By John David Hicks
Known in Scripture as a “man after God’s own heart,” David was a worshiper. His name means “Beloved of the Lord.” He was called and chosen. Yet in his troubles, problems, sin, and discouragement, David had to “strengthen himself in the Lord.” At times he had to preach to himself to regain his strength. I’m sure he would often remind himself of God’s faithfulness when he had faced the lion, the bear, and King Saul.
David also had people in his life who encouraged him and strengthened his faith. His closest friend, Jonathan, “helped him find strength in God” (1 Sam. 23:16). Nathan the prophet served as a mentor.
We can strengthen ourselves in the Lord when we “look unto Jesus” and make Him the “author and perfecter of our faith” (Heb. 12:2). The Lord gives you the promises in His Word to build your faith (Matt. 4:4). He gives you the Holy Spirit to be your comforter, helper, and guide (John 14:26). He also gives you other Christians to encourage you (Heb. 3:13).
There are times when life and problems overwhelm us and the devil discourages us. Jesus calls him a thief; he uses discouragement, problems, sin, and pain to rob us of our vitality and contentment in the Lord.
Discouragement will cause you to forget how God has been faithful over the years. It will also make you indifferent to the opportunities you have today. In time, discouragement will steal your faith and give you self-pity. Self-pity causes you to miss the presence of God and makes you blind to the needs of others. Your focus will be on yourself, your circumstances, and your troubles.
Hebrews 4:15 tells us that Jesus was tempted just like us. He is our example of how to overcome temptation in life: “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin.” Jesus understands what you are going through and He knows how to help you strengthen yourself in the Lord.
Just as in his temptations of Jesus, Satan focuses on your identity to discourage you and defeat you. In Luke 4, Satan questions Jesus’ identity two times and God’s identity once. Your faith, confidence, boldness, and encouragement all are wrapped up in your identity. Adam and Eve were created in God’s image as children of God. So Satan’s temptation was to question what they already had and to question God’s character. “Take of the forbidden fruit and you will be like God.” Satan’s focus was on their identity and God’s identity.
Your identity is a set of behavioral or personal characteristics by which an individual is recognizable or known; the qualities that make someone different from others. Your identity reveals who you are. Without identity, you will be confused and have no direction.
Consequently, your authority as a believer is contained in your identity. If Satan can get you (or Adam or Jesus) to question who you are, he knows you will have no direction, purpose, or resolve. You are wide open for discouragement, disillusionment, failure, and sin. God doesn’t question who we are; He knows who we are and who we are called to be.
That is why Paul said, “I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe” (Eph. 1:18-19).
FIRST, KNOW YOUR IDENTITY. Satan tempted Jesus by stating, “If you are the Son of God….” Satan wants to question that in your life as well. You were created for God’s good pleasure and joy (Rev. 4:11). As God’s child, born into God’s family (John 1:13), you have all the rights and privileges that go with being God’s child; you are made a partaker of the divine nature (2 Pet.1:4). God assures you that you are loved, accepted, and forgiven. “You received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ” (Rom. 8:15-17).
God has given you the gift of righteousness; you are holy and without sin (Jude 24-25). You can stand in God’s presence because you are valued, treasured, and loved by God. If Satan can get you to doubt this, you will begin to try to perform to prove that you are valuable. If Satan gets you to try to prove your value, he’s got you. You are valuable because you ARE! Know your identity in Christ.
Your authority comes from the life of Christ within you. “Your life is now hidden with Christ in God” (Col. 3:3). “In him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). “God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6).
“The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work” (1 John 3:8). Jesus has already won the victory over Satan and He is living inside you (Col. 1:27). “You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:4). “But when this priest [Jesus] had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. Since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy” (Heb. 10:12–14).
“Having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Col 2:15). The victory is won. Our job is to “mop up” the enemy and tear down his strongholds (2 Cor. 10:13). God knew that this is the only way to build your faith and for you to “receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness [to] reign in life” (Rom. 5:17).
David as God’s beloved knew God’s grace and favor. In Psalm 23, God anoints David in the presence of his enemies, and as one old preacher said, “God give him two dogs named Goodness and Mercy. Those dogs follow him all the days of his life.” David knew that he was called, chosen, and anointed by God. And so are you. “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy”(1 Pet. 2:9-10).
Know your identity in the Lord.
SECOND, KNOW GOD’S IDENTITY. God is infinite. “‘I am the Alpha and the Omega,’ says the Lord God, ‘who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty’” (Rev. 1:8). God has no limitations or boundaries. He is everything man is not—immaterial, unchanging, all-powerful, all-knowing, and everywhere present throughout His creation. God is a personal being who is Creator and Sustainer of the universe and is the only one worthy to be worshiped. God loves you, is concerned about you. His desire is to provide for you. And He sent Jesus to redeem you.
Satan wants you to worship an idol. An idol is a substitute for God. Thus, you must know God’s identity. What is God like? The disciple Philip asked this question; Jesus answered, “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). Without Jesus you cannot know God. “No one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” (Matt. 11:27). Your concept of God will determine your faith (Heb. 11:6).
Through Jesus we see the love of God (John 3:16); we love God because He first loved us (1 John 4:19). When you know you are loved, it’s easy to love back. God is love and a person. Your faith is born out of a relationship and is heightened by fellowship.
Nothing can happen in your life without God knowing about it (Rom. 11:36). “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose…[so that you may] be conformed to the likeness of his Son” (Rom. 8:28–29). “Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 1:6).
For “the eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms” (Deut. 33:27). “God has said, ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you’” (Heb. 13:5). “So is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11).
David describes the results of knowing God’s identity in Psalm 9:10 “Those who know your name [identity] will trust in you, for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.” David then testifies, “I have set the LORD always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken” (Psalm 16:8). In Psalm 100, David is a worshiper with thanksgiving and praise.
After Jesus’ baptism, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit…was led by the Spirit in the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil” (Luke 4:1). After the temptation, “Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit” (Luke 4:14). He had the anointing, but only after the temptation about His identity and the Father’s identity did He go in the “power of the Holy Spirit.”
Peter put it like this: “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him” (Acts 10:38). The same is true of you. When you know who you are and who your Father God is, you will go in the power and authority of the Holy Spirit.
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows” (2 Cor. 1:3-5).
When you know who you are and who God is, you can overcome sin, failure, and discouragement. That is the foundation of how to encourage yourself in the Lord.
My Prayer: You, O Lord, have loved me with an everlasting love. You have seen my past, present, and future. I have settled it in my heart that I am loved and accepted by You and that love will never change! No matter what I do, You will not love me any more. No matter what I do, You will not love me any less. I am secure in Your presence. I have fixed my eyes on You, the author and perfecter of my faith. I expect You who began a good work in me to accomplish Your purposes. I acknowledge Your sovereignty and sustaining grace. Thus, I will not waste my time arguing with You about my weakness and unworthiness. You called me and ordained me. The choice was not mine, but Yours. Your will be done.
Lord, give me the desire to want what I need most from You, a relationship with YOU, Yourself. I am grateful for Your heart of love that calls me into this fellowship. Your union in my heart is Your gift of Yourself. You have redeemed me and I am passionately in love with You. Let me grasp the truth that You love me, delight in me, and enjoy me! Let me comprehend that You actually want me more than my service. I pray that the eyes of my heart will be open to see the incredible greatness of Your love and power toward me.
I am Your child and want to do Your will. And that will is more desirable to me than greatness or wealth or power or position, and I choose it over all things in heaven and on earth. Your kingdom is my cause and Your joy is my strength.
You, O Lord, have anointed me with the oil of the Holy Spirit; You have gifted me with Your wisdom, righteousness, holiness, and redemption, to live in Your presence and to labor by Your power and experience Your victory. So I bow in Your presence in wonder, thanksgiving, praise, and worship! For it’s all about You, Lord!
You, O Lord, are my beloved, my message, my center, my essence, my purpose, my all! You are good; Your unfailing love and faithfulness continues forever. To You be all the glory, honor, and praise forever and ever! Amen and amen!