I am reading a book on spiritual warfare. It’s called Spiritual Warfare for your Family by Leighanne McCoy. “Why are you reading about spiritual warfare?” you ask. Well, to be honest. I am desperate for answers in my life. Desperate for peace in my house. We are really really struggling with our son Josh. He has Intellectual Disability and a host of other issues and he is destroying the peace in my house. He throws monster fits and rages and it’s an every day multiple times a day thing. You never know what will set him off, we all walk around on eggshells. I hate to have people over because you never know when it will happen. He steals, lies and just wreaks havoc on my house and I’m tired. Like bone tired. It’s been like this for about two and a half years now and I’ve tried everything. We have done counseling, therapy and medications. We have prayed and prayed and nothing is working. So, in my desperation to find answers I turned to books about spiritual warfare. Don’t get me wrong here, I do not think there is a devil behind every corner and all that, but I do think that Satan is alive on the earth and does do his best to destroy lives and cause problems. Satan wants us to think either two lies, one is he isn’t up to anything in the earth or he is behind everything. It’s neither one. But I do recognize I don’t know enough about the subject having grown up Baptist we sat mostly in the camp of don’t talk about Satan and he won’t have any control in your life.

I had a feeling that while Joshua’s issues are biological in nature Satan is using that to his advantage and causing strife in my house. It’s leaking into all of us around Joshua because we are all angry at him and tired of his chaos. I don’t want this for my family. Josh has always had issues but they just got much much worse when my husband Glenn started preaching at church, I don’t think that’s a coincidence. It’s one of the ways we know we are heading the right direction in our lives, because Satan is mad. At any rate, I need answers. So, I started reading this book and I really like it. One thing I just read that just really had a lightbulb moment. The author was talking about making idols in our lives, things we hold higher than God. I had always thought of idols as things I love more than God like my husband or something I want, but she was talking about how she was consumed with worry for her daughter over the poor choices she was making. She spent more time worrying and praying and crying over her daughter and lost her focus on God. Her heartache became her idol. Once she confessed that and started praying for her forgiveness it changed her view of the situation and she realized that God had it under control and her burden was lifted. Lightbulb! My heartache and worry over my son and his behavior have become an idol in my life. I spend way more time worrying and praying about him than anything else and that has got to change. I cannot change my son, oh how I wish. That is God’s job, but I am spending time worrying about it like I can change him. I’m trying to do what is impossible and loosing my focus on what is important, God. If I spend more time focusing on God and less time focusing on my son’s issues I will not become so angry because I won’t care so much. That sounds bad initially but it’s what needs to happen. I am worrying about my son’s future and how hurtful he can be and not focusing on God. I have to change my focus. It won’t change my son’s behavior but it will change me, which may in turn change Josh’s behavior. Spiritual warfare battles are waged in my mind. I have control over what I allow in and what I believe. Satan is feeding me lies about my hopeless situation when I serve the God of hope and I am choosing to believe them. Satan says it will always be this way and my son will grow up to be a felon if he even makes it to adulthood. And I believe that. Not anymore. I will not focus on my issues but the one who can solve them. 

So, what’s your thing? What is the thing that consumes more of your attention than God? What lies are you believing?