One of Satan’s favourite strategies for discouraging you is to make you feel incapable of doing anything worthwhile. He’ll remind you of your past mistakes so that even when you do make an effort, your fear of failure will sabotage you. Satan wants you to feel so bad about yourself that you’ll have no confidence at all. But the fact is you don’t need confidence in yourself – you need confidence in the God who lives within you. Without that, you’re like a plane without fuel sitting on the runway; you look good, but you’ve got no power. Through Christ you have the power to do what you could never do on your own. Once you learn this truth, anytime the devil tells you, ‘You can’t do anything right,’ your response will be, ‘Maybe not, but Jesus in me can; and He will because I’m relying on Him and not myself. His Word says I’ll succeed in everything I put my hand to’ (Joshua 1:7). When the enemy says to you: ‘You’re not able to do this, so don’t even try – you’ll fail again like you did in the past,’ your response should be: ‘It’s true; without Jesus I’m not able to do a single thing. But with Him, and in Him, I can do all I need to do.’
What now?
Learn these words by heart: ‘I can do all things through him who gives me strength.’ In those times when you’re feeling low on confidence, say them out loud to yourself.