Do You Want Relief or Victory?
Psalm 138:3 (KJV) In the day when I cried thou answeredst me, and strengthenedst me with strength in my soul.
(NIV) When I called, you answered me; you greatly emboldened me.
I want to look at one verse today, one tiny verse, but it is packed with a lesson that we need. (All the scriptures are packed with revelation, limitless revelation). But let’s look at this one verse: Psalm 138:3.
We have been making urgent cries to the Lord about different things: healing, relational issues, financial matters, and so on. We call, asking God to move, and He does, but sometimes He does not give us immediate relief from the assault. Instead, He desires to give us victory over it. These things, relief and victory, look very different. Relief is just an escape out of the situation. We breathe a sigh of relief. Phew. Victory looks totally different. To see what it means let’s look carefully at the definition of strengthened/emboldened:
embolded/strengthened
(Strong’s H7292 - rāhaḇ)-a primitive root; to urge severely, i.e. (figuratively) importune (to harass persistently; to press or urge with troublesome persistence; suggests an annoying persistence in trying to break down resistance to a request), embolden, capture, act insolently.
(Brown-Driver Briggs)-to behave proudly, act stormily or boisterously or arrogantly.
(Gesenius)-to rage, to be fierce, to act fiercely; to press upon, to urge on.
We see from these definitions that, when we cry out to the Lord for help, for rescue from our enemies, He sometimes answers us by giving us boldness. But boldness to do what? To fight. Sometimes, when we are attacked by the enemy, we get mousy and pitiful. So when we cry out to the Lord, He begins to make us bold. He gives us this message:
“You want victory? You’ll need to fight. Come on. I’ll help you. I’ll put that fight down inside of you. I’ll give you boldness. I’ll put a fight inside of you so that you can storm hell and take the victory.
And when you come out of this, you will not only have relief, but authority. Your enemy will have been, not merely stopped, but subdued, and you will find that I have given you authority, not only for your situation, but also to rescue others in theirs. Don’t be discouraged that my answer is not relief, but a summons, a charge to engage in the battle. Remember, I’m fighting for you. It is I give you the victory, but you must fight.”
Psalm 18:37 (NIV) I pursued my enemies and overtook them; I did not turn back till they were destroyed.