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HOW TO FIGHT IN ORDER TO WIN

Key Verse: Hebrews 12:1 I. When Should a Christian Fight? A. There is no virtue in mere fighting. One who fights for the sake of fighting wastes his life. B. Fighting must have a cause to be worthwhile. C. Fighting is necessary for the Christian because of the entrance and reign of sin in our world (Rom. 5:12). D. A person who does not fight for or against anything is a person who stands for nothing. 1. Because there are those who have no principles, those who have principles must stand up against them. 2. Our world is divided into those who insist on being enemies of God and those who have made their peace with God (Rom. 5:1). Because both evil and good exist in our world, fighting is inevitable. This is one kind of fighting. E. A second kind could better be termed a race for excellence among those who are in general agreement. The unbelievers are in a race to see who will accomplish more evil and the believers are in another race to see who will please Christ the most. F. This is what it is called in Hebrews 12:1, let us run the race. That word translated race in Greek is , from which is derived, the equivalent of the English to agonize. The same Greek word is what we render in English as fight and race or an endeavor to be first, to excel. Both meanings can have a good and a bad connotation. If the motive is right then it is good. Fighting evil for the glory of God is good. Fighting your brother to put him down so you can be proud of being first is evil. However, if you are striving for excellence to stimulate others to follow your example, then running in a competitive race is good. The word , fight or race is derived from the verb , to lead. At first meant a gathering of people. Later it

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came to mean a place of assembly and then a contest, conflict. II. The Christian Life Is a Conflict A. Examine the lives of saints of God in the past and you will see that every one of them had a conflict. These are enumerated in Hebrews chapter eleven: Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, Esau, Joseph, Moses, Rahab, Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel. 1. None were exempt from conflicts and sufferings. 2. The conflicts occurred because of the presence of sin in the world, their own yet unredeemed bodies, and the presence of other yet imperfect people in their family and communal surroundings. B. Our world has not changed. 1. These same circumstances surround us in spite of Christs coming into the world. 2. There will be conflicts as long as we live since we are not an island unto ourselves. Communal living means inevitable conflict. C. Their work will remain incomplete unless we shoulder our responsibility in the conflict. Observe how the eleventh chapter of Hebrews ends, God having provided some better thing for us, that they [the saints of the past] without us [you and me] should not be made perfect. That phrase be made perfect () means that their work could not be completed without our labor for God. III. Why Should We Join in the Conflict? A. If you and I are determined to avoid conflict we will not do what needs to be done. B. What we have to do puts the finishing touches on what others have done. C. If they did what they did because it was their Godgiven responsibility, and consequently took the heat for it, so must we. D. You and I cannot do anything worthwhile without engaging in conflict and the concomitant sufferings. E. The teaching that Christianity is a walk in a rosy garden is unscriptural. It is instead peace in the heart

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in spite of the conflict around us (John 16:33). It is peace between God and us and a peaceful attitude (Rom. 14:19; 1 Cor. 1:3; 7:15; Eph. 6:23). However, the attitude of others toward God may affect this peace. When others are slothful in their work, we ought to move forward, not rejoicing in leaving them behind, but encouraging them to move forward with us. Let us concentrate on running the race that is set before us. IV. How Must We Fight? A. We must not fight sitting down, nor walking, but running. Life is a race. Only he who runs gets to the goal first. B. If we do not reach the goal, it means we did not run. It is never too late to start. C. Let us run in Greek is , in the present subjunctive which means: 1. It is a present duty. We can never say, I ran and I reached my goal. 2. It is a continuous race. Every goal reached reveals another loftier goal to be reached. 3. It is a personal responsibility. D. We cannot run if we are burdened with unnecessary weights. 1. Try picking up one hundred pounds and start running. You will not get very far. 2. Put off every malignant tumor. The word for weight is or from which is derived the English oncology, the study of tumors. There are malignant tumors that attack our healthy spiritual organisms. We should examine ourselves for spiritual tumors. The sooner we discover them and have them excised, the faster we can run the race. Be careful lest any habit become a malignant tumor. The word does not occur anywhere else in the New Testament. 3. Let us put off sin. a) There are certain sins that are all around us, common among men. This is the idea behind the Greek word (derived from ,

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to stand around), translated which doth so easily beset us. It is the sin that stands around us. Watch the sin which everybody else does and rationalizes. Just because no one else reaches the goal does not mean that you should not. Beware of common sins. b) The prefix of the word (, well, thoroughly) further emphasizes the thorough danger of the sins that are so common around us. The deceptions of a common sin are that it looks good and that everyone else is doing it, so it cant be that bad. Watch out for it. If you do not you may never reach the goal.

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