So you have been praying and fasting. You have been to every church service and been in the word. Then you reach a point where it seems as if your prayers are not being answered, your fasting simply feels like starvation, you can't understand anything you read in the Word, and you're just going through the motions. Suddenly this tremendous low feeling overtakes you. You wonder if you are doing well enough. What is the meaning of life? Is God even seeing you? Has he rejected you?
This my dear friend is called the fire.
Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: - 1 Peter 1:6-7
Often the devil will seek to bring suggestions of failure and lowness. He does this by making it seem like God does not live up to His promises. These suggestions can bring such despair, that it makes it seem as if it's hard to talk to God or that God is in fact the problem. In these times, the devil is well aware of the power of God in your life if you simply encourage yourself in the truth. The JOY of the Lord is your strength. Being in the fire is a good opportunity to seek the joy of the Lord. You do this by simply submitting to the God's commandment to you as it relates to the situation. However, there is a trick that the devil often uses.
Knowing the power of the Joy of the Lord, the devil will seek to have you find counterfeit joy. He wants you to find something that will lead you out of the fire. Something to distract you from the heat. Something that will make you feel good for a while. Some of these sins are; anger, depression, sexual sins, smoking or drinking, chambering (laziness/wasting time), etc. These allow us to sulk and feel sorry for ourselves and for the fire we have to endure. However, this is a trick of the enemy.
The same enemy that will lead you into those sins, is the one that will accuse you when you have fulfilled your lust. The enemy does not want us happy. He wants us sinful. These sins, though they distract us for a while, will turn and destroy us. They rob us our hope in God. They create a false reality which seemingly cements that God is not listening. Though we thought they would attract God's pity, they cause us to feel even further away from Him. In these times we begin to pity ourselves, and make accusations that we have never and will never change. However we are looking at the wrong thing.
Your problem was not with the sin you fell into, it was with the fire.
Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin; - 1 Peter 4:1
The truth is, you have not taken on the mentality which says, you would rather suffer than to sin. The problem is that you have not agreed with God that the fire is good for you. That it is teaching you something you need. That it is refining you.
That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; - Phill 3:10
Though we may read our bibles a whole lot, we cannot truly know Christ unless we obey Him as we suffer for Him. It is in the fire, that the son of God will be revealed. However, you must first agree to endure. Even though it seems that God isn't there, He promised never to leave you. He is there with you till the end of the world. Trust Him, and wait on the Lord. When you do this, you would have resisted the devil, and he will flee. When He flees you will be able to see how shiny you have become, having been refined in the fire.
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