Wednesday, July 25, 2012

It's Not Our Fight


Deuteronomy 20:4 (NIV) “For the Lord God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory.”

I was thirteen years old when my family moved from the big city to the rural area that I still reside in.  We bought a small farm and embarked upon a simpler way of life, however, everything wasn’t as calm as I expected.  It was March of my eighth grade year in school and my mother enrolled me in the Junior High in town with only two and a half months to complete the year.  I was greeted warmly on my first day by students and faculty, in fact, my first couple of weeks in my new school was bliss.  I was the ‘new girl’ and momentarily quite the popular one.  

About the third week, my blissful state became rudely disrupted.  One of the girls who had befriended me became upset that I was too friendly with someone else and challenged me to a fight during Gym class.  Now where I grew up, it was considered highly crude for girls to fight.  I had never even seen girls fight nor even knew a girl who had been in a fight.  I was in a state of shock at the concept of fighting when this girl hauled off and punched me in the arm.  She then backed up with her fists in front of her face, ready to go at it.  My mind raced as I looked for a way out of this dilemma.  I grabbed at the excuse that I would not fight in school and risk being in trouble.  This only rescued me for the moment because the girl informed me she would be waiting for me when school dismissed.  

The remainder of the day went by in a blur.  I was a Christian and I was praying, asking God to help me out of this fight.  When the final bell rang, I hurried to grab my things out of my locker, hoping that maybe I could get on the bus before the girl saw me, then I would be safe, until the next day anyway.  My strategy didn’t work, she was standing between me and my bus, waiting, with a group of girls who were anxious to watch us fight.  Oh my, “Lord, please just let me disappear!” I prayed.  I took a deep breath, ready to take my beating and praying that surely the bus driver or some adult somewhere would stop the action before I was injured too badly.  I walked up to her and said,  “I'm not going to fight”.  She lunged at me anyway swinging her fist.  As I dodged her swing one of the girls who had been watching stepped in front of her.  She was bigger and I later learned, much feared by the rest.  She got up in the girl's face and said, “The new girl said she wasn't going to fight, but I will.  If you want to go at it, then come on!”  Needless to say, there was no fight that day, nor any day that followed.  God heard my prayers, He was with me and gave me victory without me having to fight for it. 

Just as I faced a fight that day that I could not win, we face battles in life that are sent to destroy us, fights that are for life and death, spirit and soul.  Ephesians 6:18 (NLT)  “For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.”   God sent His Son, Jesus, in the New Testament who overcame sin and death.  He won victory over evil through the cross.  He is bigger and much feared by Satan and all his demons.  He steps between us and the enemy and says, “If you want to go at it, then come on!”   

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