How To Be A Mighty Man

“Idle hands are the devil’s workshop,” says an old saw. The Apostle saw that this could become a problem among the faithful and warned of those who learned “to be idlers, going about from house-to-house, and not only idlers, but also gossips and busybodies, saying what they should not” [1 TIMOTHY 5:13].

As gossip is a destroyer, slander is as great a destroyer. Slander attacks the character of an individual; it arises from a wicked heart. Jesus warned, “What comes out of a person is what defiles him. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person” [MARK 7:20-23].

Perhaps it is to be expected that people today will be slanderous. We are warned, “that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power” [2 TIMOTHY 3:1-5]. The Apostle concludes by instructing saints, “Avoid such people.”

Many of God’s people have faced, or even now are facing fierce warriors. These vicious warriors and their implements of war are able to destroy a person without drawing blood. However, we must never shrink from the truth. We must stand firm in the truth, refusing to surrender to the temptation to become evil, striking back. We are taught, and we must practise, “Though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ” [2 CORINTHIANS 10:3-5].

Just as Benaiah overcame two mighty warriors, perhaps defeating them in the same day, so the child of God can defeat the mighty warriors she faces, doing so in the strength of the Lord. When John wrote of the coming of our Master, he wrote, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” [JOHN 1:5]. That light which has never been overcome is the light which now shines in the heart of each child of God. This is the reason we are commanded,” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good” [ROMANS 12:21].

I am always encouraged when I read that First Letter of John. You may recall these words, “Everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God” [1 JOHN 5:4, 5]?

Let me look forward to a day that is yet future. It may be closer than any of us can imagine, but it lies within God’s timing. “Then war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But the dragon was not strong enough to prevail, so there was no longer any place left in heaven for him and his angels. So that huge dragon—the ancient serpent, the one called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world—was thrown down to the earth, and his angels along with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven saying,