Checkmate

Have you ever played chess? My younger brother is an avid chess fan, and he would spend hours playing chess with the rest of the family if we would challenge him to a match. He has studied the game about as much as an 11 year old boy can, checking out how-to strategy books from the library, and watching other people play. His love of chess originated from my father, who is an extremely good chess player, (though, as I have learned, my father is much better at playing chess than teaching chess) and my brother has become skilled enough to occasionally beat him in a game. I, on the hand, am not a huge chess fan. I am also not a huge checkers fan, which probably explains my initial resistance to chess. One of the first times I ever played chess with my brother (who had promised to teach me how to play as the game progressed), I made the mistake of assuming that chess was basically checkers with fancy pieces and slightly more complicated moves.

Boy, was I wrong. After being creamed within minutes of starting the match, I realized there was a lot more strategy in chess than I had ever imagined. You see, each player’s goal is to isolate the other player’s king to the point that it cannot escape . This is called a checkmate. However, while players are chasing the other king, they must protect their own king from attack, and defend it so that it is never in a vulnerable position. This adds more layers of strategy and requires anticipation of the opponent’s attacks to the game, skills that I am loath to make an effort to build. There is a common saying that states “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail”. With games like chess, your ability to strategize effectively can determine the outcome of the game. Without awareness of your enemy’s plan and the position of his pawns, one move could land you in the middle of a trap. Needless to say, without the ability or desire to strategize, I lost every match with my brother (and swore never to play chess again).

Even though strategy games like chess aren’t my cup of tea, I hope that when it comes to more important things, such as my spiritual life, I learn to strategize well. As much as I would love to believe that when you accept Christ, your life will be all fine and dandy, temptation will disappear, and resistance will be non-existent, I know that is not true. You see, beyond the physical world our eyes can see is a spiritual realm that is more real than anyone can imagine. In this Spiritual realm the forces of good and evil are in a constant war over the allegiance of our souls. Scripture warns us to “Be sober-minded; be watchful.” Why? “Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” (1 Peter 5:8) As Christians, we have a spiritual target on our backs, and the closer we grow in relationship with our Heavenly Father, the harder Satan fights to drag us away. As one of my favorite Christian sketch comedy groups, The Skit Guys, say:

“Your heart is the wellspring of life. You should guard it with all that you are, because there is a battle going on for the allegiance of your heart, and most times you are doing lukewarm at best.”

The Skit Guys- Psalm 139 Skit

Although Jesus has already defeated Satan once and for all on the cross (we will talk about that later), we will still encounter his lies, schemes, and traps on a daily basis. So how do we make sure we are living a spiritually victorious life? We must develop a battle strategy. As Miss Clara declares in the film War Room, “To win the fight, you’ve got to have the right strategy and the right resources, because victories don’t come by accident.” Just as it would be nearly impossible to win a game of chess with no strategy, we cannot expect to have spiritual victory over the Enemy in our lives if we do not have a spiritual battle plan. The Lord has given us many weapons to fight with- It’s time that we learn how to use them.

If you are tired of listening to the Devil tell you that you are not enough, if you are tired of living in fear, doubt, or worry, and if you are tired of falling into the same temptations over and over or slogging along with a lukewarm faith, now is the time to stand up and fight. So I want to invite you to join me for the next seven weeks for a blog series I am calling “Spiritual Warfare Boot Camp” (Don’t worry- I promise I will come up with a catchier name by next week). In this series we are going to form a Biblically-based strategy for how to recognize Satan’s tactics in our lives, and through the Holy Spirit, destroy some of the major strongholds he tries to set up in our minds. And here is where it gets interesting: I will be using some of my favorite classic and modern animated Disney films to teach these spiritual truths.

Now if that is not the best sales pitch for a completely free blog series, I don’t know what is! But honestly, I am so excited to explore this topic with you and I hope you will stick with me through this journey. See you next week!