We can always make a comeback

“After the devil had finished tempting Jesus in every possible way, the devil left him until another time.”

— Luke 4:13 (ERV)

Did you ever feel like just when you were moving forward, suddenly you were back to square one? The relationship has, once again, gone sour. Or the money you had in the bank for a vacation or nest egg is eaten up by the unexpected bills. Or even those headaches or health issues you thought you were on top of started causing you troubling symptoms.

You were trying your best. You can’t even explain how any of this happened. But it did.

So now all you can do is take the same steps you did before and try to process your pain and move forward.

I know that feeling, and even more than that, Jesus understands it.

Jesus was sent into the wilderness for 40 days, just like our own personal wilderness. All that time he was fighting the temptations of the devil.

But Jesus knew better than to take short cuts and accept the devil's deceptive ways of being negative. Instead, he stayed the course until he defeated him. However, the Bible says, the devil only left until another time.

Our bad days, or backward steps, aren’t always something we’ve done wrong. Sometimes it’s just the fight of good vs. evil as we are making our way through life.

Even the apostle Paul mentions among his struggles being shipwrecked three times (1 Corinthians 11:25). I imagine each time he wondered if this would finally be the last time.

When fighting to make a comeback, it’s important that we aren’t tempted to make things worse by speaking negative things about ourselves or others. I’m not talking about genuine concerns, I’m talking about things like “Nothing good ever happens to me” or “I don’t understand why everyone else has better luck than I do.”

We may feel that way. But saying those things (I know I’ve done it, too) won’t help motivate us to move forward. Mostly, they are not the truth anyway.

I know a woman who has made a comeback from cancer three times and is now on her fourth. She says she’s done it before and can do it again.

I imagine, when going through his wilderness, Jesus felt like giving up, but instead he made a comeback.