You feel it, don’t you? That pressing weight, that writhing shadow coiled about the mind and the affections, as though something alien has wormed its way into the very seat of who you are. You cry out that it would leave your personality, and you do well to cry. The enemy loves to make his oppressions feel like they are you, to weave his black thread so tightly into the fabric of your consciousness that you cannot tell where his suggestion ends and your own thought begins. But hear this, for it is the truth of God concerning you: you are not what the shadow says you are. The real you, the you that was born from above, is hid with Christ in God, and what clings and whispers and accuses is not your substance. It is a foul parasite, and its doom is sure.
I know that particular hiss so well, that rushing arrow out of the dark that insists you have strayed too far, that you have given the adversary such a foothold that God himself has drawn back his hand and will be gracious no more. It comes, does it not, in those moments when the old nature flares up, when patience snaps, when a dark thought steals across the mind and you reel from the horror of it. Then the accuser aims his sharpest dart straight at the soul’s tenderest place, and the lie goes deep: “You are altogether unclean; the Holy One has forsaken you.” But the fact that you hate the darkness, that you are on your knees crying out against it in Jesus’ name, that is no proof of abandonment. That is the proof the Spirit dwells in you still. A dead soul does not groan for deliverance. A man still in the grip of the enemy does not beg for the grip to be broken. No, it is the living child who feels the knife and cries for the Father. It is the Lord’s own soldier who is pained by the arrow and calls for the surgeon’s hand.
Whatever this darkness may be telling you about your standing with God, it is a lie whose tongue you must learn to cut short. Let me urge you, do not give the dog of unbelief any meat from your table. When a foul thought whispers that you are beyond help, or that the real you is something twisted and past mending, do not argue with it, do not brood upon it, lift your eyes up and say with the sharpness of faith, “I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord!” The enemy would love for you to give your lips to despair, for despairing speech does double harm: it wounds your own heart deeper, and it robs the Lord of the praise that is due him right now in the fire. But faith, even a trembling faith that can hardly open its mouth, brings honor to your Deliverer. Let him hear you speak. Tell him plainly, “Lord, I am in the pit, but your arm is not shortened. This darkness is thick, but you are the Father of lights. These chains feel heavy, but you hold the key, and the lock shall turn, however hard it go.”
And while you are speaking, remember where your river flows. You have a well that never runs dry, a fountain opened for sin and for uncleanness, and his name is Jesus. There is not a demon in hell that can lay any true claim to the soul that has been washed in that blood. You may feel the battle, but you are not under the dominion of the prince of darkness; you have been delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of God’s dear Son. The foe may rage and thrust at you, but he has no title deed to your soul. Christ has right where Satan had only theft. And Christ is not a part-owner; he has purchased the whole of you for his own. When the shadow presses thickest, run to the wounded side of your Lord. Put your finger there, like Thomas, and let every doubt about his power and his purchase be scattered. When you read your Bible, search out the promises as a thirsty man searches for a spring. They are laid there for just such a case as yours: “I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground.” You are that dry ground, but the flood is coming. Mark it down: your deliverance, when it comes, will be all of him and none of yourself. He puts his hand upon your trembling hands, and he himself will speed the arrow of victory.
So be of good courage. This is not the hour of your overthrow; it is the hour in which your Captain means to bare his arm. Go to him now, not with polished phrases, but as a sick child goes to its father’s knee in the dark. He will not despise the groan, nor will he refuse the prayer, “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.”
---
Lord Jesus, you who walked the waves and commanded the legion to depart, speak your quiet, majestic word over this soul that cries to you now. Say, “Peace, be still,” to the storm within, and drive out every shadow that is not of you. Let the one who prays know, in the deep of the morning and in the silence of the night, that they are wholly yours, and that no one can pluck them out of your hand. Fill the emptied places with your own sweet Spirit, and give joy for heaviness, until they stand before you in Zion, wearing the garment of praise. Amen.