I’m quitting this morning. Again. Second time today, or maybe just a continuation of the first. I can’t always tell which.

Then I catch myself. Because I didn’t dream this up.

People who can’t swim don’t dream about winning gold in the backstroke.

Thirty years ago, give or take, I was crossing the street to my in-laws’ house, fellowshipping with the Lord, and He said, “I want you to start writing. Christine will help you.” I laughed. Better word for it, I said “hmph.” Three decades ago I couldn’t write a coherent sentence. Punctuation was a problem. I didn’t know why, and I didn’t know where. I left my wife a good morning note that read Good mourning baby, every day, for I don’t know how long, until she finally said, “You’re so cute.” She didn’t correct me. She kept the notes.

That’s where this started. That, and the back of our church bulletins, 2004.

So no. I didn’t dream this up. A man who couldn’t spell morning doesn’t invent a thirty-year writing assignment. The wanting to write was never mine to begin with. Which means the quitting isn’t really mine to do either. You can’t hand back something you never picked up.

Here’s what I’m still trying to wrap my mind around. I can’t see it. I’ve only been told it. And how do you wrap your mind around nothing.

But it isn’t nothing. There’s one thing in it. The thing I was told.

That’s all Abraham had. He was told. Twenty-five years of waiting and a burial plot he had to buy, and he died still holding the telling. Hannah was told, eventually, by a priest who first thought she was drunk. Mary was told by an angel and then went home and carried it where nobody could see. None of them got to look at it. They got told, and they waited in the dark on the strength of the telling.

I’m standing where they stood. Told, not shown. Waiting, and this morning not very patiently.

I don’t have the bottom of this figured out. I’m not going to pretend I do. But I know the one thing sitting in the middle of the nothing. And I know I didn’t dream it up.

People who can’t swim don’t dream about the backstroke.

It Ran In My Family

The more I look back, the more I see who I was, and who I still have a tendency to slip back into whenever I take my eyes off Christ.

Every work of my flesh accumulated one thing. Death.

Not served on a silver platter, but on a heavy lead plate stained and tarnished by my own sinful choices. Every act of pride. Every selfish ambition. Every lustful thought. Every addiction. Every moment of rebellion. Every act of disrespect toward the God who never stopped loving me.

I thought I was building a life, but I was only stacking the wages of sin higher and higher.

The terrifying part was not that I sinned. It was that I became comfortable carrying the weight of it.

It ran in my family.

Self-indulgence ran in my family.

Self-dependence ran in my family.

Addiction ran in my family.

Lust ran in my family.

Pride ran in my family.

Sin ran in my family.

I was born into Adam’s family, and I lived like it.

Then I ran into Jesus.

Everything that had been running through generations collided with the only One who could stop it.

He did not polish my lead plate. He took it from my hands.

He took every ounce of guilt, shame, rebellion, and death and nailed it to His cross.

In exchange, He offered me what I could never earn.

His righteousness, but I had to lay down my own.

His life, but I had to surrender mine.

His Spirit, but I had to stop following my flesh.

His will, but I had to release my own.

His freedom, but I had to let go of the chains I had grown comfortable wearing.

The gift was free.

The surrender cost me everything.

That is the ultimate challenge.

Not running faster.

Not climbing higher.

Not becoming a better version of myself.

The ultimate challenge is dying to self every single day so Christ can live through me.

“I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”
Galatians 2:20 (NKJV)

The cross is not an invitation to improve the old man.

It is the place where the old man dies.

Every morning I face the same decision.

Will I pick up myself, or will I pick up my cross?

The greatest battle I fight is not against the world around me.

It is against the self within me that still whispers, “Take back the throne.”

But the cross has already settled who my King is.

I no longer belong to the family of my old nature.

By grace, I belong to the family of God.

What ran in my family ended at the cross.

Jesus didn’t need to pick up the scroll.

The scroll was His fingertips.

He didn’t search the Scriptures to discover the Father’s will.

He was the Word made flesh.

His hands were the Word reaching.

His feet were the Word walking.

His eyes were the Word seeing.

His tears were the Word grieving.

His voice was the Word speaking.

There was never a gap between the Word and the man because the Man was the Lord.

I’m not. When life hits me, I have to go looking. I search my memory for what God said. And while I’m looking, my flesh wants to answer first.

That’s the battle.

The more the Word moves from something I merely know to something that shapes who I am,

the less opportunity my flesh has to speak before God’s Word does.

Jesus never had to open the scroll.

He opened blind eyes.

He opened deaf ears.

He opened the way to the Father.

Because the Word wasn’t in His hands.

The Word had hands.

Every Mother’s Day, churches across America turn to Proverbs 31. It has become the defining picture of a godly woman. A virtuous woman. A woman whose life is worthy of honor.

But have you ever noticed something?

There is no Proverbs 31 for fathers.

There isn’t a chapter that begins, “Here is the virtuous man.”

There isn’t a list of twenty qualities every father should possess.

At first, that seems strange.

Until you realize God never intended fathers to model themselves after another man.

He intended fathers to model themselves after Him.

When the disciples asked Jesus how to pray, He didn’t begin with, “Our King...”

He didn’t say, “Our Creator...”

He didn’t even say, “Our Almighty God...”

He said, “Our Father...”

Think about that.

Of all the names God could have chosen to introduce Himself to His children, Jesus chose the one that every earthly father would understand.

Father.

From Genesis to Revelation, God reveals what a father looks like.

A father protects.

A father provides.

A father disciplines because he loves.

A father shows mercy.

A father forgives.

A father is patient.

A father keeps his promises.

A father welcomes the prodigal home.

The Bible doesn’t give us a Proverbs 31 father because it gives us something even greater.

It gives us the Father Himself.

David wrote,

“As a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him.”

Paul wrote,

“ Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord..”

Proverbs 20:7,

“The righteous lead blameless lives; blessed are their children after them.”

John wrote,

“I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.”

Each writer gives us another brushstroke.

Another glimpse.

Another reflection of the Father’s heart.

Put them together, and you begin to see the picture.

A father’s greatest responsibility is not simply to provide a paycheck.

It is to reveal the heart of God to his children.

That doesn’t mean being perfect.

No earthly father has ever done that except One.

It means being faithful.

It means loving when you’re tired.

Being present when life is busy.

Asking forgiveness when you’re wrong.

Keeping your word.

Praying over your children.

Pointing them to Jesus, not just with your words but with your life.

Children may forget what you bought them.

They rarely forget how you made them feel.

They may outgrow the toys.

They never outgrow the need for a father who reflects the love of their heavenly Father.

Maybe that’s why there isn’t a Proverbs 31 for dads.

Because every father is called to become a living reflection of the Father whose love never fails.

Not perfectly.

But faithfully.

Suppose I were to tell you that God chose me, and only me, to do something so special and so important that He would not entrust it to anyone else. What do you think it could possibly be?

Could God have found someone with more education? Absolutely.

Someone with more wisdom? Of course.

Someone with more patience, more money, more time, more experience, or more talent? Without question.

Yet knowing all of that, He still chose me.

Now if you’re a father reading this, Happy Father’s Day.

Because God has chosen you, and only you, to do something no one else can.

He chose you to be the father of your children.

He did not choose another man to be my son’s father. He chose me.

He did not choose another man to be your child’s father. He chose you.

And if you’re a stepdad, don’t skip over this. God may not have chosen you to give them life, but He may have chosen you to help shape it. Never underestimate the power of a man who chooses to love a child he didn’t have to.

Here’s what amazes me most.

God didn’t choose you because He couldn’t see your flaws.

He chose you knowing every flaw.

Every weakness.

Every failure.

Every regret.

Every mistake you would ever make.

He saw it all...

...and He chose you anyway.

That is grace.

Now comes the million-dollar question.

What will you do with the assignment God has given only you?

It’s easy to tell our children we love them, and they need to hear those words.

But do our actions speak as loudly as our words?

Do we love according to what our children need, or according to what is convenient for us?

I’m not proud to admit it, but I’ve said those words.

“Not today. Maybe tomorrow.”

Sometimes I was tired.

Sometimes I thought I was too busy.

Sometimes I honestly believed what I was doing was more important.

I was wrong.

Your time is worth far more to your child than twenty dollars here and ten dollars there.

Will your son remember the twenty dollars you handed him?

Or the fishing trip where he had your full attention?

Will he remember the ten dollars you gave him for a movie?

Or the afternoon the two of you spent side by side making an old hand-me-down surround sound system work?

Will your daughter remember the five dollars?

Or the piggyback rides...

...the laughter...

...the times you threw her into the lake and caught her before she hit the water?

Children spell love differently than adults.

They spell it:

T-I-M-E.

But what if your child never gets another “tomorrow?”

What if your “maybe tomorrow” becomes “never today?”

What if, after hearing “maybe” enough times, they simply stop asking?

Remember this.

God chose you, and only you, for this assignment.

Children really do learn what they live.

So don’t stop at telling your children you love them.

Become the kind of father they will love to remember.

And years from now, when someone asks your children about their dad, may they smile before they answer.

That’s not a witness. That’s a spectator with a verdict.

Here’s what nobody tells you about judgment, it’s easy when the pressure is imaginary. You can put yourself in their shoes all day long, but imagi…

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Saul hears singing. He tunes in and catches it. “Saul has killed his thousands, and David his ten thousands.”

One song. That’s all it took. Saul looks from his left to his right and everyone is singing, Saul has……

It gave him a jealous eye. And a jealous eye never sleeps.

The next morning he wakes up with an evil spirit sent by God to torment him. Not the devil. Sent by God. Don’t run past that.

Saul can hear David doing what David does every morning. Playing the harp. Worshipping warring worship. And something in Saul snaps. He hurls a spear. Die David. Die and take your ten thousands with you.

But a man covered by God doesn’t die from a king name Saul’s spear! David can’t be killed. God’s cover doesn’t come off. Remember when I said don’r run past that, so God is sending a spirit to torment Saul, while putting a protecting cover over David.

So Saul tries a different angle. Makes him a commander. Sends him into battle hoping the Philistines finish what he started. David comes back more victorious than before. Promises him his daughter Merab. Doesn’t deliver.

When you’re not liked, know this. You are not liked. Stop trying to figure it out.

Then Michal falls in love with David and Saul sees another opportunity. This man is willing to sacrifice his own family to hold onto power. That’s what power without God does to a man. It makes him dangerous to everyone around him. Including his own.

His armies can’t kill David. His own daughter saves David and lies to her father to do it.

Saul who killed thousands cannot kill one, David.

And in the end? The Spirit of God falls on Saul’s army and falls on Saul himself. He is filled with the Spirit and prophesies in the dirt.

“What? Is even Saul a prophet?”

The man who wanted David dead ended up flat on the ground with the Holy Ghost on him.

You cannot fight what God is covering. You will only end up on the ground.

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12 (NKJV)

If you drop something, anything, what happens? It falls. Every time. Whether it’s a bowling ball or a feather, gravity takes over. The only difference is how quickly it falls.

That’s because gravity is a law. You don’t have to believe in it, understand it, or feel it for it to work, it simply is. But here’s the thing: even a law like gravity can be overridden by another law, the Law of Lift. Every time a plane takes off, the Law of Lift supersedes the Law of Gravity. Let’s say an airplane needs to reach 250 mph to take off. Once it hits that speed, the wings adjust, and the plane rises, not because gravity stopped working, but because a higher law kicked in.

In the same way, the enemy tries to apply his own laws to your life: laws of fear, lack, depression, defeat. He whispers that you’re too weighed down, too broken, that your runway is too short. But every one of his attempts can be overridden by a spiritual law from the Word of God.

This is why Paul reminds us that our battle isn’t against flesh and blood. We’re not wrestling with natural issues, we’re confronting spiritual forces. And the laws that govern the spiritual realm override the natural realm every time.

Too often, we try to fight spiritual battles with natural weapons. We use worry, logic, anger, and control, then wonder why we’re still stuck on the runway. But you can’t fight with flesh what must be conquered in faith. You need to know what law is in effect, and then apply God’s higher law to it.

Take your finances, for example. In Malachi 3:10, God says: “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse… Test me in this… and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven…”

On paper, it may not make sense. Your calculator may say it’s impossible. But God’s law overrides your spreadsheet. He’s not bound by your numbers, He’s bound by His Word.

“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:2 (NKJV)

Some of us are racing down the runway at 249 mph, wondering why we’re not airborne, flaps still up, never applying the Law of Lift.

So ask yourself: What law is governing your life right now? The law of fear or the law of faith? The law of defeat or the law of victory?

God’s law is higher and has authority to override worldly laws. Apply it, and take off.

Today’s Battle Orders, Weapon Check, and Checkpoint available for paid subscribers.

TODAY’S BATTLE ORDERS

Identify one “enemy law” currently pulling you down, fear, lack, defeat, shame. Then find the “higher law” in Scripture that overrides it. Write that verse down and label it “MY FLIGHT PLAN.” Every time the enemy whispers that you’re grounded, say out loud: “The Law of the Spirit has made me free. I am not stuck, I am lifting off.”

WEAPON CHECK

The Weapon of the Higher Law

In the natural, laws are fixed. In the Spirit, laws are hierarchical. Romans 8:2 says, “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.” This weapon is your override switch. You don’t argue with the weight of your circumstances, you simply engage the Law of the Spirit. This weapon destroys the feeling of being stuck. When you realize that God’s Word isn’t a suggestion but a law that the universe must obey, you stop looking at the ground and start looking at the horizon.

CHECKPOINT

What law is governing your life right now? Are you living by the law of fear or the law of faith? The law of defeat or the law of victory?

Faith is the throttle that gets you to the speed of lift. Don’t let the enemy convince you that what you’re carrying is heavier than the wind beneath God’s wings. Push through the resistance. Apply the Word, adjust your flaps through prayer, and watch the natural laws lose their grip.

Are you ready to stop wrestling with the ground and start trusting the air?

Gideon arrives at valley, the hill of Moreh with 32,000 men. He’s ready. The army is assembled. By every military calculation, he’s positioned to fight. But God looks at that number and doesn’t see strength, He sees a problem. Not a problem with the enemy. A problem with what Israel would say after the victory.

“If we do this. Our numbers. Our strength. Our strategy.” They will take credit!

So God begins to reduce.

Not because the men were bad. Not because Gideon failed. But because God refuses to share His glory with a headcount.

Here is the question. And it’s personal. You’re another head count, and it’s His Glory.

How many times has God tried to reduce something in your life before He moved? The job. The relationship. The resource. The reputation. The crowd around you. And instead of releasing it, you held on, so that when the breakthrough finally came, you gave the credit to what was still in your hand instead of the One who moved?

Gideon didn’t get to keep 32,000. He got 300. And those 300 didn’t even fight, they just showed up and held their position.

God did the rest.

The reduction wasn’t the obstacle. The reduction WAS the strategy.

God hasn’t got a Chris problem, He has a Glory problem!

The Negev is dry. Southern territory. Hot, arid, manageable for some things but without water it has a hard ceiling on what it can produce. Land without water in that region is land with a limited future.

Aksah knew exactly what she had and exactly what was missing.

She didn’t just dismount for a request. She dismounted knowing her husband was watching.

Aksah had just married the man who proved himself worthy of her by taking Debir, a military conquest her father Caleb set up specifically to find a man of that caliber. Now she walks up to her father with full honor, full posture, and makes her ask.

Othniel watched the whole thing.

He saw his wife honor her father by coming down off her animal. He saw her ask with precision for exactly what their future needed. He saw Caleb respond to her boldness with full generosity, upper springs and lower springs, no negotiation, nothing held back.

Othniel was watching a masterclass in how this family operates.

They ask. They ask honorably. They ask specifically. They ask for all of it. And they get all of it.

Ask for the springs.

Joshua 14:6 says the people of Judah approached Joshua at Gilgal, and Caleb son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite stepped forward personally.

One man, making one ask.

No entourage.

No delegation.

No committee.

Eighty-five years old, walks up to Joshua, and makes his case alone.

The only two men from the original scout team who saw who was occupying the promised land were still standing. God kept them because of their report. And that report hadn’t changed in forty-five years.

Caleb never revised his theology to match his circumstances.

Every other tribe had the same God and the same options. Most of them stopped at enough. They took what was manageable, made peace with what remained, and settled for partial possession. God honored what they took. They just never found out what was possible.

Caleb never found out where enough was, because he never stopped to look for it.

He walked up to Joshua and made his case. I was forty when Moses sent me.

I brought back an honest report.

I followed the Lord wholeheartedly.

Moses promised me this land.

Look at me, eighty-five years old and just as strong as the day he sent me out.

He wasn’t asking for a favor.

He was collecting on a promise.

That mountain with the giants on it. It’s mine.

Battle it was.

And the land had rest from war. Joshua 12:15

“As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.” (Genesis 8:22)

You know the bible is full of knowledge and wisdom, and then there are what I would call some absolutes this scripture being one of them!

In Proverbs Solomon tells us in all we are getting, get understanding. As…

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They answered him, “We are Abraham’s descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?” Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.” John 8:33-34

Slave: 1. One bound in servitude to a person or household as an instrument of labor.

2. One who is submi…

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People love to quote that verse, especially when things do not make sense. Someone says, “I’m just walking by faith,” but many times we have no idea what we are really doing. When we don’t know what we are doing, we call it faith. Sometimes it is just walking blindly.

Philip Yancey once said, “Faith means trusting in advance what will only make sense in reverse.”

I learned that lesson not long after we moved here.

One night I ran into town to get a gallon of milk. My plan was simple. Stop at the first convenience store, grab the milk, and head home.

But as I drove past the first store, something in me said keep going. My mind immediately started arguing with itself. Why didn’t I stop? That made no sense.

I told myself I would stop at the next store.

Then I drove right past that one too.

Now I was really arguing with myself. What are you doing? Just stop and get the milk.

Long story short, I ended up at the last store in town.

The clerk behind the counter started telling me how terrible her day had been. Her car had broken down, and she had no idea how she was going to fix it.

Trying to encourage her, I said, “Oh, it can’t be that bad.”

She looked at me and asked, “Can you put a water pump on?”

Everything inside me screamed no.

But when my mouth opened, I said yes.

Later it finally made sense.

Faith often works that way. It rarely explains itself in the moment. Most of the time it only makes sense when you look back and see what God was doing the whole time.

So here is a clue about walking by faith and not by sight.

If you are just going through the motions with no purpose, no struggle, and no internal debate, you might not be walking by faith at all.

You might just be walking blindly.

Faith shows up when you trust God before the picture makes sense.

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”
Hebrews 11:1 (NKJV)

When God first told me to start writing, I laughed. It wasn’t a hearty laugh of joy, it was what I call the “Sarah chuckle,” that mix of disbelief and nervous laughter that comes when what God asks sounds impossible. Sarah laughed when she heard she would bear a child at ninety. Her problem was age. Mine felt much simpler: I couldn’t write a coherent sentence to save my life.

I had no plan. No direction. No vision for what might come from it.

Two weeks later, Christine came to me and said, “God told me we’re going to start writing together.” We had never discussed it before. That was my confirmation. God often speaks once and then confirms through another, and when He does, you realize it’s not about your ability; it’s about His assignment..

So, out of obedience, I sat down and wrote.

I had no idea what would come from it. I didn’t know Christine would become my publisher, tirelessly editing and proofreading everything. I didn’t know those early words would end up printed weekly on the back of the church bulletin. And I certainly didn’t know those small steps of faith would one day stir the vision for a book—Chasing the Dark Away.

But here’s what I learned: once I started, God started moving. Obedience opened the door. Faith kept me walking through it.

No one can show you ahead of time what the success of your calling will look like. I can’t prove how far this book will reach. I haven’t held the finished copy in my hands yet. But I keep writing anyway. Why?

Because that’s what faith is, the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Faith isn’t blind optimism or wishful thinking. Faith is confident action in response to God’s Word, even when nothing visible seems to support it yet. Evidence, by definition, supports truth. In God’s kingdom, faith becomes the evidence that His promises are already true in His timeline, even if I haven’t seen them in mine.

If I had stopped writing when it didn’t make sense, where would my substance be now? What would I be standing on? Today it is a fact that a book will be published—not because I’ve seen it yet, but because faith made it real long before it arrives.

So let me ask you this: are you stuck in the how, or are you walking in the what?

At a Promise Keepers event, I once heard a speaker say something that stuck with me: “We get so caught up in the how, we forget the what.” That’s it, isn’t it? We obsess over how God will accomplish something and overlook what He has already asked us to do.

Our fixation on the mechanics robs us of the miracle already in motion.

The prophet Habakkuk recorded God’s instruction:

“Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it. For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and will not delay.”
— Habakkuk 2:2–3

God’s Word reminds us that visions are tied to appointed times. They may linger. They may stretch us. But they are certain. The what is clear: write it down, make it plain, keep it before you. Speak it. Pray it. Believe it. Even when the timeline stretches, the promise does not expire.

Not every calling unfolds on our schedule. Some assignments require seasons of preparation that don’t fit our calendar. But when God speaks, our role isn’t to solve logistics. Our role is obedience. He handles the timing, the reach, and the results.

So forget the how. Focus on the what. Step boldly into what God has called you to do and trust Him to handle the details in ways you could never orchestrate yourself.

Faith isn’t wishing. It’s standing on truth and stepping into obedience.

Today Battle Orders, Weapon Check, Checkpoint for paid subscribers.

TODAY’S BATTLE ORDERS

Write down one thing God has called you to do that you’ve been stuck on because you can’t figure out the how. It might be mending a relationship, starting a ministry, breaking a habit, serving in a specific way, or stepping into a new season.

Write only the what, the clear thing God said. Then take one small act of obedience toward it today. Don’t wait until you understand how it will all work out. Take one step.

WEAPON CHECK

Journaling, Following Habakkuk 2:2–3, write the vision God has given you and make it plain. Post it somewhere you’ll see it daily, your mirror, dashboard, or phone wallpaper. Every time you see it, you’re building substance. Faith isn’t wishing; it’s writing it down and walking it out. Your journal becomes the evidence of things not yet seen.

CHECKPOINT

Are you stuck in the how or walking in the what?

Write down the what God has clearly told you to do. Then list all the how questions that have paralyzed you:

• How will I afford it?

• How will I find the time?

• How will people respond?

Now cross out every how question and write this over them:

“God handles the how. I handle the obedience.”

I will walk before the LORD in the land of the living. Psalms 116:9

If you were to visit the Howard County Sheriff’s office in Nashville, Arkansas, and ask to see arrest photo #1169. And if you do that you will find a picture of me.

I was in my orange attire; my face was sunken in, the skin around my eyes was recessed, and my eyes looked hollow. I probably weighed around 165 which is exceptionally lightweight for me. My jawline was sharp, and my cheeks were sunken with no color. I had the appearance of death. Yes, I looked like the living, walking dead.

When I saw the picture, I just laughed and said I’m going to catch up with the sheriff and tell him he needs a new picture of me because if he goes looking for the guy in photo number 1169, he won’t find him. You see, that guy is dead. He no longer exists.

While we were at a church camp, I wanted to share this story with our youth and explain how they should not look the same when they get home. But the Lord wouldn’t let me. He just kept that picture number 1169 in my thoughts.

At first, I didn’t understand. “Is that a scripture?” I asked. I started flipping through the Bible trying to find a chapter with 69 verses. Then it hit me: Psalm 116:9. I asked, “Lord, is that it?” And He confirmed it. So I opened my Bible and read:

“I will walk before the LORD in the land of the living.” Wow.

God had taken what once identified me in death, 1169, and redeemed it as a declaration of life. That picture told a powerful story of what sin will do to you: it will hollow you out and kill you from the inside. But God’s grace revives. When you walk with Him, you don’t just look alive, you are alive.

That’s the power of the gospel. When you leave behind the old man and begin to walk with the Lord, everything changes. Your countenance changes. Your conversations with Him become real. You begin to recognize His voice, and He knows yours.

“The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.” Romans 8:16

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. Romans 8:28

When God says all things work together, rest assured, He means all things. When the number of your arrest photo becomes vital to God, He means everything.

Does God’s Spirit testify with your spirit?

Today’s Battle Orders, Weapon Check, and Checkpoint available for paid subscribers.

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“For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.” - Romans 7:19 (NKJV)

People don’t hate their lives, they hate their routines.

The monotony of the “forever I have” becomes a prison where we keep repeating the same cycles, expecting different outcomes. We can see everyone else’s patterns clearly, but we’re blind to our own.

If you want to see your immediate future, look no further than your immediate past. We desperately want to change, but lack the discipline to remove what’s harmful. Your past doesn’t define you, but it will teach you, if you let it.

I lived this for thirty-eight years, self-destructive patterns, abusive choices, dying the death of a thousand cuts. I was trapped in Paul’s struggle: “For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice” (Romans 7:19).

The cycle broke when I stopped waiting for a miracle and started preparing for war against the habits, mindsets, and decisions that kept me bound. Breaking cycles requires weapons, not wishes.

The first weapon I discovered was worship. When everything falls apart, worship becomes your war cry. It shifts the spiritual atmosphere around your situation, bringing Christ’s power, God’s grace, and the Holy Spirit’s peace directly into your battle. “Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise” (Psalm 100:4). Transform worry into worship.

The second weapon is God’s Word. Scripture isn’t just inspiration—it’s ammunition. God’s Word exposes the lies keeping you trapped and reveals truth that sets you free. When destructive thoughts come, counter them with what God says about you, not what your past whispers.

The third weapon is journaling. Write down thoughts, struggles, prayers, and what God speaks to you. Something powerful happens when pen meets paper, patterns become visible, progress measurable, and God’s faithfulness undeniable. Your journal becomes evidence of the war you’re winning.

Breakthrough came when I realized I wasn’t just fighting bad habits, I was fighting for my future. Every act of worship declared God was bigger than my patterns. Every time I opened His Word, I chose His voice over familiar lies. Every journal entry was a step toward who He created me to be.

If you want a different future, surrender your habits, mindset, and decisions to God today. Not tomorrow, not when you “feel ready” or “get ready,”do it today. The cycle breaks when you stop managing your dysfunction and start warring for your freedom. Your past got you here, but it doesn’t get to decide where you go next.

It ran in my family until I ran into God.

Today’s Battle Orders, Weapon Check, and Checkpoint available for paid subscribers.

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“Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true worship.” - Romans 12:1 (NKJV)

King David understood a profound truth that we often overlook, if our sacrifice costs us nothing and means nothing to us, what is it worth to God? When Ornan generously offered his land, oxen, and tools for free, David refused, saying, “No, I will pay the full price. I will not offer to the Lord what costs me nothing” (1 Chronicles 21:24). That moment revealed the difference between convenience and true devotion.

In our fast-paced world, we’ve grown used to giving God whatever’s easiest, leftover time, spare change, or half-hearted worship, and calling it sacrifice. But real sacrifice demands something deeper. It costs us.

The difference between price and value is critical. Price is what you paid; value is what something truly means to you. You might own expensive things that carry no real worth in your life—just like we often offer God gestures that carry no weight in our hearts. That extra hour of sleep we won’t give up for prayer. That grudge we won’t release. The resources we cling to instead of investing in His kingdom. If those things hold little value to us, why would they mean anything to Him?

God’s sacrifice was the complete opposite. He didn’t give us leftovers or convenience. He gave His Son. His most priceless treasure. The cross wasn’t easy. It wasn’t clean. It was costly. And if we grasp even a fraction of what it took to redeem us, how could we offer anything less than our whole hearts?

David’s refusal to bring a cheap offering challenges us to examine what we bring before the Lord. True worship isn’t defined by what we give up, but by what it costs us. If it doesn’t require anything from us, it’s not worship—it’s just noise.

“Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true worship” (Romans 12:1).

When we give God what truly matters—ourselves—we don’t just honor Him with our lips. We honor Him with our lives.

Today’s Battle Orders, Weapon Check, and Checkpoint available for paid subscribers.

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“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12 (NKJV)

If you drop something, anything, what happens? It falls. Every time. Whether it’s a bowling ball or a feather, gravity takes over. The only difference is how quickly it falls.

That’s because gravity is a law. You don’t have to believe in it, understand it, or feel it for it to work, it simply is. But here’s the thing: even a law like gravity can be overridden by another law, the Law of Lift. Every time a plane takes off, the Law of Lift supersedes the Law of Gravity. Let’s say an airplane needs to reach 250 mph to take off. Once it hits that speed, the wings adjust, and the plane rises, not because gravity stopped working, but because a higher law kicked in.

In the same way, the enemy tries to apply his own laws to your life: laws of fear, lack, depression, defeat. He whispers that you’re too weighed down, too broken, that your runway is too short. But every one of his attempts can be overridden by a spiritual law from the Word of God.

This is why Paul reminds us that our battle isn’t against flesh and blood. We’re not wrestling with natural issues, we’re confronting spiritual forces. And the laws that govern the spiritual realm override the natural realm every time.

Too often, we try to fight spiritual battles with natural weapons. We use worry, logic, anger, and control, then wonder why we’re still stuck on the runway. But you can’t fight with flesh what must be conquered in faith. You need to know what law is in effect, and then apply God’s higher law to it.

Take your finances, for example. In Malachi 3:10, God says: “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse… Test me in this… and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven…”

On paper, it may not make sense. Your calculator may say it’s impossible. But God’s law overrides your spreadsheet. He’s not bound by your numbers, He’s bound by His Word.

“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:2 (NKJV)

Some of us are racing down the runway at 249 mph, wondering why we’re not airborne, flaps still up, never applying the Law of Lift.

So ask yourself: What law is governing your life right now? The law of fear or the law of faith? The law of defeat or the law of victory?

God’s law is higher and has authority to override worldly laws. Apply it, and take off.

Today’s Battle Orders, Weapon Check, and Checkpoint available for paid subscribers.

TODAY’S BATTLE ORDERS

Identify one “enemy law” currently pulling you down, fear, lack, defeat, shame. Then find the “higher law” in Scripture that overrides it. Write that verse down and label it “MY FLIGHT PLAN.” Every time the enemy whispers that you’re grounded, say out loud: “The Law of the Spirit has made me free. I am not stuck—I am lifting off.”

WEAPON CHECK

The Weapon of the Higher Law

In the natural, laws are fixed. In the Spirit, laws are hierarchical. Romans 8:2 says, “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.” This weapon is your override switch. You don’t argue with the weight of your circumstances, you simply engage the Law of the Spirit. This weapon destroys the feeling of being stuck. When you realize that God’s Word isn’t a suggestion but a law that the universe must obey, you stop looking at the ground and start looking at the horizon.

CHECKPOINT

What law is governing your life right now? Are you living by the law of fear or the law of faith? The law of defeat or the law of victory?

Faith is the throttle that gets you to the speed of lift. Don’t let the enemy convince you that what you’re carrying is heavier than the wind beneath God’s wings. Push through the resistance. Apply the Word, adjust your flaps through prayer, and watch the natural laws lose their grip.

Are you ready to stop wrestling with the ground and start trusting the air?