The Fight of Faith

1Timothy 6:12 “Fight the good fight of faith”

    This counsel to Timothy (also to us) by St. Paul’s made me think deep. If he had told him ‘keep the faith’ I would have not pondered much, but why did he tell him to ‘fight a good fight of faith?’ I know for a fact that it doesn’t just mean to remain faithful; there is some mystery about faith hidden in these words. The very word ‘fight’, as you know, doesn’t sound pleasant; it is opposite to peace and happiness. Then why are we asked to fight? Let’s discover

    We know from the scripture that this is a fight of faith or faith’s fight. Okay wait, I thought faith was just believing that Jesus came and died for us? When I believe it already, why do I have to fight? Does holding on to faith require strenuous efforts? These questions are prone to occur. Let’s dig in

     What are we to fight against? It is undoubtedly, Unbelief. Why is this so important? – Unbelief leads to a string of consequences that leads to disobedience to God. Look at what Luke 18:8 says: “When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?”  This verse resounds with an assurance that many things will happen in the last days to distort our faith and only those who remain faithful until the end will be rewarded. 

    Firstly, 2 Corinthians 10:5 plainly spells out the agents against which we are to fight, we are called to “…demolish arguments (opinions) and pretensions (lofty thoughts) that set itself up against the knowledge (knowing) of God and we take captive every thought (disobedient) to make it obedient to Christ.” It is a psychological fight against the rebellious thoughts planted by Satan. To understand better let me illustrate it to you. Now let’s suppose you prayed ardently for your sickly friend to recover yet she died. The enemy will tell you, “What’s the big deal? You prayed still she died, God is cruel, He likes to punish or maybe God doesn’t exist at all.” This is how satan will wage war in your mind using various situations of your life. This is when 'the fight of faith' surfaces. 

    Secondly, the Bible also says, our fight is “against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph 6:12). We also need to fight against many things that will stand up to steal our faith like: Government which makes laws, the authorities who exercise control over us, the evil forces, and its powers working in the spiritual realm. Now that’s a lot. But don’t fret, these are written to open our eyes to show how satan works to mislead us in our faith and to quicken our faith. The fight, therefore, is between our faith (which we had in the beginning) and the many schemes of satan that will infiltrate unbelief in us. Why is this fight mentioned 'good'? The Bible says, “through faith and patience we inherit what has been promised (eternal life)” (Heb 6:12) and since eternal life is our reward this fight is a good one.  Paul also reaffirms, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” (2Tim 4:7) His life stands as an embodiment of ‘the good fight of faith’, come what may; imprisonment, flogging, sneering, hunger or verge of death, he held firm to his faith fighting against the darts directed at him. Every Christian should be able to joyfully exclaim like Pau did. 

    How can we be successful in this fight?  One plain answer; arm ourselves with the Word of God and be vigilant and pray.  We need faith till the end; hence we need to fight till the end. Remember, “We (I) can do all things through Christ who strengthens us (me)” (Phil 4:13) and “We are more than conquerors through Him” (Rom 8:37) God is teaching us(through His word) how to be successful in the fight of faith and He will certainly strengthen us and deliver us to the Golden Shore. 

Cheer up! We are all sons and daughters of a victorious God who has conquered the devil.

  Post Script:

     This verse always reminds me of the game - ‘Temple Run’, which I had played as a teenager.  In some version of the game, the hunted person holds secure a diamond in his hand and is constantly on the run, scaling mountains and jumping over hurdles, eluding the grasp of the creature chasing him. That’s how I see the fight of faith- constantly being chased by the enemy to rip me off the faith which I’m sheltering in my heart. When we come to such an understanding the devil can no longer snare us and we will be victors in the name of Christ Jesus.