"For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places."
Ephesians 6:12
Spiritual battles begin way before the battle begins. To win them, we must understand that the fight is won outside the ring as much as inside it.
"You can map out a fight plan or a life plan, but when the action starts, it may not go the way you planned, and you're down to your reflexes—that means your preparation. That's where your roadwork shows. If you cheated on that in the dark of the morning, well, you're going to get found out now, under the bright lights."
-Heavyweight champion Joe Frazier
1. Our fights will expose the depth of our training.
We must prepare before stepping into the ring. If we take shortcuts and slack off, we will not be able to contend with life's challenges. You may have heard the saying, "When preparation meets opportunity, there is success;" but the opposite, "When procrastination meets opportunity, there is distress," is also true.
Consider Noah facing God's request to build an ark to save humanity. God never told Noah when or how the earth would flood. He simply told him to prepare by building a boat. By faith, Noah had to trust that God was preparing him for something spectacular without knowing the details. If Noah had procrastinated because of his unbelief, he would have lost his own life and caused the extinction of the entire human race. We would not exist today if he waited until the first drop of rain to build the ark. Noah prepared for over 100 years by faithfully building every day.
At a specific point in our lives, My wife and I felt God guiding us to prepare for a geographical move. We did not know where God was calling us or how it would play out, but we felt the need to pack most of our belongings except for the bare essentials. Doing this was a little strange since we had no "natural" reason to pack our things, but we knew something spiritual was about to happen. A few months later, we received a call that changed our destiny; I was offered a position at Coca-Cola Co. halfway across the country, and within months, we had to make the transition. Had we not prepared in advance, we wouldn't have been able to move so quickly.
2. Preparing on the upfront end helps us be victorious on the back end.
For example, it is tough to forgive when someone says or does something that hurts you if you don't condition your life for forgiveness ahead of time. However, if we have already chosen to live with a forgiving mindset, we are prepared for the situation and will handle it accordingly. Similarly, Jesus chose forgiveness for those who would ask for it long before He had to offer it. When those caught in sin sought forgiveness, He didn't tell them, "Let me think about it before I make my decision to forgive you. After all, what you did was pretty bad." No, Jesus had prepared to offer forgiveness ahead of time—no matter how bad the offense.
"Forgiveness is not an occasional act, it is a permanent attitude."
Martin Luther King Jr.
This kind of preparation is required to win the fight before the fight ever begins.
Praise be to the LORD my Rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle.
Psalm 144:1
Deciding to live by faith before challenging circumstances arrive in your life will prepare you to live victoriously. Understand that, in this fight, you will get hit, so preemptively choose to handle it God's way by being prepared.
Have a blessed week,
Pastor (Rev. Elias Limones)
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