Prompted by a message from Pastor Joseph Prince, I found myself undone by one simple yet profound revelation: “As New Covenant Believers, the way we fight the fight of faith in life is by feeding.”
What?
It sounds counterintuitive, doesn’t it? In a
world obsessed with hustling harder and praying louder, what if the secret to
winning wasn’t in striving or swinging wildly in spiritual warfare—but in
sitting down to eat?
As soon as I heard that phrase, something leapt
inside me. I paused and sat with it. “The way we fight… is by feeding.” It
flipped the script. It rewrote the way I saw prayer, study, rest,
resistance—even daily living. It reminded me that in the kingdom of God,
nourishment is power. Bread is battle strategy. And the one who feeds well…
fights well.
Let’s walk through this slowly. Because this
isn’t just a “spiritual” revelation—it’s a life one. So let’s start from the
very beginning and why this matters.
The
Starting Point – Death, Not Discipline
Before we can understand the power of feeding, we
need to acknowledge the reality of our starting point. It’s not where we think
it is—it’s not about our discipline or our efforts. It’s about where we begin:
death. Spiritual death.
Jesus didn’t die to make
bad people good. He didn’t come to slap a “moral makeover” on us. He died to
give life to the dead. The Bible says in Ephesians 2:1 (NLT): "Once you were dead because of your
disobedience and your many sins..." We were dead—lifeless,
disconnected, unable to give anything. But God, in His mercy, made us alive
with Christ. Ephesians 2:1–5 (NKJV) says: "And you He made alive, who
were dead in trespasses and sins… but God, who is rich in mercy, because of His
great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made
us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved)."
That’ the point. This is the heart of
the Gospel—the starting point of everything. We all come to salvation with
nothing. We bring nothing to the table except our deadness. And God, rich in
mercy, gives us life through Jesus. That's why Christianity is not a religion
of effort, but a relationship of receiving. It’s not about what we can do for
God, but what He has done for us through Christ. It’s Christ now living in us,
and living through us. Christ becomes our very life (Galatians 2:20).
Now, we overflow to the world from the
fullness of His love and grace we’ve received (John 1:16-17). That’s why
everything begins and ends with Him. Christianity is about the life of God
flowing in us and through us. And life isn’t stagnant. Life is dynamic. Life
moves. The Christian walk is not a mechanical grind; it's a rhythm — a flow — a
relationship.
And just like in the natural, we eat
because we’re alive and we eat to stay alive. Our eating, drinking, resting,
moving — all the rhythms of natural life — are mirrors pointing us to deeper
spiritual truths. Psalm 36:7–8 (NKJV) says: “How
precious is Your lovingkindness (grace), O God! Therefore the children of men
put their trust under the shadow of Your wings. They are abundantly satisfied
with the fullness of Your house, and You give them drink from the river of Your
pleasures.”
We are saved by grace and it’s God’s
grace that leads us to love Him and trust Him and enjoy Him as our rhythm: we
eat, drink, and rest in God. Christ and His finished work are the center of our
spiritual sustenance. We don’t graduate from the Gospel. We go deeper into it.
From enjoying Him more and more, we come alive more and more, and then we
overflow with His love and life. 1 John 4:10,19 (NKJV) reminds us: "In this is love, not that we loved
God, but that He loved us and sent His Son…" "We love Him because He
first loved us."
How We Started
Is How We Continue
Colossians 2:6 (NKJV) says: “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.”
We begin our spiritual lives with receiving the
grace of God, and we continue on that journey with receiving. How did we
receive Christ? By grace through faith. So how do we live, walk, serve, fight,
and love? By grace through faith. This is the Gospel rhythm. We don’t begin in
grace and then switch to self-effort to sustain what we’ve received. That’s not
the Christian way.
Ephesians 2:8–9 (NKJV) affirms: "For by
grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the
gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast." So we were saved by
grace, and we live by that same grace. We feed on the same food. That food that
saved us is the same food that sustains us and makes us strong — the Gospel of
Grace. Acts 20:32 (NKJV): “So now,
brethren, I commend you to God and to the word of His grace, which is able to
build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified.”
The Word of His Grace — that’s our meal. Not just
for salvation, but for sustenance, strength, and maturity. We eat the Gospel.
We live on the Gospel. And we fight from the Gospel. This is why feeding is so
essential. Not to become “spiritual giants,” but to be filled, to live, to be
spiritually healthy— because we can’t give what we don’t have. We come to the
table with nothing and leave with everything — His life, His love, His light. And
from this fullness, we overflow.
Bread
& Battle – A Hidden Hebrew Link
Pastor Joseph Prince has uncovered an interesting
twist in the Hebrew language, something stunning hidden in plain
sight—something that reinforces this truth that feeding is fighting. Here it is:
The Hebrew word for bread is lechem (לֶחֶם) and the word for battle is lacham
(לָחַם). Same root. Same letters. Bread and battle, nourishment and
warfare—intertwined from the very beginning.
Isn’t that wild?!
It shows that bread is not a side note in
Scripture. It’s foundational. It’s strategic. Think about it: Jesus, our Bread
of Life (John 6:35), wasn’t born just anywhere. He was born in Bethlehem—“Bet
Lechem” in Hebrew — Beth (house) + Lechem (bread) = Bethlehem — which literally
means “House of Bread.” He is bread personified, provision incarnate, and He
came from the very House of Bread to be broken for the life of the world.
And what do we do with bread? We eat it. We break
it. We are sustained by it. But in the language of Scripture, bread isn’t just
nourishment—it’s warfare. Feeding becomes fighting. How? Because the one who
feeds on Christ, the true Bread, lives by Him (John 6:57). And the one who
lives by Him is equipped to resist, withstand, persevere, and overcome. That’s
why John said that greater is He who is in us than he who is in the world and
the victory that overcomes the world is our faith in Christ. He is our daily
bread. And the more we eat of Him — the more we feed on His love, grace,
finished work, and Word — the more we are strengthened to face life’s battles.
Psalm 23 paints this picture clearly: “You prepare a table before me in the
presence of my enemies…” (Psalm 23:5, NKJV). What a paradox! We expect a
sword in the face of enemies—but God gives a table. He invites us to eat. To
feast in faith, surrounded by threats. And somehow, in that feeding… we win. In
that feasting… we overcome. Because our victory is not just in what we eat but
in who we eat. Christ both the meal we eat and the one who prepares the table.
He is our victory, our help.
So yes, we don’t fight by flailing. We fight by
feeding.
Eating
Well: A Tale of Two Sisters
The story of Mary and Martha is a powerful
illustration of this principle—how the overflow of life, that comes from deep
feeding, is what equips us for service. But it starts in a place of stillness
and sitting. The kind of stillness that isn’t lazy, but rather, deeply
intentional and life-giving.
In Luke 10:38-42, we see that Jesus visited these
sisters in their home and the elder sister, Martha, was so focused on ‘serving’
Him that she was distracted by all the preparations and overwhelmed by the
busyness of serving. Meanwhile, her younger sister, Mary, simply sat at Jesus'
feet, listening to His words. Martha was doing the “right” thing in the eyes of
society. She was being culturally and politically correct. She was serving, she
was working hard, and yet, Jesus rebuked her gently: “And Jesus answered and said to her, ‘Martha, Martha, you are worried
and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen
that good part, which will not be taken away from her.” — Luke 10:41–42
(NKJV)
Martha thought that the more she did, the more
valuable her service was. But Jesus flipped the script. He told her that Mary had
chosen the better thing, sitting and receiving, because it was out of that deep
communion with Jesus that true service flows. The kind of service that is
life-giving. The kind of service that isn’t born out of duty or obligation but
out of overflow. By his statement, Jesus was also showing us something
profound, that feeding on Him—sitting at His feet, receiving His Word of
Grace—is not just a good thing, it’s the necessary thing. And the fruit of that
“good part” can never be taken away. It’s eternal, enduring, and ultimately
more powerful than any hurried service done in distraction.
This is not to say that serving others is
bad—it’s essential. But it must come from a place of being fed. In the same
way, when we fill up on Christ—when we sit, when we listen, when we receive—we
are empowered to serve well, to love deeply, and to pour out what we’ve been
filled with.
What’s The
Real Fight?
Here’s the part where we dig deeper, not just
into our spiritual lives, but into how this principle of feeding connects to
all of life. Let’s be honest — life feels like a battle sometimes. A battle to
stay hopeful. A battle to feel whole. A battle to “be enough.” A battle to be
seen. A battle to push through pain. A battle to fix what’s broken. A battle to
break through. But what if we’ve been going about the fight all wrong?
What if the real battle isn’t to fight harder,
but to rest deeper?
The Bible is very specific about our fight as New
Covenant believers and it’s important to know this so we’re not drawn into a
fight that doesn’t concern us. You see, our fight isn’t a fleshly struggle.
It's not a wrestle for significance, survival, or spiritual brownie points. No,
the real fight — the fight behind all other fights — is the fight of faith.
It's the fight to enter into God’s rest (Hebrews
4:11). The fight to insist — over and over again — that what Jesus accomplished
through His death, burial, and resurrection is enough. Enough for God, and
enough for us.
It’s a fight to stand firm in the finished work,
even when everything around us is screaming otherwise. Even when our bank
account, our bodies, our lives, or our emotions say “unfinished,” faith says
“It is finished” (John 19:30)
It’s a fight to walk by faith and not by sight (2
Corinthians 5:7). It’s a fight to silence the noise — the lies of the flesh, of
religion, of society, and of the enemy — that try to convince us we need to do
more to complete what Christ has already perfected.
But the Gospel is clear: we’re not fighting for
victory — we’re fighting from victory. We're not earning rest — we're entering
rest. We're not chasing completeness — we are complete in Him (Colossians
2:10). Faith says, “Jesus has done it all. I don't need to add to it. I just
need to feed on it.”
And that, right there, is the flip. Let this sit
with you for a moment.
Feeding
Well, Fighting Well
This is our fight. The most important fight ever
and how exactly do we fight? By feeding. This right here is the underrated
battle strategy. Somehow we want to do a lot of things in life except the ONE
thing that is our secret weapon. So let’s stay with that thought a bit more: the
way we fight through life, in every area—spiritually, emotionally,
relationally, and physically—is determined by how well we feed and feed well.
Remember, the Hebrew words “lechem” (bread) and
“lachem” (to fight) are deeply connected. Pastor Joseph Prince teaches that the
root words for feeding and fighting are the same, and this is profound. Our
ability to stand firm in the fight of life—against discouragement, challenges,
and the enemy—is directly related to how well we’re fed spiritually. In fact,
Psalm 23 beautifully illustrates this: "You
prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies" (Psalm 23:5,
NIV). When we feed on God’s Word of Grace, it’s not just for nourishment. It’s
our weapon.
This is where feeding and fighting go hand in
hand. To feed on Christ and His finished work on the cross is to be equipped,
not just for spiritual victory but for the whole of life. We can’t expect to
serve others well or face life’s challenges with strength if we haven’t fed
first.
Jesus is the bread of life (John 6:35), and He
sustains us. He is our water of life (John 4:13-14, 7:37-38). He is our rest
(Mathew 11:28-30, Hebrews 4:9-10). This isn’t some abstract idea—it’s as
literal as it gets. Every time we sit before Him in prayer, every time we feast
on His Word, every time we chose to rest in His love by being conscious of it, we
are filling ourselves with the only source that truly sustains us. And when we
are well fed and rested, we are able to stand firm in faith, knowing that our
strength comes not from ourselves but from the One who lives in us.
Let’s look at the analogy of eating in a new
way—because it's not just about taking in food to stay alive, like we tend to
do physically. It's about taking in the fullness of Christ, the Living Bread that
enables us to fight the good fight of faith. When we’re fed well, we can serve
well, live well, and fight well.
Feeding Well, Serving Well — What Mary
Knew That We Sometimes Miss
Now,
let’s look at the final piece of this puzzle: Mary’s prophetic act of service.
It’s not just a beautiful story of devotion; it’s a powerful illustration of
the kind of service that comes from deep feeding and perfect timing.
In
Matthew 26:6-13 and John 12, we see Mary of Bethany take an alabaster jar of
very expensive perfume and pour it over Jesus’ head and feet, anointing Him
with the most extravagant act of worship. It seems like an extravagant gesture,
almost wasteful in the eyes of some of the onlookers, but this act was
prophetic.
Mary
had been paying attention. She had been feeding on His words — really feeding.
So she understood something others didn’t. She knew the significance of the
moment, because she had spent time sitting at Jesus’ feet. She had been fed by
His words, had drunk deeply of His love, and had received revelation that
others were still grasping for.
Jesus
confirmed this when He said, “She has
done a beautiful thing to me. The poor you will always have with you, but you
will not always have me. When she poured this perfume on my body, she did it to
prepare me for burial” (Matthew 26:10-12, NIV). Mary understood that Jesus
was about to die, and she knew it was the right moment to act. She didn’t need
to wait for a future prophecy or some grand instruction from the crowd. She had
already been receiving from Him, and now, her act of service was a response to
what she had heard from Him.
Here’s where it gets even more powerful: Mary’s act of
service came before Jesus died. She didn’t wait for His death to come to the
grave and anoint Him like the other women did (Luke 24:1-3). She didn’t show up
after the fact, uncertain of whether He would rise again. Why?
Because she already had. She believed Him. She remembered He said He would rise
again (Luke 18:33). Her act of anointing Him was timely, prophetic, and filled
with revelation.
Luke 24:1–6 (NKJV): “Now on the first day of the week… they
found the stone rolled away… Then they went in and did not find the body of the
Lord Jesus. And it happened… two men stood by them in shining garments… and
said… ‘He is not here, but is risen! Remember how He spoke to you…’”
Mary remembered. And so
she didn’t show up at the tomb in unbelief. Her act wasn’t just worship; it was
war. She anointed Him in advance, with full confidence in His words. That’s
what feeding does. It prepares you for the battle ahead — often before it even
arrives. She was
the only one who truly believed what Jesus had said about His resurrection.
Because she had listened to Him, because she had sat at His feet, she
understood that He was going to rise again. Mary knew her Savior well enough to
act with prophetic timing, and she poured out her love in a way that none of
the other disciples could understand.
That’s
the power of feeding well. It positions us to act at the right time, in the
right way, because we’re not relying on our own understanding or the world’s
timeline. We are tapped into the eternal rhythm of God’s will, and that’s when
we get to do the right thing at the right time.
Her
service wasn’t just a beautiful act of worship; it was prophetic. It pointed
ahead to the truth of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and it paved the way for
the world to see the ultimate act of service—the death and resurrection of
Christ.
Feed,
Live, Serve—From The Overflow
In
the end, the way we serve the world, the way we engage with life, and the way
we fight through challenges all come back to this simple truth: we can only
give what we’ve been given. If we’re empty, we have nothing to pour out.
But if we’re filled with Christ, we can overflow in service, in love, and in
victory.
Mary’s
act of service shows us the ultimate balance: sitting before God, feeding
deeply, and then serving in His strength at the right moment. If we don’t
take the time to eat—spiritually and physically—we’ll run dry. But if we fill
up on the Bread of Life, the Living Water, we will always have more than enough
to pour out. And when it’s our time to serve, to love, to fight, we will do so
with a strength and grace that flows from the One who is the source of all
life.
So, let’s flip the script in our own lives. When the world says ‘fight harder,’ the Gospel whispers ‘feed deeper.’ Because in feeding on Christ, we are strengthened, satisfied, and supernaturally equipped to thrive and overcome in life. Let’s embrace the rhythm of feeding well before serving well. Let’s recognize the power of sitting at Jesus’ feet, receiving from Him, and allowing His love to overflow in us and through us to the world. When we are well-fed, we are empowered to live, love, and fight well.
What
would it look like today to stop striving and start feeding? What if the
breakthrough you’re praying for is waiting at the table?
Not yet in the fam?
God is a good Father who loves you so much and wants you to be part of His family as His child. He offered His only Son, Jesus Christ, to pursue your heart and save you and bring you into the family. All you need to do is to receive His love and you can live in it and enjoy it for the rest of your life. Will you receive it? Then please say this prayer:
Father in Heaven, I thank you for loving me. Thank you for sending the gift of Your Son, Jesus Christ, to save me from my sins and give me eternal life. I believe in my heart that Jesus died for my sins, He was buried and on the third day, He rose again, to make me right with you. I declare that Jesus Christ is my Lord and Saviour. I thank you that I am now saved and I'm a member of your family. I ask that You fill me with the Holy Spirit and help me to know You more. In Jesus' name, amen.
Welcome!
If you said this prayer for the first time, you're now a child of God and I am excited that you are my sibling in Christ. Welcome!!! 🥳There's a whole party going on in Heaven right now, on your behalf, like the excitement over a newborn baby. Will you please reach out to me and let me bless you with a resource that will help you get started on your journey of faith? Click here to do so. I love you and can't wait to meet you.
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