Day 30: S is for Sink

“… And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus. But when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me.” Matthew 14:29-30

S is for sink. To sink means to be submerged (beneath the surface); to fall or drop to a lower place. Life in the shoes of anyone is not easy, but life in the shoes of a Christian is even harder. What is the difference? Well, for starters, the devil already has control of your life as an unsaved person, so he is not worried about you. But, if you are a Christian, be assured that he is going to be in a constant battle with you to try to break your resolve and your faith in God.

When the devil can get you so disturbed, distraught, and discouraged, he knows that your eyes are then on the circumstances around you … and consequently, are no longer on Jesus. When this happens, we begin to sink spiritually. We are weakened. Our faith begins to shake and cracks begin to appear in places that did not have cracks before.

Some days it seems like the devil spends his whole entire day sitting on your shoulder whispering lie after lie into your ear. Right now he is residing in deep south Texas on my shoulder … and is not showing signs of heading north to your shoulder anytime soon. Everyone thinks that the temperatures here are hot outside right now, but they are nothing compared to what is inside!

The devil was even brave enough to go up against Christ in the wilderness (Matthew 4). When he fed Christ lies, what did Christ do in response? He quoted scripture. What do we do when he feeds us lies? We usually gullibly believe them and wallow around in them, do we not? But, what are we to do instead? What example did Christ set for us? We are to quote scripture, right? God’s Word is the truth and we must fight lies with truth!

I recently gifted a good friend of mine with a journal specifically for one purpose. That purpose was to write down a lie of the devil on the top of each page and then to fill that page with scripture (God’s Word aka the Truth). She and I had already been sharing scriptures to refute the lies that the devil had been trying to feed us. But, having it in black and white … on paper … just seems to make it more concrete and more sure, does it not? I encourage you to do the same thing. You do not have to buy a journal. Even a notebook will work.

You may also be interested in devoting one page to “Why sink when you can swim?” verses. What are these? Well, these are your “go-to” verses when you are needing extra reinforcements from scripture to fight the devil. Your page will probably look different than mine, but that is not what is important. What is important is that you write verses there that give YOU strength. If you do not know of any verses, ask God to show you ones and then start digging in His Word.

Lesson Objective: To understand what it means to sink. To use this knowledge to learn how to swim (fight the devil’s lies with God’s Truth). To start your own “Why sink when you can swim?” journal.

Did you pass or did you fail?