Enemies are Useful

I – Positive emotions provide nothing.

For true, lasting fuel to motivate your endeavors, you need enemies. When you are knee-deep in the comforts of life and the world, you can forget what made you work hard in the beginning. Sometimes you will not be willing to work hard out of ambition or the desire for gain, sometimes you need more. You need the energy that comes from having an opponent.

Comfort provides no energy. But if you have an enemy, you have a wellspring of eternal energy. There is nothing more motivating than having someone who wants to go to war with you. At that moment you can channel your natural warlike nature and convert it into energy for success.

You do not have to go to war with people directly. That may bother the sensitive conscience of many Christian people. You can, however, use the emotional fuel from that enemy to motivate yourself to success.

Take advantage of the fact that people will inevitably want to go to war with you. If you do this, you will have limitless power. Having an enemy gives you purpose, direction, and a clear-cut destination. Every one of your actions begins to have real meaning. All of your work is energized. What once fatigued you is now nothing more than a bump in the road. Take advantage of the energy reservoir that comes when you are at war.

II – Having an enemy is a part of life.

Sometimes it is a consequence of our poor decisions, other times people just want to go to war with us. There is no need to complain about this because it is actually a useful tool. Use enemies to your advantage.

Look at the stories of David. This was a man at war for his entire life. This was a result of his own actions (2 Samuel 12:10). He wrote many psalms about his enemies. He would write about them surrounding him at all sides. And he would also write about crushing them in battle.

Make no mistake about it, those who hate God and hate our religion are our enemies. They hate the Bible and they hate everything that Christians stand for.

III – Do not make enemies directly unless absolutely necessary.

By biblical law, we need to be at peace with all men, as possible. However, if someone decides to make war with us, we should use that energy to our advantage.

“If possible, so far as it depends on you, live in peace with all people”

Romans 12:18

We should not go out of our way to start wars. But if wars are started against us, we have the right to defend ourselves.

There is this popular notion in Christianty that tries to paint Christians as pacifists. People think that Christians will do nothing as their families are tortured and killed by governments or other enemies. This is not true. Christians have the right to self-defense just as much as anyone else. We should not go out of our way to attack others directly, but we can retaliate to protect ourselves.

Some Christians twist “do not resist an evil person” (Matthew 5:39) to mean that we should never lift a single finger to protect ourselves or others from war. This is not true. We have the right to go to war. Humans will always go to war and we may have to be a part of it. There will be war from now until the end of time, it is in human nature. It is built into the very DNA of men.

You do not have to go to physical war yourself, but you must take advantage of this programming that you have. You need to learn to channel this natural warlike nature into productive pursuits. That Is how you begin using enemies to your advantage.

IV – Be at war with the devil

If it bothers your conscience to wage war with enemies who started a war with you, you have options. We are all at war with the devil and his angels. This is an inescapable part of life. He hates you and wants you to fall, and you are at war with him all the days of your life.

Activate your apparatus of hatred. You were given the emotion of hatred for a reason, for there is a proper use for it. While we should not hate our fellow men, we are to hate sin and the devil. That is the greatest possible outset for this emotion of pure hatred. It is one of the most valuable emotions we have.

Oftentimes the Bible gives parameters around hot emotions such as anger. For example:

“Be angry and do not sin” ~ Ephesians 4:26

We are allowed to experience these emotions, but they must be controlled. Using our hatred and directing it towards sin and the devil is the parameter that we must follow.

V – Recognize Camoflagued Emenies

We have more enemies than we think we do. This is a sad and unfortunate reality, but we need to be aware of it. Others hate us and we may never know it, but we should be on the lookout for it.

Even inside religion, there are people who teach principles that oppose what we know to be true from the Bible. They teach that the Bible does not mean what it says. Or they teach that there is no need for you to behave with the extreme discipline that you do.

Either way, they are teaching contrary to what the Bible teaches. Paul writing to the church at Galatia has the following to say about the men who teach principles that oppose the Bible:

“As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let them be under God’s curse!”

Galations 1:9

That sounds like a serious bit of phraseology. The Bible makes it clear that those who teach another gospel are cursed. They are our enemies, and there is no way around this.

Because of this, we should work hard to understand the true principles of God so we can crush these arguments. Notice I do not say we should crush the people making the arguments, but rather the arguments themselves.

Crushing others directly does nothing but give us a few seconds of satisfaction. But we set ourselves back by damaging the relationship and damaging rapport. When it comes to people who are already religious, we have to be more careful with how we handle them. They may not know that they are fighting for the enemy with the things they are teaching and preaching.

Take advantage of your enemies. You are going to have them all the days of your life. All you can do is make the best of it.

Conduct Yourselves Like Men.