As godly women, we all know that we are to stay in the Word, come together with other believers regularly, and remain steadfast in our prayer lives. However, where most of us fail is in the department of possessing our souls. The Enemy’s number one tactic is to keep us from having control over our minds, wills and emotions or the ability to take charge over our thought life. He deliberately keeps us off balance emotionally and mentally. He works overtime to keeps us in a tangled web of thoughts about the past and worries about the future so that we have no faith and operate in fear. To be truly strong in the Lord we must cultivate enough soul patience and control over our minds so that we can stand against Satan's wiles.
When we are unable to control our thinking and emotions, we will not be able to cultivate enough soul patience to hear from God. Satan’s strategy is to keep us so busy and so overwhelmed that if God actually answered our prayers we would not have enough capacity in our spirits and souls to receive and retain the answer when it showed finally up. I wonder how many blessings and answers we missed or forfeited because we could not settle our emotions and minds long enough to hear from God. Satan has been able to snatch victory from us before we even realize it.
Luke 21:19: In Patience Possess Ye Your Souls..
There is one major fruit of the spirit that is absolutely critical for us to truly possess our souls and that is Patience. Patience can be defined as bearing pains or trials calmly or without complaint; manifesting forbearance under provocation or strain; steadfast despite opposition, difficulty or adversity.
As we cultivate patience in our lives, we develop the ability to go through stuff without losing our minds, running off at the mouth, and saying things we shouldn't say. It means that we develop the ability to not fall apart at every big and little thing that happens. The adversary of our souls is relentless. He comes against our minds everyday with something. If your enemy can keep you in a place where you never develop the mental stamina and patience under strain he will have successfully kept you from:
1. Fulfilling your purpose and destiny. You can’t fulfill your destiny if you have no self-control over your thinking, your mouth and your emotions.
2. Having the life promised to you in the Kingdom of God. You won’t have the patience to wait for God’s timing for the good things he has in store for you. You can sabotage what God is working to do in you because you just can’t wait, can’t keep your mouth shut, and can’t control your thinking.
How is patience developed?
Patience is developed after having gone through enough hell and trials until you finally get it. The only way patience is developed is to go through something that requires it.
Romans 5:3 And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope: and hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
The scripture above doesn’t make us happy. It doesn’t make us feel good. We don’t want to go through anything hard. Life is hard enough as it is. Why do we have go “glory” in tribulations? Why does everything have to be SO HARD all the time!
That’s just the way it is. To have a good life, you have to fight. If you want something, you have to do what it takes to have it. There are no short-cuts. There is no easy victory. The kingdom of God suffers violence and the violent take it by force (Matthew 11:12 KJV). In this instance, violence means persistence. It means being relentless to obtain the promises of God through patience in battle. Our adversary has no problem fighting. He fights every day without tiring. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal and they consist of prayer, praise and the Word of God. We can’t say one prayer for the whole week, wonder why all hell is breaking lose, why we can’t seem to keep it together, why we are all jacked up and anxious, and why we get all emotional and upset. We have to use our weapons above constantly with vigilance which requires….PATIENCE!
When we are being tested and tried, patience is being worked in us. Again, that is the only way to get patience. You can’t get it in a prayer line. You can’t go up to the altar and get anointed in prayer for patience. You will only have a greasy forehead, but no patience.
James 1: 3-4: The trying of your faith worketh patience. Let patience have her perfect work, that you may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.
Once patience is worked in you, you are perfect and entire wanting nothing. This means that you are matured and developed. Nothing the enemy throws at you can faze you.
How can I know that I am making progress in possessing my soul?
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 NIV
You know you are maturing in this area when a thought runs through your mind, and once you realize that the thought is not of God (it is negative and detrimental), you immediately know to cast it out of your mind, and not let it sit and fester. You no longer waste energy on ruminating over negative thoughts again and again. Where the mind goes, the rest of you will follow. You have learned that if you think about something too long, you will eventually act on it. And you have been burned enough in the past when you thought about something fearful, negative, evil, selfish, depressing, anxious, shameful, etc. then your emotions followed, then you acted and made a mess. You have learned that whatever you think about, if you think about it long enough and hard enough, eventually you will bring it about.
Philippians 4:8: Finally, brothers and sisters, 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.
We know that we are in control of our minds and emotions when we are able to walk out these verses on a daily basis in dependence on Christ and not in our own strength. We learn to think on God’s word and mediate on that. This is no easy feat and it requires daily surrender and the grace of God.
No matter where you are in this process, keep seeking the Lord. Lean on His strength. Be determined to walk into your true destiny in full and complete possession of your mind and emotions. Be determined and steadfast to grow into the full measure of the whole, mature and complete woman of God that you are called to be.
Maria Breeden has been an undercover writer for many years and has just recently obeyed her calling to write for the glory of God. She is a single mom, a full-time corporate bookkeeper and is actively involved in Reaching, Teaching and Releasing at New Hope Church in Durham, NC. Because of her life experiences in seeking outside sources for validation, love, and security, her passion is to help women become Rooted, Grounded, Fixed and Founded in the Love of God.
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