CCC

When God begins to sanctify us and rid us of sin, it’s because he has a purpose and a plan. We are set apart. When we experience this kind of life change and transformation in Jesus, we have to recognize that there are going to be spiritual battles and storms in our lives that will require us to strengthen ourselves.

We are called to be strong in the Lord and put on the armor of God. Salvation is not something that we have to put on every day, but rather, we are called to put on the helmet of our savior so that we can fight the good fight of faith. God has given us everything that we need so that we can live a victorious and overcoming life.

The Apostle Paul in Ephesians 6 tells us to put on the whole armor of God. Paul encourages us to go against the dark forces that are unseen so that we can stand in the day of evil. There is a battle between the forces of good and evil, but we have tools and weapons like the Belt of Truth and the Breastplate of Righteousness to help us in the fight.

In Luke 14, Jesus is sitting at a table with all kinds of people. Jesus loved gathering. He loved a good party. In this passage, he tells the parable of the Great Banquet.

Many of us may feel like we’ve been in exile this year. We may have thought we’d be in a better place by October 2020, just like the children of Israel who felt discouraged in this scripture. Psalm 85 was likely written after the Israelites returned from exile back to Jerusalem after 70 years. They thought that they could return to a pre-exilic state, but there was no going back. Nothing was going to be normal. Similar to the Israelites, we too may be facing disappointment.

Ephesians 10:6 tells us to be strong in the Lord. That is our calling, yet it doesn’t just happen overnight. Spiritual strength needs to be developed just like physical strength. We are vulnerable as we face social unrest, political division, and a pandemic. Since we don’t gather as much as before, we can become spiritually weak. There is a real heaven and hell, and the forces of good and evil battle for our soul. We are part of God’s eternal plan, and Satan has already lost the battle. We are spiritually strengthened by the Lord. We are strong in his mighty power.

Our fight is not against each other; it is against the invisible world we cannot see. The greatest weapon we can have in this fight is the truth of God’s word. We can’t always trust what we see, we can’t always trust the conclusions that we draw from the facts, but God’s Word is always true. We must look beyond the fruit and down to the root. We have been armed with the truth. We are more than overcomers in Christ Jesus. If we want to be spiritually strong and experience victory in our relationships and our businesses, we must put on the belt of truth. Then we will see his goodness and power in our lives.

1. Can you recall times that you or others followed God by setting your feet, standard, and heart in the midst of a challenging season or circumstance? What happened when you or someone you know faced a hardship in this way?

2. Have you ever failed to set your feet, standard and heart in line with God when hard times hit? How did you recover?

3. What has this pandemic taught you about faithfulness in hardship?

4. What can you do to strengthen your mind and heart to follow God in “surthrival”?

Sometimes God allows situations that bring a shift to our circumstances, either through change or transformation. We shift when we change, exchange, move, transfer, or transform. It can be hard to make that shift when things are going well, and we are successful. Oftentimes, our mindset is: why change when things are going well?

2020 is a test in our lives and so we need wisdom and how to move through it. Last week we talked about the “Whose Voice” test, and how to gain wisdom and understanding in how to navigate whose voice is speaking. The next test is the “What’s Real?” test: using wise judgment to determine truth from lies, fact from fiction, and opinion from reality.