Struggling with sin is not an obedience problem. It's a faith problem.

The answer is not trying harder to obey. That only works for a little while.

To live free from sin, we must continually stir up the faith that God has given us.

How do you stir up faith? You continually do three things with the Word of God:

Hearing. Remembering. Speaking.

Let's make it practical. The next time you are tempted to sin, head to Romans 6 and read verses 1 through 11.

Then, say this, "I consider myself dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus."

Every time you do this, faith is stirred. And faith in what God says is the only thing that will enable you to live free from sin.

Most confuse agreement with submission. But submission is not needed until you disagree.

It's easy to follow God when you agree. But how about when it goes against what you want to do, or what you think is best?

That's when submission comes into play. You choose to sacrifice your own wisdom to pick up God's wisdom.

His ways are not our ways. If you have to agree to obey, enjoy being bullied by the devil.

You cannot resist the devil without first submitting to God.

If you are impressed with yourself, you don't know Christ.

Because as you come to know Him, you realize that the only things you've done that really matter are the things He did through you.

Christ in me, the hope of glory. We have no chance at producing glory unless we are in Christ.

The Apostle Paul said, "Everything else is worthless when compared to the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord."

If we want to become one with Him, everything else must become garbage in comparison.

Become unimpressed with yourself so you can experience the same mighty power that raised Jesus from the dead.

The Holy Spirit will show you things to come.

That's what Jesus said. But somehow we translate it to, "Go figure out the future."

Jesus made it very clear that our focus is on today. Not the past or the future, but today. Give us today our daily bread.

When we try to squeeze the future out of the Holy Spirit, we end up in cuckoo land.

Yes, the Holy Spirit will tell us what's coming, but at His discretion.

We are on a need-to-know basis with the Holy Spirit. If He is not telling us, it's because we don't need to know.

But if there is something we need to know, we can trust that He will reveal it to us at just the right time.

I've been healed through the Word of God. I've been healed by being delivered from a spirit of infirmity.

You can learn more about that in my previous two posts. But now I want to tell you what happened next.

Even after all the healing I experienced, there was still one thing. I had a growth in my right nostril that was the size of a green olive.

Combine that with allergies, and most of the time, I couldn't breathe out of my nose at all.

The temptation was to just live with it. After all, God has already healed me of so much. So, just be thankful.

And I was thankful, but I was also unwilling to stop short of the full glory of God. So, I kept pressing for complete healing.

Months went by with no resolve. Then, I heard the Holy Spirit say the strangest thing, "Stop using that hair gel."

I had been using it every day for over ten years. I wrestled with such a strange instruction from the Holy Spirit, but ended up obeying.

Within three weeks, the nasal polyp was gone.

Some things are healed through the Word. Others, through deliverance. And still others through a change in the natural.

If you want to live healed, you must humble yourself before the Lord and let Him bring you the solution, whatever it is.

It is always God's will to heal.

After a careful study of the Bible over many years, this truth became so evident to me. But my circumstances didn't line up.

The more I studied, the sicker I became. It took years before I experienced the first breakthrough mentioned in my previous post.

But there was more to be done. Even though I was significantly better, I was not healed and whole.

Almost on schedule, about once per month, I would wake up in excruciating pain and puke my guts out.

It always happened on a Saturday night. I would wake up the next morning, completely exhausted, go to church, and preach the message God gave me with boldness and zeal.

Until one Sunday, as I was delivering a tongue for interpretation, an obnoxious chatter came out of my mouth. I knew it wasn't God.

Interestingly enough, it was right after the first time I had ever preached on casting out demons.

And there I was, in front of the entire church, getting delivered from a spirit of infirmity.

This was more than three years ago. I haven't even puked once since then. And the healing that came afterwards was so much more than that.

There were still more steps to complete healing after this, and I'll tell you about it in my next post.