Things We Must Fight Against

1 Timothy 6:12 Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.

Many times we find ourselves fighting against things that we should leave alone and neglecting the things in which we should constantly be warring against as a disciple. Paul encourages Timothy in this direction by reminding him to fight the good fight of faith. Discipleship is indeed the most challenging pursuit that we will ever undertake in this life. It is also our blessed responsibility as children of the King of Kings! Are you focusing your attention towards this noble pursuit?

         What are some things that we must constantly fight against as disciples? This is by no means a comprehensive list, but here are a few areas where we must be actively engaged in spiritual warfare:

         One area is temptation. Paul would  later warn Timothy to flee youthful lusts (2 Timothy 2:22). There are numerous tools in Satan’s arsenal that he will employ to cause us to stumble. We must be vigilant and avoid the many temptations that confront us every day.

        We must also fight against fear. Proverbs 29:25 proclaims, “The fear of man bringeth a snare: but whoso putteth his trust in the Lord shall be safe.” We oftimes will allow peer pressure or popular opinion to dictate our decisions. The solution to this attitude is to trust in the Lord of Hosts and not fear what man may do to you. It is my experience that many of the things that we dedicate a large portion of our lives worrying about generally are not as bad as we anticipate or never even materialize!

       Finally, we also should fight against pride. Pride causes us to have an overinflated opinion of our qualities or abilities. When we are in this state of mind, we become critical and disrespectful to others. God’s glory is also relegated to an inferior position when we are prideful. The inevitable conclusion to this attitude is a fall (Proverbs 16:18; 18:12)! We fight against pride by humbling ourselves before God.

Proverbs 8:13 reinforces this truth. “The fear of the Lord is to hate evil: pride, and arrogancy, and the evil way, and the froward mouth, do I hate.”

      Lord help us to keep our priorities straight and not find ourselves fighting against the Lord and His people, but faithfully profess a good profession before others by faithfully fulfilling our obligations as soldiers of Christ.

Blessings,

Michael D. Green, Jr.

Fort Wayne Primitive Baptist Church