http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post – Page 7

Satan’s work exposed

2 Corinthians 10:5 NIV84

We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

I suffer from lack of confidence sometimes, especially in new situations. Satan knows this and regularly attacks me there. Satan’s fiery darts, those destructive thoughts and feelings, are hitting me most recently in my new job. I am praying that Jesus will take care of my thought life and me personally and my company and their customers. I am praying that Jesus will expose the lies of satan (that I believe) to the light of God’s truth. The truth will disarm the lies and make them powerless against me. How does this work?

When satan tells me a lie it is usually aimed at a shame and insecurity I feel. He threatens to expose my weakness and I fear telling anyone because I feel ashamed. And the lie grows hidden in the dark. But if I have the courage and insight to realize what the lie is and expose it, or I talk to someone who helps me to do this, I can compare satan’s lie to the truth found in the Bible. Then I realize that Jesus loves me just as I am, that He has already paid for whatever I’m ashamed of, that I am complete in Him, and that satan cannot harm me.

Writing about this is easier than dealing with it and so though I know what’s going on I still have to fight the battle. Praying and reading the Bible, talking with Christian friends who understand, and even writing a blog post about it, helps expose and destroy satan’s work in my life.

Thanks for reading this and feel free to comment about anything you would like.

Giving and Receiving

Just a few minutes ago I had the most unusual, and baffling and joy-filled experience. My wife and my younger son and I were dining at an Italian place we like. A gentleman we had never met before was waiting for his take-out order and asked us about my son’s hoodie with the Indiana Colt’s logo on it. We told him that my wife’s family lives in Indiana and that we had followed Peyton Manning and Tony Dungy. I was trying to get up the nerve to share Jesus with this gentleman using Tony Dungy as a starting point. I chickened out and didn’t say anything and the man reached over and picked up our check. It was for over $35 and to me that is a lot of money. So I took the check back from him. He took it back from me and said, “I’ve been blessed, now you go bless others”.

I was stunned. This has never happened to me before. I asked the man if he was a Christian. I don’t remember exactly how he answered. My wife said later that he probably was a Christian because not that many people say, “I’ve been blessed”.

Wow, God is awesome! This man is awesome! I’ve never felt like this before. He mentioned that I could leave a nice tip. We left $10.

This man doesn’t know that today was the last day of my job. Or, that my wife is going from 40 hours to 20 hours per week. But God knows. And this man obeyed God. Because this man obeyed God, God was blessed, the man was blessed and I and my family were blessed.

I gave this kind man my blog information and I hope he reads this. Thank you very much, sir, we appreciate your generosity, especially at this time.

I am being considered for another job with another company right now. I would be grateful if anyone who reads this would choose to pray for me to get the job that God wants me to get. (Also, I would be glad to pray for you about what concerns you if you would like to leave a comment).

What a day! Thank you Jesus! Thank you kind man! And thank you for reading this. Have a blessed day.

Jesus can make satan’s lies tell the truth

2 Corinthians 10:5 NIV84

We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

My mental illness doesn’t present itself as voices, either inside or outside my head. What I contend with are feelings and thoughts. Painful, hopeless, anxious feelings that sometimes leave me thinking that I should give up. I call them satan’s fiery darts. And I used to give in to them. Then I battled them unsuccessfully. Now, after thinking about the preceding verse, I ask Jesus to take these thoughts captive and make them tell the truth.

The truth is that Jesus loves us. He has taken care of everything. We do not have to perform up to standards for Him to accept us. He accepts us just as we are. When we trust Him to save us from the punishment we deserve, we become His children. Two thousand years ago He took our shame and blame and suffered the punishment for it. There is nothing else to pay. He freely gives us His righteousness, Spirit, and life. There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus.

The evil one, satan, attacks us when we are weakest, and attacks the weakest part of ourselves. That’s different for each one of us. What is a constant though, is that satan’s attacks are lies. They may contain some parts that are true, but the message that he conveys is always a lie.

Before I had a personal, intimate relationship with Jesus, I thought I was “pretty good”. I thought I was a Christian, which was a lie of satan (I liked Jesus’ philosophy but I did not know Him personally). I thought the few sins I had were no big deal, which was a lie of satan (they were not few and they were a huge deal). Satan had me completely deceived and so satan just kept telling me I was “pretty good”, I kept believing him, and so he didn’t need to do anymore to insure I was going to hell.

But once I surrendered to Jesus satan went on the attack. I was now a threat to him. He couldn’t change my new eternal destination (heaven with Jesus) but he could try and stop me from taking anyone with me. My experience has been that the more closely I follow Jesus, the more I notice satan’s attacks. And it seems like most of the time those attacks are thoughts and feelings, that is, satan’s fiery darts.

Jesus dealt with satan by appropriately quoting the Word of God, the Bible. We can too. Next time, I’ll post some verses that I’ve found helpful.

	100% JESUS on American slavery was horrific.…
	100% JESUS on American slavery was horrific.…
	100% JESUS on My most important post to…
	james bruce mcnaught… on My most important post to…
	100% JESUS on My most important post to…