Written by Evi Idoghor
Lately, I have been battling a lot of anxiety and I really don't know what the real cause of this fear is. Maybe it is the fear of how my life is going to pan out -which career/purpose path would I follow once my service year is over, and things like that. When those anxious thoughts come around, then I just mumble one or two passages of scriptures that I remember from the Bible that deals with fear.
Passages like “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power love and of a sound mind” or “be anxious for nothing, but with prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God and the peace of God which passes all understanding will guard your heart and mind as you continue in Christ”. Although relief is felt for a short while before I know it, I begin to feel those nasty little thoughts creep into my mind again, and then I start feeling all the more anxious.
“For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but are mighty in God for the pulling down of strongholds and casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God.”
There is power in the word
You know when life is going "good" it is very easy to forget how you once depended on the word of God (if you are a Christian) in the hard times. Ah! I remember when I was faced with different challenges at different points in my life how the word of God was my anchor. I ate, slept and breathed the word of God—God was my only hope. The Bible says that the word of the Lord is sharper than a double-edged sword, so what we have available to us is not child’s play. I also recall the significant changes I saw in my life as a result of holding on to God's word steadfastly.
I experienced miracles that I believed only God could make happen for me. When you take God's word at face value, there is no telling what it can produce for you. But when you pay it no mind as a Christian, it doesn't work for you. It is not magic, you have to pick it up and digest it, and also confess it so power can be released to whatever situation you are faced with. Just like a sword lying next to you has no significance if you don't pick it up and use it, so shall the word of God be useless to you if you don’t work it.
In life, we are going to be faced with challenges—no one who has walked the face of this earth can boldly say that they haven’t suffered any kind of loss or haven’t been faced with some kind of challenge. It is life; we live in a fallen world. And if we do not know what is made available to us through the word of God, we would easily fall prey to the enemy.
The Bible says that the enemy goes about like a roaring lion, seeking who he may devour (1 Peter 5:8). So we have to be on guard at all times. Our weapon always has to be in our sheath, so when disaster hits, we can quickly take it out and use it to fight, rather than scrounging around the house looking for where we may have kept it.
“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of darkness of this age.” Paul (Ephesians 6)
Man is not your enemy; this world sometimes wants to make us believe that there is no devil. In fact, that is the enemy's strategy. He wants men to believe that he doesn't exist and these crazy groups of people called Christians are tripping over something that isn't real. So when your defenses are down, then he swoops in and attacks. As believers, we have to hold God's word dear to our hearts.
Our weapons of warfare are not carnal
If you don't read the Bible, you will be oblivious to the things that are available for us to war with. Just going to countless scriptures reveals that the Bible is full of what we need to get through this life. We are to fight with the word of God against those thoughts that weigh us down; the thoughts are not from God, they are from the enemy.
We possess authority as believers not to entertain them. We also should fight with the word of God against those circumstances that prove difficult and want to take us out; remembering that our situations are not unique. There is nothing that you would go through in this life that somebody else hasn’t passed through or isn’t experiencing at the same time as you (1 Peter 5:9). Another tactic of the enemy is that he wants to make you believe that you are the only one on the planet, dealing with what you are dealing with and that is a lie.
Share your struggles with other trusted believers and they will stand with you. We should also fight with the word of God for our families; we all come from homes, and no family is perfect. There are some Christians out there who are the first ones to be Christians in their families. You can imagine the opposition they face and the constant scrutiny or maybe it's a spouse who wants their partner to come to Christ or even their children, you can use God's word to fight for the family you dream of having.
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Lastly, fight with the word of God for the kind of society you want—Jeremiah 29 says that when you find yourself in a new environment, pray for that land's peace because in its peace, you will have peace. You have to use God's word (through prayer and action) to shape the kind of community, city, state, or country that you want to live in.
The message I am trying to drive here is that as Christians, as followers of Christ, we cannot be negligent towards God's word. Yes, prayer is good, yes, going to church every week is great, but if we don’t have His word ingrafted in us, then we would be taken out very easily. The word of God is our anchor, the word of God is our weapon, and the word of God is powerful.
Hope this is able to shed some light on the power and authority we possess as believers. What are your thoughts on this subject? how will you begin to apply God's word to your life? leave your comments below! thanks for reading, and do not forget to hit the subscribe button at the top.
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