Making of a Champion by Lester Sumrall

Author:Lester Sumrall
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Christian Life, Virtues, Sports & Recreation, Christianity, Religion, General, Christian Relationships
ISBN: 9780883683668
Publisher: Whitaker House
Published: 1988-01-01T22:00:00+00:00

The secret to real success is obedience without compromise.

8

Resisting the Pressure to Compromise

Nehemiah and his army of builders must have been quite a sight to the eyes of Sanballat and the Samarian army. There they were, with trowels in one hand and swords in the other (see 4:17), working side by side at an impossible job— and getting it done.

Sanballat must have realized by now that Nehemiah was working with supernatural assistance.

Having exhausted his supply of direct attacks, Sanballat, a tool in the hands of Satan, moved on to trickery. If he couldn't intimidate Nehemiah into coming down off that wall, perhaps he could get him to compromise.

That is Satan's way every time. You can count on it. When the devil finds someone working for God, if he can't intimidate him, if he can't demoralize him, if he can't subdue him with discouragement, he will try to get him to compromise.

Compromise is a peculiar word. The world, by and large, sees compromise as a good thing. Compromise has such a nice feeling to it. You give a little and I'll give a little, and we can overcome our differences through compromise. It's so easy to solve conflicts through compromise. Can compromise really be that bad?

There are times when compromise is a good thing. It's not wrong to compromise a matter of preference, to yield ground for the sake of making peace, as long as no matters of good and evil are at stake.

But this is the real issue: although it is seldom wrong to compromise in matters of preference, it is always wrong to compromise in matters of principle. There is no need to make peace with the enemies of God. To do so is to become one of them (cf. James 4:4).

The pressure to compromise is strong. The history of Israel is the story of a nation that constantly faced temptation to compromise—and often yielded. The Old Testament records cycle after cycle of compromise, defeat, repentance, victory, apathy, compromise, and so on.

Interestingly, the greatest compromises usually take place on the doorstep of our greatest victories. Satan knows we're most vulnerable when we think we have him licked. "Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall" (1 Cor. 10:12). When you are about to win a great battle, don't throw it away by making peace with the enemy.

World War II began with a compromise that many thought would bring peace with the enemy. Many of us still remember the picture of Neville Chamberlain, the British prime minister, stepping off an airplane in London in 1938, waving a piece of paper that he said guaranteed "peace in our time." Chamberlain had negotiated a pact with Hitler, which he thought would insure that Germany would not wage war against Europe. In return for Hitler's promise not to invade the European nations, Britain and France had ceded Czechoslovakia to Hitler. Their agreement, the infamous Munich Pact, precipitated the most devastating worldwide conflict ever waged.

The Munich Pact was a shameful compromise, and it proved to be one the of the greatest mistakes England has ever made.

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