When I was a little child, I knew when it was time for the early morning service by the sound of the church bell. In those days, not every household had a clock. One day, I found it was difficult to get out of bed, even after I had been woken by the sound of the bell. I muttered to myself half asleep, ‘I will go to the early morning service…’. But I could not overcome the tiredness that pressed my whole body.
One day, I made up my mind not to miss the early morning service. I went to church 30 minutes earlier than the deacon who rang the church bell in the early morning. I made up my mind to ring the bell for the early morning services. By taking this as my mission, I could wake up easily in the early mornings.
Our faith life should be a “Winning Life” These days, many Christians cannot win the victory in their faith life. During their prayer time, they are constantly distracted and fail to pray. When we are obsessed by our own tiredness, we consider whether we should go to sleep or continue to pray. We keep fighting in our own minds during our prayer time.
The main reason that we lose the spiritual fight is because of our sinful minds. Our flesh craves comfort – so when our minds control our lives, we cannot keep our soul in the spiritual battle. The mind of sinful man is death (Romans 8:6).
The mind of sinful man destroys and abuses your soul to lead your soul to death. Every single day, we should have in our minds that we are to win the spiritual battle. The Devil, our enemy, always tries to take the chance to take you down and kill you. When he takes even a small space in our heart, he attacks you.
The enemy is not only outside you – he is also inside you. The enemy leads you to live for your own flesh, as well as rationalizing and justifying your sins and failings. While your body lives on things made by the earth, your soul should live on the spiritual things that God provides for your soul that He made.
We fight many spiritual fights in our lifetime. We should never lose the battle of faith. When we lose the spiritual battle, our faith life goes backward. Therefore, we should win the victory.
Pastor Seok-Jeon Yoon
Extracted from Yonsei Newspaper #607
