2 Corinthians 10:3-5

So a dude named Tim left a comment on the blog and in my "vast" knowledge of how all this works, I ended up deleting it, Sorry Tim! So in respone to Tim's comment I will attempt to expand on 2 Corinthians 10:3-5.

In our lives we have things that we can place in front of God. There are many things that we can turn to instad of God and us guys have it pretty bad. Anything from girls to a career to the latest video game can have a negative influence in our lives. An example from my life is ministry itself. I find myself sometimes concentrating on doing things for the the Lord and not being with the Lord. Sometimes in my own private times with the Lord, I will find myself playing my guitar to get better instead of just worshiping and there is a big difference between the two. Even though I am playing worship songs and maybe even working on a new arrangement, it is still not me encountering the Lord.

One of the big things that I see in a lot of guys is the striving to live a good christian life. While there is nothing wrong with living in a way that pleases Jesus, I see many guys that live scared to face life and afraid to lead in the way they are meant to. I am as guilty of this as anyone else and this too can be something that we look to instead of Jesus. Life is near guaranteed to be unfulfilling if we try to make ourselves happy by attending enough bible studies, church services and behaving how a "good person" behaves.

Unless the changes in a persons behavior that makes them a "nice person" is initiated in the heart by Jesus, it is just acting and is not real. Verses 3-4 talk about how we can get rid of the strongholds of our hearts and explains that there is nothing that we can do about it in and of ourselves. The weapons used to take down the strongholds are not of our flesh, but they only come from Jesus. The only way that we can sucessfuly live the christian life is to look firmly at Jesus and run after Him.

What happens in the end if we have things in our life in the way of God? 1 Samuel 5:1-5 tells the story of the ark of God and what happened when it was captured by the Philistines and when they had put it in the temple of their god Dagon. In the end, Dagon ends up on the floor of the temple in pieces, face down before the ark of the covenenant. Any idol we set up in our lives will be removed, God is to Holy for them not to be.

So, as David prayed in Psalm 139:23-24
We need the Holy Spirit to show us the areas that we have set in front of God in our hearts and then we need to ask Him to help us tear down that stronghold.

I hope that this helps, friend. Please feel free to e-mail me if you have more questions, hillsj@plu.edu!