ICS Daily Devotions
We Have the Power to Overcome
Genesis 1:27-28 (NKJV) So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
To Christians, the infallible Word of God is our yardstick for measuring what is right and wrong in society. His Word is a lamp to our feet and light unto our path. It is what leads us onto the right path in life; choosing to ignore it will only lead us away from the path of righteousness and to compromise with the world. Not only is the Bible the authority in the life of every believer of Jesus Christ, but it is also the handbook for all humanity because God is the God of all creation. Therefore, the Bible has the authority to speak into the current confusion regarding gender issues and deliver people out of the deception of the devil aimed at destroying the next generation.
God made Adam and Eve to be partners for life. The Bible starts with a marriage between a man and a woman and ends with the church being the bride of Christ in the Book of Revelation. Therefore, biblical marriage is always about a man and a woman, and there is absolute gender clarity in God’s creation. God did not create transgender; it only happens because we live in a fallen and broken world.
However, because of the redemption work of Jesus on the cross, there is hope that we can live differently from the world. The new creation realities, or the born-again experience, is what enable us to live differently from the world. Because we have God’s nature in our spirit man and the fruit of the Holy Spirit, we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to live an abundant and victorious life. Having knowledge of this truth will set us free, though during our time on earth, we will constantly need to enforce the victory of Jesus and push back the forces of darkness.
2 Peter 1:2-4 (NKJV) Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
The key to overcoming passionate and illicit sexual desires, whether natural or unnatural, is found in these few verses. We can overcome temptation and walk in godliness because God’s divine power—the same power of the Holy Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead—resides in us.
Sermon Series: Natural or Unnatural? (PART 1 Gender Confusion)
