I have shared with my home church family that I have long wished I had the kind of unwavering confidence that was portrayed by characters like Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot, and even Dr. House. While Poirot is the only one I really got to know through the telly, I saw enough snippets of the other two that it really stood out how these men knew their stuff and were confident in their opinions even when opposed by others.
Since childhood, I have not been able to do anything without a “second guessing” conversation playing quite loudly in the background. What I have been learning about “enemy mode” explains why this happens more with one person than another.[1] Our brains get trained to “expect” criticism, so we ready ourselves for it by going into enemy mode even before a conversation or encounter begins. It has plagued me to have these “conversations” taking place in my head that imagine me winning arguments or convincing people of truth when the decades have settled that this just doesn’t happen in real life.
All that to simply set the stage for Paul’s next description of how his life did nothing to put any obstacle in anyone’s path but did everything to commend himself as a genuine apostle of Jesus Christ. That description is: “with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left”.[2]
I know I will be on this one for at least another day, but the gist of it for me was to picture Paul walking in righteousness by faith that was so vastly superior to the righteousness he thought he had by the law, and that this righteousness was both exemplary and a total way of life.
For now, I see Paul as a soldier of the cross putting on the whole armor of God. In one way, he is wearing “the breastplate of righteousness”.[3] In another way, righteousness was a weapon that had “divine power to destroy strongholds,”[4] and he pictured himself as a proficient Roman soldier who could wield that weapon with both hands, defending and demolishing as required.
I’m not sure how it
stands out that this will help me with my need for “unwavering confidence”,
but there is something about “righteousness” meaning we are “right”
in God’s eyes, along with the imagery of a fearless warrior using that
righteousness to defend and to demolish, that makes me think that my meditation
on this is going to be somewhat transforming, even though it may be a longer
lesson than I can imagine at the moment!
© 2023 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8
Email: in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures
are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard
Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a
publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)
[1]
I began learning about “enemy
mode” as something that happens in our brains through the book, “The Joy
Switch: How Your Brain's Secret Circuit Affects Your Relationships--And How You
Can Activate it”, by Chris Coursey. This was expanded in the book, “The
Other Half of Church: Christian Community, Brain Science, and Overcoming
Spiritual Stagnation”, by Jim Wilder, Michel Hendricks, and Brian Conover.
And our home church is now learning much needed lessons in the follow-up book, “Escaping
Enemy Mode”, by Jim Wilder.
[2]
II Corinthians 6:7 (in context
of II Corinthians 6:1-13)
[3]
Ephesians 6:10-20
[4]
II Corinthians 10:4 (context:
II Corinthians 10:1-6)
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