Give no ground

I was awakened this morning by a text at 3:30am to pray. I prayed for a long time, because the people involved are precious to my heart. Got up, read my Bible, prayed some more. Felt the strength of God's power to intervene in the situation. Intercession is real.

However, a few more hours into my day, I started to feel discouraged about some related relationships in my life. Could feel the weariness of being up so early meshing with that discouragement like waves that merge and then break together. Started to forget that early morning strength and power.

I was sitting in the car doing Luke's Bible with him while we waited for Noah to get out of book club (homeschool plug:it's so portable!). It was the story of King Ahab (he was a bad guy, but that isnt the point in this vignette) telling the king of Syria sure, you can take my wives and kids and silver and gold--whatever it takes to keep you happy and me safe. However, the Syrian king soon sent another messenger: now my servants are going to ransack your homes and take whatever they want. Ahab freaked out. He ended up getting good counsel, saying nope, enough's enough, you can't take any more--and condensing the story, he fought against Syria and whomped them with God's help.

I was explaining to Luke that it was because Ahab had given in in the first place that Syrian king came back for more. And it clicked. Why give the enemy any ground in the first place? Which I was doing, thankyouverymuch, by letting him bum me out with the discouragements of the day. That early morning intercession, I know, was whomping the enemy, and he wanted to come rip off some of my faith and peace of mind.

Nope, not gonna let him. I prayed again, put my faith back on straight, and got back in the game. Took a nap :-) and went to worship/prayer service at church where I went up for a dear friend and her husband to pray over the situations for me. More intercession. Bam!

Faith is ebb and flow. Rough things happen. None of us are invincible. Discouragement cloud banks roll in and sometimes they stay awhile. It's a definite struggle for me and sometimes it takes a while before the sun breaks through again. But today, I just managed to see it, catch it, punch through it. Gave no ground.

"Faith is the confidence of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen." Hebrews 11:1