Previous Challenge Entry (Level 3 - Advanced)
Topic: BUG (04/06/17)
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TITLE: Dealing with the Darkness | Previous Challenge Entry
By Stanley McMahon
04/13/17 -
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As the base for a mission team of twelve from several thousand miles North and West, it was bereft of home comforts. The family that lives there and runs it had done their best in preparations, but they were still struggling under the loss of the husband just six months before, due to cancer. Their grief was palpable and they were battling to regain stability.
The shower was intermittent, as was the electricity. The bedrooms were spartan but adequate. We divided into natural groupings. The two couples had a room each, the two men roomed together; the three ladies had a room and I got the Sea Room. That left another room for Gary and his son Isaac.
After the first night, we compared notes on how each of us had slept and the surroundings and facilities available. Gary had been bitten and his back was covered in sores, but the culprits, try as he might, to find them, were nowhere to be seen.
Later that day, he procured a spray to deal with what he assumed were mites of some description. The result was impressive. The mites came to the fore and it turned out that by laying his body down on the infected mattress, he had been offering himself as a tasty dish of Irish food. Unseen, but making their presence felt.
It’s the unseen things that are often most difficult to deal with in life. Take Cain, for example. On the face of it, the world should have been his oyster. He was the firstborn of the firstborn man, the son of the original First Lady, and he had a younger brother to look after and have as a companion. But something invisible lurked in the background.
Their first encounter with the Lord had not gone well. As he sat brooding over it, the Lord came and showed him how to handle the situation better, before the situation got a hold of him. The invisible was seeking to dominate him, and he needed to resist it.
But Cain knew better than the Lord and went with his own plan. He couldn’t stand being second, so he put himself first and tried to quell the bitterness in his heart by crushing his brother. He made three common mistakes.
1. He didn’t listen.
2. He didn’t deal with the darkness.
3. He didn’t back down.
A number of years ago, Bob Dylan penned these words: ‘I don’t know which is worse – doing your own thing or just being cool.’ Cain did both; he did his own thing and lost it all. He chose not to listen, not to deal with the invisible darkness that was seeking to devour him. He chose not to submit to the Lord.
Gary could have changed room, changed bed or found some other solution, but he chose to deal with the invisible. We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalities and world rulers in this present darkness. Whether it’s the invisible power of personal sin, or our spiritual nemesis, we need to stand against them, protect ourselves with armour of God and crush some bugs in our lives, in the power of His might. There is victory in Jesus, but we can only apply that and enjoy it, when we first bow to His way and not ours.
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