129 Beware Guilt!

Meaning: “conveying a significance that is not directly expressed . . .”

Spiritual Warfare is fraught with many challenges to the abundant, meaningful life, Gentle Reader. In Blog #127, we saw that the Enemy engages in cosmic and earthly aggression—battles in the heavenly places and battles visible and invisible on earth. We also saw that, in fact, he intrudes in our personal life and in the public arena to fuel the flames of spiritual warfare. In Blog #128, we saw that he seeks to replace God’s influence with his own. Therefore, in this blog we are going to look at ways to resist, refute and rebuke the Trickster—his aggression and his influence. (In a nutshell, we do that by holding our thoughts, our feelings and our will captive to the Lord Jesus. But more on that in a bit.)

Nothing is more challenging for the believer to confront than a tangle of truths, half-truths, and outright lies, Gentle Reader—which is what spiritual warfare is all about. Most of the challenges faced by believers are masked in the ordinary—he-said-she-said disputes, or I-didn’t-see-that-one-coming situations, why-me circumstances, and what-if or if-only speculations, to name a few. But believers are fortunate indeed in that God’s Word in Scripture keeps the truth available to us at all times and is meant to be used to sort-out our disputes, situations, circumstance and speculations (non-believers do not have such power at the ready for them).

So let’s explore how this works using guilt as an example. Guilt is your classic if-only spiritual battle. If-only I hadn’t done this or if-only I had done that, and so on. The Trickster frequently uses guilt as a weapon of spiritual warfare against believers; he manipulates by deluging the believer with never-ending guilt based on a tangle of truth, half-truths and lies. His goal? To prevent the believer from living an abundant, meaningful life. His hope? To so demolish the believer’s confidence in God’s promises that he “drops out,” so to speak—loses heart, loses faith.

To resist this ploy requires one be expert and practiced at receiving and employing God’s provisions and protections against the erosion of endlessly burdensome guilt. (Note: Conscience in the believer is a God-given diagnostic tool meant to be governed by Holy Spirit; Guilt in the believer is an inappropriate distortion of the application of Conscience.)

Seven Right Responses to Spiritual Warfare in the Form of Guilt:

One, right response means listening to God and what He says. Find out what God says, keep it in mind, and remember it when facing an intimidating snarl of thinking. In the case of guilt, self-loathing and succumbing to guilt-trips are contrary to the way God wants one to live one’s life. He wants one to let PEACE control one’s life (Colossians 3:15a, NKJV; “And let the peace of God rule in your hearts . . .”)!

Two, right response to guilt means resistance (James 4:7b, NKJV; “Resist the devil and he will flee from you.”). Right response to the onset of a bout of guilt in the believer is, most pointedly, to fend it off by remembering God’s promises and practices (Isaiah 1:18, NKJV; “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow.”). Guilty thoughts in the believer are inappropriate to the “keep-moving” mandate of the believer (Philippians 3:13, NKJV; “forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead”). They are Satan’s fiery darts (Ephesians 6:16, NKJV; “above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench the fiery darts of the wicked one.”).

Three, right resistance to fiery darts means to rebuke such thoughts with word from Scripture. Say, out loud, “Scripture says—and put in God’s word to replace the accusation of guilt. Right response to fiery darts means to not entertain such thinking, Gentle Reader. It means to get tough on thinking contrary to God’s. It means to refute such thinking and is always the right response for followers of good (Mark 1:25, NKJV; “But Jesus rebuked him saying, ‘Be quiet and come out of him.’”).

Four, right response means to consciously stay on the right path, the path Jesus prepares for one in thinking, emotion and action. God wants us to consciously practice His path-keeping disciplines. Living under the burden of guilt is not the path for the believer (to do so then amounts to false guilt--feeling guilty when God tells you not to), Jesus’ path leads on to greater things. The power to move on comes from Jesus through Holy Spirit (James 4:8, NKJV; “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands. you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”).

Five, right response means trusting that one is not alone in the daily effort of spiritual warfare. Jesus lives, Gentle Reader! Our faith lives! Our future in Christ is immediate and active and right response means that it is vital to remember Christians are “can-do” people—we step out in faith and God steps into our life (James 4:10, NKJV; “Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.”)! In the words of the old song, Attentive Listener, I am always picking myself up, dusting myself off, and starting all over again (and again) in Christ Jesus. And I bless the Lord Jesus for His encouragement and support.

Six, right response to spiritual warfare and especially guilt means one needs to be very familiar with God’s promises, protections and provisions in order to respond rightly (Ephesians 1:3, NKJV; “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.”).

Seven, right response in spiritual warfare means remembering that what truly matters is not what we do, it is what Jesus has done. Guilt has no place in the believer’s life. Jesus has dealt with our guilt and it is done. It is our riches in Christ that matter most (Ephesians 1:18, NKJV; “the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints [believers].”)!

To understand these truths means abundant and meaningful life. It means to learn respect for God, one’s self and others. It means to realize the demands a follower of good must meet every day. It means to learn to be more easy on oneself and others and to look to Jesus for support through trying times.

Scripture promises that Jesus has made a way through all this mess of the fall and He has accomplished our forgiveness. Scripture promises that when we embrace His work and ways, enjoying the powerful and privileged position that we have in Christ, we make life better for self and others.

The Trickster would have us miss these points. He would have us drown in guilt. And too many choose to stay burdened with guilt. Guilt is a defeating trap. Contrary to God’s will, it creates misunderstanding, confuses and misleads, dimming Christian “shine.” Make no mistake, Jesus has set us free of guilt (John 8:36, NKJV; “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.”). Beware guilt!

Dr. Stanley also said in the immediately following sentence to his quote above, “He sent His Holy Spirit to indwell, equip, and empower believers so they can reach their God-given potential. We can choose to cooperate with this plan or to live independently of His best.”

To be continued . . .