We Must Strengthen Our Achilles’ Heel

In Greek mythology, Achilles was a Greek hero of the Trojan War, the central character and greatest warrior of Homer’s Iliad. Achilles also had the distinction of being the most handsome of the heroes who gathered to fight against Troy. Greek legend holds that Achilles was invulnerable throughout his entire body, except for his heel. He was also said to be semi-immortal, although his heel was vulnerable. The legend declares that Achilles died because of an arrow shot by Paris, his opponent, aimed precisely at his heel. That is why the expression “Achilles’ heel” has come to mean a person’s principal weakness.

We need to identify the weak places in our armor, the weak points in our character, and the areas of our lives through which the enemy could penetrate and wreak havoc. Once we identify that “Achilles’ heel” in our spiritual lives, we must take special care of that aspect of our being. We must proceed to strengthen it, to “build fortresses and places of provision” in that exposed and fragile area of our spiritual land (II Chr 17:12).

Generally, when the enemy attacks our lives, he will do so through those places where there are structural flaws. He will seek to wreak havoc in those parts of our spiritual armor that have not been strengthened by the word of God, confession, fasting, and total surrender to the Lord.

The apostle James declares in his letter:

13 When anyone is tempted, let him not say that he is tempted by God; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He tempt anyone;

14 but each one is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own lust.

In other words, temptation will generally enter our lives through the areas of weakness that already exist within us. In the original Greek, the word translated as “lust” is epithumia, which refers to the desires of the flesh, whatever they may be. It encompasses all those sinful tendencies within us, those “fleshly lusts which war against the soul” (I Pet 2:11), which wage war against God’s will for our lives.

As a preventive measure, every day of our lives, especially in times of quiet and normalcy, we must be strengthening those fragile aspects of our spirituality and surrendering them to the Lord. This will ensure that we can live quietly and peacefully, free from distress, enjoying that “peace of God which surpasses all understanding” (Phil 4:7). The apostle Paul refers in Romans 12:1 and 2 to this continual surrender of our being to God’s dealings, which results in His all-encompassing blessing covering our lives:

1 Therefore, brothers, I beseech you by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

2 Do not conform yourselves to this age, but be transformed through the renewing of your understanding, so that you may prove what is the good will of God, acceptable and perfect.

By continually surrendering those areas of our lives that are exposed to the enemy’s temptations and attacks, and strengthening those cracks in our spiritual armor—in other words, by presenting our bodies “as a living sacrifice”—we are then prepared to experience and prove God’s blessing in every area of our lives, His “good, acceptable, and perfect will.”