Lord, Help Me To Stay Saved!

From the moment that you accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior the battle begins for your soul. Satan does not want to give you up so he intensifies his efforts to “keep you”; the battle becomes one of colossal proportions because your “win or loss” determines your eternal resting place. For any battle there has to be preparation; things we do before we find ourselves on the “battle field”. I served eight years in the Army and I can attest to this personally: Before there is a conflict and our military is called into action there is training that takes place. From the time you enter the military they are preparing you for one thing- war. Basic training is designed to teach you discipline, endurance, and survival skills so if you find yourself in the thick of battle you are not totally lost. Well, in Christendom we have to prepare for battle as well only it's a different kind of battle. The battle can be anywhere; in your flesh, your home, or even your place of employment. When we go into battle we have to first be able to identify (recognize) the enemy; you have to know who your enemy is. The enemy is not your husband, your wife, your mother or father (this includes the in-laws), your kids or even your sisters and brothers. The enemy is not the woman at church or the man on your job. Ephesians 6:12 tells us, “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” It does not matter who you have a problem with in this world the root of that problem is always Satan. He goes by many different names: He is the devil, the father of lies, a deceiver, the accuser, tempter, destroyer, ruler of demons and the list goes on. One thing to remember is that even though the enemy is real and has many capabilities he cannot stop the will of God in our lives but he can hinder it by causing us to get out of the will of God. His eternal resting place has already been determined so his goal is to take as many people as he can with him to hell. Once we have established who the enemy is we realize that he has very real power but we can rest in the fact that he has already been defeated. When Jesus was crucified He descended to hell and took the keys from Satan forever “settling the score” (see Revelations 1:18 and Ephesians 4:9). We already know that we have the victory so we have to walk in that but first we have to learn how to and that's what I am going to help you do. So how do we gain victory in this battle?? Have a consistent and effective prayer life Let's start off by saying that prayer is always our most powerful and effective weapon [that we can have in this battle] no matter what it is that we're dealing with; it should be our first and last resort. I heard someone say when we think that we can do something on our own [without the help of Christ/Holy Spirit] we are insulting Him. Somebody says, “Oh, I would never do that!” Well, when we start our day without prayer that is essentially what we are saying: “God, I don't need your help today, I got it.” Prayer is our life line to God…this is how we communicate with Him; it's how we come to know Him in an intimate manner and how we come to know His will. Not only is it vital to our Christian walk it is also a commandment! The Bible tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 to “pray without ceasing” (KJV). If we are to be Christ like then we are to follow His example. There are numerous accounts in the Gospels where we see that Jesus prayed (see Matthew 14:23, Mark 6:46, Luke 6:12 and John 14:16... to name a few). If He, being God in the flesh, had to pray who are we as mere humans to think that we can call ourselves saved and then go out to deal with the world and not be prayed up? Because this is one of the most important things in our Christian walk it is also the area where the enemy fights us the most. Think about it, when you are a babe in Christ you start off praying and just about all your prayers are being answered quickly so you love to pray. Then as you start to mature in Christ your prayers are still being answered (if they be in the will of God) but more time passes between the time you prayed and when God finally answers (that's a whole other lesson but if you have been saved for any length of time I'm sure I got an “amen” there). Then when you see your prayers aren't being answered [quickly] your prayer life becomes less of a priority and then before long you only pray when you find yourself going through. Oh, we have all been there. (But the more we mature we get the prayer life back under control, right??) Or what about when you have your set prayer time and someone always calls you right before that time? Or better yet, when you make it to your prayer time and then a million things start jumping in your mind about what you forgot to do and then you become preoccupied? Someone knocks on the door, the neighbor stops by...and the list goes on and on. Can I get an amen?