ForgottenWoman

Weaken the Flesh

“Whatever strengthens my spirit weakens my flesh!”   

In our Christian walk, we cling to the promises of God found throughout His Word. One of those promises is that God will bless our obedience. He says that those who walk in obedience to Him will see the goodness of God.   So how do I strengthen my spirit and weaken the flesh that is so full of doubts?  

*Intentional Exercise 

    Unless we are living under a rock, we know people who are intentional in building their physical bodies.  They pay big money to join gyms.  They faithfully go to the gym to work out – many of my children do this daily.   My daughter walks no less than 5 miles every day.  Rain or shine, hot or cold.  She is intentional in building the strength of her body – keeping herself as healthy as possible.  Others faithfully get in the gym, working upper body and legs on various days. How many believers are as intentional about strengthening our spirits with intentional exercise?   

I have a Scripture memory app that I use to memorize verses, and this is what the app is all about – it’s exercising and therefore strengthening the muscles of my mind, renewing it while strengthening its ability to remember the truths of God’s Word.  It takes consistent exercise for it to actually make a difference!   That’s one of my “workout gyms” for my spirit.

Another “workout gym” for strengthening my spirit?   Prayer!  When I follow the example of Jesus that Jesus gives us in The Lord’s Prayer, I begin by focusing on praising God, thanking Him for Who He is – and then my heart and mind are exercised in selflessness as I pray for the needs of others, beg God to intervene in the lives of those that I have purposed to pray for.  As my heart and mind practice focusing on others in these prayers, my spirit is strengthened in selflessness, and God develops the muscles of compassion and love for others.  He builds into me a love that sees beyond myself. That love extends even to those who have hurt me.

Then,  when my prayer turns to my own needs and I begin by making sure that there’s nothing in my life that separates me from pure fellowship with my Father. So, I ask Him to reveal what is within my own heart that needs cleansing, asking for forgiveness and thanking Him for that forgiveness.  I often find myself weeping and battling for the purity of my heart in these moments of repentance. That process is exercising the muscles of my spirit and building a resistance to future sin, a hatred for what God hates, and a love for what He loves.  It’s exhausting – just like the cardio workout in the gym is for our bodies – but with every moment spent there, my spirit is strengthened!  

Another “workout gym” for strengthening my spirit?  Intentional acts of service and kindness toward those who are undeserving or even those who hate me. Whew!   How do I know that these things are strengthening my spirit?  Well, because when I first do them out of obedience, it’s like going to the gym with dread:  with every part of the workout I strain, I am a tad embarrassed at my weakness, and my confidence is in the trash.  I have doubts about my service, wondering if I may be mocked or if my actions will be rejected by those I’m seeking to serve. But each time I choose to do good to, to be intentionally kind, my focus turns from my discomfort to the recipient and what it may mean for him.  My confidence is strengthened to just do it, no matter what the results!  I’m strengthened within my spirit because now I’m just doing what I know God desires of me, regardless of who is watching, who is criticizing, who is mocking!   

Back to the physical gym – there have been times in my past when I had a gym membership, and I only went after hours when I was the only one there!  My confidence was lacking; I didn’t want anyone to see the work I was doing to strengthen my body.  My fear of being mocked or rejected by the “real” gym rats was real. I knew I was weak and pathetic – but over time, I got stronger.   I could stay on the treadmill for more than 30 seconds, I could do the arm lifts… and I began to walk into a gym full of physically fit individuals, and I just did my thing – not even wondering if they were criticizing or mocking.  I got strong enough to do what I needed to do, regardless of how anyone responded to me.

In the same way, consistent, intentional exercise is a very important way to strengthen my spirit – and with each action to strengthen my spirit,  my flesh is weakened.  When my flesh rises up with impatience, hatred, vengeance and more, the strength of my spirit steps in and says,  “No.  We’re going to do this God’s way!”   My flesh is overridden with the fruit of the spirit – Love, Joy, Peace, Longsuffering, Gentleness, Goodness, Meekness, Faith, Temperance. 

Let’s consider another thought worth remembering.  

“For every natural act of faith there is a divine reaction.”  

I believe our spirits will be strengthened as we think about this today!   There is so much in our lives that you and I are not able to control.  The actions of others is a big one.  We can only control what?  Our choice to either obey God or handle life our way, and our reactions to the actions of others!   And as we will continue to learn,  God promises to bless our obedience in this area!  He promises that we will see the goodness of God.  He promises that the justice that we long for is His to bring!   But we also see all throughout His Word that when His children obeyed Him and did what they were humanly able to do, He did incredible things.     

“We do the possible.  He does the impossible.”  

Where do we see this in history?

When faced with an impassable sea and the pursuing Egyptian army, Moses, obeying God’s command, raised his staff and God parted the sea, allowing the Israelites to escape. This miraculous event was a direct result of Moses’ obedience and faith in God’s promise to deliver his people. 

Abraham, despite facing doubt and impossible circumstances, obeyed God’s command as he headed to sacrifice his son Isaac. However, God intervened, providing a ram instead, and Abraham was spared the heartache of sacrificing his son.  He obeyed, and God provided the ram, and in perfect timing.

Noah, despite ridicule and seemingly impossible odds, built the ark as God instructed, (what he could humanly do)  God did the impossible when he saved Noah and his family from the global flood.

Jesus, demonstrating His power, fed a multitude of people with a few loaves of bread and fish.  The possible was a boy giving up his lunch in obedience to Jesus’ request.  The impossible feat was Jesus feeding thousands with that small portion of food!

Joshua was facing an insurmountable enemy at Jericho.  God instructed Joshua to have the Israelites march around the city walls for six days, then seven times on the seventh day, with priests blowing trumpets and the people shouting.  Joshua, as the leader, ensured the Israelites followed God’s instructions meticulously. (obedience in doing what he could humanly do)  On the seventh day, after the march and shout, the walls of Jericho miraculously collapsed, allowing the Israelites to enter and conquer the city. (God doing the impossible) 

Is your spirit strengthened when you recall these things that God did in response to the obedience of His children?   Do you believe that this same God is FOR YOU?  

*We often can’t control what happens to us. But that doesn’t leave us completely out of control — we can recite the truth found in Psalm 91:2 to our fearful hearts: “I will say of the LORD, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’” We can choose to obey Him and trust Him. He can be trusted.

I challenge you to strengthen your spirit!  Do what is humanly possible and trust God to be working where you cannot see – doing the impossible.

*Sometimes I catch myself thinking I have to see evidence of God working today to believe He’s working at all. But there are always two realities. There’s the physical reality we see: the heartbreak, the horrific circumstances, the person who’s hurting us, the fear and anxiety we’re feeling. And there’s a spiritual reality that is also present (That God is working where we cannot see.. So, what we see right now isn’t the entire story. God is always working.

Remember that our emotions are not sinful – not wrong.  But the fact is that you and I need to acknowledge our emotions – acknowledge our doubts, any feelings of discouragement, any thoughts that maybe God doesn’t see or care…  acknowledge the emotions and realize that when they pop up we need to “strengthen our spirit!”   In these moments the first act, the emergency act of strengthening our spirit is prayer!  

These exercises to strengthen our spirit are like the intentional physical exercises in the gym that need to be everyday habits, but sometimes we need the spiritual emergency room for doubts and weakness of spirit. That emergency room is a different kind of prayer.

I think of this as those times when we are so overwhelmed within our spirit that we feel depleted of all of our own resources. Our strength is gone and our spirit feels ‘sick’ because we are simply overwhelmed with the monstrous realities we find ourselves facing. We may even feel too weak to do the basic daily habits. Our emergency room style of prayer is like the ER for our physical bodies when our normal daily strength is weakened by illness or sudden trauma.   My emergency room style of prayer begins with “BE STILL AND KNOW THAT I AM GOD.”   How often, when we are physically weak to the point of exhaustion, do we need to just sleep, or just lie down and close our eyes, too weak to even move? That ER rest will refresh and give us our strength back so that we can resume the daily exercise.  That’s what “Being Still” and resting in Who God is will do for our spirits.  Usually, when I’m in that spirit emergency room, I stay there until I realize that my ability to think clearly begins to return and the Holy Spirit is giving me words for my prayers. Then I can get back to praying!  After some time in that ER for my spirit, my strength returns and I’m able to resume the daily habits of memorizing, prayer and serving others. 

“While our emotions are not wrong and God doesn’t zap us for having them – He responds to our acts of faith that get those emotions under control!  Like it or not, you and I are in a constant fight; a fight to strengthen our spirit and to weaken our flesh!  

One more illustration along this line.  It is true that in our battle for physical health and strength, the more we replace the junk (sugar and useless carbs) the less our bodies crave them.  We begin to long for what truly strengthens us (proteins and living nutrients).   The same is true of our spirit:  the more I strengthen the spirit with these things we’ve spoken about here, the weaker our fleshly desires and responses become.  

There is a word used when speaking of building physical strength – and that’s discipline.  It requires discipline, and not many have that discipline of character!  That’s why hundreds who join the gym with good intentions in January will discontinue their memberships by March!  That’s a real statistic.   We, as believers, are no different in our drive to strengthen our spirits!  That is sadly why we are highly ineffective.  That’s why we react just as those who don’t know our Savior do so often!   That’s why onlookers rarely know who knows Jesus and who doesn’t.  When you and I react to those who hurt us in the same way that those who don’t know Jesus do, well, we give no indication that we know Him! 

As we intentionally strengthen our spirit, our natural responses will become more like Christ.  It becomes easier and easier to forgive God’s way, and the thought of unforgiveness toward others becomes despicable to us!