TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 1
Scripture: Galatians 5:20-25

Galatians 5:22-25 says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law. And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” The fruit of the Spirit that we are called to develop has a conviction element in it that is translated faithfulness but in fact it comes from the Greek word pis-tis and it means conviction that God exists and rules in all things. That conviction really gets challenged whenever we face life-threatening physical sickness or financial hardship. The conviction that God exists and rules in all things is challenged by a very real spiritual adversary. Every believer is faced with the assignment of overcoming the enemy. Trusting God becomes a life or death issue. If God rules in all things then what is our response to be in the face of advancing evil. Faith is a personal issue in development of a relationship with the living God both from a Priestly view and from a Kingly view. Most churches today primarily develop only the Priestly side. This creates an understanding deficit for ruling in all things by a lack of teaching the Kingly foundation. Adversity challenges God’s rule. When dramatic adversity comes at us from government mandating abortion, nature worship and homosexuality, we pray for our enemies and by blessing them enable evil. The judicial nature of God is never activated by a passive church. Psalm 110:1,2 commands us to rule in the midst of our enemies. The Lord promised to make our enemies our footstool. Since He promised, we should ask! The church is supposed to teach us how… Is it fulfilling that assignment? If not, then the question is, “Why not?” Are we learning the principles of implementing God’s promises to rule? Is the failure to rule because of what we believe? Is it because we are not exercising what we should? Is it because we are not praying what we should? How can we grow in implementing God’s rule? The New Testament presents David as our example!