Episode 286: I’m Talkin. . .Fight

I’m Talkin’, episode 286, for October 8th, 2023.

This is Joel from the I’m Talkin’ microcast, where I share my thoughts on a topic that has piqued my interest this past week.

This week we’re talking fight.

Before I get into the details of the word fight, I just want to remind my listeners that this year I’m doing a theme of podcast associated with a sentence that I came up with.

So 52 letters in the sentence, one for every week that I do my podcast, and the theme is challenge Christian listeners to live sold out for God’s glory.

So far this year we have been through challenge Christian listeners to live sold out, and so now I’m on the word for, and the first letter is an F, and today’s word is fight.

Fight is a pretty simple word, I’m not sure it needs much explanation.

You think about the word, and it comes into play when we’re very young, and seems to stick around.

One would think we might outgrow that word, but it just stays in different forms.

It might always be a sticks and stones will break my bones kind of thing, or taking a swing at someone who offended you, although into our adulthood, unfortunately that still happens, and generally the word fight is associated with an outcome, and that outcome is losing and winning, and therein lies the challenge for those of us who call ourselves Christians.

So my original thought about outgrowing the word fight, and the fact is it just looks like it takes a different form as we mature and as we grow into adulthood, but there is always that continual fight in the world to get ahead, to do whatever it is that they’re trying to accomplish, and so as Christians, the question that I had was, are we supposed to fight as well, and if we are, who are we fighting, and when do we fight, and what do we fight, or do we at all, and what does it look like to fight and win as a Christian.

My challenge to those of us who call ourselves Christians is that maybe we do not have to fight at all.

I think we need to prepare ourselves for a defense about what we believe and who we believe, but the Bible says, vengeance is mine, says the Lord, and I think if we leave it in God’s hands to do the fighting for us, then we are much more apt to be successful.

In fact, we probably won’t be successful unless we do that.

If God calls us to get in the midst of a fight, and I’m not sure he would, then I guess that’s a different picture.

You do see that in the Bible on occasion.

There are wars.

There is fighting.

There is winning, losing, but I think at some point, we realize that God is directing all of that, so if God is in control, and we know he is, and if God is sovereign, and we know he is, then what does fight look like in today’s world as a Christian?

Well, I think what it looks like is someone who follows Jesus Christ, someone who stands for what they believe, who will not back down from the truth of the scriptures, and does so not in an angry or overly macho type of way, but in humility and in peace and in love, and that is a weird way to fight.

But we know that that’s what Jesus Christ came and did, laid down his life for those who follow him.

He took the sins of the world upon him.

He abolished Satan’s control over death and gave us the freedom to fight a different way, the freedom to fight for what the scripture says, to fight for people and their salvation in such a way that it looks like love, that it looks like hugs, that it looks like welcoming, that it looks like no judgment, and in that, we get to experience victory every day.

Until next week, this is Joel from the I’m Talking Microcast.