Feeling the Attacks

Today's is a personal post. It has been my study for the past week. It is umpolished and not what I consider "pretty" enough for a real blog post. For that reason, I am hesitant to share it. But I feel the Lord telling me to share what's on my heart.

Last week, I posted this about a person's spiritual temperature. I shared how lately I had been inching toward lukewarm, and that made Satan happy because the lukewarm person will do the work of the devil for him. Now that I am moving back toward hot, I know I am making him angry because I can feel his attacks.

That poses the question: How does Satan attack the Christian? I found this article the other day, and I think it does a good job of using Biblical truth to explain. Let me share what I've learned:

1. Satan attacks the Christian by bringing up fleshly desires through unbelievers and an unbelieving world. (Gal.5:19-20, Gal. 5:17).  

2. Satan attacks the Christian by deceiving him with the lies of worldly wisdom through unbelievers and an unbelieving world. (Jas. 4:1-6, Matt.16: 21-24).

3. He attempts to deceive us with a false Jesus and a false gospel through false Christians. (2 Cor.11:2-4,  2 Cor.11: 13-15)

4. Satan can physically afflict us or ones that we love with illness, crimes, disasters, persecution and the like.
(Job 1:1-2:8, 1 Pet.5: 8-9)

In James 4:7, James tells Christians to “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.”

It is wise, therefore, to know and understand these ways of attacks so when we are confronted with them, we recogonize them for what they are and do not allow ourselves to get drawn into them. That is the scheme of the devil: to distract us from the works of God.