LET'S GET READY TO RUMBLE!

I often hear of the analogy made between the Christian life and the practical waging of war...and rightly so. Battle and war imagery used in depicting spiritual warfare is not a foreign concept when it comes to the Bible. One of the most recent struggles highlighted in Christian media has been the concept of "Every Man's Battle"...the struggle and fight for sexual purity and integrity. Of course, this is a conflict that applies to women as well, and one which has been addressed in similar fashion. And sexuality is but one of the areas where battle lines are being drawn in the name of righteousness and the advancement of God's kingdom. Believers around the world are being taught and challenged to wage war against carnal and ungodly desires including greed, unforgiveness and pride. So...I got to thinking one day.

Looking at lust as an example...which I'll define as a harmful, idolatrous, deviant and obsessive distortion of the beautiful God-inspired pleasure and gift we call sex: The nature of war implies a willful, deliberate resistance against a detestable enemy...an enemy whose ideals and intentions I am in complete opposition to. War also implies an authentic, passionate devotion to the values and characteristics of the entity to which I've pledged my allegiance...be that a king, a country, or an ideology. If this be the case, what am I to do when the alleged enemy I face is not only one I fail to hate, but one I've learned to co-exist with and tolerate...even indulge? What do I do when the kingdom who's interests I'm meant to enforce fails to rouse the previously mentioned passion and commitment in my heart toward it? How do I effectively and perpetually declare and wage war on the enemy of lust or any other demonic vice? It's my belief that this war, and a war it is indeed, is first and foremost fought and won or lost in the deepest reaches of my heart.

It starts with a heartfelt cry to my heavenly Father to be blessed with the supernatural gift of loving what He loves, and hating what He hates. It begins with me being grieved by my own sin in the same way that my sins grieve the heart of my God...and as passion for the glory of His name begins to run through my veins like an unquenchable flame. It is upon this passion that virtues like self-control find their strength. It's to the degree that my own desires are conformed to the will and desires of God, that I can expect a sustainable, genuine victory over the onslaught of depravity launched against me. The greater my hunger for purity, the greater my dedication to the fight for it. (Proverbs 16:26) If my desire for obedience to God is complacent and apathetic at best, my chances of resisting the seductions of hell are about as good as a snowball's chance of surviving in it.