Buckling The Belt Of Truthنموونە

THEME: Buckle up the belt of truth by believing you are ACCEPTED, SECURE, AND SIGNIFICANT.

According to Neil T. Anderson, nearly all Christians struggle to overcome Satan’s lies in at least one of these three areas:

1) I’m not accepted. No one wants me. God certainly couldn’t want someone like me.  Even though I confess sins, I never feel that I am fully forgiven.

2) I’m not secure. I am weak. The evil one is stronger than I am.

3) I’m not significant. I can’t live up to anyone’s expectations. I am worthless and stupid.

Beware! Satan’s evil spirits often introduce thoughts into our minds which they pass off as our own thoughts. In other words, they don’t tell you, “You’re worthless.” Instead they pass of the suggestion as if it came from your own mind, saying, “I’m worthless.” This is made worse because harassing spirits know what your weaknesses are. Ask God to show you the source of your negative thoughts.

Recall what we read on Day 3 about the Holy Spirit. If you have accepted Christ as your Savior and Lord, the Holy Spirit is working in your life. He is the sign that you are in union, or have been joined as one with Christ. Therefore, you are ACCEPTED by God! Not just accepted as slaves, but observe how Romans even calls us God’s ‘sons’. Even though some translations use ‘children’ here to be gender sensitive, I think it is good for women to also consider that they become— spiritually speaking, ‘sons’. (Men have a similar difficulty in accepting that they are part of the ‘bride of Christ’.) The precious thing here is that these verses say that we ALL are given the legal status of ‘sonship’. This legal adoption means that our position is SECURE!

The above things should show us that we are SIGNIFICANT in God’s eyes! But there are more treasures for us in this chapter. This chapter assures us that we are objects of God’s love who have been chosen, called, and put right with God. All this happens by our unity with our Elder Brother, Christ. The Holy Spirit works in our hearts making it seem natural to call God ‘Our Father’ when we pray to Him. And Romans 8 (especially v. 9-16)  and John 10 assure us that nothing can change our Father’s love for us.