Chambers talks today about battles, and I think about the kinds of battles I fight. There can be battles against sin in my life, sins that God has pointed out to me and that I have even acknowledged before him, and sometimes even before others. There can also be battles against going a certain way where God is leading. Whatever the specific battle, I realize that they fall into what Chambers is referring to today. He says:
"Our battles are first won or lost in the secret places of our will in God's presence, never in full view of the world. The Spirit of God seizes me and I am compelled to get alone with God and fight the battle before Him. Until I do this, I will lose every time. The battle may take one minute or one year, but that will depend on me, not God. However long it takes, I must wrestle with it alone before God, and I must resolve to go through the hell of renunciation or rejection before Him. Nothing has any power over someone who has fought the battle before God and won there."
There can be at least two distinct factors that come into play here. Will I acknowledge that I need to fight a particular battle and then will I fight it. It is fairly easy to agree with God that a certain area of my life needs help, but it is much harder to fight the battle to straighten it out.
The hardest battles to fight are those that, in my own mind and heart, appear to have some good in them, and that I really don't see a need to give up. After all, they define me.
But that is the major problem, ME. My standards of right and wrong, of better and best, or any other such choice. My struggles are not fought out in the public arena, but have to be a one on one with God Himself, and that takes a willingness to take that step with all its attendant consequences.
I want to struggle to get myself right, to shape up my life, but the problem is one of I, ME and MYSELF. I have met the enemy and he is me.
I can realize that I need to give up all rights to myself, but then comes the battle.
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