Psalm 30:1-2, KJV
I will extol thee, O Lord; for thou hast lifted me up, and hast not made my foes to rejoice over me. O Lord my God, I cried unto thee, and thou hast healed me.
I received an email yesterday from a person who made sexual advances to me. I became very angry and for about three minutes was tempted to answer the email and say some very unkind things to this person. Thank God that I did not follow through on my anger. Instead, I deleted the email and blocked the sender. Even though I didn’t say those unkind and criticizing remarks that I wanted to say to this person, I became very nauseous. Every time that I hurt Jesus, I get nauseous. No, I didn’t say the unkind things, but I thought them and that is just as bad.
I allowed that email to keep me upset for two hours until I realized that it was just another sneaky attack from satan trying to discourage me and keep me from serving Jesus. I prayed and asked God to forgive me for not going to Him immediately and asked Him to please help me.
It’s not how many times that we fall that matters; it’s how many times that we get back up that counts. This is exactly what satan is trying to do, keep us discouraged and defeated. We can choose to wallow in the pit of discouragement and defeat or we can choose to walk in victory with the help of our precious Saviour. However, Jesus can’t help us if we don’t allow Him to do so.
There are times in all of our lives when we are tempted to say unkind things in return when somebody says criticizing, cruel and sarcastic things to us. However this does not please Jesus. It makes Him very sad and it hurts Him that we are thinking these unkind thoughts about someone. We need to run to Jesus as soon as we realize that satan is attacking us once again and ask Him to please keep us from saying unkind things. He will be faithful to heal our hurting and broken hearts and once again restore peace and joy to our hearts.
What is so tragic and sad about this is that sometimes satan uses people that are very nice and sweet and the people don’t even realize that he is manipulating and using them. We need to keep our guard up and not allow satan to creep into our thoughts and our actions. Are you wallowing in defeat and discouragement because of the attacks of satan, or are you walking in victory through the help of our precious Saviour? He not only saves us from our sins; He protects and saves us from the attacks of satan.