The Strongest

 DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LUKE

THE STRONGEST

Luke 11:21-22

 21 "When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe. 22 But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up the spoils.

NIV

We would think that all these different sayings, or teachings of Jesus are related for He is speaking continuously. However, each phrase has a special meaning as with this idea about the strong man. Jesus is talking about a strong man who guards his own house, with his own strength, trusting in his fully armed stuff. He has his ring doorbell with the full video feature, his door and window alarms are all in place, including iron gates and he might even have set traps around the lawn that set off loud alarms, and he might even have all his automatic rifles and handguns at strategic places throughout his house. The idea here is someone trusting in himself and that will always be met with someone stronger, better equipped, and overpowers him. This could be applied to many areas of life, such as in the workforce, where a man trusts in his own abilities, education, and experience to obtain a position, but someone who also applies who has more abilities. education, and experience. However, the man who trusts in Jesus Christ is secure. It is not that when we are completely safe from someone taking our possessions, but we must see this in another sense. If we trust in ourselves, the stronger one is Satan and he can overpower us and divide up our life’s work. But when we trust in Jesus, there is no one stronger than God, and we are secure, our salvation will not be divided up, being the spoils of Satan. Of course, if we trust in our stuff, that is our abilities, education, and experience to succeed in life, and yes, even in ministry, we might be in danger of having someone stronger taking it all away, so that we fail at whatever we attempt. But trusting in He who is the strongest of all, we will not fail, because He directs our path, and His light shines before and within us, so that we are secure. We trust in His strength for He is the strongest of all.