“For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” — 2 Corinthians 10:3-5

    So many of our temptations begin with an evil thought. James mentions this in his letter as our “own evil desire” (1:14). How do we set up boundaries to keep us from thinking the wrong things? Is there any hope for us when it comes to our own evil desires? I believe there is... we must learn to take them captive and make them obedient to Christ.

    The only way I know that can help us to achieve this goal is for us to know the will of Christ. The foundation of knowing Christ is knowing Scripture. The passage above is true, many arguments and pretensions set themselves up against the knowledge of God. To demolish them we must depend on divine power and not worldly wisdom. We must know the Scriptures.

...we just won’t chose to keep our distance.

    Memorizing Scripture is becoming a lost art but it’s an art we cannot afford to lose. If you really want to take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ, work on memorizing sections of Scripture that will help you “bring in the big guns” when you need them. Maybe you could start with 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 then work your way through several more. Problem with lust? Identify a passage that speaks the will of God and set it to memory. How about greed? There are more than a few Scriptures that help you know God’s will for our greed.

    Here’s one I’ve recently set to memory that I hope will be a first line of defense for you too:

“His divine power has given us EVERYTHING we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us according to his own glory and goodness.” — 2 Peter 1:3 (emphasis mine)

Father, give us strength and power to demolish the strongholds of this world. Open up a place in our minds to store your word and bring them to the top when you see us turning! In Jesus name. Amen.

From The Online Devotional mailing list. To join, send an email to thedsmith@aol.com with the subject "SUBSCRIBE TO DEVO."

Title: "Defense Strategies III"
Author: Mark Waltenbaugh
Publication Date: June 14, 2001

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