To Be or Not to Be Alone

Do you ever feel you are left to fight alone? Does it seem like God stands off at a distance, watching us struggle but with a hands off policy? Like Jesus said to Mary, “Don’t touch Me because I haven’t ascended to My Father?” If God isn’t helping me fight the good fight of faith, it’s not a “good” fight. It’s just another bad fight.

Many have come to conclude that strife is not necessary. They have grown exhausted with striving with their sin and some have all but given up the fight, many completely. They haven’t left the fold, but have moved back into the dark shadows of doubt and disillusionment. “Where was God when I needed Him?” I hear them say, and I’ve said it myself. They have been fighting the wrong fight. Rather than admit to failure and then fall at His feet in helplessness, they have insisted on fighting the fight of sin, which Jesus has promised to fight for us. In our helplessness is where we pick up the fight of faith, the effort of getting and staying with Jesus, which gives Him the green light to fight the fight of sin in us. Just for that purpose, He left His written Word for our study and meditation, to get to know Him. It is His authorized method for winning the fight.

But back to fighting alone…

Even though the work of getting to know Jesus is the “good” fight of faith, if I believe I’m fighting alone, if I don’t know Christ is pulling for me, it’s a bad fight. The mother looks into the face of her helpless babe and loves her little one. There are many lessons for it to learn, and she is ready to take on the challenge. Love makes her more that up to the task at hand. The gift of love from God prepares her to be the preeminent child psychologist, the best that ever was for that child. She deals with the immerging personality, a bundle of curiosity combined with stubborn self-will, as she patiently and lovingly gives of hers and takes of the infant’s persistence. She chooses her battles so that she can win the war.

Unbeknown to the infant’s blob of a brain, mother is its intercessor; nothing but love will be in all the training. Justice, at times? Yes! Mercy at times? Showered! If ever it’s a toss-up between justice and mercy, her agape love always sides with mercy. And so goes the home school. That mother knows she has only a limited period of time to prepare her baby’s trust and love and intellectual faculties so that she may one day hesitatingly hand the child over to life with all its scary unknowns. As long as life lasts, it will always be her baby. Till death parts them, she would die for her young. Even in the prime of its life, the child is always one generation behind her in the lessons passed on through her from the great Master Teacher. The mother knows there is no end of training until she finally says, “I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. We will meet again at His appearing.” And by faith she looks for her lessons to continue to mold, even after death.

So she trains the little person up in the way it should go. The smile on her face becomes impressed deeply on the memory banks, so that ever afterward it discerns her joy on every face and tree and flower, even in troubles and distresses. The person of that mother is branded on the personality of her little munchken.

Unbeknown to our natural senses our heavenly Intercessor broods over us; He has promised to, He has made an oath. “Can the mother forget her nursing child that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yes, they may forget, yet will I not forget you.” With utmost intensity of interest He is bent at His work, maneuvering events and timing arrows of conviction, all within the pale of the rules of freedom of conscience. Our freedom to choose He will never trespass, even if that leaves Him powerless to save us. But if we are willing and looking to Him for help, we have an ever-present Companion. He dispatches His messengers and with a flash of lightning they do His orders for our sake, to help bring us into a closer union with Christ than they can even know. All we need do is ask, and help is immediately on the way. It may not be the help we asked for, but it is the help we need. He sends the Comforter to meet our deepest need for fellowship when heaven seems so far away. The Spirit strives with self, and self strives with the Spirit. Wonderful thought─that we do not strive alone! And in the end, Christ will have us safely in His arms, surrendered to Him, with all the attendant joy and peace.

The fight is over, He has won the war, we never again to doubt or fear. We are fully His and His forevermore. He brought us all the way. And rightly so, He gets all the praise.