Psalm 21:8-9 — Thine hand shall find out all thine enemies: thy right hand shall find out those that hate thee. Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the Lord shall swallow them up in his wrath, and the fire shall devour them.

I had a very tricky meeting this afternoon. To be honest I was not looking forward to it. A valued colleague and I had been working diligently in preparation of some information to share, and we knew that what we had to share might not be very welcome.
In our meeting, besides we two, there were five others. We figured the vote about four to one against us before we went in. Two hours later, we were smiling. No, we didn’t get all we wanted — but we got enough to know that the battle was won, even if the war will continue.
But who won the battle? Based on past experience we could certainly have got our heads chopped off. I choose to believe that God went before us, and defeated out enemies even before the battle started.
Do you think I’m being dramatic, or romantic? I don’t. I am convinced that prayer, mine and that of others, made sure that we had our will lined up with God’s. You don’t have to take my word for it. Trust to your own experience. How many times have you been anticipating difficulties only to see them melt away before you when you have been praying fervently for divine intervention? “Well yes,” I can hear you say. “But those weren’t battles. Those were illnesses, arguments, temptations … but not really battles!” All I can say is that perhaps, like me, you don’t always give God the credit He deserves. You see, I have come to believe that a lot of “battles” are not the obvious head-on confrontations with those who would harm us. I know our meeting today was a bit like that — but often our battles are against “the world, the flesh and the devil.” In fact very often my fiercest battles are the ones I fight against myself, or at least the temptations that rage within me. “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
It’s when we turn to God and put our battles — personal, spiritual, physical, emotional, against ourselves, or others, or satan or circumstances — that God takes up arms on our behalf. It is then that He finds out our enemies and in His wrath consumes them like a mighty fire. The battle is The Lord’s!