Even If i Walk Alone

The Armor of God

November 21, 2016 by Tim Sherfy

What does the armor of God look like in your life? Ephesians 6:10-18 is a familiar passage of Scripture detailing the armor of God. Like many familiar passages, it can be easy to overlook and never take the time to apply it to your own life. Paul gave us a great gift when he outlined the weapons of our warfare. Though I have distant memories of a flannel-graph (remember those?) soldier in Sunday School, there is nothing childish about the depth of this passage.

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Within these words are the strategic plans to counteract the attacks of the devil. To best make use of the armor and weapons, we should know what they look like in our own lives.

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Triggers

November 17, 2016 by Tim Sherfy

We all have triggers that prompt sinful behaviors. If we learn to recognize the triggers, we will begin to overcome the most problematic sins in our lives. Satan does two things really well. He lies, and he manipulates. When it comes to his attacks on us, all of them can be traced back to one of those two strategies.

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Either he’s trying to get you to believe something untrue, or he’ll try and get you to do something against the will of God. Understanding the simplicity of the enemy’s attacks should help us formulate strategies to resist him. But unless we recognize the triggers in our own lives, we will struggle defeating the schemes of the devil.

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Why We Sin

November 14, 2016 by Tim Sherfy

Devoted followers of Christ hate when they sin. It’s maddening. We don’t understand why we continue to do things we know are not honoring to God (Romans 7:15). If you’re like me, you may have often pondered why we sin in the first place. It seems logical our love and devotion to God would keep us close to Him and far away from sin. It would be that simple if we did not have an enemy who was constantly seeking to trip us up and eventually destroy us (1 Peter 5:8).

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While we can’t blame Satan for our failures, we can blame him for planting the seeds of those failures. Ultimately though, the reason why we sin is because we choose to take our eyes off Jesus.

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Your Identity and Mission

November 10, 2016 by Tim Sherfy

For devoted followers of Christ, two things never change regardless of any circumstance. They are your identity and mission. Your identity is who God says you are and is dependent on no one or anything else. Your mission was set by Jesus before He returned to be with His Father; we are to tell everyone about His love and character, and to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to reality on earth (Matthew 28:18-20; Matthew 6:10).

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Human tendency is to focus on what is going on around us, what is affecting our comfort and our plans, and allow those things to define who we are and what we do with our lives. And thus we fall into another of Satan’s insidious traps.

Heaven is Closer Than You Think

November 7, 2016 by Tim Sherfy

In “It’s Not What You Think”, Jefferson Bethke writes, “Life isn’t about going to Heaven when you die, it’s about making Heaven true on earth in every facet and level of our relationship with God, others, and self. The Christian life is asking, how can I make what’s true of Jesus and His gospel true in [every] aspect of my life?”

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It’s a question that perfectly sums up what it means to be a disciple of Jesus. As you go throughout your day, how can you reflect the gospel of Jesus in everything you do and say? Most of us never take the time to ask the question or consider how the answer to it might dramatically change our lives.