Steven Furtick - When The Enemy Attacks
This is an excerpt from: The God Of After
If you will look at your life (and I did it this week), you'll find patterns of "These are the times where the Enemy attacks me. If I build some different things into these rhythms of my life, I can be more ready". I think our rhythms and our readiness go hand in hand. The rhythm of your life cannot be marked by isolation and still be flowing in victory. The rhythm of your life cannot be marked by constant chronic complaining and still have an outcome of overflowing joy.
The Enemy is looking for someone to devour. He's looking for someone who's not paying attention. He's looking for someone who just took family pictures and is just a little thankful for their family and just a little bit triggered by the whole experience. Because it really went well. Everybody was good. I don't even know why I was in a bad mood. It went great. The photographers were great. It was happy. Just something about it… Then I look at it, and I'm like, "Okay, okay, okay. Next year, when we take family pictures, I am not going to back up my car and almost fight any rednecks. Okay? Next year". No, no, no. Next time. Next time I find myself susceptible, I am going to feed my spirit and talk to myself and be a little bit more ready for that. All of that you can do if you will just take some time in your life.
There are only two times you need to do this: after you win and after you lose. When you win over a victory, ask, "What was it that got me ready for that"? Y'all, I have certain friends that I found out when I talk to them, I win more. Do you have anybody like that in your life? Now let me turn around so you can have a private moment. I have other friends who when I talk to them and spend time with them, it puts me in this spin cycle, and I don't know why, but I end up more cynical on the other side. Pay attention to all of that, because sometimes in your life you'll notice, "Oh! When this happens, it is the consequence of something that came before it".
A lot of times, that is a relational consequence of who you are spending the most time around. Here's another thing since you asked me about Instagram. Sometimes you feel sick to your stomach, but it's not your stomach; it's what you scrolled through 15 minutes ago that made you judge something, feel something, see something that triggered a response in you, but at the moment that it was triggered, it didn't show up. It doesn't show up in the moment that you see it. It shows up after. If the moment you were looking at the stuff you were like, "This is making me more judgmental and less content, and this is causing me to kill my own appreciation for my own life and only aspire to things that aren't even a part of my calling…"
If you thought that while you were looking at it, you would stop looking at it, but the Devil hides the hook. Stop biting. How many times is he going to have to reel you in before you resist him, before you can see it coming and say, "No, I'm not even going to take the bait. I don't even get paid to argue with you. Nobody is worth that in my life. I'm not coming down there for this anymore"? If you don't see it, he will eat you alive. He's looking for someone to devour. The one he can devour the most is the one who is vulnerable and doesn't know it. When you know you're vulnerable, it gives you an opportunity to be vigilant…when you know where you're vulnerable.
So, this great apostle writes a letter to the church that's being persecuted somewhere between AD 60 and 70. He's writing to them about their sufferings in their time, but it also applies to ours. He says, "Be alert and sober-minded, because the Enemy is looking for someone to devour". Is it you? Have you trained him that anytime he tries, you'll lie down and go with it; anytime he takes you down that dark path, all he has to do is lure you out there? Is it you? Is it you that every time he can even suggest an anxious thought to you, the Enemy can get you to go down so deep in it that it's going to take you three days to recover? Is it you?
If he can make you a little uncomfortable about something, you will reach for something to feel instant relief that is going to bring you an aftereffect that's going to cause you to be in captivity. Is it you? If you're not paying attention to the patterns in your life, you are easy prey for the Enemy. You have to get into Spirit-led reflection where the Holy Spirit takes you back through your day and shows you ways you can handle things next time, not so you can blame what happened in your day or in your life but so you can beat it next time, because there will be a next time. If the Devil hasn't messed with you, good news: you can practice this message very soon. He'll mess with you again. You're like, "I don't know. He has just been leaving me alone. I don't really need this message".
Keep this message right there. Don't put it in the fridge, because you're going to need it. You can leave it right there. It's going to be right there soon. He's looking for someone to devour. He's looking for somebody, somebody who's vulnerable. You have to ask the question, "What came before this attack that caused me to be in a vulnerable position"? That's a great question to ask. The more you ask it, I believe, the more God will show you and give you an awareness and an alertness.
You can't prevent the attack, but you can plan for it after. I don't usually respond right in the moment, but it's when I go back and ask the question, "God, what do you want me to see about that that I can know next time?" and that's how I grow. It's not fancy. I know it's not amazing. It's not sexy, but it's what Peter said. He said, "Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone…"
Who's he looking for? Someone. Someone he can devour. You have to ask the question, "If the Enemy is attacking me right now, how is he attacking me? When does he tend to attack me"? I want to be alert to this. I don't want to be ignorant of his schemes. When does he attack me? How does he attack me? What are those access points where I let him get to me? What are the things? That is a valid question, and we have to ask it or we'll keep repeating the same patterns, but there's another question I want you to start asking. I want you to ask this question right after you ask, "Where is the Enemy attacking me"? Because you could mention a few areas today.
I know you could. If we passed the mic around and you were honest and weren't scared of being judged, you could name a few places he attacks you. They might be some areas that are more socially acceptable or they might be some areas that cause shame, but you could answer the question, if I asked it, "Where is it that the Enemy attacks you, and what usually comes before it that causes you to give in to it, that makes you weak for it? What is that"? But there's another question I want you to learn to ask, and I think this is also very powerful. If the Enemy is attacking you as much as he's attacking you in your life, I want to ask the question…What is it about you that he knows that is causing him to attack you like that?
If he's looking for someone to devour, and he's picking on you, then what is it about you that causes you to be a target? In other words, how many of you feel like the Devil has really been after you or someone you love in this last season? This is not a trick question. I really want to see who to aim this spit at when I preach it. I want to know. If the Enemy is attacking you like that, what is he after? What is it that God has inside of you that may even be unknown to you right now that he sees about your future that is causing him to fight you so hard like that? What is this spirit of heaviness that has been on you lately really about?
I know on the surface we tell ourselves, "Well, the reason I'm depressed is because I just suck, because I'm not much, because I don't have the resilience. I don't have the fortitude. I don't have the moral character. That's why I'm dealing with this insecurity". Is it? Is that why you're dealing with the insecurity…because you're really a nobody? Or is the Devil looking for someone, someone who has something, something they don't see the true value of yet, so he can catch you in your vulnerability so that you never see your true value so that you never do what God gave you to do on the earth? What's he after?
If you've been discouraged, really discouraged and down in your soul lately, and you've been thinking, "That must mean my best is behind me," is that really true or is there something…? I'm just curious. Is there something so significant in the next stage of your life, and you can't see it? Maybe the Enemy has more vision for your life than you do because he sees something that's in you in a seed form, and if it ever comes forth, if it ever gets watered, if it ever gets light, if it ever gets full grown, it's going to spread out and bear fruit and touch lives and change the world.