Discourage Discouragement!

Reading: 2 Corinthians 12:7-10

"Cast all your anxiety on God because He cares for you" (1 Pet 5:7)

Satan has found that discouragement is the most effective of all tools he employs against God's people. No saint in the Old or the New Testament could escape this. Otherwise how do you explain Prophet Elijah, a champion on Mount Carmel, becoming the coward of the worst sort the very next day under a juniper tree? It's the experience of men and women of God that they get dumped in discouragement usually following a mountaintop experience with God or a meritorious exploit done for His Kingdom.

Apostle Paul enjoyed abundance of divine revelations. But he was bothered by a thorn in the body. He calls it "a messenger of Satan" sent to beat him (2 Cor 12:7). How he wished he could get rid of it! He didn't casually pray about it but repeatedly "pleaded" with God that this pricking arrow of Satan would be removed from him. Instead of delivering Paul from this problem, God strengthened him to live with it. It was grief no doubt, but by the grace of God the mourning was turned into dancing! (vv 9,10). The devil was defeated again. Instead of burying himself under the heaps of discouragement and depression, Paul bounced up with a hilarious declaration, "When I am weak, then I am strong!"

Life was much simpler for the earlier generations. We are at the zenith of scientific and technological advancement. We now have more gadgets and facilities than ever. But the end result is a life filled with tension and anxiety. Diseases unknown to our forefathers have become common today. Satan uses all these to discourage God's people and depress them. But the Bible, which has answers to our problems of yesterday, today and tomorrow, teaches us to throw all our anxieties on God because He cares for us. Otherwise we will become an easy prey to our adversary the devil who "walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour!" (1 Pet 5:7,8).

Prayer however does not guarantee solution to all problems and deliverance from pain, but it does promise the peace of God which is beyond understanding (Phil 4:6,7). This is the joy of the Lord which becomes your strength to resist Satan steadfastly. The knowledge that every other saint suffers like you is another encouragement (1 Pet 5:9). Worry worry until worry worries you no longer!

Faint not, nor fear; His arms are near;

He changeth not, and thou art dear;

Only believe, and thou shalt see

That Christ is all in all to thee!