1. We have been given victory in Jesus over the power of sin, evil, and death
Last week on Easter Sunday we looked at the Scriptures which reveal that we who have faith in the resurrected Jesus have been given victory over sin and death. We find forgiveness through Jesus for our past sin, and we are given victory over death, because those who are in Jesus will never die but have eternal life. But I also mentioned last week that the Scripture teaches we have also been given victory over present and future sin, and the power of evil (Satan).
Rom. 6:6 Our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. 7 For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. 8 And since we died with Christ, we know we will also share his new life.
We haven’t just been forgiven of our sin, we have been set free from the power of sin now and forever. Sin no longer has control over us. In other words we shouldn’t sin any longer. We have been made into new creations in Christ Jesus. We are given a fresh start, a new life.
We are also delivered and kept safe from the power of Satan and his influence on our life. In other words, Satan’s got nothing on us anymore, he has no power over us.
NLT 1 John 5:18 We know that those who have become part of God’s family do not make a practice of sinning, for God’s Son holds them securely, and the evil one cannot get his hands on them.
Through Jesus believers have been given victory over sin, death, and the power of Satan. I remind you these promises are only for those who have faith in Jesus Christ. Without faith God does not guarantee you will have victory over darkness. You can apply the principles I will be teaching today and over the next four weeks and it will help some, but without the power of God’s Holy Spirit, who comes to live within those who believe, you will continue to face defeat and darkness. My first recommendation is that if you have not put your faith in Jesus and given your life to him, make that your first priority because otherwise you will continue to struggle.
However even Christians continue to struggle with temptation, with sin, with anger and evil thoughts, with anxiety, fear, or worry, with addictions, or even depression. Why is this? Is this the way God wants it to be? I believe God wants to bring victory over all of these to every Christian believer. So why then do we struggle with these areas?
We’re going to get into some of these areas specifically over the next few weeks, but I’ll tell you why we as believers struggle with sin and evil, it is because we lose the battle for our mind. I didn’t say you are losing your mind. Although you may wonder about that from time to time. No, we struggle because we lose the battle over our thoughts.
2. We still struggle with sin, temptation, and the influence of Satan because we haven’t allowed Christ to have control of our thoughts.
First, we need to realize our thoughts control our behavior. You will rarely, if ever do something without thinking it first, even if only briefly. Although I have known some people whom I wonder if they talk without thinking first, but rarely do we do anything without first making the decision to do so in our mind, especially when it comes to temptation and sin.
In the comic strip, Cathy, we see the internal struggle with temptation and sin. In the first frame Cathy thinks “I will take a drive but I won’t go to the grocery store.”
In the next frame, “I will drive to the grocery store but I won’t go in.”
“I will go in the grocery store, but I will not walk down the aisle where the Halloween candy is on sale.”
“I will look at the candy, but not pick it up.”
“I will pick up it up, but not buy it.”
“I will buy it, but not open it.”
“Open it, but not smell it.”
“Smell it, but not taste it.”
“Taste it, but not eat it.”
“Eat, eat, eat, eat, eat!”
The battle is lost in the mind first before it is acted upon. Someone who commits adultery at one point thought, “my spouse isn’t meeting my needs, I deserve this, it will be worth it, no one will find out.” Someone who battles alcoholism will think, “it won’t hurt if I drink just one beer, and then what will one more beer hurt” and they have that glass, and another and another, until they are drunk again. Someone with anxiety problems is already thinking the worst case scenario, “but what if this happens or that happens,” which leads to a panic attack, ulcer, or other health problems. A person with anorexia or bulimia is looking in the mirror thinking, “I’m too fat, I’m eating too much”. It begins up here [pointing to head]. So if we are going to win the victory over our struggles we have to face up to what is going on in our mind, and then change what we are thinking.
3. Influences over our thoughts
A. Our thoughts can be influenced by past memories, habits or strongholds
When we become Christians, God erases our sin, makes us into new creations, and places his Spirit within us to help us gain victory over sin and evil, but God doesn’t have a delete button to erase our memories, habits, or strongholds. It would be nice if our brains were like a computer hard drive and we could just hit the delete button, but it doesn’t work that way. Even though we become Christians we carry around the same painful memories of our past and these continue to influence our thoughts. We also bring with us into our Christian life past habits and strongholds. Strongholds are long term patterns of behavior, which usually result from a traumatic experience(s). Let me give you an example of a stronghold. Suppose three children grow up with an alcoholic abusive father. The three children learn to deal with it differently. The eldest learns to fight back, “if you ever touch me again I will kill you.” The middle child on the other hand learns to appease his father, “what can I get you dad, is there anything I can do for you,” with the hopes that it will avoid further abuse. While the youngest learns to hide in the closet when dad comes home hoping to avoid his wrath. What do suppose these kids will do when they grow up and get into a hostile situation or a heated argument with their spouse? The oldest will fight, the middle will appease, and the youngest will flee. These strongholds are ingrained within us and they are not always purged immediately when we accept Christ. Although we can find healing for these too through Christ, and we will get more into that next week when we talk about anger.
If you have had a traumatic experience it has created an emotional scar, a permanent imprint on your memories. It could have been growing up in a physically, emotionally, or sexually abusive home, going through a painful or broken relationship, like a divorce, or the untimely death of a loved one. These memories and strongholds influence affect how we think and feel.
B. Our thoughts can be influenced by Satan
Our thoughts can be influenced by Satan as well. We are in a spiritual battle. Satan is trying to work against God’s good plan for healing, wholeness, and restoring of relationship with himself and others. Satan is going to do whatever he can do prevent you from living the victorious life God intends for you to live. He will lie, deceive, cause doubt, whatever it takes.
2 Cor. 11:3 But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by its cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.
One of Satan’s favorite tactics is to lead your thoughts astray by making you believe a lie. Remember how Satan, as the serpent, led Eve and Adam astray in the Garden of Eden. Satan lied to them, “if you eat the forbidden fruit you won’t die, you will be like God knowing good from evil.” Satan lies to us to get us to doubt God and his Word. He leads us away from the truth. He places a thought in your mind and makes you think it was your thought, “God doesn’t love you, how could love someone like you, if you really want to find love and acceptance you need to…(fill in the blank).” Have sex, change your hair, buy a new outfit . If you have gone through some bad times Satan might tell you, “God doesn’t love you look how he treats you.” God loves you unconditionally, he always does good for those who love him.
C. Our thoughts can be influenced by culture
Our thoughts are also influence by our culture: The music we listen to, the television shows and movies we watch, magazines and books we read, the internet websites we go to. Any of these can fill our thoughts with things that are contrary to God’s truth. Our culture tells us messages like; “you need to have this or else you won’t be happy, you need to look like this otherwise you will look ugly and people won’t like you.” These are not God’s truth. God tells us we can be happy with what we already have, we are loved by God nothing separates us from God’s love.
4. We achieve victory in Jesus by changing our thought patterns
If we want to gain victory in all areas of our life we must change our thoughts, and not allow our memories, strongholds, the lies of Satan or our culture to influence what we think. Listen to what Paul writes:
NLT Romans 12:2 Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is.
A. Control the What Enters Our Mind
How do we win the battle for our thoughts and change the way we think? We must control what we allow into our minds because it will influence what we think about, which in turn determines how we act. We have choice on what we allow into our minds. We have already talked about the influence of culture. You make a choice on what you listen to, what you read, what you watch. Don’t deceive yourself into thinking it doesn’t affect me because it does affect how you think and what you think about.
You’ve heard the phrase ‘Garbage in, Garbage out.” If you continue to put impure things into your brain you will struggle with your thought life and sin. I remember when Amy made a decision for herself that she was going to quit watching her favorite cop and crime investigation programs because she noticed she was becoming desensitized to the gruesome violence. Gruesome things didn’t affect her anymore, and so she decided not to watch them. I decided shortly into our marriage that I was going to listen almost exclusively to Christian music because it was uplifting and encouraging, and it gets me praising God and thinking good thoughts about God’s word throughout the day.
What do you allow into your thoughts? Is there something God is revealing to you that you need to replace with something positive?
B. Think About Things From Above
NIV Colossians 3:2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.
NIV Philippians 4:8 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable-- if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-- think about such things.
NIV Colossians 3:16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and
admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God.
We begin to win the battle when we think about things from above, on God, on Jesus Christ, on heaven, on God’s Word. Paul encourages us to think about good things, what is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, or praiseworthy. We can choose what we think about. While you may not have control over all the thoughts that enter your mind you are able to choose which ones you will allow to stay there.
We are NOT talking about the power of positive thinking. There are a lot of books out there on positive thinking, which says just think positively and everything will come out right, and you will be happy. What we are talking about is focusing on God and his truth. It does us no good to think positively about things that aren’t true. I can think positively that the sky is green when the truth is it is blue, I can think positively that everyone should worship me when the truth of God’s word says before Jesus every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord.
What do you think about most often? What fills your mind and dominates your thoughts? How often does God or his Word permeate your thoughts? How often is a Scripture passage or a song or hymn rolling around in your heart and mind throughout the day? If these rarely, if ever happens it is an indicator that your thoughts are being influenced more by your other things than by God.
C. Make Every Thought Captive to Christ
Lastly, I feel we need to mention that all of us have thoughts which pop into our mind, which are either from our memories, from Satan, from our culture, or perhaps even our own sinful desires, what can we do?
NIV 2 Corinthians 10:5 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.
Remember, we can choose what to do with our thoughts, whether they originate from us or not. We can choose to take that thought and make it obedient to Christ. When a thought comes into my mind which is not God honoring I can choose to ask God, “could you take this thought from me?” Or we can practice what I can flushing, which means I mentally clear the thought or mentally flush it out of my brain. I literally envision my thoughts like a magne-a-doodle and I mentally pull that slide bar and clearing the thought out.
Conclusion:
In order to win the victory over sin and evil we must win the battle for our thoughts. Ask God, is there anything I am allowing into my mind which is not of you? What good things of God does He want you to replace them with? Let us ask God together for victory over our thoughts.
