More Wins
Last week I shared a part of my journal from our trip to the UK last month, and how I encountered intense spiritual warfare that often went on for hours on a daily basis. Every one of those battles ended in a win. It wasn’t always this way.
From 2007-2009 I went through a time of severe trial and testing that was accompanied by a lot of warfare. I made a lot of mistakes during that time and ran up a lot of losses. Yet God used those mistakes and failures to teach me more about spiritual warfare than I could ever learn in a book and to prepare me for the battles I’m engaged in now.
Perhaps you’re in a season where it feels like you’re racking some losses. Take courage in knowing that the Lord uses our failures, mistakes, and even our sin to mold and shape us, to strengthen our spiritual spine and teach us to trust Him, no matter what.
“And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”
Romans 8:28
“Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”
James 1:2-4
Some of you may be scoring win after win but feel like you’re losing, perhaps because you’re tired, alone, or discouraged. The truth is that you’re spiritually tougher and more alive than the average flesh-driven Sunday Christian who is laying back in the weeds and living for pleasure and entertainment. The enemy will do what he can to convince you that you’re a loser. You’re an overcomer, a warrior, a fighter. Take heart and keep moving. Don’t base your walk with God on your feelings.
“What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Just as it is written, “For Your sake we are being put to death all day long; We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.”
Romans 8:31-37
No matter where you are, perseverance is critical. Never give up or stop going hard after God. Keep pouring your life out until your last breath. (Pouring your life out usually means helping other people with much prayer, not hours on a screen.)
“Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.”
James 1:12
Food
I was in the UK and Europe for 3 weeks last month. I lost 6 pounds. My Covid symptoms tapered a bit. Yet, we were eating out all the time. As I’ve experienced in the past, I feel better when I travel to Europe because they’ve outlawed some of the chemicals that are prevalent in American foods; many of the European foods are lower in sugar, including their desserts. Consuming foods with less chemicals and sugar makes a big difference; much of what we consume in the States is lab created Franken-crap.
It’s the same in the spiritual world. Live on a steady diet of pleasure, entertainment (even Christian entertainment), the news, sports, or politics and you’ll be spiritually numb at best, miserable, angry, or addicted to some false comfort at worst. Feeding on God’s word and immersing yourself in prayer brings peace, healing, wisdom, life, and joy. This is the way of life for the Rogue Christian.
“The open secret of many Bible believing Churches is that a vanishingly small percentage of those talking about prayer and Bible reading are actually doing what they are talking about.”
– Dallas Willard, 1935-2013
How’s your Bible and prayer life? Really?
Been to a prayer meeting lately?
The 62%
A new study from Barna Group reported that:
62% of Christians believe they can regularly watch porn and have a healthy sex life.
44% of women regularly watch porn.
Just 10% of Christians said their churches had programs to help in this area.
84% of porn users say they have no one helping them.
49% of practicing Christians who admit to viewing pornography say they are “comfortable with how much pornography” they use.
More than half of millennials and Gen Z adults (ages 18–37) say they have sent a nude image of themselves, and three-quarters say they have received them.
66% of adults believe that “with enough willpower, a person can overcome porn addiction on their own.” (Yeah, how’s that working out?)
Meanwhile, another recent survey of Barna’s, Engaging the Spiritually Open, showed that 37% of Christians say they have deconstructed the faith of their youth.
Mene, mene, tekel, upharsin.
I’ve been reading through Lamentations lately. That’s not a book many gravitate to. Jerusalem has just been razed, and Jeremiah is broken-hearted over its destruction, to the point of tears. Several themes from this excerpt struck me as being parallel to where we are today:
“Those who once feasted on delicacies
perish in the streets;
those who were brought up in purple
embrace ash heaps.
For the chastisement of the daughter of my people has been greater
than the punishment of Sodom,
which was overthrown in a moment,
and no hands were wrung for her.
Her princes were purer than snow,
whiter than milk;
their bodies were more ruddy than coral,
the beauty of their form was like sapphire.
Now their face is blacker than soot;
they are not recognized in the streets;
their skin has shriveled on their bones;
it has become as dry as wood.
Happier were the victims of the sword
than the victims of hunger,
who wasted away, pierced
by lack of the fruits of the field.
The hands of compassionate women
have boiled their own children;
they became their food
during the destruction of the daughter of my people.
The Lord gave full vent to his wrath;
he poured out his hot anger,
and he kindled a fire in Zion
that consumed its foundations.
The kings of the earth did not believe,
nor any of the inhabitants of the world,
that foe or enemy could enter
the gates of Jerusalem.
This was for the sins of her prophets
and the iniquities of her priests,
who shed in the midst of her
the blood of the righteous.
They wandered, blind, through the streets;
they were so defiled with blood
that no one was able to touch
their garments.”
Lamentation 4:5-14
“Feasted on delicacies… dressed in purple.” The nation of Israel was prosperous, blessed… and corrupt with sin and evil. Even the kings of the other countries didn’t believe that prosperous Jerusalem would fall (“The kings of the earth did not believe, nor any of the inhabitants of the world, that foe or enemy could enter the gates of Jerusalem”).
For decades God pleaded with and warned them through His prophets to turn away from their sin. There finally came a day when the hammer fell… “overthrown in a moment.”
Surveys like those above from Barna and the daily flow of news stories of Christian leaders exposed for sexual sin are warnings that we’re not facing the sin that is rampant in the church, with devastating consequences.
This is a picture of a car I saw near London last month:
The world has no problem ramming sexual depravity down our throats and even boasting about it. Why are we such cowards when it comes to openly talking about sexual sin? Why is there no sense of urgency, no realization that we’re in serious trouble, no equipping people in these areas?
“It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans, for a man has his father’s wife. And you are arrogant! Ought you not rather to mourn?”
1 Corinthians 5:1-2
