The Church in the West today presents too easy a target for Satan. We do not believe we are at war. We do not know where the battleground is located, and, in spite of our weapons, they are neither loaded nor aimed at the right target. We are unaware of how vulnerable we are. We are better fitted for a parade that for an amphibious landing. Ed Silvoso
Next month (August 27-28) I am hosting a Warring Women Weekend through my organization the Center for Emerging Female Leadership. The reason I feel God lead me to host this weekend is that we are losing ground in this invisible war we are in. Some people have forgotten that we are in one!The event is for women of all ages and in various levels of kingdom assignments. This event to me is probably one of the most important events I have ever put together. Obviously the reason is simple: the enemy of my soul YOUR soul does not want you to “get it” he doesn’t want you to get that you have a choice to make about not just whether you will serve him but how you will serve him! I am mad right now. Not mad at you but mad at the enemy because he is just having way too much fun destroying men and women of God!
Leaders, especially beware. Don’t think you ever “got this!” I was reading through I & II Samuel last week and two thoughts hit me HARD enough that I got out of my hiatus in writing to blog about it, and it is this:#1 – The Enemy Will Always Come After The Leader! God hit me in the face with this truth in I Samuel 31:1-3 (where the enemy came after Saul) and II Samuel 5:11 (where the enemy came after David.) In both instances the enemy came hard after the leader because they knew…take out the leader and you can stop the movement!Here is a truth about every leader you know in church world…we are all under an intense amount of spiritual attack. And…the larger the ministry grows the larger the target on his or her back!
I’ve had leaders talk to me about this in the past as if they were surprised! The false mentality that seems to exist is that the higher we climb on the leadership ladder the less temptation we will face. Uh no! NOTHING could be further from the truth. How many men and women of God do we know who have succumbed to the great liar!
David was at the top of his game when the enemy came after him and took him down with an affair. Elijah had just accomplished one of the greatest victories he had ever seen in his life–then Jezebel sent word that SHE was coming after him (and he freaked out…many times as leaders we lose perspective when under attack!)
In my church we just started a new sermon series called “The Heat Is On” and I told the church, the heat is going to go hotter. The intensity of this war is going to get heavier. I am not saying this to scare anyone–heck…it’s a fact of life. There was a chant I would sing with my sorority sisters in college and it used to go like this “It’s hot in here, It’s hot in here, it must be the Delta’s in the atmosphere” Well, I need to paraphrase that for our purposes right now and “it’s hot in here, it’s hot in here—it must be Satan in the atmosphere!”
Yeah, It’s on folks! War big time. Are you complacent? So I was just reflecting on all this and asked myself how do we guard ourselves?I will tell you in a minute, but I wanted to get this out into the blogosphere not because I have many readers but because it is stirring up in my spirit. I am just like you, yes I am a leader, some would say I am well-regarded, others well LOL; yes I am a pastor and yes I have been serving the Lord for many years but and I want to clearly state this, I too get attacked and sometimes the heat is ridiculously on! Some of the things that pop into my head are crazy! Seems to me the devil works overtime with people who can help scatter other sheep away from the great shepherd. So I try real hard to not just walk away but “run” away from situations like Joseph did with Potifar’s wife!
So getting back to what we can do, here are some suggestions:
a – Consistent time with the Lord! Find out what brings you close to Jesus and DO IT A LOT!
b – Memorizing Scripture – if Jesus defeated Satan three times by quoting Scripture then we should learn to do that as well! Do you think you’re better, cooler than Jesus? Huh, really?
c – Intense accountability – not some lame meeting with a group of guys/girls where you share popcorn and talk about what you are learning…but rather an invitation for people to “get in your face” and call you out when they see something unhealthy and destructive. I have a group of 3 women I love and we have journeyed together for about 10 years. Truth is we haven’t met much like we used to because one is still in NYC, the other two and I while living in the same State have very different schedules. But I miss the “in your face” meetings we would have. I have cried with them, yelled at them (in a nice kinda way) and vice versa but we grew and we grew a lot! I need to get that happening again and ASAP, those ladies helped me look at the ME I didn’t want to be and the ME I was becoming. What an awesome group to have. I encourage you to get one going. But you have to be committed to being called out as well as calling someone out. If not, don’t waste your time!
d – Becoming a FREAK about personal integrity – no one knows your thoughts, feeling and struggles but you…and YOU are the only person who can establish correct boundaries for your personal integrity. If you don’t make integrity a priority then it will fall by the wayside as important…which makes you ONE stupid decision away from losing what it may have taken YEARS to build. As the old saying goes “It takes years to build a good reputation and only a second to lose it” so please don’t be a knucklehead and guard yourself!The enemy IS coming after us…which should not cause us to fear but rather to FOCUS more on Jesus… WE WIN because JESUS wins…HE IS IN US!!! Isaiah 54:17!!! And remember what the enemy shows us is never real, it is always an optical illusion. So don’t fall for it folks. It is NOT what it looks like. We got to learn to take our authority and kick satan right in the cojones!
#2 – The Enemy Will Always Come After The Leaders Family
Once again, take a look at I Samuel 31:1-3…and notice that the enemy first killed Saul’s sons before they got to him!
DANG! Why they gotta mess with our families!
Church leader…here is a fact…the enemy IS coming after your marriage! He did it to me exactly this month (July) ten years ago! My 20 year marriage is a miracle. I could have ended up being only a 10 year marriage. The enemy has a plan, do you have one? His plan is for you to:
- Take your marriage for granted
- God will lift you up higher if you keep ignoring your marriage.
- Have high expectations of them but they better not have any expectations of you
- Be a Jesus freak at church but God forbid you mention Jesus at home.
- Take most of your time investing in this grand ministry of yours but not give any time to investing a god’s vision for your marriage.
AND…trust me…he WILL come after your spouse! What better way to break your heart than to have the person who has your heart break it for him. And if that doesn’t work he will go after his/her health and go down the line from there. Your spouse is a target…and that is why we must LOVE THEM and LEAD THEM through this minefield! If we think our spouse is immune to this we are idiots! When we are married the two become one…period!
Question…what steps are you taking to SHOW your spouse that they are important to you…and you will do whatever it takes to love and protect them. (Date nights, back rubs with NO strings attached, conversations about what they are reading in Scripture, etc.) I’m sorry but this is a hot button for me not just because I have experienced it but because as a pastor I see so much dysfunction in marriages and its in the homes of people who profess God is a God who can do anything. But why aren’t we letting him? Why aren’t we doing our parts to work our marriages and not give the devil a foothold?
AND…church leaders…the enemy is coming after your kids…UNFORTUNATELY many pastors kids become “wild as hell” because they spend all of there time looking after every kid in the church except his own. My NUMBER ONE discipleship responsibility are my kids! Yet the enemy will tempt me with…
- You’re tired…you can play with them tomorrow.
- Vacation time is coming, you can spend time with them there.
Every mom and dad MUST take their children seriously…the enemy does!!! But Pastors and Leaders even more so… He IS coming after them…and so we must raise them to love Jesus and walk in victory…and then they can grow up and kick satan in the cojones…just like we did!!!
So you see, it’s a war folks and dang we need to get with it already. This is a conflict that won’t end until the Lord returns for His peeps. I pray God gives you the wisdom and grace to handle that dirty devil every day of your life. You can’t do this alone. AndI’m just sayin…cause I care!













