he DIDN'T WIN

1st Peter 1:3-7

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith-of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire-may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.


The refiner's fire.

Sarah Moore is the one who reminded me of these verses and was yet another confirmation that God is testing my faith in Him. It has not been an easy process.......in fact it has been down right painful at times. But what God is teaching me is that I must stand on His truth and not on what I feel or on what some one else says that God has for me!! It's funny and sort of ridiculous how you can know something, but until you actually experience it for your self, you really don't know the true meaning of it.
Satan has brought one blow after the other. He has used everything he can to get me to doubt God. He has over whelmed my mind with doubt to the point that I literally felt physically sick! He has even used someone that I am close to and respect very much to try and turn me away from what God has told me - telling me that God told them this and it was completely opposite from what God had told me!! This has been very hard!!
Something that was hard to deal with was that God told me that He was not going to stop Satan from attacking me. But that I had to stand on what HE had told me, even if my mind began to waver and my stomach was in knots. God told me that he was allowing me to go through a testing time and teaching me to stand on his word, rather than relying only on whether or not I "feel" like it's the right thing!! In my heart I never doubted. But my mind had other idea's. But I resisted the enemy's lies and FINALLY Sunday night after church I felt Satan give up and back off.

I am very much aware that he will be back............but he didn't win!!! And this has made my faith stronger!! So I will be better equipped for the battle when I should face it again. But it hasn't been easy!! It is a horrible feeling to think that you are outside of God's will when you were SO sure that you were doing exactly what He wanted!! But it's during those times that the lies come the hardest. If Satan can get you to doubt, he demobilizes you with fear - Keeping you from doing the very thing that God has called you to do!! And robbing you of the blessing of joy that comes with walking with the Father!!
So we must not let him steel our Joy. And we must keep pressing in and getting deeper into Him. For there is NOTHING better than knowing God in a very intimate way!!



Natalie Y Hill