An Unusual Weapon of War for Spiritual Warfare
Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin (1 Peter 4:1, ESV)
It has become part of our collective awareness and knowledge as Christians that we are in a warfare or battle. The enemy is NOT your neighbor who does not like you. Your enemy is God’s enemies, things and spiritual personalities that have dedicated themselves to ensure that everything about God is destroyed or frustrated. And since God’s heart is on you, it becomes obvious why the enemy is after you. The primary enemies of humanity are just three: Satan, sin, and death. These three are at the root of all the suffering, pains, sorrow, griefs, etc. of human beings on the earth. You need God’s weapons to subdue these enemies.
The scripture above gives us an unusual weapon, which many of you have probably never heard of because whenever we talk of the weapons of our spiritual warfare, we are limited to Ephesians 6. There are more weapons than those listed in Ephesians chapter 6. The Apostle Peter says “arm yourselves with the same way of thinking.” He is telling us clearly that our “way of thinking” is a spiritual weapon by itself. This is what is called the mindset. It did not say the mind is a weapon, but the mindset. The mind in itself is a battlefield, as Joyce Meyer has written in her book the “Battlefield of the mind”. However, the way you think is a weapon all by itself.
In the scripture above, Jesus’s mindset regarding suffering unjustly was not that of frustration, disappointment or unfairness in life. He had a different way of thinking or looking at things. Can you tell how different that is from our typical mindset today? What is our first thought when we get into some difficulty? Most of us undoubtedly will start asking God the “why” questions, and wondering why God would abandon us. Jesus had a different mindset. This is not limited to adversity. What is your mindset regarding sickness and disease? How do you think about money and provisions? What about the devil and demonic activities? You see, the attitude of your mind already puts you on a course, of either success or failure. And the sad reality about it is that many of us are unaware of the powerful mindsets that are driving ourselves in the wrong directions. In fact, many of you reading this devotional might not even be aware of thought patterns in your life that are responsible for perpetual poverty, defeat, relationship failures, etc.
The right mindset is a weapon in God’s hand to deal with your enemies. God cannot help you with disease in your body if you THINK that He is the One who put that disease there to teach you a lesson. But if your mind gets rooted in the Word, and you start thinking the Word-way, that is, Christ took my disease on His body so disease has no business in my body, even if you do not fully understand what is going on, you have just given God a powerful weapon to bring your health in order.
Be conscious of the weapon in you called the mindset. It is a double-edged sword, that can either build or tear you down.
MEDITATE
What is the meaning of “mindset or way of thinking”? Can you think of one thought pattern in your life that has consistently led you into trouble?
APPLY THE WORD
We do not have any options when it comes to the mind if we want to live the life of God. There is just one way forward, and that is to renew our minds with the Word of God. You do not even need to know what to change. Just feed your mind with the Word and it will start showing you destructive weapons in your mind that need to be removed and replaced!
PRAY
Ask the Lord to help you renew your mind every single day in the Word.
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