Which fight? ...

Monday, Mar 31, 2014. Sometimes we need to fight. We are forced to fight in particular challenges to our life. We can decide to fight in special situations. Fight is not something bad in general. But we need to know which fight we fight!

Challenges …

We are sometimes there with particular challenges. A friend of ours has cancer. She fights the fight against cancer. It is a fight for her life. She is forced to fight it - she does not have much choice. And she does it quite well, from what we can say.

There are other fights we a forced into. You might fight for your company or institution, to do good work and to make it a success. You might fight for good solutions to the management problems or the scientific problems which you are facing. You might fight with some code, some implementations, some engineering problems.

Sometimes we are drawn into a fight about other important things. We need some ressources, and we need to fight for them. We need to make progress, and it is difficult in the particular environment we are in. We want the best for our institute or our church, and the structures we work with do not support that. All this can lead to different fights, to discussions, even to severe conflicts.

What fight we should fight …

But the bible calls us to a different fight. It is the fight of faith. It is not the fight for money or fame or success. The fight for faith is a part of the other fights. It can be in the middle of any of the fights we have been talking about - and it can and will change our fights, since it will draw us to the center of life! Let us read 1 Timothy 6:

6 But godliness with contentment is great gain, 7 for we brought nothing into the world, and3 we cannot take anything out of the world. 8 But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. 9 But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. 11 But as for you, O man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. 12 Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.

So it is important, it is crucial for us, to fight the right fight. It is not about our institution in the first place. It is not about our health even. It is not about our success. It is about our faith. It is about righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. It is the good fight of faith - a fight which will not be against the others, but for the others. Let us fight this fight! Yeah. (Roland Potthast) ... more texts