Taking Every Thought Captive

Well, I hesitate about this post from Ransomed Hearts because of two reasons.

1)     First, it seems like it is geared toward women only. But, in reality any child of Christ males or females experience spiritual warfare.

2)     The second reason I hesitate is because while the author did not say it, but this idea of struggling through spiritual warfare with Satan because he is trying so hard to create doubt in our mind about Christ, purchasing you and I through His blood, works to a certain extend.

Satan can play this kind of game with us when we are babe in the faith because we do not know who we are in Him, quite yet.

If you have passed the stage of being a babe in the faith, because you have been a Christian for a while now, yet Satan can still make you doubt your Sonship and the price that was paid for you and me, then this means you need to get on your knees and find out what has been happening with you in terms of your salvation. The only proof that you have been sealed as a born again Christian is that the Holy Spirit is working in your life. It is His job to witness to your soul that you are a child of God. So if this has not been drilled down within to a place where Satan has lost the power to play this basic game with you, then you are failing somehow or the Holy Spirit is failing. Take your pick

When you are a true child of God and you are maturing in the faith no matter how bad and how big your sin is, like David when he was confronted about his sins of adultery and murder, he was able to fall down to his face and call upon his father for forgiveness. Why was it so easy for Him to do? Simply because he knew no matter how he messed up, God would not stop being his father. When we mess up with our human father, there are always consequences, but the love does not go away. If we as human being we can love in spite of the offenses and imperfections of our children, then what about God?

By the same token, I have people in my family, friends and acquaintances who claim to be Christians, they are involved in Church activities, mission, and leadership and so on, yet nothing about them seems to show they have been born again. Yet, they sound good because intellect, education and common sense are at work. They have this kind of twisted frame of mind where they put all their stocks and bet on God’s love to fix everything for them. Some of them actually believe the more you sin, the more grace abounds so they act as if God’s grace is a license to sin. Most of these people fall under this verse you find in Matthew 23:15 “"Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.” This is a very big accusation on Christ’s part and some people would tell us that this verse is for those under the law.

What some of us do not realize is that Satan has a very big ministry right inside the Church. There is nothing new under the sun. This ministry of his is to keep people from truly turning to God while they remain busy living some form of godliness. Satan is very well aware when we are selling this kind of diluted Salvation and he steps in big time with these “Christians.”  Sadly, we might not know where we are with God, but Satan knows it. So, with these kinds of Christians, he does not bother whispering to them that they have failed, rather, he does the reverse and keep them thinking they are alright with God while he helps them minimize sin and believe God’s word backwards.

I hope you can see the difference. Know that there is a balance in the Christian faith. It is found only in Him as we allow Him to live this life through us. 

HERE IS YOUR POST FROM RANSOMED HEART

In order for us to live in freedom and become the women we are to become, we need to receive God’s love even in our lowest places. Spiritual warfare is designed to separate you from the love of God. Its goal is to keep you from living in the freedom that Jesus has purchased for you. Satan whispers to us when we have failed or sinned or are feeling horrid that we are nothing and no one. He is a liar. And our fight for our freedom involves exposing him for who he is even when the lies feel completely true. The battle is waged and won in our thought life: in our minds and in our hearts.So what are you thinking? (Yeah, right now.) Descartes famously wrote, “I think, therefore I am.” I would add a fill-in-the-blank in each phrase. I think I am ______, therefore I am __________. I think I am kind, therefore I am kind. I think I am chosen, therefore I am chosen. I think I am becoming more loving, therefore I am becoming more loving. I think I am forever bound to sin, therefore I am forever bound to sin. What we think about ourselves, others, or a circumstance informs how we perceive it, which informs the way we experience it. Our thoughts play out in our lives."We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." (2 Cor. 10:5)What do you think about God? What do you think about yourself? Who are you? What do you think life is about? What do you think is true? Because what you think informs your reality and has a direct effect on how you live your life. What we focus on, we move toward. What we look at, esteem, molds us in its direction. What we think is true plays out in our moment-by-moment existence