Spiritual Victory

The struggle between spirituality and carnality is a constant in this life. The solution from a religious standpoint is usually backwards and unproductive, which is an attempt to beat back fleshly desires with our own willpower.

It is too easy to criticize those who struggle with a problem that we do not struggle with. Those who are not addicted to drugs, may say something like. “They just need to stop it!” My response to that is, “Okay, go lose ten pounds and keep it off for a year, and come back and tell me how easy it is!”

Spiritual victory over fleshly desires is won from the spiritual side not from a beat-down of the fleshly side. I like to use the illustration of a playground see-saw. One side is the spiritual and the other side is the carnal—when one goes up, the other goes down, and vice-versa. If our spiritual life is up, the carnality goes down. If our spiritual life goes down, the pull of carnality goes up.

I believe we can have more victory in life if we focus on strengthening our spiritual life. Lately, I have been praying about this and asking God for more wisdom. I wanted to share some of my thoughts.

When we are obsessed with God, the world appears in its true form as something that is trivial and meaningless. Jesus said in Matthew 22:37 (NKJV), “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” If the things of God fills our heart, soul, and mind, then there is less room for the things of this world.

When we are lost (in the sense of deeply focused) in God, the world cannot be found. If God has our undivided attention, then the flashing lights of the world will not distract us. Our deep joy in God surpasses the shallow thrill of earth.

The gravity of earth cannot hold us when the pull of Heaven is stronger. The Bible tells us that a man by the name of Enoch was taken out of this world by God without dying, kind of like a ‘one-man rapture’. “And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him” (Gen. 5:24 NKJV). “By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, ‘and was not found, because God had taken him’; for before he was taken he had this testimony, that he pleased God” (Heb. 11:5 NKJV).

I remember as a child when my mother cooked a special meal, she would say, “Save some room for dessert!” If we are filled with the milk of the Word and the meat of the Spirit, there is no room for the dessert of the world. If we feed upon the wine of His blood and the bread of His flesh, then all else seems to be nothing and not important.

Once we have walked in the light of Jesus, the pale light of this world shows itself to be darkness. The world tries to blind us with its artificial light. But the true light of Jesus is brighter than the shining of the sun.

When we absorb ourselves in the Word of God, pray, seek after the heart of God, and gather to worship Him, the pull of the flesh will be less than the tug of God.

The lyrics of Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus by Helen H. Lemmel 

Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in his wonderful face
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of his glory and grace

Yours on the Journey,

Harry L. Whitt