Contenting For The Faith

Contention

Proverbs 22:10 Cast out the scorner, and contention shall go out; yea, strife and reproach shall cease.

(Jesus speaking: ) Cast out the scorner and contention shall cease. What is contention? A contentious woman is someone no one wants to be married to. (Proverbs 19:13; 21:19; 27:15) To earnestly contend for the faith is what My believers are admonished to do. (Jude 1:3) In short, it means fight or be in opposition.

When someone is in opposition—in the opposite position as you, facing you down, trying to get you to change something so that you will conform more to their way of being (whether it’s for good or wrong)—then contention is present.

To get people to change in something—their mind or habits or work, etc.—when that person isn’t of the opinion to do so, will take some fight. Trying to change, not just a person but a group of people, takes real effort.

To contend is to speak up for what you think things should be like, and to speak despairingly to those who are of a different opinion so that they’ll give up their way and change to doing or seeing things your way. When you are contending, you aren’t as concerned about the feelings of others involved as much as you are about making progress in some direction. You’ve got a goal and are hoping that others will support you in it.

The trouble comes when others don’t support your ideas, and rather than agreeing and walking the same way as you, they flare up to contend for their side, the way they think things should be. So you then have two or more people each trying to walk in opposite directions and contending, or standing up to the other, for what they think is right.

This is the path you must walk on, for much will be in opposition to you as you take this narrow and uphill pathway climb. Anyone you meet will be facing you down. You will have to make the extremely dangerous and heart-rending decision to keep on going even though it costs you getting jostled along the way or nearly tossed over the edge of the cliff at times while you pass those who are going in opposition to you. But if you can get past those narrow conflicts of interest and manage to find your feet again, you’ll see more from the new vantage point you will come to.

You wither when you see an opponent coming down the pathway that you are trying to go up, because you know it will cost you a great deal. Now, rather than hiking up bravely and joyfully, you might be limping instead, because they stepped on your toes while facing you down, nearly treading over you. You get a stick then and use it like crutch for a while, attempting some sort of forward progress. But every now and then you look back down the pathway to see who troubled you and see them slowly making their way down. You have ill feelings  towards them now. If only they could have been walking the same way you are, you might have had interesting discussions, urged each other on and made further progress in less time. You feel like tossing a few stones to roll down and hit them. It seems like you are above them just because the pathway has wended upward. But you really don’t want to have another encounter with them. Besides, if you stop to stone throw, it will cost you in time, in joy, and just might make you lose your balance, while you are barely able to keep it as it is. So with one hand on the side of the mountain to your left, and your other hand holding your stick crutch, you go on, one labored step at a time.  You cry. Your heart breaks, and you are really confused.

“Luke 8:53, 54 And they laughed him to scorn, knowing that she was dead.  And he put them all out, and took her by the hand, and called, saying, Maid, arise.”

So darling, what or who is in opposition to you? A man’s foes shall be they of his own household. I told you this in My Word and will I not bring it to pass? For these are as gates that you must walk through; each warning will find its fulfillment, for I will see to it that My Word is accomplished.

But what are you to do about it? It’s Me or the other. You can’t have both. You can’t please both God and man. And this is what you must learn. Learn it well before the tests get even tougher.

What do I want you to do? Who do I want you to please? Just live My Word. You are to be as a thumb that sticks out and does not become as a finger. People might try to pull you and stretch you to try to make you more finger shaped, but it won’t work. It will just cause you pain and prove to them and to you that you are and will be what you are meant to be.

But be glad for the pulling and the stretching, for it makes you ever so solidly sure that you can’t become something you are not meant to be.

When you turn away from Me, even ever so slightly in order to please the people, that is when I really hurt. Ouch, I cry in pain.

So basically, as time goes on, more and more that you are called to do will continue to be in opposition to others. More of what you do or are asked to do will seem just plain wrong to those who are using their own tally stick to measure your deeds. Nearly everything right for you will have someone on earth fighting it tooth and nail. So if you listen to man—to all people who oppose you—you will be hindered from doing absolutely anything I have called on you to do, because this guy over here will stop you in that thing, and the next person will hinder your efforts in the next thing. –All through words and ideas and opinions.

And you can be that way too if you play that game of making people conform to your way of being. So lighten up and let each go on their way while you focus on doing what you are meant to be doing, rather than making life a game of changing others to suit your fancies. Instead, just face Me and say yes and do what you are meant to. Let others make their own life choices when there is nothing more you can say or do to convince them otherwise. Don’t get dragged down in the choices and interests of others. Walk harder, do more for My kingdom, and never let yourself be tricked off the path of what My will is for you.

The “scorner” is Satan and his minions who are constantly belittling your efforts and the way you do things. If it’s not supporting what you are meant to be doing, then it’s wrong and you don’t have to listen to it.