Counter Attack Series

When I immerse myself in the Word and prayer, I am most aware of Jesus' presence with me. I am reminded that Jesus understands my weakness and He is helping me in my time of temptation. I see it is His power at works in us and the gates of hell cannot prevail against us.

The third strategy of counter attack is fully embracing your identity in God. You and I have to fully embrace our new identity in Jesus as children of God. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, "If anyone is in Christ Jesus, they are a new creation. The old has passed away. All things have been made new." You are not who you were. Your past no longer defines you or controls you. You are now a new creation in Christ. This new identity begins to determine everything else in life. It’s determines your self-esteem, your attitudes, your thoughts, your decisions, your relationships, your spending habits and all your actions. Pastor Zan Holmes tells the story of growing up and every time he began to run outside to go play in the neighborhood, he would always hear her voice say, “Remember whose you are.” And he would go on to say that he never forgot that: “Remember whose you are” and remember who you are.” You are a child of God! If you claim that you begin living like a child of God. There is no other choice. This is how we are to live holy lives by living into our new identity. And here’s the good news: you’re not left to your own devices. Just as Jesus was not alone in the wilderness because God was with him every step of that 40 day journey, God is with you too. Let me says that again: God’s got your back!

If we would read beyond the time in the wilderness, we would find that the first thing that Jesus did was call the disciples and form a community of support around him. Jesus knew he couldn’t live his life or fulfill God’s will alone. And try as we might, we can’t either! Tim Allen rose to fame as a comedian and then the star of TV's Home Improvement. A lot of you know him as an actor but you didn’t know that he spent time in jail in the late 70s for a drug charge. Tim got into some bad habits being a college hippy and not your typical kind of criminal. So when he was arrested, he was thrown into a holding cell and he said it was the scariest thing in the world. It was with about 14 big, hardened kind of criminals with multiple kinds of records. The kind where a guy blinks and he’s got tattoos on his eyelids. He said what was so scary about this scenario was there was one toilet right in the middle of the room. So he thought here he is, thrown into this holding cell with 14 monster looking guys and he thought, "I am not going to use it no matter what." Now you know that the more you think about what you’re not going to, the more you have to. Am I right? So he started walking back and forth and thinking. Then he thought, "Oh my gosh, what’s going to be more embarrassing? To soil myself?" So he went over and sat on the toilet right in the middle of the cell. Fourteen guys came at him at one time. Then they turned their back, formed a semicircle around him to protect him from the view of the guards standing in the hallway looking into the cell. Tim Allen said all of a sudden he realized that this is what it means to be human. We have to have each other’s back and nowhere is that more important than when we are under attack.