Look at those verses again. How do they say to bring your senses in line? First by becoming skillful in the word of righteousness, and second, by reason of use, or practice.

You have to practice walking in the things of the Spirit. Practice walking by faith. Practice walking in love. Practice, practice, practice!

At first, your flesh will rebel against it. Since it’s not been trained that way, it will be contrary for a while. Some people don’t realize that, therefore, they get discouraged when they stumble around and fall the first few times they try to walk by the Spirit in some area.

Don’t be that way. Keep practicing. Pick out someone who is nearly impossible to love and start practicing on them. If you strike out the first time at bat, don’t worry about it. There are more than three strikes in this game. You just keep swinging until you hit.

Somebody once asked me, “Don’t you ever have any failures?”

No, I don’t…because I don’t play nine-inning games. I play until I win. I will have a lot of opportunities to fail if I receive failure. My shortcomings are many. I’ve fallen on my face many times. But I don’t count that as failure. I just count that as practice. But when I win, praise God, that’s for real!

“But Brother Copeland, that’s not playing fair.”

You show me in the Word of God where it says we have to play fair with the devil. I don’t play fair with him. I go in with a stacked deck. I go in with the Name of Jesus that’s above every name. There’s nothing fair about that. But that’s ok, because the devil is already whipped. We don’t have to play fair with him anymore, we just go in and exercise the victory.

Speak the Word

« I train myself to win as I practice walking in the things of the Spirit. » (Hebrews 5:13-14)