Just a Thought "81"

Romans 8:14 - “as many as are led” is the Greek present tense, it is a tense of continual action. It is not something that takes place occasionally. It is not something that takes place at various times in our lives, or something that may have taken place at a time or two in the past.

God through his energizing power from on high is leading believers whether or not the ones being led choose to follow that leading. You see, the tendency of most believers is to wait for a major crisis to rear its ugly head and then they begin to seek out God leading through his energizing power from on high.

God leading through his energizing power from on high is comprehensive. It is there for all believers. It is not contingent upon our following. When things are running smoothly, we can pretty much handle things on our own, make our own decisions. We wait till crisis time, until we are frustrated or at the end of our proverbial rope and then we look for God leading through his energizing power from on high to fix things for us.

That is how Christianity so-called looks at it. That is how most of us look at it. We think about God leading through his energizing power from on high as if that leading was made available for us to access only at crisis time, but the fact is God leading through his energizing power from on high is constant. It is ever present and continually accessible. It is available to us every minute of every day of our lives. It is even available to us when there are no decisions to make.

Ephesians 6:10-14 (A) When we put on the armor of God we are really putting on Christ, and when we put on Christ, we take ourselves out of the realm of the flesh, where we are vulnerable to attack, it is not wise for us to live on Satan and his forces level. Since their primary weapon is the lie, our belt of truth is continually being attacked.

We are more vulnerable to Satan and his forces deception than to any of their other schemes, because when they tempt us or accuse us, we can recognize it, but when they deceive us, we do not always know it, that is their strategy, to keep us in the dark. If they can disable us in the area of truth, we become an easy target for their other attacks.

We cannot expose their deception by human reasoning; we can only do it by the light of the truth, it is the only valid piece of the armor against the darkness of deception. It is critical that when we put on the armor of God, we start with the belt of truth. If Satan and his forces can deceive us into believing a lie, they can control our life in that area. God’s protection is that our role is not passive, God requires us to be active participants in the defense that he has provided for us.

Ephesians 6:10-14 (B) It is absolutely vital that we put on the breastplate of righteousness, so that we can resist the persistent accusations of Satan and his forces, they never give up trying to get us down and keep us down by hurling one false accusation after another. The insidious reality of Satan and his forces relentless assault of deception on our mind can keep us from experiencing maturity and freedom, because our past has shaped our present belief system and will determine our future unless it is dealt with.

Our understanding of the identity that Adam had before the fall, that identity has been restored to us, that restored identity is the critical foundation for our belief structure and our behavior patterns. Many people that are of the body of Christ have obsessive-compulsive behaviors because of this relentless battle for their minds, and the battle for our mind can only be won as we personally choose truth.

Those who put on the breastplate of righteousness know that we have peace with God, for a person to have to make their own peace with God would be nothing more than an exercise in futility, it could never be done. We could not make peace with God, to say that anyone could make peace with God, would be to limit God to his mercy, because grace is the foundation on which Paul’s entire ministry was built. There is a glory that belongs to God’s grace, and it is to be praised on the bases on what God’s grace has accomplished.