A few years ago, I received a phone call from a woman whose family my husband and I have been helping and working with for about 13 years. She was so excited and so happy and I had never heard her so focused on changing.

You see, for years {maybe even decades} her life has been a total mess.

I was so happy and excited for her. She really made my day! She talked about coming to church and plans she was making and even asked me about how to tithe.

I offered to come and pick her family up for church since they don’t have a car and promised we’d get together soon to talk more about some of the questions she had. When you’re in pastoral ministry, it’s really exciting to see change like this after so many years!

Anyway, we talked for about 45 minutes and as I hung up the phone, I had this sinking feeling. I told my girls that we needed to pray really hard for their family.

You see, the devil doesn’t want you to succeed.

Less than sixteen hours later I arrived at their door and knocked. Her husband came out and apologized for not having called me. They’d been up all night with their little ones who had the stomach flu.

I wasn’t surprised. 

The Bible says: “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” 1 Peter 5:8 ESV

Whenever you make the decision to change for the better, you are going to face a battle.

• If you’ve decided that your marriage needs work and you set to it, things will be especially challenging before they get better.
• If you decide to wake up earlier to have your prayer time, you’ll be tempted to stay up late or get sick.
• If you decide be more patient with your children they will be especially trying on your patience.

Satan knows we are weak. And it’s only the Lord’s strength that makes any change possible.

“And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.” 2 Corinthians 12:9,10 NIV

There is always hope! And it is possible for us to change our bad habits and create new healthy ones.

“All things are possible with God.” Mark 10:27

3 WAYS YOU CAN FIND SUCCESS TODAY

Here are three ways you can find success as you work toward making change in your life.

1. Pray about it. We need God working alongside us every moment! He is our strength!

2. Don’t get discouraged. So yesterday you failed to meet your daily goals. BUT, today is a new day. God’s mercy is new every morning! Don’t beat yourself up over mistakes.

3. Take baby steps. Slow progress is much better than no progress. This maybe one of the great mistakes we make. I’ve seen it happen over and over again. You’re sick of your life {or maybe just a part of it} and you want change – NOW.

That’s good. But you can’t change everything overnight. If you try, you are very likely to fail. Instead, set goals and work on one or two each week {or longer} until you feel success. Then, move onto the next one.

New habits are hard to create, whereas bad habits are easy to keep doing.

Don’t try to revamp your whole life all at once. They say that it takes an average of 28 days to really form a new habit. That’s a whole month!

Remember, baby steps!

This morning’s worship song: