Friday, January 15, 2016
In addition to all of these, hold up the shield of faith to stop the
fiery arrows of the devil. Ephesians 6:16
(NLT)
There is a lot of teaching
around about what constitutes genuine faith.
And, if Paul’s analogy of a shield
holds up, that’s the way it should be.
We all have faith. You and I are
exercising a form of faith right now. We
are sitting or standing, perhaps reclining in our chairs or at a desk
somewhere; we believe they will
support us. The point is never whether we will use faith – it is generally to
what or whom we will direct
that faith.
A man bought a new hunting
dog. Eager to see how he would perform,
he took him out to track a bear. No
sooner had they gotten into the woods than the dog picked up the trail. Suddenly he stopped, sniffed the ground, and
headed in a new direction. He had caught
the scent of a deer that had crossed
the bear's path. A few moments later he
halted again, this time smelling a rabbit
that had crossed the path of the deer.
And so, on and on it went until finally the breathless hunter caught up
with his dog, only to find him barking triumphantly down the hole of a field mouse.[1]
Sometimes we as Christians
are like that. We start out with high
resolve, keeping Christ first in our lives.
But soon our attention is diverted to things of lesser importance. One pursuit leads to another until we've
strayed far from our original purpose.
At times it is a lack of
faith in God’s Word.
In his book Rebuilding
Your Broken World, Gordon MacDonald shared an event from
his life which illustrates just how far resisting faith will take you:
A few years
ago – a friend asked a strange question. If Satan were to blow you out of the water,
how do you think he would do it? I'm not
sure I know, I answered, but I know there's one way he wouldn't get me – He'd
never get me in the area of my personal relationships. That's one place where I have no doubt that
I'm as strong as you can get.
A few years
after that conversation – a chain of seemingly innocent choices became
destructive, and it was my fault. Choice
by choice by choice, each easier to make, each becoming gradually darker. And then my world broke – in the very area I
had predicted I was safe. Oswald
Chambers comments on the tendency of men and women to lose major personal
battles not at the points of their weaknesses but, strangely enough, at the
points of their perceived strengths. He
wrote, The Bible characters never fell on their weak points but on their strong
ones; unguarded strength is double weakness.
Funny! During my earlier years I'd thought we were
most vulnerable at our weakest points – until I realized from personal
experience that where we perceive ourselves to be the strongest is where we're
least likely to be prepared for a battle that isn't psychological or
emotional. It's spiritual![2]
How do you appropriate the
shield of faith? Ask God – and then act
as if you believe He is listening.
When Alexander the great
sailed to conquer Persia, his ships landed at night. As the troops gathered on the cliffs
overlooking the harbor they were amazed to look back and see the torrid blaze
of the entire fleet. They learned that
Alexander himself had ordered the ships burned.
He wanted his men to know that the only direction was ahead.
Retreat was out of the
question.
For You Today
Satan will tell you there’s
a way out – a more conservative approach.
But not if you want a shield of faith that works!
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