Things Satan Wants For Your Life.

The enemy has a plan for your life: to steal, kill, and destroy.

God calls us to be alert and of sober mind, watching ours for the scenes of the devil who prowls around like a roaring look looking for someone to devour. ( 1 Peter 5:8) The devil wants to devour our lives, keeping us from the job of living in a relationship with Jesus.

Satan wants for you to doubt God.

In John 29, the disciples shouted that that had seen Jesus raised from the grave, but Thomas’s doubt kept him from believing in the miracle of salvation. Jesus appeared to Thomas and said, Stop doubting and believe ( John 20:27).

When the devil tempts you to doubt😍God, don’t let your circumstance determine your God, let your God determine your circumstance.

Satan wants you to live in fear.

Fear is not the absence of faith, it is the displacement of it. The devil doesn’t want to rob us of our faith, he wants our faith to be in anything but God. Life in God is life not in fear.

Psalm 34:4 says, I sought the Lord and he answered me; he delivered me from my fears.

Satan wants you to feel insecure.

Don’t let the devil tell you that you are unloved or not good enough! You are God’s handiwork and in Him, we are not only good enough, we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.

Satan wants you to avoid the church. The more uninvloved you become with the body of Christ, the harder it is to persevere in your faith. It isn’t easy to follow God in a world that doesn’t. When we leave the community we were made for, we are destined to be devoured (1 Corinthians 12).

Satan wants you to be led astray.

Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves (Matthew 7:15). When we rely on the words of men or ourselves in place of God’s word, we can lead others away from. Jesus and be led away from Hid truth ourselves.

Satan wants you to fail.

The devil wants to destroy us. He wants us to settle for what the world gives us and accept default (2 Corinthians 4: 8-10) says we are pressed on every side, but not crushed: perplexed, but not in despair: persecuted, but not abandoned: stuck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may be revealed in our body. When you feel like your going to love, take heart, Jesus has already won for you.

I want to share with you, what my pastor spoke of in church day.

Cow and sheep with their heads down and just nibbling away at the grass can get themselves lost in no time. We do much of the same thing as well.

If you’re not looking around where you’re going or paying attention to what you’re thinking about or how you’re going about your daily lives, it can be easy to meander out of the safety of God’s protection and find yourself in reckless compromises and foolish decision, never noticing how far away from the truth we’ve strayed.

God Gives Second Chances

I am so thankful for second chances. Life is a journey filled with ups and downs. Sometimes our lives are going great and other times we fail. We are reminded of our human state how imperfect we are. But through our moment’s imperfection, we are humbled with the realization of God’s grace and mercy as He forgives us and gives us a second chance.

Because of the Lord’s great love, we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning: great is Your faithfulness.

Lamentations 3:22-23

King David and the Apostle Peter were great men of God, yet imperfect like you and me, had to hit rock bottom before the scales came off their eye, and they saw clearly.

Adultery And Murder

David is known as the man after God’s heart, sought after God, and walked in faith bravely trusting God even when the odds were stacked against him. Yet his area of vulnerability was women. He initiated an adulterous affair and caused the death of her husband.

Consequence

Death of their first child.

At rock bottom, David repents and asks for forgiveness. This is key. Sometimes we are so wrapped up in concealing our sin, we fail to ask God for forgiveness and stop letting that area of sin control our lives.

When I was young, I had an affair with a married man, I was an alcoholic and was addicted to cocaine.

I tried to overdose on cocaine. I felt like I was living in hell and thought I would be better off dead, surely no one would even notice I was gone.

God gave me a second chance, I year later I was married and had a daughter. To the man that saved my life from that overdose. I have consequences for what I have done, I was admitted to the state hospital a couple of times. I was severely depressed. My husband has had an affair on me. I attribute to me having an affair. It was at that time I had empathy for the man’s wife I had an affair with.

Second Chance

Bathsheba and David go on to have children.

God wants us to move forward with our lives. He wants to bless us but, we have to turn to Him and repent.

It took me twenty-five years to repent and ask forgiveness. Twenty-five years repent and ask forgiveness. For those years I lived in hell. I finally hit rock bottom and repented and asked God for his forgiveness.

Disobedience

Jonah was a great prophet of God, he was told to go to Nineveh, but he had no desire to share a message of hope and repentance to such an evil nation. So Jonah decided to take a ship in the complete opposite direction toward Tarshish. How often do we take matters into our own hands and try and escape God’s plan for our lives?

Consequence

Jonah got swallowed by a giant fish and stewed there for three days. God had plans for this message to be delivered by Jonah and he was either going to obey the hard way or the easy way. He chose the hard way.

At rock bottom, nearing and fearing death, Jonah repents and promises to be obedient.

God forgave like he always does. Jonah was able to continue his journey to Ninevah. They listened to Jonahs message and repented Nievah was spared from destruction and Jonah was spared death in the giant fish.

Fear

Peter known as the Rock, follow God with his life, only to face her and doubt when Jesus was crucified cowardly denying Jesus three times, even to a little girl, Jesus warned him that this trial would come, and when the rooster crowed three times, it was a reminder to Peter of what he did.

It may not appear as severe as other consequences. Peter wept bitterly. Peter was a broken man, probably ashamed of this conduct. He walked with Jesus and still had so little faith. When He did not see Jesus even for a short while, his faith started to dwindle.

Second Chance

Did Peter’s journey end with his fears and doubt? No, God continued to work on his heart and grow his faith. Ultimately using Peter as one of the main vessels to spread Christianity to Rome.

These men fell and got back up again. They repented and leaned on God for strength and obedience. If you fall, get up. Stop whatever negative road you are heading down and start fresh with God. Don’t ever think you are useless because you have fallen. We all have. God wants to bring victory in your life, but you have to make the conscious choice and decision to follow God.

For the righteous man falls seven times, and rises again, but the wicked stumble in time of calamity.

Proverbs 24:16

God knows the plans he has for you. Plans to prosper you and not harm you plans to give you a hope and a future. (Jeremiah 29-11)

Don’t Play The Victim

Many people think they are entitled to good treatment. The truth is that they are neither entitled nor not entitled to it. The significant issues are what is going on and how do they feel about it. We need to face the facts of the situation and acknowledge the emotional reactions, rather than personally judging it and feeling victimized by it.

If you are robbed, you don’t sit around thinking, This shouldn’t be happening to me. It isn’t right. Instead, you react. You may defend yourself, call the police or try to run away. Constructive action is the opposite of victimized brooding.

If a woman whose husband was late for dinner every night has the right to feel angry and to consider practical action if she wished, but to try to justify feeling victimized is maladaptive and meaningless.

Even in the most extreme situation, such as a concentration camp, feeling victimized is not adaptive. Feeling your anger, planning an escape, attempting to survive any and all of these courses of actions are preferable to indulging powerless, victimized feeling. Your attitude is a vital part of determining whether you will survive or perish, succeed or fail at life.

Viktor Franki contended that many of the survivors of the German Concentration camps we’re able to endure because they refused to give in to the feeling of being victimized. Instead, although stripped of all their rights and possessions, they used one remaining to sustain their spirit; the freedom to choose what attitude or position they would take in relation to bear oneself, this way or that.

Maintaining a child victim role leads to chron passivity. Victimized feelings are very appropriate for a child’s situation. Children are without power, are helpless, and are at the mercy and of their parents. Later as an adult, things happen that are sometimes beyond your control and understanding. But, the adult who is still playing the child victim tole responds like the deer that sees a mountain lion approaching a d instead of running from the danger becomes paralyzed. This person keeps noticing over and over that the situation is unreasonable, unfair, or threatening but doesn’t make the appropriate adaptive responses. Like the woman mentioned above, the tip-off to the fact that she preferred the child victim role was that she never made any attempt to change her circumstances. Like so many of us, she would rather feel justified in complaining endlessly about her unfortunate circumstances while passively registering her dissatisfaction that active changing her situation.

It’s more advantageous to experience feeling than to deny them or cut them off. Actions, unlike feelings, have consequences and must be considered in relation to both moral issues and rational reality concerns. Acting out emotions, especially angry emotions, must remain under a person’s control. For example, a feeling of murderous rage can be considered innocent, but to make sarcastic remarks has consequences.

Victims deal in judgments and should in interactions with others. They operate on the assumption that the world should be fair. ”I should have been loved by my parents.” My children should call me or write to me. After all, I’ve done for them, it’s the least they should do. This type of preoccupation with rights and should in irrelevant to the real problems that we are all faced with, it leads to inward brooding and vengeful feelings. Worse yet angry, victimized feelings are bottled up inside, contributing to depression and psychosomatic disorders.

My had to go overseas for his job he was there for about a year. It was a new contract job, at first I was completely hurt and felt victimized when he didn’t call me for weeks at a time, when he was home he used to call me every Sunday. Why isn’t he know I thought, what have I done? Is he angry at me? I was playing the victim. He was a man now the responsible, successful man I taught him to be. I was feeling hurt because he was successful at what he did for a living. I was feeling victim because he couldn’t contact me like he used to, it wasn’t that he forgot me or didn’t love me anymore.

Playing the victim is maladaptive. Even though passive manipulations may occasionally work, taking this powerless act is never in anyone’s best interest. In the long run, it does more harm than good. People can control their destructive urge to play the victim by acknowledging that their personal world and the external world contain many inequities and social injustices that are discriminatory and unfair to individuals or groups of people, yet they can take power over their lives. Despite these negative circumstances, there are active remedial solutions available to make an effective adaptation.

Things God Teaches Us Through Our Most Painful Moments.

Sometimes life just seems hard. The days are dark. Uncertain times and stress mount high. An unexpected diagnosis or devastating loss can feel to difficult to face.

Today was a hard day for me, I lost someone very dear to me heart. A young man of 19. I used to have prayer meeting with his grandparents for years. This young man was selfless he never did anything for himself.

Usually, our faith in most strengthened in the trying times of life, it’s often hard to walk that out while in the midst of that all. We long for carefree days, yet God takes our hand a d leads us straight into the darkest of times. Not to hurt us, but to bring greater strength, character, trust, beauty, and perseverance to the deepest part of our souls.

I don’t understand why the Lord took this young out of his family and my life. But I know the Lord had a reason.

For those who need fresh hope today remember, you are never defined by the wrong things that happen to you, by difficult circumstances or hard seasons you’ve walked through. Here is His powerful truth about the dark seasons.

You are mine, you have a purpose, you are loved, you are beautiful, you are courageous, you are called and redeemed for my purposes. Even through all the hard days. Especially through the hard days.

If you’ve been holding onto baggage from difficult times, or find yourself still stuck in a head season, maybe you’re clutching on to past mistakes because it’s hard to let go and move forward: them maybe it’s time to drop the burdens you’ve carried around for way to long so you can live free.

Lock back and learn all that God has for you, see what strength and beauty He has built within you through the difficult days then keep moving on. Confident in Him.

What does God teach us through painful moments:

He teaches us that he is bigger than we are experiencing.

Ah, Lord God! Behold, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by Your outstretched arm. Nothing is too difficult for You. (Jeremiah 32:17)

God often reminds us through the toughest times in life that He is bigger than the store may face. He’s greater than the problem, the obstacle, the giant, and the fear. Nothing is impossible for His. He is a God of miracles who is constantly working on behalf of His children, even in the dark where we can’t fully see. Because we can be confident of this one truth, we can also trust Him, fully. We may not understand it now and we may never on this side of heaven, but God is always faithful. He works in ways that are powerful d far greater than we could have ever imagined. And He can do it in just a moment, what might take years for us to work through on our own.

When I was diagnosed with cancer, my first thought was ” Oh No, I’m going to die.” but God came to give us life and have it abundantly and be free. But the enemy strike against that, and come to try and steal, kill, and destroy all the good. It’s true we have to struggle against hard things, this world is not perfect, but God’s power is still greater than the works of darkness and far stronger than anything we may face here.

Consider it pure joy, whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance find it’s work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. (James 1:2-4)

God prepares our minds for battle in his Word, he says when you face trial, a not if. We will. we will all face hard things. Not because God is unable to protect us or help us, but because this world is not a perfect place, and He knows that we will grow stronger through every trial and struggle, as we set our eyes on Him.

He reminds us that His work in the hardship is greater than what we might be able to see at the moment we’re in it. But He will never waste pain. The testing of our faith produces perseverance. Endurance’s how athletes train. We get squeezed. It’s hard and maybe at the time, we don’t know we’re going to make it through. But He’s there, right with us, in the midst of every storm. So we can lean in, and He holds us secure until we can finally step-through to the other side. Notice that you aren’t the same person you are, your faith is strengthened. Your character is deeper. Your roots are stronger. Because you have really relied on Him, like never before.

He teaches us that resting in Him is vital.

Be still and know that I am God… Psalm 46:10

One of the hardest things I’ve learned in life, especially in the tough times, is to be still more.

When we are prone to hurry and worry, this can feel like such a challenge. But don’t ever let the pressure of what you’re facing get in the way of just spending some much needed time in God’s presence. It’s truly the most important minutes of your day: getting still, reflecting on who He is, and who you are in Him. Learning to rest in Him is not laziness. It’s never time wasted. It will only bring peace to your spirit and strength to your day. Don’t ever buy into the lie that you don’t have time, not it won’t make a difference anyway. It will, many of us have walked it out, and we’ve seen the impact it makes, on our lives and those around us.

Maybe everything hasn’t gone as planned for you this year so far. Maybe times seem harder you’re not sure what God is doing through this difficult season you’re In right now. But whatever is concerning you, entrust it to our Powerful God, it’s the safest place to let it go. Pray, talk to Him. He knows all the concerns you and He cares. Read His words and part them back to Him. Hope on to every promise of hope. Think about them day and night. Write them down, hang them up around your house. God’s truth and time spent with Him will help you to never quit spinning into cycles of worry, as we keep our hearts and focus on Him.

What Are You Fighting For?

It’s easier to stay on course when you know what your fighting for.

When you don’t know what you’re fighting for, if you’ve had a course to begin with. You can avoid decisions altogether and the ones you make will lead you in confusing directions.

When we reach a fork in the road, ask your self which way would stay true to your reason why. You may not know all the details about the forks, but you’ll be happy than you can lean on your reason why and make an objective decision.

Sometimes it’s not good enough to have just any reason why. Some reasons are ineffective, and others can lead to sacrifice other important things.

While many choices are not life threatening they always alter our lives. The best reasons why are the ones that will benefit lots of other people. Every decisions you make in your life has consequences. When you fight to change that will help others and other people will want to help you. Some may rally around your cause and give you time and resources you don’t even ask for.

What ever you decide to fight for, you have to believe in this deep in your heart. It has to make you feel something.

If it makes other people feel something too, you’ll be able to accomplish more than most people dream of.

I’m fighting to help people realize there is a better way to live life, rather than having low self-worth and being depressed. Realizing you are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem and smarter than you think is an amazing gift that I believe is locked inside of all of us.

The world is place when you change your life and the way you feel about yourself, and be positive rather than negative.

When I fight for these things. I feel like I’m doing what I was meant to do. That’s how I know these goals are worth pursuing.

I’ve always feel my purpose was to help people through their life when they struggle. I have lived a life of wrong decisions and rough roads, but that doesn’t mean anyone else should have to. If people can learn from my mistakes, maybe they won’t suffer as much as I did.

God wants what’s best for us. Fight for what you need and never give up.

Stand Up For Yourself In Any Situation

Every day we many dozens of choices that either benefits or diminish us, sometimes it seems it’s easier to go with the flow to avoid conflict. But the truth is that letting people walk all over us can increase feeling of stress and anxiety, and might eventually lessen your feels of self-worth and lead to our insecurities.

Learning you stand up for yourself will help you take charge of your life. We need to believe in our own power to reach your dreams. The stronger you feel, the stronger you will become.

For almost thirty years, I chose to go with the flow saying ”I don’t care what happens” basically I let people control my feelings, my opinion, and my life. This finally reached the point where I knew things had to change. I had to build up the strength to stand up for myself. I told myself I couldn’t do this. I was actually at the point that I was seriously thinking about getting in my car and driving away. Changing my name so no one could find me.

Here are a few ideas that might help:

It might be hard at times, but when you learn to express yourself openly and honestly it will feel like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders. Too often we hide behind a half-hearted smile and nod instead of saying what we think. It does take practice, but learning to be the real you and be open about what you are feeling or thinking is a great step.

Take small powerful steps:

If you’re struggling with being assertive start taking small to stand up for yourself. Here is a simple example, I would finish weekly grocery shopping about the time my husband got off of work. I would be lugging the in the groceries and he would walk right by me. Finally, I told him he needs to help me carry the groceries in. To my shock, he said anytime I needed help with that to ask him. That’s the last thing I expected him to say. A small powerful step that led to respect.

Even just learning to walk with your head held high, shoulders back will help you appear and feel more confident. Transfer that confidence in dealing with others. Attitude can apply to all areas of your life. Feeling annoyed at the person who won’t show you respect. Ask them to help you in a situation like bringing in the groceries because it’s difficult for you. See an extra charge on a restaurant bill. Stand up for your self dispute it.

When someone attack you, wait it out

As you learn to be more confident in expressing yourself, you’re also going to have to learn to face those who want to override. There will always be people whose personalities are set to attack mode. It’s important to remain calm but assertive if you feel someone’s trying to bully you. Don’t allow tour to get frazzled or react with low blows. Don’t cater to them or allow them to badger you either. Walk the high road, stand your ground.

Figuring out what’s really bothering you

Going with the flow for purposes of not making waves creates more stress and anxiety for yourself. Of course, getting to courage to face something that’s bothering you can be scary. But, facing the issue will empower you to make it better and diminishes the control it has over you. It’s best to remember people cannot read your mind, if you don’t vocalize what is bothering you, no one will know.

Clarify first without attacking

It’s tempting to take a self-righteousness stand, especially if you are sure your right. From your viewpoint, you are justifying defending yourself against someone who seems to be in the wrong. But its impo to resist the urge to react with emotion. Take a deep breath and calmly explain your perspective to them. Avoid combative tones and accusatory words. Say exactly what you mean and listen to their response. Then a real discussion can begin to take place.

After you build up enough confidence and get the hang of what it means to stand up for yourself. It’s time to practice asking for what you want as often as possible. When someone says something to you disagree with, or you feel push into doing something you don’t want to do, say something.

Stick with this new assertiveness for a couple of months and you might be surprised at the results.