Surviving the Abyss

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Have you ever started something and were all in, just to end up giving up a few weeks later?

For me it was a diet, I was all in, I got all the supplements, just to get to Kelt’s birthday and ate half a Costco cake, lets put this in prospective, a Costco cake is meant for 48 people, that means I ate 24 servings of Cake.

What Happens When We Fall Into The Abyss?

We make New Years commitments and now we are past the excitement of the prospect of change and things are getting more difficult to maintain.

1 of 3 things happen when we are thrown over the side of the Abyss

1. We Just give Up

We feel like we just cannot do it

We make excuses to why we cannot do

or we just don’t talk about

2. We Kind Of Keep Up With It

we do the bare minimum

When we pray, we just kind of do it

When we read our Bible

John 11:35 NIV

Jesus wept.

we work out, we hit one push up and we are good

3. We Fight Through It

We push through the feelings of wanting to quit

when Things get in the way we make time, we put in an “all in effort”

We keep the goal in the forefront

Galatians 6:7–10 NIV

Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

How does this passage help us prevail?

A Man Reaps What He Sows

if we just give up, we reap defeat

How many things in our lives have we wanted to do, and when things didn’t go to plan we just gave up

“Resist the devil, and he will flee from you” (James 4:7). All too often we let our fears overwhelm us, and we give up. But God says, “Don’t give up. Get up! Take courage. Stand up. And trust Me!”

Edward E. Hindson

How many times have we started something, just to let fear take over? and we just let go of the goal or calling we have.

I’m going to share my faith with other this year

what if

They make fun of me

ask a question I don’t know

think I’m weird

ect.

We do not want to reap fear and defeat

Whoever Sows To Please Their Flesh Will Reap Destruction

Our flesh is lazy

If we only give a half effort when things get hard, or old, then we are being lazy with our faith and will not grow.

A lazy spirit is always a losing spirit.

Thomas Brooks

Our flesh wants to the easy route

our flesh wants us to spend our time that is spouse to be in prayer and study and so on, to be watching TV, scrolling on social media, sleeping

Don’t get me wrong, you can do those things but when it is in the way of building our faith it becomes an idol and the flesh gets in the way and we lose.

Whoever Sows To Please The Spirit, From The Spirit Will Reap Eternal Life

When Fight through the hard times, the times when it gets old, the times when we just want to give up and say that I WILL DO WHAT I AM CALLED TO DO we are sowing in the Spirit

How Do We prevail and survive the Abyss

Philippians 4:13 NIV

I can do all this through him who gives me strength.

We Trust that God will give us the strength to be able to fulfill what we need to do. but lets add to this a bit

Philippians 4:8 NIV

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.

Paul lists a bunch of stuff here

What is true

Get away from the lies

what is right

lets not focus on the flesh, the things that take away from God

What is pure

Another word here is Holy

Anything excellent or praiseworthy

Think about the good things

Lets not set our minds and that of the world, the negative but on God

to survive the abyss we need to change our mind set, we need to get away from the world, and the flesh, and put our minds on God and and what is right. if we only set our minds on the negative that is what we will get. and then we will fail at what we are called to do.