Every Believer’s Battle Against Unbelief
The Good Fight of Faith
Good faith is based on truth. Bad faith is based on falsehood.
1 Timothy 6:12 NKJV — 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.
Every believer must fight the good fight of faith. It is internal. This is different from the war against principalities and powers. In fact this is a bigger battle, the mother of all battles. This is the battle we must win. Victory here will guarantee victory everywhere else. We cannot afford to lose the fight of faith.
No matter what you lose in life, you're not a loser, unless you lose faith.
Don't be a loser! Don’t lose faith!
This is the fight to hold on to the truth of God in every area of our lives, especially in the face of contrary evidence. We may have strong faith in one area of life, but there will be other areas where our faith will not be so strong. Those are areas where we are dealing with unbelief.
Unbelief comes from either ignorance of the truth, misinformation or a combination of the two.
Jeremiah 7:8 (NKJV) “Behold, you trust in lying words that cannot profit.
In order to fight the good fight of faith, we must start with a knowledge of God’s truth. His truth alone sets free.
If one believes a lie sincerely, one would only be sincerely wrong.
Jude 1:3 (NKJV) Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints
Assertion: No matter how long we have been Christians, we will still have areas of struggle in our faith. We have faith for many aspects of our lives, but in other areas we struggle. All our struggles can be placed under three headings.
3 areas of battle in our fight of faith.
Battle area of information.
Battle area of time.
Battle area of the inner man/self
Battle area of information
Main actors: self (ignorance) and the devil (misinformation)
Manifestation: Unbelief
We need to fight to bring every thought into captivity to obey Christ.
It is a fight we must win. It is located in our minds. Information is the oldest of all battles.
Satan took advantage of Eve’s ignorance and sold her misinformation.
Colossians 2:4 (NLT) I am telling you this so no one will deceive you with well-crafted arguments.
Unbelief in the hearts of believers
Mark 16:9-20 (NLT) 9 After Jesus rose from the dead early on Sunday morning, the first person who saw him was Mary Magdalene, the woman from whom he had cast out seven demons. 10 She went to the disciples, who were grieving and weeping, and told them what had happened. 11 But when she told them that Jesus was alive and she had seen him, they didn’t believe her. 12 Afterward he appeared in a different form to two of his followers who were walking from Jerusalem into the country. 13 They rushed back to tell the others, but no one believed them. 14 Still later he appeared to the eleven disciples as they were eating together. He rebuked them for their stubborn unbelief because they refused to believe those who had seen him after he had been raised from the dead. 15 And then he told them, “Go into all the world and preach the Good News to everyone. 16 Anyone who believes and is baptized will be saved. But anyone who refuses to believe will be condemned. 17 These miraculous signs will accompany those who believe: They will cast out demons in my name, and they will speak in new languages. 18 They will be able to handle snakes with safety, and if they drink anything poisonous, it won’t hurt them. They will be able to place their hands on the sick, and they will be healed.” 19 When the Lord Jesus had finished talking with them, he was taken up into heaven and sat down in the place of honor at God’s right hand. 20 And the disciples went everywhere and preached, and the Lord worked through them, confirming what they said by many miraculous signs.
If the disciples, followers and apostles still struggled with unbelief, is it not possible that we also harbor some unbelief in our hearts?
We love to claim the promises in verses 17 and 18, but we must take note that Jesus made those promises, only after He had rebuked them for unbelief in verse 14.
Our effectiveness in God’s Kingdom is tied to our faith.
No faith, no fruit.
Little faith, little fruit.
Prayer: Lord, if there be any area of my life where I harbor unbelief, search it out and expose it by your Holy Spirit. Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.
A refusal to believe is a refusal to be fruitful. Jesus did not see their unbelief as weakness. He saw it as wickedness. He saw their unbelief not as inability but rather as unwillingness. He rebuked them for their stubborn unbelief, their hardness of heart in KJV.
Hebrews 3:12 -13 (NLT) 12 Be careful then, dear brothers and sisters. Make sure that your own hearts are not evil and unbelieving, turning you away from the living God. 13 You must warn each other every day, while it is still “today,” so that none of you will be deceived by sin and hardened against God.
Hebrews 3:12 (KJV) Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.
Prayer: Lord, you promised to give me a new heart. Lord change my heart today. Change it from a hard stony heart, to a heart that is full of faith, one that is willing and able to trust you. I ask this in Jesus’ Name .
The longer we have been following the Lord, the greater our risk of staggering in faith. New believers are often strong in faith. The faith is young, it is not mature but it is lively. But as we begin to experience some delays, and some disappointments, we begin to flag and get weary. It does not have to be so.
Hebrews 3:14-19 (NLT) 14 For if we are faithful to the end, trusting God just as firmly as when we first believed, we will share in all that belongs to Christ. 15 Remember what it says: “Today when you hear his voice, don’t harden your hearts as Israel did when they rebelled.” 16 And who was it who rebelled against God, even though they heard his voice? Wasn’t it the people Moses led out of Egypt? 17 And who made God angry for forty years? Wasn’t it the people who sinned, whose corpses lay in the wilderness? 18 And to whom was God speaking when he took an oath that they would never enter his rest? Wasn’t it the people who disobeyed him? 19 So we see that because of their unbelief they were not able to enter his rest.
We are called the children of Abraham, not because we are his biological descendants but because we have his kind of faith.
Romans 4:11-12 (NLT) 11 Circumcision was a sign that Abraham already had faith and that God had already accepted him and declared him to be righteous--even before he was circumcised. So Abraham is the spiritual father of those who have faith but have not been circumcised. They are counted as righteous because of their faith. 12 And Abraham is also the spiritual father of those who have been circumcised, but only if they have the same kind of faith Abraham had before he was circumcised.
Abraham’s kind of faith
Honors the word of God above circumstantial evidence. (Vs. 18)
Does not grow weak with time. (Vs. 19)
Does not stagger or waver (20)
Grows stronger the longer we have been walking with God. (Vs. 20)
Romans 4:18-25 (NLT) 18 Even when there was no reason for hope, Abraham kept hoping--believing that he would become the father of many nations. For God had said to him, “That’s how many descendants you will have!” 19 And Abraham’s faith did not weaken, even though, at about 100 years of age, he figured his body was as good as dead--and so was Sarah’s womb. 20 Abraham never wavered in believing God’s promise. In fact, his faith grew stronger, and in this he brought glory to God. 21 He was fully convinced that God is able to do whatever he promises. 22 And because of Abraham’s faith, God counted him as righteous. 23 And when God counted him as righteous, it wasn’t just for Abraham’s benefit. It was recorded 24 for our benefit, too, assuring us that God will also count us as righteous if we believe in him, the one who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. 25 He was handed over to die because of our sins, and he was raised to life to make us right with God.
Prayer: Lord, please grant me Abraham’s kind of faith.
