Winning the Battle

This morning, my pastor at Harvest Bible Chapel in Rockford, preached an outstanding message entitled, "Winning the Battle Over Sin".  I instantly knew that I wanted to share this on my blog not only because it is so convicting and powerful, but also because he relates it so strongly to the sports arena.  His whole point was to encourage us and inform us of the necessity it is to "make war" with our sin on a daily basis.  So many times we find ourselves just doing the typical "Christian" thing and making sure we are just doing OK.  But I was really challenged in this message to take initiative and really take a "Holy violence" against my sin. He had 3 things we need from Colossians 3:1-7 that he used to make that point to us.  The three points were:

1. You must have a good OFFENSE

2. You must have a good DEFENSE

3. You must have good TEAMMATES

The entire passage talks about our utter dependence on God and how me must put on a "New Self."  I thought it was so awesome how he related sports analogies to our walk with Christ.  I was extremely convicted of my walk with Jesus and how I am playing "defense" too often.  I just want to fight sin and stay out of trouble.  But Jesus really encouraged me to take the "offensive" in winning the battle over sin.  I was also struck back by how important it is to have the right 'teammates' on your side to encourage you in your walk.  Instead of summarizing the entire sermon in this blog post, I would rather allow you to listen to it yourself.  I STRONGLY ENCOURAGE you to listen to this sermon while your working out in the morning or while your driving your daily commute to/from work.  I feel like this idea  of "making war" or "winning the battle over sin" really needs to be strengthened in my walk as a Christian and I believe that it can be directly translated to the way I coach a basketball team.  I hope you are as encouraged by this message as I am and I would love to hear your feedback!