STRONGER - PART 2 | THE SOURCE OF THE BATTLE

STRONGER | THE SOURCE OF THE STRUGGLE. PART2. For Part1please click here.

I came across a book early this year by Havilah Cunnington titled “Stronger than the Struggle”. I strongly recommend you read it. Much of what I am blogging here is from that book. The blogs in this series are reflections and a summary of what I got from this fantastic book that I recommend you to buy.

In the last Blog, we reflected upon the fact that everyone goes through struggles and that does not disqualify you from being used powerfully by God. He will use the very thing that has tried trip you up to be a trophy of His enduring Grace in your life. We fight from a place of victory because of the finished work of the Cross.

In our struggle, we need to be utterly convinced that God is for us, and His intentions toward us are always good. We need to surrender and yield to His sovereign will, timing and ways.

We also need to remind ourselves at the end of the day our struggle is not against flesh and blood (though satan uses flesh and blood) living people to cause strife. Our fight is against spiritual forces at work. Once we recognize this we will learn to engage the right enemy and not our spouse, child, friend, mother in law, work colleague etc.

 SO WHERE DOES THE ATTACK COME FROM?

I think the battle largely starts in the mind, our will, and our emotions i.e thoughts, decisions, feelings.

 1        I INTERNAL

THOUGHTS

Our battles can come from inside our own minds. We belong to Christ once we accept Him. However, our minds need renewing. We do not fight our old self or the flesh because that already died with Christ on the Cross. We are told that the old has gone (2 Cor 5:17) and the new has come. So don’t waste time beating up a corpse!

So where is the battle? Satan will take truth and make us question it and doubt it. Did God really say? Let’s look at Gen 3:1-3 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”

² The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, ³ but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”

Point out the two untruths in these verses. God did not say “any” tree but only one tree.

Then Eve adds her own spice “you must not touch it” did God say that?

Did the devil forget what God said? Was he really asking Eve for clarity? NO!! He was engaging her mind. Have you heard this saying, “Curiosity killed the cat!” Curiosity, in this case, created confusion that indeed led to death. The devil will do everything you make you distrust God.

So it is important for you to know the Word of God and apply it appropriately.

Trust believes God’s intentions towards us are good. You need to partner with the truth and not the lies the enemy is feeding you.  What you partner with you empower. Partner with truth and empower the truth. Partner with a lie and you give it a place of influence in your life. Therefore, he will try to destabilize your mind – fill it with doubt and unbelief.

Remember God wanted to live and have close commune with his creation forever. Sin marred that plan. Sin and God could not co-exist. Good and evil could not be in heaven. Therefore, God’s salvation plan comes into play and he sends Jesus to redeem us.

We are now his children because of accepting this gift of salvation. I am a child of God.

However, the battle still rages. The war over Satan has been won. But he is like a chained dog still thrashing about harming whatever is within his reach.

We can have thought patterns that are sinful and do not reflect the heart of God. We need to retrain these our minds. The Bible calls it the renewing or transforming our minds. When we do this we will be able to discern God's will for our lives. Rom 12:1-2. We have been used to thinking and reacting in certain ways viz. getting angry, being impatient, rude, taking offence, being selfish etc. Now we have to replace those reflexes with new ones. When we do this, our behaviour will change. 

 THE WILL

When the resolve in our mind weakens, it affects the choices we make. We act on what our minds meditate upon. Therefore, it is very important what we think.

EMOTIONS

What we think about affects how we feel. When you indulge in negative thoughts, you feel down, and it shows in your actions, tone, face.

When you are praising God, having a thankful heart it changes your mood and how you feel.

As Christians, we have a new identity in Christ. We are children of God loved completely and have the same access to all God's goodness.

However, sometimes it feels like others get more than we do. Doesn’t it? That they are more favoured by God and we are left out. That is a lie. God has more than enough for all of us. You will not go without. This comes from a poverty mindset that thinks God is holding out on us and does not want to give us the best in our lives.

This is when we need to renew our minds and remind ourselves of God’s good intentions toward us. What we are thinking will change our behaviour and our feelings.

 

II EXTERNAL

Sometimes our battles are simply because we live in a fallen world. The Bible reminds us that it rains on the righteous and unrighteous. There is sickness, sin, sorrow, wickedness all because sin entered the world. Sometimes we are victims of other people’s poor choices. These have a domino effect on our lives. E.g.) A person driving a car breaks the signal and injures someone crossing the road. The choice to break the law on the part of the driver had a ripple effect on an innocent pedestrian.

God has given everyone a free will. True love requires that we have a choice. Eve made a bad choice, a selfish choice. She fed her curiosity and desire. The result has had a ripple effect on history. This continues for those who have not put their faith in Jesus. For those who have, Jesus death arrested that curse and cancelled it.

 III BELIEF SYSTEM

We can face the battle, the struggle if we have the right core values and belief system.

How we make choices and take decisions affects things and people around us. What do we think about God, ourselves, our life, people? All this affects the way we behave. What is shaping your core values? A lot of the times this needs to be recalibrated. The standard against which this is done is the eternal, unchanging truth that we find in the Bible. We need to realign our thinking to that standard or plumbline.

OUR RESPONSES

We all have defence mechanisms. These are knee-jerk ways in which we react to negative situations. They are Freeze, Flight or Fight

FREEZE – Here you feel powerless. This can happen because we feel overwhelmed, anxious, fearful, incompetent or confused. We can be like that deer with headlights in the face and just freeze rather than respond. We could even play dead like the possum and hope for the conflict or battle to blow over.

FLIGHT –  Like a rabbit, we can run away from what is uncomfortable or things that we do not understand. Some Christians are like this when dealing with spiritual warfare or any kind of unpleasantness. They do not know what to do with it and ignore it or we leave it to a few "experts". We need to remind ourselves that greater is He that is in us than he that is in the world. I John 4:4

FIGHT

Here we take on everything as a challenge. Like a lion, we will roar and fight back and not back down. In the spiritual realm, we can see demons everywhere, in everything and on everyone. We can overreact.

We can respond in fear and get defensive about everything or we can stay open-minded and learn what the situation has to offer. 

When we are defensive, we get into tunnel vision. We are unable to think clearly or see things from just one angle.  Our prejudices about that situation or a person colour everything we see and experience with that person which only further builds up the animosity or the distance. When we are like this our mind shuts out all other options and ways of thinking or approaching a problem. We need to ask the Holy Spirit to give us discernment to understand the nature of the problem and its source.

We need to stand in the authority that God gives us. Jesus promised that we will never be alone. He has given us Himself and the Holy Spirit. We do not fight on our own. Also, remember Jesus is ever interceding for us before the Father Heb 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.

 Do not over-analyze things. Just remind yourself that that power that raised Jesus from the dead is alive and at work in you. You are powerful.

In Eph 5 God has given us a whole battle suit. There is a lot there for our protection. We have one piece of weaponry that is for the offence. Everything else in the armour is for our defence save one i.e the Sword of the Spirit which the Word of God. We need to know how to use it in order to fight well.

Don’t give in to fear. Fight. As Kris Vallotton says “Fear is faith in the wrong kingdom”.

In the next blog, we will reflect on why is the battle important and how to know your enemy

Reflect upon which one of these three is your response? 

Once you recognize it you will be able to respond in a way that helps you face and fight the enemy and see victory.

 Understand where the battle is coming from - is it internal - Do our thought patterns need adjusting? Are our emotions a runaway train? 

Is the source of our battle external? Pray into that situation and remember your battle is not against flesh and blood even though it might look like it.

(To be Continued. PART 3)

STRONGER-PART 1 | KNOW GOD IS FOR YOU

STRONGER PART 1 GOD IS FOR YOU

Has anyone had a smooth sailing life without a struggle? Has anyone lived a problem-free life where it has been a bed of roses, no conflict in relationships, always been in the pink of health and the sea of life is calm and placid? You might be chuckling at this and saying to yourself I’d like to meet that person! Me too!!  

Or like many others, maybe right now, you are facing a storm, you feel like you are drowning in and over your head with whatever situation that is encumbering you. You feel that dark tunnel does not seem to end and you have no strength to go on or no will for you have lost hope of it ever-changing. I have been there my friend and I’d like to urge you to hang on. Go through this series and I pray that you will find HOPE and Strength again.

 For me personally, 2017 was a very tumultuous year. There was relational strife and I just could not get my head around it. It felt weird. It was energy-sapping. It was paralyzing in many ways. I am not one to look for a devil under every chair or chaos that I encounter. However, I began to have a sneaky feeling there is more to this than meets the eye. I knew I had a choice to either give in or fight. Have the clouds blown away you might ask? Yes and no. We face different and new challenges every now and then. The point is not to get you to a place of being trouble-free but to be stronger than the struggles we face.

We need to know how to deal with the struggles and trials that we face, and in a biblical way. In the next few blogs, I will be sharing what I shared with a group of ladies at church. They found it very useful and so I thought, “why not blog it?” Here goes.

Firstly, you do not have to have it all together for God to use you. That is a lie from the pit of hell to stop you from being effective. God uses our weakness and turns them into opportunities to be a blessing and for His glory. He takes our failures and makes them a springboard for success. He takes our brokenness to bring wholeness and healing to many. He takes our trails and makes them trophies of His grace in our lives. He has done that for me over and over in my many years of knowing HIM.

What Satan planned for your destruction, to wreck your life, to derail you from God’s purpose and destiny for your life; God can take and make it a lasting testimony and evidence of His goodness that will never leave us but pursue us all the days of our life.

So how do we learn to be overcomers? How do we face these battles of life?

Fight, I did and with the best weaponry on the planet – the Word of God and trusting in His goodness.

I came across a book early this year by Havillah Cunnington titled “Stronger than the Struggle”. I strongly recommend you read it. Much of what I am blogging here is from that book. The blogs in this series are reflections and a summary of what I got from this fantastic book that I recommend you to buy.

 Do you know that God has a purpose for your life i.e not to drift from one day to the next, rather each day building upon the next toward something?

The enemy knows that you are a powerful weapon in the hands of a mighty God and He will try every trick in the book to trip you up.

 Remember that God and the Devil are NOT equally opposite powers. The devil is a created being. He is not as powerful as God. He is defeated. So remember you fight from a place of victory and not for victory.

In the next few blogs, we will examine some of the schemes the devil uses to try an defeat us and I will share with you how to gain some skill sets, to how to recognize where the attack is coming from and defuse these bombs he throws at you.

We are all called to fight the good fight of faith. This is not a few specialists. It is not just for the pastor to lay his hand on you and “ command” all your problems to disappear. No! Every Christian can and must learn how to fight because we do have an enemy that is waging a war against our souls and is trying to keep us from our destiny. And we are all equipped to fight. We are all more than conquerors in Christ Jesus. Therefore, we need to be alert for He prowls like a roaring lion looking for who he can destroy.

In this battle, one of the first things we need to come to terms with, without a doubt is that God is for us. God is 100% for you. His plans for you are always good. We need to trust that. Trust will be reflected in how well we YIELD to His sovereignty in our lives without doubting, getting anxious, getting back in the driver’s seat of our life. In this age of hyper-independence, we don’t like to yield to anyone or anything. Yielding or surrender requires complete trust, to give up the need to want to control everything and everyone. We have to trust that his intentions toward us are always good. God can manage your diary, timeline, relationships, finance, and a job far better than you.

Satan has always wanted us to doubt the goodness of God. This is an old trick. It is oldest in fact.  We need to remind ourselves of what God says to us in Jer 29:11. ¹¹ For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

Satan will take what God has said and make you doubt it or twist it as he did with Eve. Satan knows what heaven is like and what it is like to have a relationship with God. Remember he is a fallen angel. He once lived in the presence of God until pride got the better of him. He wanted the glory that belonged to God alone. This caused his downfall, and being cast out of God’s presence forever. Now he does not want you to enjoy that either.

So what is the source of our struggles? We need to be clear what we are battling, and who is our enemy. As the saying goes, is it the world, the flesh or the devil? If you battle against the wrong enemy, you will never win!  “You must understand your enemy for you cannot defeat what you do not understand”~ T.D Jakes.

For now, reflect on the goodness of God and what that really means? As I pause to ask myself, ask yourself do you truly believe that God is eternally GOOD and always for you. That He will work it all out for your good. HE will take you through this struggle and you will come out stronger and victorious. (To be continued. Part 2 The Source of the struggle)

God Stories – A Test of Admission 2!

A test of admission - Part 2

PART 2
Over the past few weeks I have felt prompted to write stories from my history and walk with God. I don’t think I need to pen them in chronological order but  rather as I feel led to write. These are my stories of challenges, steps and leaps of faith. I hope you are blessed and encouraged to trust this eternal, faithful  God, Jesus. Here goes....

A few years after Andrew’s schooling years began, we felt called to move to Pune to pastor and nurture the beginnings of a new church plant. We were confident and excited about our move. We knew that God had called us here, we started all the preparations to move 180 km away from Mumbai, family, familiar surroundings, and a great home church. Part of the preparation was looking out for schools in this new city. Trips back and forth between cities began, now with a new addition to our family- Jessica.

It was in the hot month of March that we came to Pune on our first trip as a family: Andrew 6 years old and Jessica 3 months old. We took the train journey in the blistering heat. Pune was a city I was familiar with as many  a childhood holiday was spent at my aunt’s place in the cantonment of Khadki.But nothing prepared me for the transformation this sleepy little city had morphed into. There was rapid development taking place with frantic building activity everywhere. There were huge suburbs being added to the city expanding its boundaries everyday into areas one had never seen before.

This trip to Pune was to do with Andrew’s Entrance Test to a school we had no doubt he would get into, as his average performance was over 95%.  Having done the test and met with the people of this fledgling church we returned to Mumbai buoyant and full of faith.

A few days later we were only expecting to hear good news. But when the list was put up Andrew’s name did not feature there. We were shocked and confused.  It defied all logic! There had to be a mistake! We tried in vain to get some information to no avail. Being a Christian School we thought it would be a cake walk on so many counts. But the door seemed tightly shut.

From the last experience I learnt that God is a gracious provider and it is not wise to pry open a door He has shut. I wondered where and how a new door would open. Anxious thoughts would try and get me but I would remind myself of God’s goodness to me in the past. I was also beginning to realize that church planting is not for the faint hearted – there is an enemy who does not like what were are about and wants to make it as difficult for us in every possible way.

 Divine corridor conversations:That evening had taken Andrew to his school grounds ( near our home in Bandra, Mumbai) to play  (it was a daily routine). I was chatting with one of the mums as Jessica dozzed in her stroller. She asked me how the move to Pune was coming along and I mentioned this hurdle of school admissions.  When I mentioned the name of the school she looked at me perplexed and asked  me why I had not considered the sister school of the one Andrew was presently in. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that there was a sister school and lost no time in making inquiries.

We applied for admission; Andrew appeared for the entrance test and secured a seat in a very fine school run by the Jesuits, the masters in education. We were over awed and over joyed at God’s leading, guiding and nudging us on the path he has chosen for us. Once again this school cost us a fraction of what it would have been had we secured admission in the first.  I could truly say again that “ ⁵ LORD, you alone are my portion and my cup;  you make my lot secure.⁶ The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; surely I have a delightful inheritance.”Psalm 16:5-6.


However our testing on this score doesn't end here. We meet like old acquaintances once again many years later. Read about it in the next blog!

Navaz D cruz

Feb 2012-02-16

God Stories 1 – A Test of Admission!

Over the past few weeks I have felt prompted to write stories from my history and walk with God. I don’t think I need to pen them in chronological order but  rather as I feel led to write. These are my stories of challenges, steps and leaps of faith. I hope you are blessed and encouraged to trust this eternal, faithful  God, Jesus. Here goes....

Colin and I got married in 1991 a few days before Christmas. We both had successful careers – I lecturing in College and Colin jet setting  around the world training people on proprietary software the Dutch company he worked for  wrote and developed. We enjoyed the “good life” living abroad and travelling to many countries. But this did not really feel like the “good life”. We both sensed God had a call on our lives.

So, in 1993 June we gave up our careers to do a 9 month intensive training with the church and thereafter  join the church staff in full time service. This took us spiralling down financially. What we used to tithe now became our monthly income!! But we were overjoyed to serve and give ourselves to something that would last forever – The Church. We learned to tighten our purse strings, budget, be generous, do hospitality all within that meagre amount. We learned to be content in plenty and in want. Every month we would see 5 loaves and 2 fish multiply in our hands.

Andrew's first day of Pre- School.

 Then in June of 1995 we were blessed with a beautiful baby boy – Andrew. We saw God’s sovereign provision where we lacked no good thing. Fast forwarding a few years – Andrew was 4+ and it was time to send him to pre- school. We had our eye on a fine pre- school that had a super reputation for good education. But to our horror we were confronted with fees that would be nearly 30% of our salary and we had to pay up 6 months fees in advance. I was very disappointed and even angry thinking to myself “Lord, I’ve given up everything for you and now this??” But I quickly repented of that sinful thought and surrendered to a sovereign God who knows what is best for us and our children.  I prayed for God’s miraculous provision if it was His will that we take admission into this school as we did not have that kind of money.

That evening a friend dropped in to visit and we got talking about schools and fees etc. He casually mentioned that they had just got their son into a preschool close to our home which was very good and much cheaper. But he warned us that admissions are over and that people usually queue up at 5 in the morning to get an admission form for this place. “Great!!!” I thought, “Let’s give it a try, we have nothing to lose”.

Fancy Dress
Robin Hood!

The gang at Kids R Us with
teacher Rosemary.

Later that evening another friend along with his wife dropped by to chat and before leaving put an envelope in our hands!!Now this does not usually happen to us (people putting money in our hands). The amount was generous but nowhere near what we needed. I was still seeking God’s guidance and leading. Later that evening, I called the other preschool recommended by our friend  and introduced myself. We realized that the teacher and I had common friends etc. I then broached the subject of admissions to her preschool. She paused and said, “You are very lucky, I have just one seat left because one child has just dropped out of school!” I knew it was not luck. I was beginning to sense  God’s divine orchestration. I then tentatively broached the subject of fees. She gave me the break up of the Admission fees, the first month’s fees and activity fees all of which was a fraction of the cost of the other school. There were no advance fees to be paid but only on a monthly basis. I was also required to buy a couple of book, a Tiffin box and Water Bottle. When I did the calculation for all this it all fit in exactly in the amount that was in the envelope our dear friends earlier that evening had placed in our hands.

I was awe struck at God’s sovereign leading and gracious provision.  Both Colin and I marvelled at His divine guidance which has always been with us. I had asked for divine provision for the school fees and God was not slow to answer, just not in the way I was asking!! Andrew went to a wonderful pre -school and enjoyed his first year of formal education under the very skillful tutelage of a wonderful teacher whom he went to meet (as a 6 foot tall young man) on completing his schooling years.

You would have thought we had learned our lesson.  Well three years later we found ourselves at similar cross roads. What happened and how that story ends  needs to be told in the next Blog post!

Navaz D Cruz

Feb 2012