Are those fighting words???

So, I've been fighting this inner battle as of late... and I can't seem to determine yet who is winning. It's making me more aware of the many crusades that are fought everyday but go unnoticed because the echoes of war are muffled by chest cavities. It shouldn't surprise me how often these battles are fought considering the state of the world and it's desperate need of redemption, but it does. I mean, everybody seems all cool and collected. Tidy and neat. But if you could hear the silent screams of fear and criticism...the shouts ringing inside our heads, out of earshot to rest of the world...then maybe our perceptions would fade. Everybody fights the war of the heart and i'm recently reminded of that.

I've been fighting for confidence. The enemy has hurled arrows of insult at me and my armor is feeling insufficient. I don't know how much more I can take. I have the overwhelming sense that I can't do anything. That no matter how hard I try, I will never measure up to what i'm capable of becuase it's too difficult. It will take too much work... and too much time. I can't fight like this...I have no real weapons. All I have is my heart and in it's bruised and battered state, it's close to surrender. Surrender...surrender? Why would I even consider it? If I surrender... I truly have nothing. And if I have nothing...what will identify me...what will be my worth? Why does this thought all of a sudden feel so irresistibly freeing? Has this fight really been about something else?

It seems that the tables have turned. This inner conflict really isn't about a lack of confidence in myself, it's been about a lack of confidence in God. It's been a battle over control and the enemy really wasn't the evil tyrant I imagined him to be. I'm the tyrant. I'm the control hungry man who wants to have the final say. But life doesn't work that way. You can't claim a faith in God and not be willing to give Him what is rightfully His. And I am rightfully His...you are rightfully His. Oh, and by the way, I'm not talking about Sunday you, or Gave-the-homeless-man-a-dollar you, or Read-The-Purpose-Driven-Life-in-public-as-a-witnessing-tool-you. Giving God little moments like these are easy and take virtually no effort. It's easy to claim God's supremecy in these moments. But what about when you feel like you are literally walking through the hopelessness of hell. What about moments like those? You know what those moments are...those are the moments that really show us how genuine our faith really is. Jesus isn't interested in redeeming moments...Jesus wants to make ALL THINGS new.

When we choose to believe there is no hope, in essence we are telling God that He is not capable of doing His work in the world and that is unaccpetable. Our small dreams are incapable of concieveing the plans the Lord has and in the same token our minds tend to limit God to our own agendas. That is why the thought of surrendering the battle is so freeing. When you take the step to give up control and the need to understand you then start to realize the opposition was actually fighting for you and not against you. Be careful not to misinterpret peace talks for fighting words...it will really save you some avoidable wounds.