nature. We absolutely cannot afford to think of life in any other way. Choosing ignorance by passively trusting in God to fight for you will only solidify the Enemies victory. God will give us victory but only if we actively seek the victory His name. Romans 6-8 is the perfect example of how we should live. 

Romans 6: We are saved from condemnation by the grace of God and by The Miracle on the Cross. But this does not give us free reign to sin knowing we are forgiven and sanctified; to him condemnation is deserved (Romans 3:8b). We are created subsidiary beings; we will always long and desire something greater than ourselves. Before The Miracle, our slave-driver was sin. Now it is righteousness in Christ through the eradication of the law (or our bounds to eternal punishment for breaking the law) and the entrance of Grace.  So our ties were broken to slavery in sin and now we are slaves to righteousness through the Spirit being our intercessor.

Romans 7: Since we are saved from the law, does that mean we don't have to obey the law anymore? Absolutely not. The law is intended for good; for we were not excused from adherence to the law but were saved from the damnation as a result of breaking the law. The law's purpose was to awaken our consciousness of sin, for without the law we were dark-minded to sin. Sin came alive because of the law, but the law is still good. "In order that sin might be recognized as sin, it produced death in me through what was good, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful" (vs.13). With this knowledge of sin comes the the beginning of the war against it. The dichotomy of pleasure vs. preservation is fierce and violent, thrashing and tearing even the slightest resistance. "But I see another law at work in the members of my body, WAGING WAR against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin" (vs.23). So why, since we are sanctified and saved through The Miracle do we still have to wage war against sin? Because sin is resilient. "So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to the God's law, but in the sinful nature to the law of sin" (vs.25).

Romans 8: The acceptance of the 'get out of jail free' card from God does not eradicate sin's power over our lives. We don't automatically change and cease to struggle. God saving us from the damning grasp of sin did not outlaw sin in our lives and in our worlds. But because He has sanctified our minds and our spirits, He is able to condemn the sin in our lives without condemning our spirits. He allows us the opportunity for righteousness to reign in our lives by offering us the most satisfying and fulfilling solution: Himself. Outside of Him, we are controlled by sin, and whoever is controlled by sin is incapable of pleasing Him (vs.8). We are without excuse when we fall to sin because we have a guaranteed victory through the Holy Spirit inside of us, being our intercessor and being our front man on the battle field.

So why, then, do I feel overwhelmed and constantly hopeless against the power of sin? BECAUSE I DO NOT WAGE WAR!! How dare I treat this issue with anything other than the most heightened sense of alarm. How dare I not take up arms and defend for my life. How dare I choose to view this with even the slightest inkling of passivity. Sin is strong, my friends. So know this:

 

- You have the ability (because of The Miracle) to be dead to sin

- If you are not dead to sin, you will be unable to please Christ

- If you do not wage war against sin, you will never be dead to sin

- The war will never end, so don't you dare give up

Encourage each other DAILY to wage war, because we are strong together friends.

Fear

 Today I came to a bittersweet realization: I realized what my biggest fear is. I always thought that it was a fear of commitment, but it turns out it is even deeper than that. My biggest fear is failure. It is what prevents me from trying new things. It constrains me in relationships. It makes me a mediocre Christian. I choose to not share my faith because I am afraid I will fail and not be able to successfully converse with them about my beliefs. If I say one wrong thing they could be turned off from Christ completely. Either that or it will deepen their belief that they can out-smart a Christian. God will convict me to talk to a random person and I immediately come up with ten reasons I shouldn't talk to them. "I don't know them. That is socially unacceptable. They will think I'm weird. I have to get to class. They are walking the other direction as me. Its not the Holy Spirit, its just a random feeling." I keep walking, convincing myself that its no big deal and eventually get over it. I love my life, because its comfortable. I love playing frisbee because I know I am good at it. I love exercising because I know I succeed every single time I try.  
                                               My abilities give me confidence.
 I feel so low right now knowing that is the way I think and that I have been living this way for so long. My way of living is completely contradictory to the calling of Christ. His power is made perfect in our weaknesses (2 Cor. 12:9-10), which give us all the more power to boast in them. God worked so explicitly in the Scriptures in people's lives, carefully crafted so that there was no way He couldn't get glory. One of the two aspects of the Chief End of Man is to glorify God (the other being to enjoy him forever). And yet I refuse to act unless I know I am capable of it, thus bringing me glory. The sinful nature of my thoughts have made me completely reverse the Biblical mandate to bring Him glory and made me justify my actions, convincing me I'm still living a "Godly" life.

 But it is never too late to turn things around. I have failed so far, but God works even in our failures. The first step has been to recognize this in my life, and now I need to change the way I see each opportunity each day. God will never call us into a situation that: 1 - He has not already been through and conquered and 2 - He has not already given us the strength to succeed in. I have not been willing to make myself look like an idiot for the kingdom. Not an idiot in God's eyes, but an idiot in the worlds eyes. To break all social constraints and make myself completely transparent, eradicating all my darkness, and allowing the Father to shine His light that is within me.

 I implore all who read this to assess the way we view our impact in the Kingdom. If it is even 1% our ability and 99% God's ability, then we have not surrendered enough.

Judgement

Judgement is God's way of assessing out lives and how successful we were at carrying out the commands of the Bible. "We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad" (2 Corinthians 5:10) A lot of people say that the Bible is just a big book of rules and that it's impossible to follow. But if you think about it, it tells us a few things we can't do, and then the rest we are allowed to do! Wouldn't it be way more difficult if the Bible was a list of things we were allowed to do on earth, and whatever wasn't mentioned in there was off limits? God is so good to us. But still we fall short. Every day we fail to uphold His commands. So that is why we will be judged at the end of times. It is not the correct motivation to do good in fear of God's wrath during judgement, but I would be lying if I were to say that I haven't thought that way before. We should do good out of our love for God, not out of fear of punishment. But in Philippians Paul talks about those spreading the gospel, saying some do it out of the pureness of their hearts and some do it for selfish gains, but the most important thing above all is that God's wonders are being told. So fear of judgement isn't the best motivation, but it is motivation. Do you do good out of fear or out of love? Do you even think about judgment on a daily basis? It is vital to have a kingdom mindset and think about the eternal implications of our actions; if we don't, we will get caught in the quicksand of the monotonous society and our focus will be about acute, fleeting pleasures.

 In my quest through Psalms, yet again I am challenged to live a life that is focused on the Kingdom. We are on our best behavior when we are conscious of analysis. We know when we can get away with things and when we can't. How often do we do this? We choose the dark over the light because we are comfortable in the dark. We get what we want without anyone knowing. But the righteous man has nothing to hide! On the day of judgment, the righteous man arrives in the absence of quivering knees or elevated heart rate. David is a perfect example of this. He wasn't just ready for judgment, HE ASKED GOD TO JUDGE HIM. How bold! Psalm 82:8 "Arise, O God, and judge the earth." I have to honestly admit that I would not ask God to judge me, because I know how short I have fallen. What would I have to change in my life to start living a in a manner where I boldly ask to be under scrutiny? It all starts with the integrity of character. Take some time today to assess your life through the lens of the Scripture and see what needs to change so that we may boldly approach the throne (Hebrews 4:16) and have our Father say "WELL DONE, GOOD AND FAITHFUL SERVANT".

Restoration

Psalm 78 resonates way too closely with my life. Reading it, about how the Israelites rebelled over and over again, inherently elicits emotions of anger and frustration. STOP SINNING!!!! I've always wondered why God chose the Israelites to be His chosen people, until my eyes were opened to the intense similarities between their journey and my/your journey. Day after day God longs for intimacy with Him and He longs to provide for us. "But again the continued to sin against Him, rebelling in the desert against the Most High. They willfully put God to the test by demanding the food they craved...When He struck the rock, water gushed out and streams flowed abundantly. BUT, can He also give us food? Can He supply meat for His people?" (vs. 17-20). God gives us water, and we complain because He didn't give us a fat juicy steak to go with it. We are no different from the people of this time. We gyrate through valleys and mountains and continue on in a perpetual cycle of disappointment, repentance, forgiveness, and disappointment. After several thousands of years of experience and history, how have we learned nothing? "Again and again they put God to the test; they vexed the Holy One of Israel. They did not remember His power..." (vs. 41-42). So how in the world are we supposed to combat this addictive and destructive lifestyle? How and why is God even trying anymore? Ah, but now we reach Psalm 80, and that glorious and incomparable word comes into play...RESTORATION. In His sovereignty, He has the power and desire to restore us to our former glory as we had in the Garden of Eden. Without restoration, we would be marred and rotten and less valuable than dust in the wind. Take the time today to ask God to restore you. Ask Him to wipe your slate clean and to forgive you of your trespasses. We will never be fully restored until the Day of Second Coming is upon us, but God is desperate to restore us daily. All we have to do is fall to our knees and ask.

Slavery to Justification

Christians are the best in the world at justifying sin. No matter what the situation is, and no matter how firmly we believe in righteousness, we find a way to sin and push our convictions aside. This is true of every person on the planet every day of their lives. How do we stick to our convictions and resist the ploys of Satan when he is attacking us in our weakest moment? We are all slaves. When you are obsessed with something, you can't stop talking about it and you find yourself intertwined with our master constantly. Lovers are slaves to their affection. Gluttons are slaves to food. Addicts are slaves to their addictions. They cannot help but act out of submission to their master. How do we become slaves to Christ? How do we become so enamored by His love and mercy that we cannot help but act out of our obsessive state? So far, my best guess is find a way to experience the magnitude of God and taste the kingdom. It is like Edmund in the Chronicles of Narnia, when he ate the turkish delight he could not stop eating. He got lost in his desire to continue eating. Once we experience the power of the kingdom we will not be able stop pursuing it to its fullest extent. How have you experienced the kingdom and what have you done to become a slave to Christ?