Who do you think you are?

If you can imagine that your problem is staring you down and threatening you, that’s probably about as close to reality as you can get. There are spirits that operate through and behind every problem. They have the ability to convince you with absolute certainty that your problems are huge and insurmountable, or that you’re weak and helpless. They can distort the appearance of the problem and deflect your focus so that you blame everyone else and ignore the demons orchestrating it. But the last thing an average Christian thinks of doing when a problem looms over him is to stand up and speak directly to it: 

“Who are you? Who do you think you are to threaten me? I’m a child of God, and by the authority of the Lord Jesus who died and rose again, you are bound up and destroyed! Get out of here!’’

Is that your typical response to problems? Jesus spoke to fevers, to spirits behind sicknesses, to fig trees, to storms, corpses, and to Satan speaking through the mouth of His friend. Jesus saw the spirits behind problems and teaches us to do the same. But the average Christian avoids confrontation and is afraid of speaking directly to a demon. I was just like that, until the day I saw the reality of the spiritual world in front of my eyes. When you know demons are real, and that Jesus has given all true believers authority over them, it changes everything about the way you respond to problems. Life gets so much simpler and problems so much smaller.

Pleading for problems to go away, trying to convince people to play fair, or just caving in to overwhelming circumstances is basically a waste of energy just trying to control demons’ diversions. You work so hard by your own strength to contain your problems, but God provides weapons to defeat them. Why not pick them up and battle against the real enemy? We’re to wield the weapons, but the strength and supernatural power is all His. He wants us to have the audacity to speak to our big scary mountain of a problem and tell it to throw itself into the sea. And through our faith it’s done by His amazing power.

Zerubbabel was sent to rebuild the mountain of rubble that once was Jerusalem. Enemy nations hated the returning Jews. But what were God’s words to them? That little old Zerubbabel was going to turn that mountain into a level plain where the temple would be erected once again. That mountain had to be confronted. It was used by demons to threaten and intimidate God’s builders. But it all happened, just as God said. 

Don't be an average Christian. Make a habit of confronting your mountains by faith and ordering them out of your life, all the time, every day. 

So he answered me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: ‘Not by strength or by might, but by My Spirit,’ says the Lord of Hosts. ‘What are you, great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you will become a plain. And he will bring out the capstone accompanied by shouts of: Grace, grace to it!’ “  (Zechariah 4:6-7 HCSB)