Day 237 - The Truth In The Lie

Thoughts that have come from various quotes taken from the book, "Victor - Breaking Free From a Victim Based Society" by John H. Hovis. Click here to link directly to the audio file.

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"He is pleased with us (being His children) because of our identity, not because of what we do with that identity. Hold on to this fact – it is where victor thinking has the power to overwhelm victimhood in our lives."

As quoted from the book "Victor - Breaking Free From a Victim-Based Society" by John H. Hovis Page 92.

Now there's a concept that I have trouble grasping from time to time. Do I really live life believing that God is pleased with me? How about you? Do you have any challenges believing in God's pleasure with who you are at this moment in time?

That feeling of doubt, that feeling of condemnation that comes as I doubt who I am in God's eyes is what makes victim thinking a possibility. It is when I do, or say or fail to do or say something that this world is uniquely positioned to make me feel like there is no way this God could ever be pleased with me. This is nothing more than a lie from the pit of hell. I have found that learning to recognizing this lie in my life, and calling it for what it is, is paramount if I am to live out my victor status.

We have to remember that for a lie to be truly effective, there has to be some element of truth in it. If the lie we need to deal with is that God could never be pleased with us because of what we have done or are doing now, then we need to parse the truth from the lie in that statement.

Truth is that we all have done things, and are doing things right now, that should bring displeasure to this God that loves us so. Who of us is living a perfectly sinless life? No one! God is perfect so any lack of perfection makes it impossible to commune with Him in any way. Because of our mistakes, our transgressions and our willingness to do things outside of God's provision and protection, we are deserving of death and eternal separation. If the story ended there, the lies of Satan would have to be considered complete and absolute truth.

But the story doesn't end there. God knew that, left to trust solely on our own misguided ways, it is hopeless to ever think that we might be in a position to bring pleasure into His life at all. That's the power and the beauty of the plan of salvation through Jesus Christ. It isn't what we do that makes it possible to please this God. It is what Jesus has done that makes it possible for all our transgressions to be overlooked. Our actions mean nothing as far as pleasing God is concerned. Our action in letting Jesus be our bridge to God is what makes any other actions we do, good or bad, irrelevant when it comes to our relationship with this God.

So, the truth in the lie that says we will never please God is that on our own, we can't please Him. What Satan wants us to believe is that we are left abandoned because of that fact. He wants us to over look the completed work of Jesus and just give up hope all together when it comes to a relationship with God. In this case, even the truth portion of the lie doesn't even matter because of Jesus' work on the cross. No amount of our doing will ever be enough to make us be what Jesus has done for us on the cross.

I can't stress how important this concept is for us to live like the victors we so long to be in our lives. Relying on our actions to confirm our victor status is just as futile of an endeavor as to thinking that our efforts will ever be enough to please this God. Alone, we can't - we can't make our identity work, we can't live like a victor, we can't avoid victim thinking, we can't relate to this perfect God. With Jesus we can!

Let me read today's Bible passage as it relates to the work we do trying to please God.

If God doesn’t build the house,
    the builders only build shacks.
If God doesn’t guard the city,
    the night watchman might as well nap.
It’s useless to rise early and go to bed late,
    and work your worried fingers to the bone.
Don’t you know he enjoys
    giving rest to those he loves? Psalm 127:1-2 (MSG)

It is useless to work your "worried" fingers to the bone. Oh if I could only lock this thought into my head when Satan comes at me with the lie that I am not doing enough to please God. It isn't that God wants me sitting around doing nothing. That's not the kind of rest the author of today's passage is talking about. The rest that God loves to give is rest from that stress filled, panic driven and completely useless striving to prove that we are something God already sees us as. God's rest is filled with plenty to do. The kind of rest God loves to give is rest from the self focused, life draining efforts of trying to live up to an impossible standard that only we hold ourselves to.

By the way, Satan will do all he can to make sure you don't let God's rest be a part of your walk with Him. The busier you are at trying to earn what God freely gives, the less likely you will have lasting impact on your world and on the Kingdom being built around you by God. If Satan can't get you to believe that God doesn't love you, he will do all he can to make you as busy as possible trying to earn that love we all so desperately want in our lives.

To live the fullness of this life as a victor, we have to start recognizing the lies in our life. Not only that, we have to stop letting those lies be what drives us into more and more frenetic activity. At some point, we need to come to a place where we can look at our lives and determine why we do the things we do. Root out as much of the God pleasing and identity earning motives as you can. It is when we are living in a place where we believe what God says about us that the power of victor living can really be experienced in our lives.