Strength is the way (Philippians 4:13; Luke 22:43). Getting more and more strength from God is the way to true security while we are still in this world and not yet in heaven. Because God is greater than any or all difficult circumstances or situations that we could ever face. No matter how many of them there are or how regularly they arise, no matter what our overall circumstances are at the time, having more and more strength from God within us is the way for us to overcome. God does not despise the weak the way a lot of strong people do. But when weak people and the (humanly) strong people humble themselves before God, keep asking God for strength (and help), and keep relying on God in faith, and get used to it, they are transformed inwardly and they become Christians that live in victory in spite of all the challenges. God is glorified in this! And this is how we get the help we need and we can help others to do the same. The weak people and the (humanly) strong people can all learn to have more and more of God’s strength and become strong. “let the weak say, I am strong” (Joel 3:10KJV) and let all believers say, “God is our refuge and strength” (Psalm 46:1), and “what can man do to me?” (Hebrews 13:6) and “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31).
More about strength from God below…(something I added later)
During our lives we face discomfort, stress, challenges of various kinds, and different kinds of pressure from difficult situations. Some people can handle more pressure than others and some can endure the emotional effects of pressure better than others. Some can endure intense trouble or ‘multitask’ many kinds of troubles better than others, but I (as one who has lived in this world and known God’s words) am persuaded that everyone has a limit and some people get pressed beyond it. Paul was pressed beyond his limit at least once and likely many times. Paul worked harder than any of the other Apostles and endured various kinds of injustice, extremely difficult situations, suffering, and yet he pressed on. I think Paul must have had a very strong will perhaps like that of an olympic athlete or an elite soldier in special forces, but he never would have been able to do what he did if God had not been empowering Him, guiding Him, helping Him. Jesus said, “…apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:15; that is we can do nothing for God’s will on earth that we further as born again Christians without Jesus). Yet, we use our will to start going in the direction of God’s will (God’s words) and then as we do so God’s helps us and empowers us. Some do this with more of God’s power working than others. The Holy Spirit is in us, but we are still human and feel overwhelmed or weak sometimes. Some may have a stronger will than others, but we can all feel overwhelmed at times.
(2 Corinthians 1:8-10) “We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about the troubles we experienced in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us,”
Paul said that they had “troubles” (plural) and were facing a death sentence which is likely more intense than what we are facing right now, but Paul and his coworkers relied on God, and God delivered them. They overcame their limits by relying on God and they believed that they could continue to rely on God for the rest of their lives. We should believe this as well as we overcome our limits by relying on God by prayers, by faith, by being careful to take the right actions according to scripture, and by being guided by God as we do so.
*In general, we need to rely on God by faith and prayers, but sometimes we may not get as much help from from God because we are trying to go in the wrong direction (Acts 16:7). But just a warning, I do think some Christians exaggerate about how much of the time this happens and some are proud and try to sound spiritual by saying ‘it’s not God’s will for you’ when it may not be against God’s will. God weighs the motives of the heart and some might say this out of jealousy, a desire to feel superior (more spiritual than you), a desire to control other people, ect. But others might say this sincerely because they really think it’s not God’s will for you (or is) and are mistaken or they might be right-maybe it really isn’t God’s will for you or maybe they will tell you they think something is and they could be right. Even a new Christian can be right about such things so don’t think that because you have been in Christ for longer than them them that this can’t possibly be. Maybe God wants to give special honor to the parts (individual Christians) that lacked it (1 Corinthians 12:23) or just work through everyone in the body of Christ and not always through the more experienced ones.
Knowing scripture, praying for guidance, and consulting mature Christians who understand the situation can help us figure out what God’s will is for us and if we might be in line with it or not. Ultimately, whether we get to know God’s will directly from God or through others Christians we know through God’s words and through the Holy Spirit. We (believers) have the Holy Spirit and so do other believers. Which is why we can figure out God’s will directly from the Holy Spirit and through others.
When we reach our limit we should pray for God to give us strength to go beyond it. We should pray for the strength to handle it and not just to survive, but to thrive. It may seem impossible now, but we should just keep trying to go in that direction of thinking, praying, and taking action. We can feel better about it as we go along.
Philippians 4:13 “I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.”
We need God to give us strength. How much strength? Depends on how much pressure we are under and how much strength we ask God for.
Since Jesus is the Word who became flesh and lived among us He too felt pressure even though He did not sin.
Mark 14:33-34 “He took Peter, James and John along with him and he began to be deeply distressed and troubled. He said, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death,” he said to them…”
The gospel of Luke reveals some additional details about what happened during this time.
Luke 22:42-44 “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.”
We can talk to God about anything, but we need to submit to His will. Sometimes doing His will or just living our lives is beyond our strength and that’s when God can give us strength to handle it. These are times when we should pray more earnestly, have patient endurance, and not give up. Jesus must have been praying very intensely for His sweat to be dripping off of Him like that. He did not fall apart or go to food or video games or other things for comfort, He to His Father who did not let Him down. But it took some time for Jesus to get the strength to go forward and do God the Father’s will. It will not be as difficult for us as it was for Jesus who paid for our sins with His own blood.
Luke 22:43 brings up an interesting question. Why was Jesus strengthened through an angel? (Gonna get sidetrack for a bit here to address this question and then I will get back the main point about strength from God)
Luke 22:43 “An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him.”
This may be a bit hard for us to understand. How is it that Jesus the Son, One person of the Trinity is getting strengthened through an angel? He’s much greater than any angel! The Son did the will of the Father. The Son became flesh and lived here on earth as a human being and lived according to God the Father’s will all His life. Flesh is subject to weakness, it’s a humble form, it’s limited, it must rely on God the Father to live spiritually and do God the Father’s will. So the Son relied on the Father when He became subject to the weaknesses of flesh (though He did not sin or have sinful desire). Jesus said while experiencing this weakness of flesh, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow even to the point of death,” (Mark 14:34) Some might think Jesus does not understand us. But, He does. He was here in this world suffering like us. More than us.
God the Father has a process for doing things. He could have chosen to have strengthened Jesus the Son another way, but He choose to do it through an angel maybe because of the way God planned for His angels to interact with humans in order to do His will on earth. Maybe this even applied to Jesus who came into such a humble form. The point is that God the Father strengthened the Son after He became subjected to the weakness of being in flesh-the point is not that God the Father used an angel to do it.
Tiny human beings crucified Jesus, it doesn’t mean they are greater than Jesus. God allowed it to accomplish His plan and let Jesus triumph over fallen angels by the cross and by His resurrection.
God the Father used an angel to give strength to Jesus the Son after He became flesh and was experiencing the weakness of flesh. But of course, Jesus is much greater than that angel or any angel.
Again, Jesus (the Son-One person of the Trinity )is so much greater than any of us and greater than any angel.
Hebrews 1:5 “For to which of the angels did God ever say, “You are my Son; today I have become your Father”? Or again, “I will be his Father, and he will be my Son”?”
Angels are servants, ministering spirits who serve the King and serve the subjects of the King and these angels carry out God’s will (the part of God’s will that is for angels to carry out). So a servant angel served the King of Kings (Jesus the Son) by appearing and strengthening Him since the Son had become subject to the weakness of flesh. The angel did what God the Father wanted. And Gods wants to give us strength too so that we can accomplish the will of God the Father for each one of us and so we can please our Lord Jesus Christ. As the Father sent Jesus so Jesus sends us. The Father and the Son love us and the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are One.
Well, more about strength from God.
Acts 18:23 “After spending some time in Antioch, Paul set out from there and traveled from place to place throughout the region of Galatia and Phrygia, strengthening all the disciples.”
Why should they be strengthened? I suppose because it pleases God, is better for their souls, and because the world is spiritually against them and will put pressure on them (Matthew 7:24-27). Let them be stronger so they can endure the pressure. Let them be stronger so they can do God’s will successfully. How could these disciples be made stronger? By sharing God’s words with them-I suppose more deeply and more holistically and perhaps by reminding them of what they already kn0w.
And by praying for them with all kinds of prayers and requests (Ephesians 6:18, Colossians 4:12-13). More reason why we should train ourselves to pray deeply often and for long periods of time throughout our lives. Why? Because we need to be strengthened and we need to strengthen others.
We should study various parts of the Bible deeply and let those words dwell in our souls richly (Colossians 3:16) and keep improving our ability to share with others. Pastors, teachers, evangelists, and Church leaders have more of a responsibility to do this, but we all need to do this so that we are all strong. In the early Church everyone shared God’s words with others because it was God’s will and nothing has changed about God’s will since then. After Stephen was martyred in the book of Acts “…all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria” (Acts 8:2) and Acts 8:4 says “Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went.” Which clearly indicates that all believers should share God’s words and not just Pastors, evangelists or teachers. Acts 8:2 and Acts 84 seem to have a greater emphasis on evangelism (also Colossians 4:6), but we can see in Romans 15:14 “I myself am convinced, my brothers and sisters, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with knowledge and competent to instruct one another.”, we can see that believers can and should share God’s words with each other. The more often they do this the stronger they are going to be. We can be strengthened by receiving God’s words from others and by sharing God’s words with others. But we receive and don’t share we are going to be weaker and less inspired by the Holy Spirit. “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:31) so feed your neighbor the word of God and not just yourself. The Holy Spirit will be more active in your life if you do this.
*When you share God’s words with others try to be polite, respectful, and if possible share it in a way they will like receiving it and not hate hearing it from you. Many pastors are quite good at this so study what they do when they preach to get people to agree with things in God’s words that may be hard for some people to accept and you can try it. It’s not just what you share, it’s how you share it. It’s not a way to be self-righteous or feel superior. The kind of character with which we share God’s words is important too.
Again, speaking God’s words to others often can make us strong. Think of how strong Paul was and consider that he spent a lot of time speaking God’s words to others.
Acts 20:7 “On the first day of the week we came together to break bread. Paul spoke to the people and, because he intended to leave the next day, kept on talking until midnight.”
I am pretty sure Paul was not talking about the latest fashions in Rome, but about God’s words. We can also see that Paul witnessed from morning till evening in Acts 28:23. In Revelation 12:11 God’s words say “And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony…” Though the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour and though he comes up with schemes to bring us down, the Church overcame him, not only by the blood of the Lamb (not only by salvation), but by the word of their testimony. By speaking God’s words. How often? The more the better. We don’t have to do it as much as Paul did, but we should do it often. How often? Maybe not on the way to first base if you are playing baseball. Maybe not to the car next to you while driving on the freeway. Maybe not all night on the phone instead of sleeping and then later you collapse while at work. Maybe not while you are cooking if you working as a chef and you can’t multitask well and you mess up your recipe….but let’s speak God’s words often. Often in your spare time and whenever it’s wise to do so. I think that even Paul said, “pass me the spoon” or maybe “wow, that’s delicious” sometimes (although it wasn’t necessary to put those things in the Bible). Let’s speak God’s words often so that we are stronger.
It’s a good idea to study God’s words with the intent of sharing much of what we learned or felt convicted about with others later and to share these words by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (though if we don’t feel inspired we should share anyway, just share accurately.) Colossians 3:16 “Let the word of Christ dwell in your richly, teaching and admonishing one another with all wisdom…” With what wisdom? God’s wisdom to help us understand God’s words (Mat. 13:23, 1 Corinthians 2:6-16) and help us share them with others during appropriate moments and share well. James 1:5 “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.” And let’s keep asking God until we get it-consider Luke 18:1-8. If even an unjust judge who doesn’t care could eventually be worn down into using his authority to give a helpless widow what she needs, how much more would God who does care and loves us give us what we keep asking Him for when we keep praying determined to get the answer and don’t t give up? If we have come to believe in Jesus as our Lord and our Savior of course God will answer.
So don’t just study and share God’s words, but pray to understand them and share them by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and with God’s wisdom, but you don’t have to wait until you feel inspired to share, in fact you may start to feel inspired by the Holy Spirit after you start sharing. I get the word “inspired” from the New King James Version of the Bible (I also used the NIV, ESV, and NLT on this page). 2 Timothy 3:16 “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness;” The Holy Spirit gave the prophets of the Old Testament (1 Peter 1:10-12) and the apostles of the New Testament exactly what to say and how to say it (in the Bible) and we cannot add anything to it or take anything away from it, but we can understand it and share it by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (yes, and our Lord Jesus spoke by the Holy Spirit as well-even Jesus worked with the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirt came upon Him at the Jordan river just before He started His ministry like the way Israelite kings were anointed with oil during Old Testament times).
Studying God’s words often makes us stronger. Psalm 1:2-3 “but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—whatever they do prospers.” Joshua 1:8 “Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.” 1 John 5:4 “for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.” Our faith in what? Our faith in God’s words. And faith comes by hearing (or studying in some way) Romans 10:17 “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”
Can we have easily have faith in something that bores us or isn’t interesting to us or doesn’t move our hearts? When some of us first got married our love for our spouse was strong. But later some of us just didn’t feel that strong love or emotional attraction nearly as much. But keeping that love strong is essential for a good marriage. In the same way, we should keep encouraging ourselves, influencing ourselves and praying that we keep our love for God strong, and our love for God’s words strong as well. Since we love God we should love His words and we should keep being interested in God’s words, keep enjoying them, and make studying them our hobby. Something we treasure in our hearts. If we start to not feel that way, lets pray and influence ourselves to feel that way again. A person that is very bored by the Bible and sits down to read it for a few hours won’t get nearly as much out of it nor will they be nearly as empowered by God in their lives. Loving God’s words, being interested in them, and enjoying them helps make us stronger. And let us especially continue to enjoy reading about the gospel of our salvation (notice that Paul mentions grace at the end of almost all of the letters he wrote by the Holy Spirit). Let us especially enjoy reading about our salvation and reading about the Son, the Father, and the Holy Spirit. Other topics in the Bible like king Josiah have value, but there’s a few people that are bored by the gospel and Jesus and excited about Old Testament genealogies or things like that. Their priorities are off so their faith is weaker in my opinion. I believe God will be pleased about us studying anything in the Bible, but let’s not overdue it or have a heart for everything, but the gospel and Jesus in the Bible. I think that would make us weak. I guess most Christians don’t have their priorities off like this, but there’s at least a few.
Why do we need to be stronger? Here’s another reason. When the Church starts losing more than it’s winning, the number of disciples decreases in a region or in a country…or the number of believers who live according to God’s will decreases. But if we put in the time and effort for God and for other souls because Christ’s love compels us we can turn this around. Gideon was surprised that God wanted to work through him because he thought he was of small account, but God made his choice and it wasn’t for nothing. In spite of all the challenges that Gideon faced, he didn’t give up along the way, he kept being guided and encouraged by God and fulfilled God’s will in His life and we can too. We might not think much of ourselves (we should not think too much of ourselves either), but with God we can do it, but we need to keep going in the direction of God’s will, studying the scriptures deeply, and praying earnestly. Let’s turn things around and improve them greatly in our lives. Let’s succeed in doing God’s will for the Church in our regions, our countries, and in the world. We are the light of the world and no one can put us out.
Another way to be stronger.
Philippians 4:8 “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”
Thinking about Jesus, about heaven, looking at the bright side of anything we can think of, and being thankful to God for that helps us to be emotionally stronger, mentally stronger, and help us have faith whereas looking at the bad things about our situation can have the opposite effect and make us doubt, worry, fear, ect. We should think about the negative things and bad situations just long enough to pray about them, approach them with faith, come up with solutions, take action to resolve them with God’s help and then mostly think positive and in faith. This helps us stay strong. Think sad thoughts all day and you will almost certainly get depressed. Think happy thoughts all day and you will almost certainly be happy. Think of how good God is all day and you will love God. Think of all the bad stuff that happened to you and think ‘where were you God’ all day and you will likely feel more distant from God….ect. of course there is more to our emotional, mental and spiritual state than this, but this aspect can really influence us a lot. I think this is also why the devil and world throw hard situations at us, not just to hinder us or to steal, kill and destroy at the moment they come, but to get us thinking negatively afterward so more vulnerable to the next attacks.
I told a Pastor years ago “I am getting attacked’ and he looked at me like he didn’t like what I was saying and he told me to “attack”. He meant that I should attack the enemy. That’s what the people of God did in the book of Joshua and that’s what we should do spiritually in New Testament times. Still, I understand that sometimes it feels very hard and sometimes it even feels impossible to think this way when things have been so hard for so long. We might think, ‘who are they to judge me since they don’t carry nearly as much weight as me and haven’t been in my shoes?’ Well, people are not always so sensitive about your feelings when you are heavily burdened and they are not, but whether things are utterly difficult or not, whether you feel totally worn out and weary or not, start moving back toward a better mindset even before things get better. It’s not going to hurt or make things worse. Rather it will help you change your mind and heart so you can be effected by God’s words and the Holy Spirit more easily and then your situation can change. more easily. God is a merciful God. He’s filed with compassion and mercy. Things may change even before you get into this better mindset and emotional state, but even so, try to improve your mindset and emotional state. As Arnold Schwartzenegger once said, “Do it! Do it now!” (Ok some of his movies are anything but Christian, but we should do it now! haha)
Some have criticized some Christian leaders for suggesting that our thoughts and words create our reality in our lives. I would like to be more specific than some of them and say that our mindset, emotional state, and words effect how much we are effected by God’s words and how much faith we have in them. God’s words contain God’s promises which apply to various situations that we go through in our lives. **We do not create additional words of God or additional promises of God with our thoughts, our emotions or our words.** But, we experience the promises of God when our thoughts, our emotions, our words, and actions are as such that God’s promises are manifested in our lives by our faith in God’s words. I feel like clarity on this topic helps us avoid dangerous misunderstandings and helps us Christians get along with each other better. Unless of course you think you can add to God’s promises or you are against God’s promises. Let’s just go with what the Bible says about this so we can get along with each other and do well in our Christian lives. Christians are fighting each other while the number of believers is greatly declining in some places.
Strengthened through prayer.
We should not be looking at Jesus with strained eyes, but with a restful gaze. … said it takes the joy out of our…
As I wrote below, humble ourselves and focus on grace several times a day at least.
Above, mention more about minor Biblical topics sometimes we may need to listen to a Christian book or read it, listen to sermons, listen to OT books and other topics in the Bible to get interested again, but soon excited about the main topics again.
God is concerned about everything about us and wants us to enjoy and be happy and be thankful with the good things He gave us. They ate together with glad and sincere hearts. And I think they would give thanks as Paul did on the ship.
We should not think applying ourselves for God is bad with our will and efforts, but as we do it we should not do it out of our pride, but out of dedication to God, love for God, to glorify God, to love souls because Christ’s love compels us. There are many motivations that would please God. Some of us may focus more on one or more good motivations based on our individual personalities, heart for God, and experiences in life that shaped us. But we learn to not do it out of pride, to not do it thinking we are earning our salvation, we do it with an awareness that God is helping us go beyond our limits, working through us so we give the credit to Him. We work and He works, but the part that He does is so much more impressive and important. We are just servants. blessed. It’s God’s will and part of His plan for us to take action.
It’s hard to pray sometimes. I might compare it to running when we feel tired and want to stop and walk and then you no longer want to walk and you stand still. Then we are no longer moving at all. Praying can be like that. We start out praying and it may feel easier enough to do, then we start to feel like it’s kinda hard to keep praying and we are not praying as well and then we may even just sit or stand quietly and not be praying at all (my intention is not to judge people or burden people here and I hope you don’t do that either). Think of how good our lives can be and our Churches can be if we pray for longer, pray more often, and pray better…just one person doing that can make a huge difference. So heres’s a few tips. Pray that you can pray. When you find it hard to pray, keep asking God to help you pray.
You don’t have to ask for things the whole time that you pray, you can talk to God part of the time. So, if you are not sure what to pray for you can start talking to God until you think of something to pray for. You can also talk to God and then start praying.
Pray for Church leaders. They strengthen souls and make disciples so they are important (though we are all important).
Pray for souls to be saved.
I think it’s a good idea to take some time (several times a day at least. To humble ourselves before our Almighty God who is so very great compared to us and yet loves us so much. And to take some time to think deeply about His grace and the gospel of His grace by which we stand. I think God will not help us as much when we are proud. Being humble helps put us in a mindset of reliance on God whereas pride tends to do the opposite. There are many verses in the Bible that reveal to us that God does not like pride. Surely pride has bad effects on us and reduces God’s power and working in our lives. I knew a Missionary whom God worked through to heal sick people. Then, all of a sudden, God was not working to heal through Him. God soon let him know that he had become proud. God does not heal or work through us for our glory, but for His glory. Some preach well with God’s help, some do well in their jobs with God’s help,….., but if we want to keep getting His help, let’s stay humble, stay focused on the gospel of God’s grace and keep relying on God.
Some might get a bit anxious and think. Oh no, if I try hard at preparing a Bible study or studying in school or helping my family or performing tasks at work I might be relying on myself… It’s good to use our will do try our best to do things successfully, but aknowledge that we do everything better with God’s help, He helps us as we do it,
** Added note: (Technically, I’m a Missionary, I’ve been in charge of a Church and of different ministries before while abroad-and of some parts of Churches while in the USA. I have a calling to be a Pastor that does Missionary work, but I haven’t been ordained as a Pastor yet. Just being straightforward with everyone here because this section of the site says, “Pastor’s Blog”. I do currently communicate with Pastors who were in Christ before I was. Titles matter more to some people than to others and God directed that a system of Church leadership should be in place, so I am just letting people know (for those that care about such things) that I may not be doing things exactly the way they are done in some Church denominations, but I keep aiming to them within a Biblical framework. I think that if you accept the way other denominations are doing it, you should also accept the way I am doing it as well. Most Christians have no problems with a Missionary leading a Church while abroad, but they might have a problem with a Missionary doing that in the USA and getting ordained as a Pastor a little bit later along the way. If you accept one, you should accept the other. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Lets be flexible (within a Biblical framework) so we can have a greater harvest.
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