Psalm 18:37
37 I have pursued [radaph] mine enemies, ['oyeb] and
overtaken [nasag] them: neither did I turn
again [shuwb] till they were consumed. [kalah] KJV-Interlinear
37 I
pursued my enemies and overtook them, And I did not turn back until they were
consumed. NASB
All of your life, you
will live in a live battlefield. The
battle of life is ongoing, and will never end until God removes you from this
life, which is to say, when God removes you from the battlefield.
And even though you may
never see any physical conflict in a battlefield sense, the ongoing battle is
one of the spiritual realm, not of this world.
This is not a war of guns
and beach landings and battleships and planes and rockets and such. This is a spiritual battle of ideas, between
good and evil, and you are exposed to it every moment of your life, from the
day of your birth, to the day of your eventual death.
We have studied the
concept of parables. The entire Bible is
full of parables, or living real world examples that teach spiritual
principles.
And since the battle
began with Satan and his rebellion against God, so this worlds history has been
filled with real world historical wars and battles that can be used to illustrate
how you should function within your spiritual war.
War in this world is
caused when evil raises its head and good has to do something about it.
If good did nothing, then
evil would bring havoc and pain and suffering and ruin on everyone. Thus war is the good side of life, bringing
evil under control or at least into check.
Those who oppose war, are fools, since they are in effect saying that evil
should rule and good should surrender to evil.
But from the Biblical
point of view, war has to be the stand that is mandated in order to control or
to get rid of evil.
And so when good goes to
war, it needs to conduct that war in accordance with several principles, in
order to win that war.
David followed those principles
and he won most of his battles and all of his wars.
The first principle is
that of offense. No defensive posture
ever won a war. Offense if the only
posture that brings a battle to its successful conclusion. And thus David
pursues his enemies.
The word for pursue, ‘radaph,’
means to continually pursue, to run after, to put to flight, to push and push
and push until the action is completed.
In World War 2, when the Allies
landed in Normandy and Southern France, and Itally, they pushed and pushed and
pushed until the entire war was ended.
They kept on pushing, leaving the enemy virtually no time to regroup, to
recover, to reorganize. Only when the
Allies let up, did it eventually cost them a high price for being lax.
David did not turn or let
up, until his enemies were consumed, ‘kalah,’ finished, destroyed, done, spent,
dead.
The battle is not over
until the enemy is dead, or there is at the very least, a person remaining who
can raise a hand to sign the surrender.
When Christ returns at
the Second Advent, the entire population of the evil world will die. There will
be no one to sign anything. Satan will be
chained and thrown into prison for a thousand years, while the Millennium
proceeds.
And so the principle as
it applies to your spiritual life. You
will not be carrying a gun, or flying a jet, or shooting off rockets,
spiritually speaking, but your offensive will be in your daily studies, in your
daily memorization of verses, in your daily confessions, in your daily prayers,
in your daily application of the biblical principles that you learn, in your
honesty, in your humility, in your empathy, in your responsibilities and
obligations and obedience to God.
That is your offensive.
When you become lax, don’t
study, don’t confess, don’t do that which you are expected to do. When you get
cranky, when you make small things into greater things, when your worldly
priorities becomes greater than your spiritual priorities, then the cost of
that course will take its toll on you and in your life.
When the Allies reached
the shores and if they had sat in their ships, if they took the beaches and
remained there, if they move a bit and then waited, then the enemy would have
had time to regroup and the cost would have been far greater.
So it is in your spiritual
life. Your battle is one of a moment by moment
battle. You monitor yourself on your
battlefield, by means of your confession, by means of your daily studies, by
means of your spiritual activities within your daily life.
Your objective is not to
vanquish evil all around you, but to vanquish evil within you.
You cannot control the
world, but you can control yourself. And
your victory comes when God removes you from this life, and within your soul is
the spiritual structure and muscle and assets and possessions of spiritual
productivity and growth, and thus success for eternity. That is your victory.
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