Paul taught us how to wrestle with the enemy and push back. But what happens when we are too discouraged to fight? There are many remedies for moments like this, including: prayer, praise, reading the word, or even exposing the lie we believe to the truth of the living Christ.
Karen, a friend of mine, was very discouraged. “I just can’t fight back this time,” she told me.
I asked her, “What do you believe about your troubles?”
“I believe I deserve my difficulties. I’m stupid. I’ve made some bad decisions in my past, and so now the enemy has the right to torment me. My failures are exactly what I deserve.”
I was shocked by Karen’s words. Wasn’t she a person Jesus loved? Hadn’t Jesus already shed his blood for her, for the forgiveness of sin? Hadn’t she received that forgiveness as she committed her life to Jesus?
I told her, “You’re believing a lie. You don’t have to live in defeat and failure, you can live in victory. You have the power to cancel these lies and put them under the blood of Jesus. Would you like to do that?”
“Yes, I really would.”
Karen and I prayed, “Lord, expose these lies to Your Word, to your truth. We declare that because You have covered Karen in the righteousness and blood of Jesus, that the enemy does not have the right to torment her.” We also prayed that God would take her failures and turn them into victory, not because she deserved it, but because she was appealing to God through Christ her Redeemer. She is in His love and the love of Christ can never be lost, stolen or destroyed.
At the end of the prayer, Karen said, “I feel the lies I believed have been broken. I now feel that God can and will answer my prayers. I finally realize that I’m not praying in my own righteousness, I am praying in the righteousness of Christ.”
Amen to that! Let’s pray together:
Dear Lord,
Help me to realize that you see me through the lens of the righteousness of Jesus, not my own filthy rags. Help me to believe that You love me and want good things for me. Teach me how to live and to walk by faith, defeating the attacks of the enemy that come against me. Help me to believe Your word, that You love with an everlasting love. Your love for me is mine, now and forever. No one or no thing can ever take it away.
To further protect myself, I put on the full armor of God; the salvation of Christ, the righteousness of Christ, the truth of Christ, the peace of Christ, the Spirit of Christ and the Word of Christ, and I continue to pray to you Lord, in, with and through Christ.
In Jesus’ name,
ARTICLE APPEARED IN LEADING HEARTS MAGAZINE JUNE 2018 ISSUE. VISIT LEADINGHEARTS.COM TO READ THIS ARTICLE AND MORE.