Will He Break You?

In Rocky IV, the champ goes up against Ivan Drago a Russian super soldier who killed Apollo Creed in the ring. As he is preparing to fight Rocky, he says, "I must break you." I was thinking about what I wanted to write about this morning, and this image appeared in my mind as I was mulling around some ideas. Check it out:

This got me to thinking about the enemy of Christians everywhere, the devil. Jesus defeated him with His death, burial and resurrection, yet for all of that he continues to try and conquer those of us who bear the image of Christ. The problem I've seen with most Christians is that they just let the devil win. It's like he says, "I must break you." and they respond by going, "Okay."

Jesus told us in Luke 10:19, "Look, I (Jesus) have given you authority over all the power of the enemy, and you can walk among snakes and scorpions and crush them. Nothing will injure you." Does that sound like the enemy has the authority over us, or we have the authority over him? I mean if this doesn't settle for us once and for all who is in charge, then I don't really know if there is hope for you.

This is not to say that the devil doesn't have power, he does. But he is missing the true element here, and that is the authority to use that power. You see he can throw all types of fiery darts at us, but we don't have to allow them to hurt us. We have the authority to either accept them, or deny them. I can hear you now, but bad things happen, we can't deny that bad things happen, our five senses tell us what's going on.

True, our five senses will try to tell us what is what. But there is a higher level of understanding than what our bodies tell us, that is the understanding of our faith. Faith trumps all senses. Because faith comes from the Word of God, look at Romans 10:17, "So faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ and what He has done for us." When faith comes, it supersedes whatever your body is telling you.

This is where the battle comes in for us. We have to believe what God's Word says is true, even when our senses say it isn't. That is called the fight of faith, it's the fight to believe what God has said is true even when everything and everyone around you says differently. Jesus Himself had to deal with this, why do we think we are any different? Check this passage found in Matthew 16:21 - 23:

21)"From then on Jesus began to tell His disciples plainly that it was necessary for Him to go to Jerusalem and that He would suffer many terrible things at the hands of the elders, the leading priests, and the teachers of religious law. He would be killed, but on the third day He would be raised from the dead.

22)But Peter took Him aside and began to reprimand Him for saying such things. "Heaven forbid, Lord." he said. "This will never happen to you!"

23)Jesus turned to Peter and said, "Get away from me, satan! You are a dangerous trap to me. You are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from God's."

Notice that it says that Jesus turned to Peter and said, "Satan!" Wait a minute, I thought Peter was His friend? Why then would Jesus be talking to satan? Because Peter had been just talking to Jesus about not fulfilling the call of God for His life. Peter was allowing his mental thoughts to be persuaded by the enemy of all mankind, and then talking to Jesus. And the devil is just not that clever folks, he still uses the mental realm to do his dirty work. Jesus wasn't calling Peter the devil, he was addressing the enemy where he was at, in the words of Peter.

What we say has power in our life, this is why we must, and I stress must watch what we think about. If we focus on what our five senses tell us and then bring that over into the realm of our Christian walk as the basis for what is really going on, then we will find ourselves in the same place that Peter was. Obviously we must allow our senses to give us information, but we don't have to accept that information as the truth, because God's Word is truth and it will overcome what our senses tell us, IF we will let it.

So don't let the enemy use your five senses to tell you what is what, when that happens, you turn it on him and tell him what God's Word says about that situation. It doesn't matter what area of struggle in life you may find yourself, God's Word has something to say about it all. Dig into the Bible and find it. I love how God has hidden things in the Bible for us, not from us. It's like digging for buried treasure, when you find it, man you are a blessed person for sure!

Strength and honor for the Kingdom and the King!