Avoiding Spiritual Attack

I like to observe a daily routine of awakening at 4 AM and beginning my prayer and devotional time. Nothing starts off my day better than some quiet time with God. The minute my alarm goes off, I say Good Morning to my Lord and Savior. I then pray individually for each member of this household, then myself. Next I just randomly pray for what ever is on my heart that particular morning. Sometimes I work from a prepared list of prayer requests, but mostly it just comes as the Holy Spirit leads me. Next I go to my email and go through my morning devotional messages. I subscribe to several daily and weekly devotional, instructional series.

And then by 6 AM I always try to listen to Dr Charles Stanley's morning broadcast. If ideal circumstances prevail I will even write out my own personal morning devotional based on one or more of the morning's studies.

I figure that in the course of an entire day, (24 hours) I should be able to give God at least a tithe of my time. So using that thinking then 10 % of the day would be about two and a half hours minimum that I should give to God. Now, I don't want to be legalistic here, I don't think that God has a stop watch and is literally counting the minutes of my study, but that's how important it is to me. And I want to be disciplined about it. I know that the best way to achieve a goal in sports is to be disciplined about it and I am applying that same principle to my spiritual life.

So, obviously if you look at my journal records you will notice that lately I just haven't been posting regularly. The age old demon of 'busy-ness' is still waging assault on me. My days are just too jam packed and I am not keeping up. Before I know it, it's nearly 11 PM or mid night and when I finally go to bed it's next to impossible to dive back into the next day with only three or four hours of sleep day after day. I end up wearing myself down physically and getting sick, or lately I'll just be so tired that I sleep straight through my alarm.

When something like that happens my day usually snowballs out of control. And if I miss my morning devotional time a couple of days in a row I really get in a spiritual funk that effects my relationships in every area of my life.

Today things are going well. I had to push myself hard, though. Becuase I didn't get to sleep until around 11:50 PM last night. And today will be busy. ( And potentially difficult) But I will be praying about it all day long and I trust in God to see me through.

A good, disciplined prayer life is one of the best defenses against spiritual attack. But I warn you, the stronger your prayer life becomes and the deeper your commitment to God then the more artillary the Evil One brings out against You. But take heart because although the bible promises that we'll face troubles in this world, we are also reminded that Jesus hsa overcome the world...!

Trust in HIM. To Know Jesus is to Know Peace. And No Jesus equals No peace.

Lord, I thank You for Your saving Grace. You are an awesome God. Wonderful, indescribable, uncontainable Lord and Savior, I Love You. You have blessed me abundantly, Father. Lord today I pray for those who are overwhelmed with busy schedules like myself. Help us to slow down. Help us to priortize. Help us to prune away unproductive activities in our lives.

Help us draw closer to You and the Holy Spirit. Jesus I give this day to You. I pray that my light shine brightly in every encounter, every circumstance. Father God I pray this prayer in Jesus' Name... Amen.