Overcoming part 1 ~ recognizing the battle

Time to get real. Be genuine. Let it out.

I want to be known as an overcomer. One who finishes strong. Does the right thing to the end. Follows Jesus all the way. No holding back, no turning back, no waywardness...

Yet I struggle daily on what this means, as I battle the flesh, my laziness, my selfishness... me.

I'm reading Dwight L. Moody's"The Overcoming Life" and I wish I could finish it! If you have ever read it, it should take but one evening to finish, its so small. But the simple fact that within its pages lie chapters on what human flesh wrestles with day to day... my flesh! I rarely say the "if only" phrase, but I will say it here: If only I could live out what little I already know to be true! What a change my life would encounter!

Read the opening from Moody:

"I found out after serving Christ for a few months, that conversion was only like enlisting in the army, that there was a battle on hand, and that if I was to get a crown, I had to work for it and fight for it. Salvation is a gift, as free as the air we breathe. It is to be obtained, like any other gift, without money and without price; there are no other terms.... It is like this: when a man enters the army, he is a member of the army the moment he enlists; he is just as much a member as the man who has been in the army ten or twenty years. But enlisting is one thing and participating in a battle another. Young converts are like those just enlisted... The Christian life is a conflict and a warfare, and the quicker we find it out the better."

Wow. That is all I can say. Not sure about you, but I'm amazed at how good-old fashioned gospel-giving churches, in addition to today's trendy seeker-churches sort of leave this out. Would you have enlisted if you heard this off the bat???

I find it interesting that it was the battle of David & Goliath that first rocked my world as a mere 6 year old and helped me to understand that God was real and that I needed Him. It was a simple message of David, a little shepherd boy, who had more confidence in his God to help defeat this big, vicious, ferocious enemy. I would have called for my daddy!

But I realized then, as a simple child, that God must be bigger than even my own daddy! I realized this, because I saw how big the "giant" was, and there was obviously a difference in stature and strength! As much as I trusted in my daddy, as much as I believed he loved me and would do anything to help me or protect me, the enemy was still bigger. The enemy could still beat him up! But NOT SO with the Big Daddy! My logic was such that I knew that in order to win a battle, I needed God on my side! I needed to trust Him to win it for me, just like David did!

It will be 28 years this summer since I "enlisted" as a soldier of the Lord. Admittedly, I had no idea the spiritual depth of it all at the time, but somehow, I knew it was a battle. David was the one who taught that to me as a 6 year old.

Over these past 28 years, I see how the Lord has taken me through so much, and I want use Moody's book as a basis for allowing me to remember, or rather, not forget past battles... those won as much as those I have lost. My desire is to blog through the book, share those victories & defeats by being real & genuine.

Thank You, Jesus, for being my Foundation, my Captain, My Lord. You are the One Who fights for me, Who fights with me, You never give up, even in all my weakness & failure. You know my heart, You know it all. Help me to recognize the seriousness of the battles in front of me... with joyful abandonment!