Joy and Strength (Christian life and music)

I have my PhD in Spiritual warfare.  This is not Christianity 101.  This is for the warriors who have been in this for decades with the Lord.   Your wounded-ness - the devil knows your Achilles heel.  He is not going after your strengths  He's going to where you've been hurt before, to reopen that wound to get you in a state of fear, anxiety, doubting God, anger - whatever it is - he only has a few tools in his toolbox that he uses over and over again, each one lousy! Recently, one Friday morning, all of these awful thoughts came at me.  I knew they were not my own thoughts, that it was a spiritual attack.  I was at work so I couldn't pray or speak the Word out loud. But in my heart I was praying, worshiping the Lord, knowing that the victory was coming. How did I know the victory was coming?  Because Christ promises to always lead us in triumph.  That doesn't mean there won't be battles; there will.  But it's a done deal.  Not...

Did you ever wonder why certain thoughts pop into your mind?  Are you aware of the enemy's tactics in this realm? You may have heard that the battlefield is in the mind.  Our thoughts steer our actions, our lives. So as a Christian, it is crucial to know when a thought is a spiritual attack.  The enemy wants us to believe thoughts that mess with our identity.  But remember, he is crafty!  So it's not always so easy to discern.  He may even disguise himself as an angel of light (one of his guises) so that your thought may even seem "good." He takes God-given desires and needs and twists them so that we want to get them met outside of God's will.  That road leads to disaster and our destruction and the devil knows it! Now I much prefer focusing on the beauty of the Lord, and wish I could just ignore that the devil even exists.  But exist he does!  And once we are in Christ, he is truly our total enemy.   He wants to get us so caught u...

"They are: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord."  This is what I found when I Googled "character qualities of the Holy Spirit."  Yes, I am aware of the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23.  And those are just as true.   And there are many more writings that you will find on the topic of the Holy Spirit.  But for now, I want to write about these. When I talk with God, I talk with Jesus.  They are one and the same.  Jesus is God with a face on.  He came to earth as a human so that we could see God and know Him.  What a gift!  May we never take this for granted! Some people pray to the Holy Spirit.  Since God is a Triune God, it is the same as praying to God and Jesus. Jesus IS the Holy Spirit and vice versa.  It is not a part of who He is but who He is in total. I still can't fully understand this but maybe I'm not supposed to.   But I know that the Holy Spirit is ...