One Year Bible Blog - 21 Jan - War

Some verses from Psalm 18 on the One Year Bible Blog caught my attention today:

³¹ For who is God besides the LORD ?
       And who is the Rock except our God?
³² It is God who arms me with strength
       and makes my way perfect.

³⁴ He trains my hands for battle;
       my arms can bend a bow of bronze.
³⁵ You give me your shield of victory,  (NIV)

Just for a moment I thought "this is what Brian Doerksen's Fortress 144 is based on":

All praise to you my rock
Who trains my hands for war!

but, of course, Brian's song is based on Psalm 144:

^{1 Praise be to the LORD my Rock,
       who trains my hands for war,
       my fingers for battle.
  2 He is my loving God and my fortress,
       my stronghold and my deliverer,
       my shield, in whom I take refuge, (NIV)}

We have had quite some discussion at home in recent weeks about all this talk of war. I was very much taken by John Eldredge's Waking the Dead and its message that we are in a war zone, the battle between good and evil is going on around us and about us, so we had better wake up and get equipped and skilled in doing battle. My wife felt this was all a bit over the top. For one thing, Jesus has already won the war. For another this focus on war leads to an inappropriate focus on the enemy and an endless hunt for demons under the bed, in the computer, in the news, etc.

So what is the wise view of this stuff about war?

A couple of days ago on OYBB John posted a comment in response to a question of mine:

Matt 13:22 and Andrew B.'s ?:

"How DO we break through and live in the fullness of being reborn?"

When I finally committed to a church, I decided to employ something most business schools advocate. Find someone you think is doing things correctly, talk to them, ask how they got to where they are, emulate them.

I looked around at the elders, talked to pastors, and observed characteristics of the elders.

What I learned from them is also in the New Testament, but I can't find it right now:

1)  Stay in fellowship with God.
2) Worship
3) Pray
4) Give
5) Stay in the Word
6) Fast
7) Minister to others

TWO THINGS:
-  If #1 is not taken care of almost daily, the other six will suffer as will the fullness of your relationship to God.
- Do all the above JOYFULLY.  If you go thru the motions, it will hamper the fullness of your relationship to God.

Is the battle actually the struggle to do these things consistently, or is it that these equip us for something more?

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