Could Pogo (former comic strip character) have been right when he said, “We have met the enemy, and he is us?”  A similar reinforcement comes from the idiom, “I am my own worst enemy.”

We certainly don’t set out that way, but upon reflection, at times it seems we have a propensity to step on our own foot, and even put one or two of our own feet in our own mouth.  Have you ever wished you could either hit the “undo” arrow, or even hit the “reset” button, start over, and think before you speak. 

Mark Twain said there are times to keep our mouth shut when our intelligence is in question, rather than open our mouth and remove all doubt.
 
When we learn to laugh at ourselves there is light at the end of the tunnel and hope for a better tomorrow.  But today we want to stretch beyond such insight and humor, to see if we can probe some things lurking behind “our own worst enemy” understanding to see other forces at play, and see how to become the winner we were intended to be.

Could there be a better way to avoid seeming to sabotage our good intentions?  Is there a way to improve our batting average so our credibility and effective helpfulness and usefulness to others improves?

First can we agree that evil occurs in our world, emanating not only from powerful rulers like Hitler and Stalin, but also sometimes from our neighbor and even possibly ourselves?  Next there is the fact that Jesus not only wants all people to choose and experience Him as savior from sin, but through that choice to live forever in fellowship with Him in heaven.  For example, He wept over Jerusalem whose majority was choosing their own path through life, and thereby rejecting His upcoming payment for them on the cross.
Jesus equips believers in Him with powerful tailor-made armor to do victorious battle with the Evil One.  These include gifts of prayer, His truth, word, righteousness, faith, good news about how to trust Christ, and the helmet of salvation (past, present, and future).  In contrast, Satan is full of pride, lies, deception, discouragement, depression, and destruction, along with being a super salesman.  As we renew our mind to become more like Christ in humility and servanthood, taking His armor, we can access His resurrection power to overcome pride, greed, selfishness, and all sin in behalf of ourselves and those around us.  When that happens, we have learned from Pogo, and experienced victory in Jesus, resulting in Him receiving glory, honor, praise, and thanksgiving, as we allow His fire to burn brightly in our corner of the globe.