Do you ever deal with thoughts of confusion and doubt?
When you've been obedient to all Gods asked of you, yet things go from bad to worse?I found myself questioning if I was truly obeying God because I believed that by being obedient to him, my life would become easier, right away. What I didn't realize is it is usually the opposite. Opposition I have found is actually a sign of obedience. A tactic of the enemy is to use opposition to hit you hard, knock you down and keep you there.
Opposition: resistance
or dissent, expressed in action or argument.
There
is a great fallacy as believers that when we give our hearts to God
things automatically get better. The harsh truth is that
it usually gets worse before it gets better. I don’t say
this to alarm anybody, in fact if you have been walking with God for
any amount of time I’m sure you have already become aware of
this. I write this to encourage you and tell you that you
are going in the right direction.
Why Does It Get Worse Before It Get It Gets Better?
Why Does It Get Worse Before It Get It Gets Better?
- God allows it to test our faith in him
- We become forced to deal with our sin (past and present), choices and pain in order to be restored and be made whole.
- The enemy wants to destroy progress and healing and will put up roadblocks and opposition to make you become weary, discouraged and simply just give up.
Those Who Have Overcome Opposition:
Nehemiah: He
reconstructed Jerusalem’s walls in only 52 days despite heavy
opposition and personal attacks.
“I
sensed that God hadn’t sent this man. The so-called prophecy he
spoke to me was the work of Tobiah and Sanballat; they had hired
him. He had been hired to scare me off—trick
me—a layman, into desecrating The Temple and ruining my good
reputation so they could accuse me.
“O
my God, don’t let Tobiah and Sanballat get by with all the mischief
they’ve done. And the same goes for the prophetess Noadiah and the
other prophetswho have been trying to undermine my
confidence.”
The
wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of Elul. It had taken
fifty-two days. When all our enemies heard the news and all
the surrounding nations saw it, our enemies totally lost their nerve.
They knew that God was behind this work.”-Nehemiah
6:13-16 MSG
Helen Keller became deaf and blind before her second
birthday, yet she was the first deaf/blind person to read and write
and obtain a bachelor degree. She also fought against
inequality and poverty.
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it. My optimism, then, does not rest on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of good and a willing effort always to cooperate with the good, that it may prevail.” – Helen Keller
When
we give our hearts over to God and we diligent obey and walk with Him
we inherit some incredible tools; Favor and Grace. We
receive kindness, preference and honor wherever we go. This
can be in big or small ways. Doors (that have not opened
before or for others) suddenly fly open. People, who we
have never noticed us before, all of a sudden notice us. Not
because of our power, but because of Gods power and favor.
I
encourage any of you who are feeling discouraged and as though there
is opposition on every side of you, to keep pushing. Where
there is great opposition, there is breakthrough and blessing on the
other side.
“Therefore,
since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let
us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily
entangles, and let
us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let
us fix our eyes on Jesus, the
author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before
him endured the cross, scorning its shame,and sat down at the
right hand of the throne of God. Consider
him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so
that you will not grow weary and lose heart.” —Hebrews
1-3
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