FIGHT ON!!!!!

I realize this is long but please read it all.

I just finished watching a movie that I hadn’t watched in a long long long time: “The Never Ending Story”. The Power House Teen Center had a movie night held here at the Bangor Corps. I don’t know how many of you have actually seen it recently or remember it that well, but there is apart of the movie where this mysterious Nothing that is sweeping across Fantasia is described. This part really stood out in my mind because of the way things are described, it made me wonder if it was put this way for a reason. In the movie where Atreyu (the hero of the movie) is confronting this beast that has been coming after him for a good portion of the movie and he asks the beast what he knows about the Nothing that is sweeping across Fantasia? It’s leaving behind…nothing; the land is being destroyed into non-existence. The beast (G’Mork) describes the Nothing as “It's the emptiness that's left. It's like a despair, destroying this world. And I have been trying to help it…people have begun to loose there hope and forget there dreams so the Nothing grows stronger”. He is then asked why and this is his response, “Because people who have no hopes are easy to control; and whoever has control has...the power! I am the servant of the power behind the Nothing. G’Mork basically says he’s a demon serving Satan and helping him bring people into this sense of hopelessness and despair and depression so they can be controlled.

I see it as a message for Christians. We have to be guarding ourselves against this sense of hopelessness that comes after us. It creeps in on us at times when we least expect it and when we’re most vulnerable. If we don’t combat against this feeling it will overtake us and take us out of the fight for Christ and render us ineffective. I have seen this oppression take its toll and work on people here in Bangor. That has got to be one of the saddest thoughts in the world: a Christian who can’t fight because they feel it’s too hard, and it’s pointless to try. Yes, there are times in our lives when sadness comes and grieving is, at times, a very good thing, but we can’t stay in that state. We need to fight and work through stuff that is trying to pull us down so that we can do everything in our power to win the battle’s that are we find in our daily lives that are on our battlefronts. When we fight we know we can have victory because Christ made us more than conquerors. We're on the front lines!!

Ephesians 6:13-18 (NIV) Put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints.