God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. I Cor 10:13
Greetings to everyone in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I am glad to resume the New Creation series this year. There are plenty of new revelations I want to cover. But, I was stuck in this series for so long, around 1.5 years. There are few more chapters I have to cover and then we will be done with New Creation. We have seen about the goal of the New Creation in Christ in the last two articles, that is bearing fruits for Christ and walking in the Spirit fulfilling God's will. Now, in this chapter we are going to see what are the problems and troubles we face in the new creation life. We have to remember that each new creature in Christ have a common enemy in satan and the world. Both will fight in every possible way to make the new creation go weary and side track from fulfilling the God given goals. The main goal of trials and temptations that come from the enemy is to make us tired, lose the faith and then go back to the older ways of living thereby rendering us ineffective. We may remember the words of Jesus to Peter the night before our Lord's crucifixion. "And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren." Luke 22:32. So, we understand that the main goal of satan is to disturb our faith in God.
To learn more about the trials and temptations, please read my earlier chapters, TTT and Overcoming Temptations that I wrote in July and August 2017. Now, let's focus on the ways that the devil attacks the new creation. Being aware of the different ways make us ready to fight and give us half victory even before the test starts. There are essentially four main ways the devil uses to pull us back to the older ways. The first one is temptation. Temptation is about pulling back to worldly pleasures by hitting at the weak points of our old man. We should be aware even the inner man is born again and became a new creation still we live inside the old body which is prone to our older weaknesses. The lust of eyes and lust of flesh play main role in temptation. You may read more about the temptation of Eve and temptation of Jesus in my earlier chapters. In this, the devil will remind us of our older sins, attempt to throw new temptations to pull us back. Remember temptations are not sin in itself but it will lead to sin and we have to resist and reject the temptation to avoid sins. The primary weapon to overcome temptation and lust is knowing the Word of God and applying correctly to the situation. Please refer to my article on overcoming lust that will help a lot to fight back lustful thoughts. The Holy Spirit help you to overcome the temptations through the Word of God which is the Sword of the Spirit. Ephesians 6:17
The second one is trials and troubles. Often the devil will be attempting to bring in lot of troubles in our family, work or profession or through any other external ways. If that doesn't work, he will try to affect our health or the health of our family members. Remeber how satan tested Job. If not, then he will bring some quarrels and unnecessary strife between our family members or friends and try to target our peace. Be aware that these things will happen for sure because it is written that, "Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" 2 Tim 3:12. If you are going through this, remember Jesus is with you and He will deliver you at the appropriate time as He delivered Paul. "Persecutions, afflictions, which came unto me at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra; what persecutions I endured: but out of them all the Lord delivered me." 2 Tim 3:11. The title verse shows that God will make a way to escape. But, pray fervently when you go through these situations that God will strengthen your faith. God will eventually deliver you from all troubles. These troubles are very much needed to bring us more glory. Remember a Goliath is needed for David so that he can eventually become a king. Same way, the worst troubles will help to exalt our faith and give us more eternal glory. 2 Cor 4:17. Peter also writes "That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:" I Peter 1:7
The third approach the devil takes is to make us feel tired, bored and worried when we wait for our Lord to prepare us. He will make situations such that we often get into troubles and temptations so that we grow weary and distract from God seeking our own ways instead of pursuing God's ways. Often we feel like there is nothing happening from God's side and even we think whether God hears our prayers, whether God supports us during our distress, whether He loves us any longer. It may look like God is turning His face away from us leaving us to fight the battle all alone. But, all these thoughts are complete lies from the devil through the situations so that we walk away from faith or return to our older ways of living. How do we stay focused through all these situations and thoughts? Faith comes to the rescue. The stronger faith will overcome situations like this. It will always go back to the Word of God and through prayer and faith fighting back the situation. The Christian life is all about fighting like a warrior, staying strong like a wrestler and run our race like an athlete. Eph 6:11, 2 Tim 2:3-5 and I Cor 9:26. So, with practice comes endurance. Practice with Word of God and going through the situations strengthens your faith. This is a real test of a matured Christian character. You have to remember the metamorphosis process where a worm go through difficult changes and emerges out as a beautiful butterfly.
If you have overcome the first three obstacles, it will be a great journey and now you are a real tool in the hands of our Lord. 2 Tim 2:20,21. The fourth and rare attack of the devil is to make you feel proud of your successes and make you stagnant feeling you had achieved greater things. The spiritual proud and fame will pull down us from greater heights. I am seeing great and wonderful pastors and ministers and young musical talents who were bestowed with anointing of God's talents taking a different path and enacting the worldly styles and falling for heroism and misdirected from their direction. We have to remember one thing that Paul said in Philippians 3:22,23 he is not thinking he had already attained the goals and forgetting the past and reaching forth unto coming things, pressing on goals until the life endures. We are yet to make it to heaven and that comes either with our death or transfiguration when the Lord appears. The eternal rest and glory comes thereafter. But, until then we should remember the race is still on. We need to be watchful on the attacks that we are going through in order to overcome them.
I believe these are certain ways to overcome various fiery darts fired at us from the wicked. Ephesians 6:16. There is one central mandatory truth we must remember in order to succeed. That this new creation is entirely started by God and we are not fighting alone. I just think this verse whenever I face any of the above difficulties and that verse is, "For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day." 2 Timothy 1:12. This assures me that our Lord is faithful to make our run successful and bring me to eternal glory. Its not me but it is He who called me and I am sure that He will fulfill His calling and that makes me to keep at rest. Same thing applies to you as well if you are serious about New Creation.
Dear believer, if you feel like you are going through lot of sufferings and pains in this world, be assured that you have double portion awaiting in the next world. But, fight the good battle of faith. Remember the one who is in us is greater than the one who is in the world. Final Victory is going to be ours. Our Lord fights the battle for us. One who called us for this new creation life is faithful and trust Him. He will be giving rest to you. May God's name be glorified. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. All glory, honor and praise, I give to you Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Greetings to everyone in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I am glad to resume the New Creation series this year. There are plenty of new revelations I want to cover. But, I was stuck in this series for so long, around 1.5 years. There are few more chapters I have to cover and then we will be done with New Creation. We have seen about the goal of the New Creation in Christ in the last two articles, that is bearing fruits for Christ and walking in the Spirit fulfilling God's will. Now, in this chapter we are going to see what are the problems and troubles we face in the new creation life. We have to remember that each new creature in Christ have a common enemy in satan and the world. Both will fight in every possible way to make the new creation go weary and side track from fulfilling the God given goals. The main goal of trials and temptations that come from the enemy is to make us tired, lose the faith and then go back to the older ways of living thereby rendering us ineffective. We may remember the words of Jesus to Peter the night before our Lord's crucifixion. "And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren." Luke 22:32. So, we understand that the main goal of satan is to disturb our faith in God.
To learn more about the trials and temptations, please read my earlier chapters, TTT and Overcoming Temptations that I wrote in July and August 2017. Now, let's focus on the ways that the devil attacks the new creation. Being aware of the different ways make us ready to fight and give us half victory even before the test starts. There are essentially four main ways the devil uses to pull us back to the older ways. The first one is temptation. Temptation is about pulling back to worldly pleasures by hitting at the weak points of our old man. We should be aware even the inner man is born again and became a new creation still we live inside the old body which is prone to our older weaknesses. The lust of eyes and lust of flesh play main role in temptation. You may read more about the temptation of Eve and temptation of Jesus in my earlier chapters. In this, the devil will remind us of our older sins, attempt to throw new temptations to pull us back. Remember temptations are not sin in itself but it will lead to sin and we have to resist and reject the temptation to avoid sins. The primary weapon to overcome temptation and lust is knowing the Word of God and applying correctly to the situation. Please refer to my article on overcoming lust that will help a lot to fight back lustful thoughts. The Holy Spirit help you to overcome the temptations through the Word of God which is the Sword of the Spirit. Ephesians 6:17
The second one is trials and troubles. Often the devil will be attempting to bring in lot of troubles in our family, work or profession or through any other external ways. If that doesn't work, he will try to affect our health or the health of our family members. Remeber how satan tested Job. If not, then he will bring some quarrels and unnecessary strife between our family members or friends and try to target our peace. Be aware that these things will happen for sure because it is written that, "Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" 2 Tim 3:12. If you are going through this, remember Jesus is with you and He will deliver you at the appropriate time as He delivered Paul. "Persecutions, afflictions, which came unto me at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra; what persecutions I endured: but out of them all the Lord delivered me." 2 Tim 3:11. The title verse shows that God will make a way to escape. But, pray fervently when you go through these situations that God will strengthen your faith. God will eventually deliver you from all troubles. These troubles are very much needed to bring us more glory. Remember a Goliath is needed for David so that he can eventually become a king. Same way, the worst troubles will help to exalt our faith and give us more eternal glory. 2 Cor 4:17. Peter also writes "That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:" I Peter 1:7
The third approach the devil takes is to make us feel tired, bored and worried when we wait for our Lord to prepare us. He will make situations such that we often get into troubles and temptations so that we grow weary and distract from God seeking our own ways instead of pursuing God's ways. Often we feel like there is nothing happening from God's side and even we think whether God hears our prayers, whether God supports us during our distress, whether He loves us any longer. It may look like God is turning His face away from us leaving us to fight the battle all alone. But, all these thoughts are complete lies from the devil through the situations so that we walk away from faith or return to our older ways of living. How do we stay focused through all these situations and thoughts? Faith comes to the rescue. The stronger faith will overcome situations like this. It will always go back to the Word of God and through prayer and faith fighting back the situation. The Christian life is all about fighting like a warrior, staying strong like a wrestler and run our race like an athlete. Eph 6:11, 2 Tim 2:3-5 and I Cor 9:26. So, with practice comes endurance. Practice with Word of God and going through the situations strengthens your faith. This is a real test of a matured Christian character. You have to remember the metamorphosis process where a worm go through difficult changes and emerges out as a beautiful butterfly.
If you have overcome the first three obstacles, it will be a great journey and now you are a real tool in the hands of our Lord. 2 Tim 2:20,21. The fourth and rare attack of the devil is to make you feel proud of your successes and make you stagnant feeling you had achieved greater things. The spiritual proud and fame will pull down us from greater heights. I am seeing great and wonderful pastors and ministers and young musical talents who were bestowed with anointing of God's talents taking a different path and enacting the worldly styles and falling for heroism and misdirected from their direction. We have to remember one thing that Paul said in Philippians 3:22,23 he is not thinking he had already attained the goals and forgetting the past and reaching forth unto coming things, pressing on goals until the life endures. We are yet to make it to heaven and that comes either with our death or transfiguration when the Lord appears. The eternal rest and glory comes thereafter. But, until then we should remember the race is still on. We need to be watchful on the attacks that we are going through in order to overcome them.
I believe these are certain ways to overcome various fiery darts fired at us from the wicked. Ephesians 6:16. There is one central mandatory truth we must remember in order to succeed. That this new creation is entirely started by God and we are not fighting alone. I just think this verse whenever I face any of the above difficulties and that verse is, "For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day." 2 Timothy 1:12. This assures me that our Lord is faithful to make our run successful and bring me to eternal glory. Its not me but it is He who called me and I am sure that He will fulfill His calling and that makes me to keep at rest. Same thing applies to you as well if you are serious about New Creation.
Dear believer, if you feel like you are going through lot of sufferings and pains in this world, be assured that you have double portion awaiting in the next world. But, fight the good battle of faith. Remember the one who is in us is greater than the one who is in the world. Final Victory is going to be ours. Our Lord fights the battle for us. One who called us for this new creation life is faithful and trust Him. He will be giving rest to you. May God's name be glorified. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. All glory, honor and praise, I give to you Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
