If you’ve ever played poker, there may have been times you’ve had a bad hand and had to fold. I’ll be honest, I’ve felt like folding lately.

If you play often you might know some people who bluff really well.  I’m not one of them. They say everyone has a ‘tell.’ A physical sign that they may be bluffing about a good or bad hand. It could be a twitch, a giggle, nervous hands, but whatever it is, if you can find the pattern you will know when they are lying.

Well these weeks have sort of been like playing poker with the Devil. He’s bluffing about his hand, trying to convince me to fold. But he doesn’t have the winning hand.

How do I know that I have the winning hand? Well there’s the Words of Promise from the Lord, but honestly, I’m not sure which to apply here. Which to discard, which to pick up.  Are the promises I’m standing on the right ones? Does my opponent have a hand I can’t beat?

Well, it turns out I figured out his ‘tell.’ Yes, when he has a losing hand he pushes extreme hopelessness. If I watch him, that’s what I’ll see. But that’s a sure sign he’s trying to get me to quit because he knows I’ve got the upper hand.

If I stay focused on my hand, I’m going to see a Royal Flush: Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Me and the Faith card. I’ve got all the Hope cards, he’s got none. So I stay in the game and do what I was called to do before the onslaught.
If I continue in the Faith then I win, raise the stake called the cross and he has to fold.

So if you’re feeling an extreme case of hopelessness it’s a sign that you are on the edge of breakthrough. Don’t fold, keep playing knowing Christ is the hand you’ve been dealt. And He IS the overcoming Right Hand.

But if we hope for what is still unseen by us, we wait for it with patience and composure. So too the [Holy] Spirit comes to our aid and bears us up in our weakness; for we do not know what prayer to offer nor how to offer it worthily as we ought, but the Spirit Himself goes to meet our supplication and pleads in our behalf with unspeakable yearnings and groanings too deep for utterance.
Romans 8:25‭-‬26 AMP

For though we walk (live) in the flesh, we are not carrying on our warfare according to the flesh and using mere human weapons. For the weapons of our warfare are not physical [weapons of flesh and blood], but they are mighty before God for the overthrow and destruction of strongholds, [Inasmuch as we] refute arguments and theories and reasonings and every proud and lofty thing that sets itself up against the [true] knowledge of God; and we lead every thought and purpose away captive into the obedience of Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One),
2 Corinthians 10:3‭-‬5 AMP