PREACHING TO MYSELF FOR MY FAITH'S SAKE

“Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.” 1 Timothy 6:12 ESV

If there is one thing every one of us need these days it is faith. That vibrant heart-faith and childlike trust in the risen, supernatural Christ- the kind of faith that changes the way you live, talk, and feel. Satan wants to snatch this more than anything else, for he knows “the righteous shall live by faith”(Rom.1: 17). He knows that “without faith it is impossible to please God.”(Hebrews 11: 6) He knows that real faith is our lifeline to God’s grace and power. If he can sever the “faith connection”, he has gained a tremendous victory.

No wonder why Paul exhorts us to "fight the good fight of faith”. Fighting the fight of faith is the struggle to keep the faith. Every day is a battle to treasure Christ above all else, to keep on believing God, to keep on trusting his promises, to stay faithful, and to lay hold of eternal life over the promises of sin.

Paul Tripp writes,
The battle is in your mind where you are constantly involved in an internal conversation that greatly influences the things you decide, say, and do...What do you regularly tell yourself about yourself, God, and your circumstances? Do your words to you encourage faith, hope, and courage? Or do they stimulate doubt, discouragement, and fear? Do you remind yourself that God is near, or do you reason within yourself, given your circumstances, that he must be distant? Do you encourage yourself to run to God even when you don't understand what he's doing? Or do you give yourself permission to back away from him when you are confused by the seeming distance between what he's promised and what you're experiencing?....When others talk to you, is your internal conversation so loud that it's hard to concentrate on what they're saying?

So how do we fight these thoughts that lead to despair, anxiety, and unbelief? We fight by preaching to ourselves the Word of God instead of listening to our unbelieving selves speak. I learned this from Martyn Lloyd Jones in his book Spiritual Depression based upon Psalm 42. Listen to what he says. It has helped me greatly.

Have you realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself? Take those thoughts that come to you the moment you wake up in the morning. You have not originated them, but they start talking to you, they bring back the problems of yesterday, etc. Somebody is talking. Who is talking? Your self is talking to you. Now this man’s treatment was this; instead of allowing this self to talk to him, he starts talking to himself. ‘Why art thou cast down, O my soul?’ he asks. His soul had been depressing him, crushing him. So he stands up and says: ‘Self, listen for a moment, I will speak to you.’… The main art in the matter of spiritual living is to know how to handle yourself. You have to take yourself in hand, you have to address yourself, preach to yourself, question yourself. You must say to your soul: ‘Why art thou cast down’– what business have you to be disquieted? You must turn on yourself, upbraid yourself, condemn yourself, exhort yourself, and say to yourself: ‘Hope thou in God’– instead of muttering in this depressed, unhappy way. And then you must go on to remind yourself of God, Who God is, and what God is and what God has done, and what God has pledged Himself to do.”

That is exactly what we must do. I have discovered that most of my unhappiness in life is due to the fact that I listen to myself instead of talking to myself! What we have each day is an internal conversation that never ends. It is ceaseless. It continues always within us. And so each day, throughout the day, we have two simple choices: We can either spend the day listening to ourselves, listening to ourselves in our constantly changing feelings and circumstantial interpretations, or we can spend each day talking to ourselves. We can talk truth to ourselves. We can preach the gospel to ourselves.

My mind cannot be trusted and my circumstances often lie to me. They informing me that God isn't sovereign, God isn't wise, God isn't kind, God isn't active, God isn't present, God doesn't love me, God isn't for me, in fact, he has forgotten me. Do you ever think that way?

THIS IS A BATTLE THAT I FACE EVERY DAY OF MY LIFE! Therefore, my only hope for victory is to preach to myself. It is what I do when I am afraid, stressed, defeated, discouraged, depressed, tempted, losing hope, feeling useless, abandoned, lost, and overcome. I pull out my sword of God’s word, God’s promises and weld it against my mind.

Charles Spurgeon wrote the following about welding God's promises,

God's promises were never meant to be thrown aside as waste paper; He intended that they should be used.... Nothing pleases our Lord better than to see His promises put in circulation; He loves to see His children bring them up to Him, and say, "Lord, do as you have said." We glorify God when we plead His promises. Do you think that God will be any the poorer for giving you the riches He has promised? Do you dream that He will be any the less holy for giving holiness to you? Do you imagine He will be any the less pure for washing you from your sins? He has said, "Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord, though your sins...be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." Faith lays hold upon the promise of pardon, and it does not delay, saying, "This is a precious promise, I wonder if it be true?" but it goes straight to the throne with it, and pleads, "Lord, here is the promise, do as You have said." Our Lord replies, "Be it unto you even as you will." When a Christian grasps a promise, if he does not take it to God, he dishonours Him; but when he hastens to the throne of grace, and cries, "Lord, I have nothing to recommend me but this, You have said it;" then his desire shall be granted. Our heavenly Banker delights to cash His own notes. Never let the promise rust. Draw the word of promise out of its scabbard, and use it with holy violence. Think not that God will be troubled by your importunately reminding Him of His promises. He loves to hear the loud outcries of needy souls. It is His delight to bestow favors. He is more ready to hear than you are to ask....It is God's nature to keep His promises; therefore go at once to the throne with, "Do as you have said."

Let me give you some of my favorite weapons I use to preach to myself against my unbelieving thoughts:

• Psalm 16:8 have set the LORD always before me; Because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved.
• Psalm 23:1-6, “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters. He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness For His name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; My cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me All the days of my life; And I will dwell in the house of the LORD Forever.
• Psalm 27:13 – 14, “I would have lost heart, unless I had believed That I would see the goodness of the LORD In the land of the living. Wait on the LORD; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say, on the LORD! “
• Psalm 31:14-16, “But as for me, I trust in You, O LORD; I say, "You are my God." My times are in Your hand; Deliver me from the hand of my enemies, And from those who persecute me. Make Your face shine upon Your servant; Save me for Your mercies' sake."
• Psalm 46:1-2, “God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble. 2 Therefore we will not fear.”
• Psalm 50:15, “Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me."
• Psalm 55:22, “Cast your burden on the LORD, And He shall sustain you; He shall never permit the righteous to be moved.”
• Psalm 57:2, “I cry out to God Most High, to God who fulfills his purpose for me.”
• Psalm 73:25-26, “Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”
• Psalm 112:6-8, “For the righteous will never be moved; he will be remembered forever. He is not afraid of bad news; his heart is firm, trusting in the LORD. His heart is steady; he will not be afraid.”
• Psalm 121:1 – 8, “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.”
• Psalm 123:1-3, “To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens! Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a maidservant to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the LORD our God, till he has mercy upon us. Have mercy upon us, O LORD, have mercy upon us.”
• Matthew 28:20, “behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age."
• Matthew 7:7-8, "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened."
• Matthew 11:28-30, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
• John 6:35 “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.”
• John 14:1-3 , “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”
• Romans 8:28, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”
• 2 Corinthians 4:16-18, “We do not lose heart. Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”
• Philippians 1:21, “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”
• Hebrews 13:5-6, "I will never leave you nor forsake you” So we can confidently say, "The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?"
• 1 Peter 5:7, “Cast all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.”
  

These are but a few of my weapons that I use to preach to myself and fight the good fight of faith.
Pastor Bill