You wake up in a good mood knowing today will be a great day! You are feeling good, but suddenly, everything starts to go wrong. The dog threw up in the night, your alarm clock didn’t go off, you spilled your breakfast all over your new shirt, and you just realized your gas tank is running on empty. The good feelings start to fade away, and the amazing day you expected begins to vanish. I’m sure you have been in this scenario many times; I know I have!
Similarly, have you noticed this with your prayers as well? You get a revelation of a promise from God, and you begin to stand firmly and expect victory; you feel free and sure that God is going to come through; almost immediately, the opposite starts to happen.
You believe God is the supplier, but then an unexpected bill arises, or there is less in your account than you expected; you believe God is your healer, but the doctor gives you bad news, or your symptoms worsen. It appears God’s promises aren’t true, and then the doubts and questions begin.
Distraction
I believe, as Christians, we realize this is Satan, but I don’t think we comprehend that these are distractions meant to defeat us. John G. Lake stated in one of his sermons that if hell had a characteristic, it was that of distraction.
Reading this quote was enlightening in a powerful way for me. I no longer saw these moments as simply oppositions but as distractions. The devil’s strategy is to take our eyes off the promises of God and place them on physical reality.
If he can successfully do this, he can win the battle and leave us bruised and battered. See, the devil knows the war has already been won; he knows who the real victors are; therefore, his only job now is to convince us that we are the ones losing instead of himself. Satan knows that if we stood firm, not looking to the left or the right, we WOULD have what God said we could have.
So he turns our heads to the right looking at our circumstances, then turns our heads to the left, showing us the worst-case scenario. All the while, his goal of taking our eyes off God is being accomplished.
Friend, we must begin to recognize the distractions of the devil. When our thoughts shift to things, not from God, we must see this as a distraction and actively shift our focus. We cannot imagine ourselves not paying our bills or staying sick. Instead, we must imagine everything God said coming to pass.
Believe You Have Received
Jesus says in Mark 11:24: Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. The key in this verse is believing when we pray and not once we have received it. If we believe we received, when we pray, we wouldn’t be prone to giving into doubt and the devil’s lies. If we truly knew God and trusted him fully, the devil could try all he wanted, but he couldn’t make us doubt. The thoughts might come, but they couldn’t take root.
Example
Let me give you a relatable example. If I asked my mom for some groceries and she said she would buy me some. I would believe her; no questions, no doubts. I would expect her to deliver on what she said; because my mom is trustworthy.
If someone came up to me and tried to convince me that she wouldn’t come through for me, I would call them a liar. If my refrigerator told me I was about to starve, I would remind it that my mom said she would buy me groceries. Nothing and no one could turn me away from the truth that I had groceries on the way.
Let God Be True
Likewise, we cannot allow Satan to convince us that we do not have what God said was ours. He will use your bank account to tell you lies and to convince you that God isn’t your provider. He will use well-meaning doctors to convince you that God hasn’t already taken your infirmities.
He will even use your body to persuade you that God’s word isn’t true; by your symptoms getting worse. But all these tactics are simply to distract you from what God said, and they are lies. Roman’s 3:4 states, let God be true and every man a liar. Anything and everything that contradicts what God has said is a lie.
When you gain this revelation and put it into practice, powerful things will begin to happen for you. Believing is key to receiving, and doubt is merely believing the devil and your circumstances over God. Stay alert and note when the devil is trying to distract and derail you. He has no power that we do not give him. We have the authority and power to resist and make him flee, and it’s time to take it
Put Into Practice
You may be reading this thinking this is easier said than done, and you are right. Our physical world is more real to us than the spiritual, so when we see things not looking good in the natural, we tend to focus on that. The devil knows this and uses it against us.
The important thing for us to do when we face these distractions is to return our focus to God and his promises. We need to open our spiritual eyes so we can believe.
We do this by reading, meditating, and speaking out the promises we are standing on instead of the bad news. Don’t spend time speaking or thinking about your negative reality when the spiritual truths of God are far more powerful.
Fill yourself with the word of God and let what he says become more real to you than what the doctor or your bank account says. Begin to thank him for his promises and remind yourself that he cannot lie, so if he said it, he will do it or has already done it.
Closing Thoughts
We must get to a place where our confidence in God and the words he has given us is so firm that the devil’s distractions have no impact. A place where we believe God fully so that we can begin to obtain all of his promises.
A place where we believe we received, what we asked for, as strongly as we believe we received salvation when we first asked. All the promises of God are yes, and amen. No exceptions; anything that contradicts that is a distracting lie from the devil. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark+11%3A24&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+3%3A4&version=ESV
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