Spiritual Warfare and the Prepared Mind

Much of both my personal study and my preaching lately have focused on spiritual warfare.  Whether or not we realize it or admit it, if we are Jesus-followers we face conflict on a spiritual level daily.

spiritual warfareMany people think of spiritual warfare in physical terms.  Some see physical illness, financial distress, or problems with material things in our lives as the devil’s attack, but the Bible teaches us that spiritual warfare takes place on an invisible battle field – what Paul refers to as the “heavenly places.”  (Ephesians 6:12)

Granted, the devil will try to use these physical and material circumstances against us, but they are not in and of themselves the battleground. Spiritual battle takes place over HOW WE REACT AND RESPOND to them.  The devil will try to muddle our thinking and demoralize our emotions by tempting us to focus more on our circumstances than on God.  The primary theater of operations in spiritual warfare is our MIND.

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Preparing Our Minds for Spiritual Warfare

1 Peter 1:13 challenges us to prepare our minds for action.  We cannot wait until spiritual attacks occur to defend ourselves, but we must ready ourselves for the inevitable onslaught of the devils devices.  Let me suggest three readiness steps you can begin doing today that will put you in a better position to prevail in spiritual warfare. Read More

The Battle for Your Mind

The struggle is real, indeed! As believers, we have a very real enemy and he doesn’t play nice. Over the past two-weeks, I have encountered intense spiritual warfare raging in my mind and heart, and believe me, this was not my first rodeo with the devil.

One of the biggest mistakes believers make is to at best minimize the devil’s influence and at worst to disbelieve in him or his work to distract, demoralize, and derail your joy and service for God. I am saddened that there are people who do not believe in God, and I pray that their eyes would be opened to the truth, but the saddest of all to me is the one who does not believe in the existence of the devil.

The devil’s main arena is our minds. Therefore, He likes to mess up our thinking and confuse us with his lies. Deception is the name of his game. At the very first encounter a human being had with the devil, he tried to confuse her thinking and understanding of God’s truth. Genesis 3:1-7 recounts the very first sin committed, and the bait the devil dangled in front of Eve was in the question of verse 2, “Did God really say…?” (emphasis added)

The devil is not very entrepreneurial. He has been creating confusion and doubt in the minds of the creatures about the Creator’s explicit truth forever. God’s Word is VITAL (I cannot overstate this notion) to our spiritual effectiveness. The Word is both an offensive weapon, the sword of the Lord in Ephesians 6:17, and a defensive tool, the word hidden that we might not sin according to Psalm 119:9,11.

Intentional Bible Study

This is why I challenge you so often to be intentional with your Bible reading and study. If we fill our minds with God’s truth, we are more equipped to fend off the devil’s attempts to confuse and delude us. For the believer, spiritual victory begins and ends in the mind. Read, study, memorize God’s Word so you will be armed and defended against our very real enemy’s attacks.

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. – John 8:32

I want to help prepare you to memorize Bible verses for when you don’t have a Bible handy. Below is  a link where you can download for free my A to Z Bible Memory sheet. The sheet provides you with 26 Bible verses each beginning with a successive letter of the alphabet. You can memorize and have them ready when the devil tries to deceive you.

A to Z Bible Memorization Plan.