Fighting with Yourself

I have had so many people tell me how they have little to no desire for God's Word. Many are burdened by guilt. A common piece of advice many recieve is, "pray and ask God to give you the desire". A good thing to pray but working it out can be a highly subjective thing. Many tell me about how bad they feel when they don't feel the desire for God and His Word, even after praying. I have another solution: fight with yourself. That's right, duke it out with yourself. Not literally of course. Let me explain.

Life in Christ is a battle here on earth. We battle sin, the flesh and the devil. Our propensity is to set our minds on the things of man rather than the things of God. We are weak. In God's strength we are strong, able, adequate and sufficient because Christ is our adequacy, life and sufficiency. When we walk by the Spirit we do not carry out the desires of the flesh. But when we willfully choose our own way things go haywire. It can happen multiple times an hour. It is then we must allow objective truth and not subjective feelings to dictate. We must win the battle for the mind or we suffer defeat. See Matthew 16:21-23 for what happened to Peter. Taking every thought captive to obedience to Christ is the answer. And that takes disciplining ourselves for the purpose of godliness. Sometimes we need to literally fight with ourselves and the tendency to take the easy way out. Tell yourself the truth and do what you know is right, even if you don't feel like it.

What about you? Not feeling it? No desire for God's Word? That is real life for many. Our frozen hearts need the Spirit of God to defrost us by His Word.  We have this mistaken idea that we must have the emotional desire to make progress in Christ. I rebel against that notion. Facts must drive feelings. Fight with yourself if you must. Force feed yourself the Word of God until it breaks through your hardened, bitter, brittle soul. Keep setting the Word before you. There is power in it. God's Word will change you. Give it time. Transformation will come. 

Suggested reading: Psalm 19 and 119; 1 Thessalonians 2:13; 2 Timothy chapters 1-4; or just open the Book and read anything!

Jesus loves you!