Biblical Coping: The Hard Road to Victory

Biblical Coping: The Hard Road to Victory

By Matthew J. Mallecoccio author of Biblical Coping

Preface by the Author

I wrote the first Biblical Coping in order to guide the mental health patient to a greater victory than just victory over today's problems, but I began to realize that I didn't fully explain that there's a road to that victory, and it is narrow and difficult to walk on. Now, that description of that road may sound familiar. The straight and narrow path is indeed the same path to the ultimate victory. The ultimate victory will not be attained in this life. Now, that will most likely turn most of you readers off, but the ultimate victory is when there no longer will be problems, disease, mental illness, injury, death and darkness – Heaven! Heaven is the ultimate victory!

I would beg you, though, if you are inclined to do so, do not close this book and neglect the soul, the most important part of you. Don't be of the school of thought that says, "I can make it to Paradise on my own." Because you cannot. Jesus is the only way to the ultimate victory. I know that that is the most unpopular notion in the history of notions, but the truth is often hard to receive. I think of the line in the movie "A Few Good Men" when Jack Nicholson says to Tom Cruise, "You want the truth... You can't handle the truth!" And it's true! As humans, we cannot handle hearing that we are lost and we are sinners, and that we cannot atone for that on our own. It's like fingernails on a chalkboard, because of our natural bent toward lies. Why do we have a natural bent toward lies? For that, the answer is found in Genesis chapter 3.

Satan crept up to Adam and Eve, our very first ancestors, and deceived Eve. It is true that Eve sinned first, but sin is attributed to Adam. Why? Because it says in Genesis 3:6, "And she also gave some to her husband WHO WAS WITH HER." He was standing there with Eve, letting her succumb to a lie. The sin that condemned the entire world to a fall from grace was the sin of complacency and laziness. Adam was so lazy in what God had entrusted him with that he wasn't even concerned with the well – being of his wife's spiritual condition. That is why we have the problems we experience every single day.

There are some of you that will admit, "Okay. I'll buy that, but Jesus, even if he is God, cannot be the only way to Heaven. There's gotta be something else that you're not telling us." Sorry, but there isn't anything else. "For it is by grace that you have been saved, through faith (in Jesus Christ), and it is not of your own doing. It is a gift of God, not by works, so that no one may boast." (Ephesians 2: 8 – 9) That's all. "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our LORD." (Romans 6:23) "And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under Heaven by which we must be saved." (Acts 4:12)

That being said, the road to ultimate victory consists of a lifetime of love and submission to God. That cannot be attained without accepting Christ as LORD and savior, repenting of the sins that you were conceived in and that rules your life, and walking the straight, narrow and difficult road to ultimate victory.

I realize that some of you readers will not accept Jesus as the only way, and will put this book away, but I beg that that would not be the case. Make today the day that you start your journey down the road to victory.

Matthew J. Mallecoccio

Part One: The First Step on the Road to Victory: Accepting Jesus

Chapter One: The Wrong Lane is the Right Lane

I don't drive, but I know that if you are driving in the wrong lane, it is deadly. You are taking the chance that another vehicle will run into you. Since I walk, and the Christian life is known as the Christian walk or foot race, not the Christian drive, it is more correct for my point to talk about walking. Living in a city, (Elmira, NY) I know that when the average Elmiran is walking on a sidewalk or is crossing the street, very few of these people follow the rules of the road. I've seen countless people where I live walking across a street when the traffic coming at them has a green light like there isn't any oncoming danger, and "Oh, no one's gonna hit me, because I'm good at timing." I've been in situations where, even walking in a crosswalk, I've been very nearly flattened by a car that I did not see coming.