When our lives are scarred, healing comes when placed into hands scarred by love from hammered nails.

When the painful past darkens the path ahead, follow the wounded feet that bore the weight of sins that were not His own.

When our hearts are loaded from griefs of shame, trust the pierced heart from which flowed cleansing water and blood, drained by death to give new life.

Scars are not mere signs of a wounded past but stories to show we have been healed.

See Isaiah 51:3-19

Binding the Strongholds, pt. 2

     There is more to binding the strongholds than can be said in these two devotionals, but some steps yesterday and today are basic, crucial and foundational. You will never bind a stronghold of Satan if you do not recognize, read, resist and spiritually arm yourself for the battle (see part 1).

    What are spiritual weapons?

    1. First, Discern the battleground. Discernment in your spirit as to whether this is a test from God, a temptation from Satan, or a trial from everyday life. Temptations from the devil is a battlefield that needs utmost discernment. That is one of the reasons why Jesus asked legion what his name was, and then found out that it was a host of many demons. You may think your "demon" is alcohol, but it may have a root in a host of underlying issues.

    2. Solidify your foundation. As we have been looking at all this week, make sure you are not only hearing the word of God, but heeding it. Is there any area of your life that the floods are knocking you off of your foundation of obedience. True we are not saved by works, but we are saved to work (Eph. 2:10, Titus 3:5). The floods that come up in life can be devastating. The word floods used here is actually a word which can be translated as river or stream but is also used as dangerous torrents of rushing and rising rivers. We’ve seen torrential rivers here in Texas. Satan can issue out a powerfully raging river. But we Christians have weapons of fighting that flood of temptation.
     Paul said to not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good (Rom. 12:21). Live godly and it will have a mighty offense to the evil. The power of the blood of the Lamb and a good testimony of works and obedience is a lethal combination (Rev. 12:11). 

     3. Identify which weapons are needed. Look at 2 Corinthians 10 in context.
"For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. 4 For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, 5 casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, 6 and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.
      Now this is an entire sermon (more likely a seminar!) by itself but if you want to have a strong Christian home, you must first have a foundation of faithful obedience, but also have a firm foundation of fighting in the spirit and not in the flesh. Paul says our warfare is not carnal, not fleshly, not merely human, but it is mighty, dynatos, from the dunamis power word from which we get dynamite.
     Satan is going to flood you with Temptations, but the Holy Spirit is going to enable you to fight in the flesh but with supernatural dynatos weapons. Casting down ARGUMENTS or IMAGINATIONS or even LOGISTICS.
     In other words, when you fight in the flesh, with carnal earthly human weapons, it may make sense, but you are going to lose. BUT when you fight with supernatural mighty dynatos weapons in the spirit, it may not make sense but you are going to WIN.
     Every high thing that exalts itself. In other words, the enemy of temptation will look big, it exalts itself but when it stands up to the knowledge that intimate relationship and understand and familiarity of and with and for God, it will be puny in comparison.

 
     4.  Release the nuclear option of prayer and fasting (Ps. 35:13). When the disciples could not cast out the demon from the boy when Jesus was on the mountain of transfiguration, He said that they should have prayed and fasted (Matt. 17:21, Mark 9:29). Every weapon and defeat from the enemy should be confronted with prayer, but there are strongholds that especially need much prayer and fasting (1 Cor. 7:5). Daniel fasted and prayed and the spiritual warfare lasted for weeks (Daniel 9:3, 10:13). Jesus was gone for three days and the disciples should have know that when the Master was away, or when answers delay, the disciples should fast and pray (Matt. 9:15; Acts 13:3, 14:23; 2 Cor. 11:27). 

     5. Finally, don’t give up gained ground. Soldiers despise winning a battle, only to have it regained by the enemy, who will entrench themselves even deeper to keep out the previous victors. Jesus gave the illustration in Matt. 12:22-30 of binding the strongman’s house. Once the strongman was overtaken, he left for a while and came back with a stronger force, and finding the house empty and vacant, he overcame it.
       Have you gained a victory over a stronghold? Don’t be prideful and definitely don’t leave your house empty or the last stronghold will be worse than the first (Luke 11:26). Replace whatever stronghold with something even more powerful and occupy that vacancy. 1 Pet. 2:20 says, “While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage. For if, after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning.”
     If you are putting your faith in anything other than the spiritual weapons God gives, the enemy will only make a mockery of the things you are trusting in. “But when a stronger than he comes upon him and overcomes him, he takes from him all his armor in which he trusted, and divides his spoils.”

Bind the Strongholds, pt. 1

   For Christian Home week, it would be good to understand why there is a need to prioritize the home, or as James Dobson said it, to focus on the family. If you read Heb. 2:14, you will see that Satan was rendered powerless by the death of Christ on the cross. “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.”

    We are weak when the enemy attacks us because we oftentimes are unaware that we are at war, we are generally unaware of our weapons to be used and almost always unaware that we are already the victors of that war. At least that seems to be the way we act when we willfully allow sin into our lives, our marriages, our homes and our families.  When we willfully sin, we allow Satan a “free pass” into our Christian Home.

    If you have a stronghold of Satan in your life, how can you defeat it? You may not think you have a stronghold of Satan, but look at the following definition.

Stronghold  -- any area of your life over which you have not given Jesus full-control.

    What that means is that you may have an area in your life that is not sin, is not an addiction, is perfectly socially acceptable  but yet still is an area over which you have not given Jesus full and complete control. That is a stronghold.

     The devil knows where we are weak and wants a strong hold over you and me. If he cannot get it the form of a vice, he may attack you in the form of a virtue. Do you take pride in a certain area? Have you ever said, “I will never do ______________.” Are you willing to admit that there are areas of your life over which Jesus has anything less than full control?

      Satan begins his attack on us in our minds. Only God can read our minds but the enemy can definitely put thoughts in our minds. If there is an area which you find yourself having the need to justify it to others or yourself, it likely is a stronghold. If there is something that you have confessed a dozen, a hundred or a thousand times to God, yet are still committing it, it is a stronghold.

    How to defeat a stronghold.

1.       First admit and recognize you are not stronger than the stronghold without the aid of Christ. The surest way to defeat is to not recognize the problem. If you justify it and think “everyone struggles with this” or “no one is perfect” then you will never defeat it. Even if the “everyone’s” and “no one’s” argument makes sense, you are not everyone and no one. Even Michael the arch angel knew that he could not defeat the devil and said “the Lord rebuke you.” Do not fight on your own strength.

2.       Listen to, read, memorize and meditate on the Word of God (2 Tim 3:16-17). That is not a cop out answer. Jesus did it in His temptations (Matt. 4:4, 6, 10). God’s word says it is the only defensive and offensive weapon (Eph. 6:17). If you struggle with fear, pride, lust, anger, worry, low-self-esteem, greed, selfishness (I can keep going, you know), find verses on those topics.

3.       Submit to God and resist the devil (James 4:7). Sometimes we are defeated not because of Satan overpowering us, but simply because we are used to giving in. We fall because of WSS—weapons of self-destruction. A stronghold may not be of disobedience, but rather because of a failure to submit to God. Are you speaking words of others that are not edifying? That is an area of failing to submit, and gives the devil a stronghold, even in other areas unrelated. Submit to God in all areas, and the devil will flee, at least for a season.

4.       Battle with spiritual weapons, not fleshly (2 Cor. 10:3). Don’t resort to human solutions, look for spiritual, godly solutions. No self-help books or 12-step program will work without God. Not that there are things wrong with those things, but first and foremost look to God’s instructions (Ps. 20:7, Zech. 4:6, Rom. 13:12, 1 Cor. 2:5, Eph. 6, 1 Thes. 5:8, 1 Tim. 1:18).