(Part 1/3 – A summary of the Sunday morning teaching on 29-Mar-15, in AFT Church, English service. From the series The Law of Faith)
12 Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. 13 I urge you in the sight of God who gives life to all things, and before Christ Jesus who witnessed the good confession before Pontius Pilate, 14 that you keep this commandment without spot, blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ’s appearing.
– 1Timothy 6:12-14
The Bible tells us to confess the ‘good confession’, but many people confess their weakness, unworthiness, failure and sinfulness. That is ‘bad confession’. We must engage only in ‘positive’ or ‘good’ confession.
Positive Confession declares: –
- What we have in and through the redemption of Jesus Christ – Abraham’s blessings.
- What we are because of the new birth in Jesus. We are a new creation and the Holy Spirit dwells in us.
- What we are to God the Father. We are His sons and joint heirs with Jesus Christ.
- What He is doing for us. He is our High Priest interceding for us at the right hand of God the Father.
- What His word can accomplish in and through us – from and through the words of our mouth.
Last week, we learnt about the faith fight. Even though we are followers of Jesus, we face challenges and problems in life. We have an enemy called Satan. We are in a spiritual warfare with him. Apostle Paul says –
- It is the good fight of faith. If we read the biographies of any man or woman of God, we will realize that all of them fought the fight of faith.
- We must take hold of eternal life. The fight exists because eternal life has been given to us. Eternal life is not just about dying and going to heaven. It’s a higher quality of the divine life that we have in and through the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. The enemy tries to deprive us of all the things that have been given to us. We must fight him and keep a firm grip over our Salvation.
- We must fight the enemy with good confession.
Paul tells Timothy, ‘You have too much at stake. God has not only saved you but has brought you into the ministry. He has given you gifts and is using you mightily. He has great plans for you. So fight this good fight of faith. Take hold of all that God has given you because you have already made the good confession’. Timothy made the good confession when he accepted Jesus Christ as His Lord and Savior. He had also been making the confession through his life and preaching ministry. So Paul encourages Timothy to walk in line with that confession.
THE FIGHT IS INEVITABLE
Paul says that God had separated him, even when he was in his mother’s womb. This is true for all of us. Every child of God has been called for a special purpose. The purposes might be different for every believer. But the fact remains that we have all been chosen by God.
Since we are chosen by God, we are all against a common enemy who is keen to spoil God’s plans. This enemy called Satan is God’s enemy more than ours. When he sees God in us, he wants to ruin us. The fight of faith is very real. We can’t be spiritual pacifists. Some people say that they don’t like to fight. If we take a passive attitude in life, we will become history. Satan will destroy us. We won’t be able to accomplish anything in life. We have to fight the spiritual battle.
…to be continued…
