“Let hope give substance to your faith

“We use God’s mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments. We destroy every proud obstacle that keeps people from knowing God. We capture their rebellious thoughts and teach them to obey Christ.”

2 Corinthians 10:4-5 NLT

Hope is the intense expectation of what you are waiting on the Lord for, as you are renewing your mind with His promises to you. It is the important element that keeps your thoughts in check, so that your faith will not go wary in the Lord. 

Your faith is strengthened by hope, even as the enemy fights against your thoughts from being established in those promises. Satan does this by making you to go wary in between, what your heart is believing God for and the negative thoughts, which he is injecting into your mind. He does this with the aim of creating doubts in you about the promises of God.

That’s why the scriptures says to you about God’s promises and oath:

“God did this so that, by two unchangeable things (the promises and the oath) in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where our forerunner, Jesus, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.”

‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭6:18-20‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Hope is that anchor of your mind or soul. It gives you strength against the negative thoughts from the enemy. It makes you firm and steadfast in your faith, even when the enemy keeps telling you, that you can never be able to make it. Hope keeps you hanging on the promises and oath of God to you. 

The way you can ever be able to take hold of hope in strengthening your faith, is by not taking hold of the negative thoughts.

Jesus said:

“Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?”

Matthew 6:25 KJV

And in another translation:

 “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?”

Matthew 6:25 NKJV

In a nut shell Jesus does not want you to “worry”, by not taking hold of those negative thoughts. That’s how you can take hold of hope. Therefore don’t take the “thought” and you won’t have to worry about it.

And by renewing your mind in the promises and oath of God, you’re being strengthened on the inner man. Renewing your mind with the word of God keeps your thought patterns healthy, even in the middle of the devil’s assault against you. It keeps you going on, when everything around you are signaling for you to quit. It gives you the confidence never to quit. 

This means that your physical body may be failing in health, but if you’re healthy in your thoughts about God’s promises of healing, you are sure on the way for your healing to manifest. Your bank account may be in the red, but if your thoughts are healthy towards God – as the One who delights in your prosperity (Psalms 35:27); then you know that everything is going to be okay. It’s just a matter of time before your prosperity begins to shine.

Don’t be ignorant of the devil’s schemes 

Watch out! Your enemy is subtle and cunning

You don’t have to wait until the enemy attacks you, before you know that you have to do something, about the way you’re thinking concerning your situation. The Bible says that, you have to constantly bring every one of his negative thoughts to you, down to the obedience of Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). You do this at the very moment when those thoughts comes to you. 

Don’t fold your arms, because everything looks good around you. The devil is not folding his arms. He is working 24/7/365 days to bring you down. Don’t even wait until his negative thoughts are manifesting what, he wants you to accept around you. 

Remember that the devil is always marketing thoughts, ideas and other things across your mind. And just because he is marketing his wares to you, doesn’t means that you have to even be entertaining anyone of his products for consideration. He is more aggressive and subtle than most telemarketers in the world today. He uses thoughts to manipulate people into believing his lies.

Paul once told the Corinthians:

“in order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes.”

‭‭2 Corinthians‬ ‭2:11‬ ‭NIV‬‬

“Schemes” are plans which are thought out very well by the devil, especially with the intent to do something illegal or wrong against you. The enemy knows you very well. He takes time out together with his host of demons to study you every day. He knows your level of seriousness with the Lord. 

He will use his schemes from the information that he has gathered about you, to make you fall in line with his own way of thinking concerning you. His ultimately goal is your failure. He never wants you to think or meditate on the promises or oath of God towards you. 

But the scriptures says that:

“You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.”

‭‭1 John‬ ‭4:4‬ ‭NIV‬‬

And:

… “Those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”

‭‭2 Kings‬ ‭6:16‬b NIV‬‬

That’s why you don’t have to fall for Satan’s “setup” against you. His schemes are very dangerous and subtle towards your thought patterns. He knows that if your thoughts are strong towards God, you can be strong in faith for anything that you want from God. 

He knows that your healing, financial breakthrough and everything that, you are waiting on the Lord to do for you; are within your reach if your thoughts are good and very strong concerning them. His schemes are targeted to make you weak in thoughts, so that your hope can’t give substance to your faith in God concerning those things.

That’s why Jesus said:

“Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them.”

‭‭Mark‬ ‭11:22-23‬ ‭NIV

Doubts and worrying are the direct results of the devil’s schemes towards your thoughts, about the promises and oath of God to you. They are fear based. The devil will manipulate your thoughts, so as to inject doubt and worrying in your life. 

Doubt and worrying will make your faith unproductive (James 1:6-8). They will make you negative in your thoughts, about your inheritance in Christ Jesus. Doubt and worrying will deprive you of your healing, prosperity and the wisdom of God. 

Don’t draw back from faith 

If you are not standing in faith, the enemy will use his schemes to bring you down

A lot of Christians do often endanger their faith by comparing their lives, with what they are seeing on the television and the social media. They are putting themselves on the same scale with the people of the world, based on what they have heard somewhere else, or had witnessed with other people. 

But you need to know that you are unique. Your case is different from others. That’s why too much television and those strong entanglements with the social media, will rob you of God’s very best. Be very careful with them. The devil will use anything to move you away from the promises of God.

You may need to move away from them, in order to make room for more time, to meditate on God’s promises and oath. That’s where you are situated. Those promises of God needs to be saturating your mind, and not what people are saying on the television or somewhere else. You do not live in that delusional world of fantasies. You live in the secret place of the Most High God (Psalms 91:1-3). Don’t let the devil steal your blessings away from you.

Satan is the god of this world. He has people who work for him around you. So don’t ever get yourself into entertaining the devil’s thoughts, that are being constantly presented to you by the world. Whatever you put up with is what you are affirming in your life. It will continue to get stronger and stronger, until you can’t handle it anymore. And eventually you’ll find yourself doing those very things, that you don’t really want to do. 

That’s exactly how the enemy deceives people into debts, poverty, sicknesses and other curses of this world. They had refused to renew their minds with God’s promises for their lives, in fighting the good fight of faith.

Don’t let the enemy defeat you with those negative thought patterns of the world. Your enemy is very manipulative and intense, in his assault against your thoughts. You must be resisting him on a regular basis, if you’re ever going to win against him (James 4:7). He will manipulate the truth of God’s word against your faith. And he is very smart and cunning about it. 

He was manipulative in pushing Adam and Eve (see Genesis 3:2-7), to sin against God. So what makes you think he can’t manipulate you? You are not immune from temptations. If he could try to manipulate scriptures against Jesus (Matthew 4:1-11); he surely will do the same thing to you.

Watch the thoughts on your mind

You are affirming whatever thought, that you are entertaining

Thoughts that are conceived in the mind may be dangerous, especially if the mind is not being renewed. But the thoughts from the spirit man of a child of God are different. That’s why Paul said:

“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”.

Philippians 4:8 NIV

You can’t basically fight thoughts with thoughts. It’s impossible to win against the enemy, without speaking words out of your mouth against his thoughts. You replace negative thoughts with words that are godly. The word of God out of your mouth is like a double edged sword. It has the power to penetrate thoughts, and bring them to the obedience of Christ (see Hebrews 4:12).

The heart is primarily the place of conception of the good things, that comes into your life. While the thoughts that are conceived in your mind, as a child of God gives you the strength into spiritual maturity. 

As your godly thoughts gets matured, the enemy will come against them. But if you will dare to stand strong, you will surely prevail against him. That’s why you can’t hold back from fighting the good fight of faith, with those godly thoughts from your heart. 

But for you to be able to get the negative thoughts out of your mind, you must return back to the basics of the scriptures. Renewing the thoughts of your mind as you are waiting on the Lord to reveal Himself to you, is vital to your victory. So don’t hold back.

Don’t ever hold back from the lifestyle of faith

Just keep on standing by faith. God is on your side

When you draw back in your thoughts away from the promises of God to you; you are actually drawing back from walking by faith before Him. This is what can deny any Christian of the blessing of the Lord. God can’t do anything without your faith in His promises. A believer who draws back from the lifestyle of faith does not please God. 

The Bible says:

“Now the just shall live by faith; But if anyone draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him.”

‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭10:38‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

The faith of a righteous man pleases God, because his actions shows what his faith is doing, in getting for him what’s on his heart. That’s what makes God to bless him. But a slothful believer will drag himself into doubtful and worrisome thoughts, that will hinder his ability to act on the word of God. The process of drawing back begins always with entertaining those negative thoughts. 

That’s why as a Christian you are not supposed, to be entertaining the negative thoughts from the devil. No matter what, he will keep advertising them to you. But don’t ever hold his thoughts in your mind. Let them go away by destroying them with words (2 Corinthians 10:4-5). By speaking clearly articulated and purposely targeted words out of your mouth, against those thoughts of the enemy; you are holding him captive until he becomes obedient to the Spirit of Christ.

Watch your thoughts therefore to build up your faith. Don’t let the enemy defeat you. Your victory is just around the corner. Keep on renewing your mind with God’s promises to you. Set your face like a flint on them (Isaiah 50:7), and never give up until you win.

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