The fight for faith is different than a fight for the faith. The fight for faith occurs within your own soul on a daily basis. Ours is a spiritual struggle–a fight for faith. This is different than fighting for the faith, i.e. defending the truth of the gospel against false teachers or the world. There is a different, more deadly fight. This fight takes place within our own souls. It’s a daily struggle within our own souls to trust in God and to believe his promises in the moment of temptation. It is a fight for faith. Scripture speaks of this fight:
- “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you” (Jms. 4:1)?
- “So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members” (Rom. 7:21-23).
- “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul” (1Pe. 2:11).
We are fighting for faith on a regular basis. In other words, we are fighting to obey the command of Proverbs, “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding” (3:5).