The unlikely path to victory

Good Morning!

I had no sooner finished writing my post when I came across a sermon. I listened to it as I got ready. I continued on my way to work. It turned out that the military boarding school I work at one day a week had no kids for me to see but the sergeant forgot to tell me. So I turned around to drive back home (about 1.5 hour total drive time that at first could have been a bummer but turned out to be good soul time !)

When I got home, I decided to take notes on the sermon because it impacted me in so many ways. You know that I’ve been studying about the brain, and from Romans with my mom and friend, and personally with Breaking Free by Beth Moore, right? Well, they ALL came together in this sermon……so much so, that my original plan to do yoga with prayer will most definitely incorporate what I learned so far on walking in victory. I have thoughts to lead a group of us (whoever that might be!) in a Renewing the Mind exercise that we will become so familiar with that we will automatically revert to that behavior over the one that we tend to cling to!

What if every time trouble or temptation comes our way, it is a reminder to thank God? How could this be? Think about it…….if Satan knows every time he knocks on your door, he’s going to get a less than Christ-like response, what do you think he’s going to do? Duh!!!! He’s gonna keep on a-knockin!!!!

SO, what if we decided to answer the door the next time with a thankful attitude and words from our lips that thank God that we have already been made righteous, that we already have victory, that He already won? What if our brains become so accustomed to praising God every time Satan knocks? I think eventually we won’t hear that same door knocking anymore! What if a different door gets knocked on then? Well, how about if we decide ahead of time, that we will answer that door with praise?! Are you catching my drift?

Is this even possible, you might ask? It is. People will try to say “my situation is different” or “it’s harder for me because of xyz” or “it is just my nature to be this way”……ummmmm NO IT IS NOT!

If you are a Christian then you already died to the old nature. You are clean and blameless and righteous in the eyes of God. You MUST stand on that or you will never get free. If you choose to blame things on your nature then you are lying to yourself out rightly. Your nature after choosing Jesus as your payment for sin is holy and righteous, not worried and angry and bitter and resentful and full of passions of the flesh. NO! Your nature is holy because of Jesus giving you new DNA. Your Father God is your Father and He is holy. His Spirit lives in you and He cannot dwell where there is sin. Therefore, you are in right standing with God.

Why don’t I feel it then? Remember that dangerous word—FEEL!! Emotion and feelings fly around haphazardly depending on circumstances unless we are grounded in the truth of what God sent His Son to save us from—our feelings and our sins and our past! We must learn to refresh and reframe our thinking. This doesn’t just happen. It comes from our choice to answer the door with a different attitude this time and every time after that. It comes from us choosing our thinking so that we create new neuropathways in our brains that become so worn that it becomes our default!

This is what victory and freedom is. This is how we will change and grow into what God has already given us!

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! 2 Corinthians 5:17

Hallelejuah! We are free indeed!

Jennie

P.S. If you want to be involved in any way with this On Fire Freedom program as I’m developing it (in God’s time!) please let me know! I’m planning to do a practice that will help develop those neuropathways and teach us how to live out the freedom He already gave us!