LISTEN TO THE DEVOTIONAL
Picture this scenario: You’re really down—flat on your face, exhausted, defeated. You feel the devil’s hot breath on your neck as he whispers:
- You’ll never break that habit—as soon as you try, you’ll go out and do it again. It’s hopeless.
- God doesn’t care. If God really loved you, He would never have let this happen.
- God has forgotten you—you’re on your own.
- You’re toast.
Yes, the devil is firing flaming arrows at you, just when you’re the weakest. What are you going to do?
God has given us two weapons to fight our enemies: a shield and a sword. Paul talks about them. He says you “take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.” Then he says to take “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:16-17). Our faith is a weapon of defense, and God’s Word is a weapon of attack.
God has given us two weapons to fight our enemies: a shield and a sword.
You can count on it: the devil will throw flaming barbs in your direction. If you have the shield of faith, you can fend off his attack, and those darts can’t reach your vital spiritual organs. In turn, you can attack him with the Word of God—and he is no match for God’s Word.
You can be sure that if you quote scripture to the devil, he will answer back the same way he did to Eve in the Garden of Eden, “Did God really say ….” That’s when you use the shield of faith to say, “Old Devil, ‘the word of [God] is right and true; he is faithful in all he does’” (Psalm 33:4).
So, the next time you’re in a spiritual battle, remember you have two powerful weapons: the shield of faith, and the sword of the word of God. These “weapons we fight with,” says Paul, “have divine power to demolish strongholds” (2 Corinthians 10:4).
Claim that promise today when you go out to do battle!
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