The Christian Life Is a Fight for Your Life

Why does the Christian life feel like a fight when I thought it was supposed to be rest?

Paul writes this near the end of thirty years of ministry and does not soften it: there are enemies, and they are fighting whether you are or not. Some of them are outside you and some of them wake up with you every morning.

Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called, and you confessed the good confession in the sight of many witnesses.

1 Timothy 6:12

But the Spirit says expressly that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons, through the hypocrisy of men who speak lies, branded in their own conscience as with a hot iron,…

1 Timothy 4:1–2

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind of the flesh is death, but the mind of the Spirit is life and peace; because the mind of the flesh is hostile toward God, for it is not subject to God’s law, neither indeed can it be. Those who are in the flesh can’t please God.

Romans 8:5–8

For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world’s rulers of the darkness of this age, and against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.

Ephesians 6:12

Be sober and self-controlled. Be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, walks around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Withstand him steadfast in your faith, knowing that your brothers who are in the world are undergoing the same sufferings.

1 Peter 5:8–9

What am I actually supposed to run from, and what am I supposed to run toward?

Fleeing sounds like retreat until you notice Paul tells the man of God to do it. Bunyan pictured a man with his fingers in his ears running from a city and toward a gate, and Paul gives both directions in the same breath.

But you, man of God, flee these things, and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance, and gentleness.

1 Timothy 6:11

If anyone teaches a different doctrine and doesn’t consent to sound words, the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness, he is conceited, knowing nothing, but obsessed with arguments, disputes, and word battles, from which come envy, strife, insulting, evil suspicions, constant friction of people of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain. Withdraw yourself from such. But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we certainly can’t carry anything out. But having food and clothing, we will be content with that. But those who are determined to be rich fall into a temptation, a snare, and many foolish and harmful lusts, such as drown men in ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some have been led astray from the faith in their greed, and have pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

1 Timothy 6:3–10

About this time, he went into the house to do his work, and there were none of the men of the house inside. She caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me!” He left his garment in her hand, and ran outside.

Genesis 39:11–12

Don’t enter into the path of the wicked. Don’t walk in the way of evil men. Avoid it, and don’t pass by it. Turn from it, and pass on.

Proverbs 4:14–15

Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect; but I press on, that I may take hold of that for which also I was taken hold of by Christ Jesus. Brothers, I don’t regard myself as yet having taken hold, but one thing I do: forgetting the things which are behind and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

Philippians 3:12–14

How do I keep going when I have been at this for years and I am worn out?

Paul does not promise a sprint. He tells Timothy to keep the command until the appearing of Christ, which is longer than most of us plan for. The charge is held out in front of a man who will shortly die for it.

…that you keep the commandment without spot, blameless until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which at the right time he will show, who is the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords. He alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen nor can see, to whom be honor and eternal power. Amen.

1 Timothy 6:14–16

I have fought the good fight. I have finished the course. I have kept the faith. From now on, the crown of righteousness is stored up for me, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give to me on that day; and not to me only, but also to all those who have loved his appearing.

2 Timothy 4:7–8

Let’s not be weary in doing good, for we will reap in due season if we don’t give up.

Galatians 6:9

Therefore let’s also, seeing we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let’s run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising its shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him who has endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, that you don’t grow weary, fainting in your souls.

Hebrews 12:1–3

Even the youths faint and get weary, and the young men utterly fall; but those who wait for Yahweh will renew their strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run, and not be weary. They will walk, and not faint.

Isaiah 40:30–31

If God is really in control, why does any of this feel so urgent?

Paul stacks title after title onto God in the middle of a charge, as if the fight only makes sense in front of a king who actually reigns. He is sovereign, he is happy, and he does not run out.

…which at the right time he will show, who is the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords. He alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen nor can see, to whom be honor and eternal power. Amen.

1 Timothy 6:15–16

For by him all things were created in the heavens and on the earth, visible things and invisible things, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things are held together.

Colossians 1:16–17

He has on his garment and on his thigh a name written, “KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.”

Revelation 19:16

At the end of the days I, Nebuchadnezzar, lifted up my eyes to heaven, and my understanding returned to me; and I blessed the Most High, and I praised and honored him who lives forever, for his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; and he does according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth; and no one can stop his hand, or ask him, “What are you doing?”

Daniel 4:34–35

What does it mean that I will give an account to the God who gave me life?

Paul charges Timothy in the presence of God and of Christ, and he does not treat that as decoration. The God who made everything is the one before whom believers stand, which is both a sobering thing and the reason the fight is worth it.

For we must all be revealed before the judgment seat of Christ that each one may receive the things in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad.

2 Corinthians 5:10

I command you before God who gives life to all things, and before Christ Jesus who before Pontius Pilate testified the good confession, that you keep the commandment without spot, blameless until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ,…

1 Timothy 6:13–14

Jesus answered, “My Kingdom is not of this world. If my Kingdom were of this world, then my servants would fight, that I wouldn’t be delivered to the Jews. But now my Kingdom is not from here.” Pilate therefore said to him, “Are you a king then?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this reason I have been born, and for this reason I have come into the world, that I should testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.”

John 18:36–37

“His lord said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a few things, I will set you over many things. Enter into the joy of your lord.’

Matthew 25:21