A Nugget from New Life Network
Scripture for the Day (September 15, 2016)
Let my heart be sound in Thy statutes, that I not be ashamed. (Psalm 119:80)
One of the primary tools that the enemy uses against us is guilt and condemnation. The scripture tells us that Satan is the accuser of the brethren (Revelation 12:10). How does he do that? The primary way he does it is to constantly remind you and I of where we have fallen short. His goal is to beat you down and steal your closeness with God. He wants to convince you that you are not worthy, you have done too many bad things, and tell you that God is Holy and He will not have anything to do with an imperfect person like yourself. This is when you have to know that Satan is a liar so you can boldly take into captivity and cast down every thought and imagination that exalts itself above the knowledge of God.
I recently re-read the story of Saul (the Apostle Paul) in Acts 7-9. Saul was as mean as you get. His life’s purpose was to persecute Christians. He participated in the stoning of Stephen, a man full of the Holy Ghost. As they stoned Stephen to death they threw Stephen’s clothes at the feet of Saul (Acts 7:58). In Acts 8:3 it says that Saul, “shamefully treated and laid waste the church continuously [with cruelty and violence]; and entering house after house, he dragged out men and women and committed them to prison.”
Now, if you or I were the Lord we probably would not have anything to do with Saul. But the Lord looked at him and said, “for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles (that’s us), and kings, and the children of Israel:” Jesus appeared to Saul on the road to Damascus and Saul was never the same. Saul went on to be one the most influential and powerful Apostles who was responsible for two-thirds of the New Testament.
My question to you is this. Do you think Satan ever attacked Saul (Paul) with his past? You know he did! Paul was a perfect target to remind him of every rotten thing he ever did. I can just imagine the enemy re-running over and over again a mental video of Stephen’s stoning in Paul’s head.
Paul was no different than us. He was a man that had made serious mistakes in the past and was subject to making mistakes in the future. However, he learned how to fight the good fight of faith and he learned that his enemy was constantly trying to drag him down. More importantly, he learned that God was not going to leave him or forsake him (Hebrews 13:5). Listen to some of the truths that Paul understood and no doubt used himself. You can use these same scriptures to walk in freedom!
Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 3:12-14)
Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; (2 Corinthians 10:5)
There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. (Romans 8:1)
