Run To The Battle

For You have girded me with strength for battle;
You have subdued under me those who rose up against me.
Psalm 18:39 NASB

"I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.”
Matthew 16:18 NASB


Why do people who say they have received Jesus and have been delivered from their old lives, suddenly fall back into their old ways of thinking? Personally, I believe they grew tired of fighting. Make no mistake, the battleground for every person who will ever exist is the mind.

The enemy knows this and uses it against us…our thought-life. Reality is this: we never stop thinking or never stop the conversation in our mind. What we think reveals who we are and makes the difference between failure and victory…between life and death.

Every feeling we have is attached to a thought we think. It stands to reason that if we change the way we think we can change the way we feel. If I think myself a failure when I fall and choose to not get back up, then I am a failure…but if I decided to keep getting back up and seeing myself as a victor, then I can fall a hundred times and still rise as victorious over each failure. I just need to remind myself that I am at war with the liar…and that I have been granted the weaponry and arsenal necessary for victory in this life…and it all begins with renewing my mind!

For as he thinks within himself, so he is. Proverbs 23:7a NASB

To hear the song RUN TO THE BATTLE, listen to The Dennis Jernigan Podcast at http://podcast.dennisjernigan.com/e/run-to-the-battle-1546371984/

I pondered all the reasons I have never even entertained giving up the fight for freedom. A huge reason is because I have chosen to believe God’s Word over my own feelings…and have learned how to trace feelings back to the thought that brought those feelings about…and then made the choice to renounce such stinkin’ thinkin’ and replace the stinkin’ thinkin’ with God’s Word. I believe He surrounds me with songs of deliverance - and songs of warfare begin to pour out of my soul.

You are my hiding place; You preserve me from trouble; You surround me with songs of deliverance. Selah. Psalm 32:7 NASB

I also have some great examples of what to do when the enemy is at war with my mind. Rather than cower in fear, I choose to run TOWARD the battle rather than to run in the opposite direction. Did David run away from Goliath or did he run out to face him? Did Jesus run away from the cross or did He go willingly to face it? They ran toward the giant and the cross!

That is what we must do with things that cause us fear. We must run toward them with the Truth rather than run away from them allowing the fear to dictate our lives! In my current health crisis, I choose to run toward the diagnosis with God’s Truth rather than to run from it, using this weapon of my warfare - the Word of God:

As for you, you meant evil against me, [but] God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive. Genesis 50:20 NASB

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to [His] purpose. Romans 8:28 NASB

I can face the giants and the crosses I must bear in this life knowing God loves ma and that He wastes nothing…that what the enemy means for evil, God will use for my good and His glory!

Knowing Jesus is worth any and all struggles I have had to face thus far…and are worth any I will need to fight in the future. Such knowledge keeps the grace of God alive and well deep in my soul. Just as in my marriage when I say ‘divorce is not an option’, I also say similarly in my fight for freedom, ‘surrender to the old life is not an option.’

I think many lose the battle simply because they grow tired of fighting. What I have learned in the past 37 years is this: I do not wait for the battle to come to me. I run to the battle and storm the gates of hell…because I am guaranteed the victory!

Let’s think about this one more time: Did David wait for Goliath to come to him or did he run to face the giant head-on? He faced Him head-on!

When faced with the laying down of life on the cross of redemption, did Jesus wait for that cross to come to Him to did He run to the cross? What if Jesus had cowered in fear and not gone on to face the cross on our behalf? We - far too often - allow fear to take away victory that lies just in front of us as we face the giants in our own lives?

When did I overcome my old identity? When I faced it with then truth of who God says I am!

When did I overcome always thinking of myself as a victim rather than a victor? When I faced the selfish giant of victimization head-on with the truth of the victory sealed for me with the resurrection power and redeeming love of Jesus Christ!

Believers, let us stop cowering at and having our livers dictated by fear today. Here and now! Let us run to the battles we face and meet them head-on! Truth wins! How do I know this? Because we are loved!

37 But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:37-39 NASB

…and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. John 8:32 NASB

We never get to the truth if we never take the first step truth requires and that is our own honest confession. Honesty is facing the giants in our lives. Put them down by facing them with the truth! You were born again to win! Be the victor God calls you to be!

Dennis Jernigan