Happy Friday!!
1 Corinthians 15:57 has been our fighter verse this month. God’s word says: But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!
When we’ve been talking around the dinner table (and at breakfast too!), we’ve been asking the kids (Collins for right now but Tommy included!) what is something they are thankful for. Instead of just wording it that way, we say “what is one thing you’re thankful to God for?” I worded it that way last week during my first lesson of children’s church too to get them thinking about Thanksgiving with a perspective that points them to the creator and not only the creation. And if I’m being honest, I’ve found that my own heart needs a continual reminder to look to the creator and giver of all good gifts too.
As I listen to our own children and heard the many ideas from the children at church on Sunday, I loved hearing the things that they’re most thankful for. We ended though, by opening up God’s word and looking at 1 Corinthians 15:57, and breaking it down to figure out what it means (very slowly night I add with a group of 4-8 year olds) haha, but we did it!!
And it was so sweet to talk through the hope and assurances of God in His words with these little ones. We, as sinners in need of grace and forgiveness EVERY day, have the assurance in God’s word that God will not keep us in our sin but will deliver us from that sin that separates us from God AND will give us the VICTORY over Satan and his lies and the sin that He so lavishly longs we stay in.
This is good news. Because in my own strength I could never, ever stop loving and living in my sin! Apart from Christ, I will always be defeated by my sin. BUT thanks be to God, because his faithfulness and love for me is fully displayed through Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection, defeating all sin and death for those who trust in Him.
This is the victory! Jesus gives us the victory over our sin. As a believer will we still struggle and have to battle our sin? Well of course. We are human! Imperfect always on this side of eternity. BUT our relationship to that sin changes. We no longer love sitting and participating in it. We BATTLE against it and how do we do that?
God’s word tells us that he gives us the POWER to say NO to that sin. That’s how we worded it simply for the children at church, and it works for me! Where does that power come from?
“But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and all of Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”Acts 1:8.
What is this power from the Holy Spirit for? Paul testified that it was his “earnest expectation and hope” that by life or death Jesus would be magnified in his body. (Philippians 1:20)
The Holy Spirit will lead and empower us in a development to learn obedience to the Word of God in our sufferings, and be led to perfection, just as Jesus was. (Hebrews 5:7-9)
The Holy Spirit gives us power for victory over conscious sin. It is written, if we walk in the Spirit, we will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. (Galatians 5:16)
See more This article for more truth that gives us insight in what the Holy Spirit does for us!
I hope my Thanksgiving devotional + fighter verse brings you hope and encouragement as you look to Thanksgiving next week, and reminds you that our highest devotion and thanks among all the many blessings we don’t deserve, and yet, we’ve been given by our gracious Heavenly Father, ought to be for the creator and giver of all good gifts Himself.
Happy Thanksgiving, friends!
with love,
from courtney
withlovefromcourtney.com 