It's Not Your Battle, Part 4

Yes, we're still talking about the immutable principles of waging battles of life - praise, promise and prayer. Last week, we started explaining the role of praise in overcoming the challenges of life. We said that genuine, whole-hearted praise must precede any interaction or relationship with God. Praise is the golden key to God's presence, favor, power and treasury.

Jesus Himself mastered this very well, and that was why He had a very rewarding relationship with God the Father, while He (Jesus) was on earth. He never did anything without first giving thanks to God. He never allowed the reality or the size of situations, persecution, sickness, emergency, storms to becloud his knowledge and confidence in God. He was always sure that God would not disappoint at any given time, so He was always relaxed and gave thanks. Or what do you say about Him sleeping in a boat tossed by that rampaging storm across the lake in Galilee?

Also, look at the same Jesus immortalizing this particular principle (praise), when He was teaching His disciple how to pray, "when ye pray, say, our father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name..." Luke 11: 2. This model is supposed to be eternal prototype of how we should approach our heavenly father. It's not just when we want to pray, but also in all or relationship with Him. His (God's) praise should come from the depth of our heart. It should be genuine and also define our commitment to Him always. Yes, May His name be honored!

Promises

I can't wait to rush into this all-important aspect of our relationship with God. But before we continue, I must confess that we are just scratching these principles, as it will take volumes of books to exhaustively treat some of them in details. Now, our relationship with God (even at the time of difficulties) will always be based on Him promises.

The promises of God are linked to His words ,purposes and covenant . These assurances from God are found in the scriptures. There is no situation one would face in this life that does not have a corresponding promise in the written word of God. This is the reason why any would-be victorious Christian must be bible-based. The word of God, containing the promises, covenants and assurances from God are the greatest weapons to defeat your enemies in the battle field. It sometimes comes inform of rhema (spoken word). This is specific divine direction coming for a particular situation. However, it comes, one thing is certain, the promises of God do not fail.

When we face challenges of life, let us be quick and wise enough to find out what God has told us about those situations. Once you find and appropriate the promises of God in your situation, you would definitely be leaving your enemies in a very weak position. Whether they are satanic oppositions, wicked conspiracy, sickness, threats, financial crises, childlessness etc. Find what the word of God is saying about them today, and begin to appropriate them in your life. I'm not talking about confessing them one or two days and after that no more. Find out what God is saying about you and stay permanently in it.

King Jeshoshaphat understand this, that was why he threw those promises back to God, "O our God, did you not drive out those who lived in this land when your people arrived? And did you not give this land forever to the descendants of your friend Abraham? Your people settled here and built this temple for you. They said, 'whenever we are faced with any calamity such as war, disease, or famine, we can come to stand in your presence before this temple where your name is honored. We can cry out to you to save us, and you will hear us and rescue us" 2 Chronicles 20: 7 - 9.

Jehoshaphat started by "reminding" God that what the enemy was contending for was what He (God) had established by a covenant. God promised Abraham; their ancestor, that He was going to give his descendants that particular land to dwell. All he did was to throw God's word (promises) back to Him.

God, through His word has given us everything that pertains to life and godliness. All we will need (divine weapons) to fight at the time of battle are embedded in the scriptures. What you need right now is to excavate and exploit the portion that rightly applies to your situation, and you have solution in your hands!