The Sniper

It has been a while.... I have to say there is a lot going on in my life these days. I am still getting settled in to my new job, the kids are involved in all kinds of sports, I had braces put on my teeth about a month ago, I had minor surgery on my right thumb a couple weeks ago, a friend of mine is battling a lawsuit to preserve his business that will become a key piece of the missionary ministry that I am part of and I am preparing to head to Colorado in a couple of weeks to attend a Wild at Heart Boot Camp with John Eldridge and his band of warriors. What does all this mean?

SPIRITUAL WARFARE is abundant in my life. The enemy is sniping me at every turn.

About a month ago I was considering leaving the church we attend because of some perceptions that I had developed. The enemy was right there feeding me with all kinds of judgemental thoughts. I was on the edge of leaving when I sat down with my friend, Jeff, and talked to him about it. Jeff is somewhat of a spiritual mentor for me [he is also an elder in the church]. I explained to him what I was thinking and he told me to follow my heart and allow God to lead me. He encouraged me to "remember why you are there [at church], you are not there for anybody but God" - this hit me like a ton of bricks and exposed the enemies strategy. I prayed after my meeting with Jeff and removed the enemies foothold....

I went to court a few Friday's ago to support and pray for my friend, Robert. He is the rightful owner of a company and technology that he is fighting to keep. He also has a heart for kingdom work and would like to use this company to fund a ministry that I am a part of. This SCARES the enemy for sure! So I went in to the court room and sat with the opposing side and prayed the entire time. I prayed for Robert's protection and success and I also prayed for all of the folks that are trying to steal Robert's company. That night the right side of my mouth became a bit sore and by Sunday night I was in extreme pain and unable to sleep most of the night due to the infection that had set in on the right side of my mouth. The sniper had got me again. I don't know if you have ever had a gum infection before, but it ranks in the top 5 of pain for sure. I went to the dentist on Monday and got some medicine and began to heal. Long story short, it did not heal right and I had exposed jaw bone in the back of my mouth for about a week - a final pot shot by the enemy.... how ridiculous, right?

I knew this whole gum infection thing was a direct attack and had to laugh about it, despite the amount of pain I was in. I began praying about it quite a bit and was really "ok" with the attack. I figured the pain I was experiencing was nothing compared to the cross. I must have read Eph 6 about 10 times during the whole thing.... the armor definitely helps as long as I remember to put it on.

Finally, there have been a number of other attacks on various relationships, some ethical issues at work, silly arguments with my wife that I can not even remember what they were about. The enemy is lurking in the shadows with his sniper rifle and taking shots at me all the time.

I expect the battle to get worse and the attacks to become more intense as my trip to Colorado draws closer. I will stand strong in the faith knowing that angels are near and that the armor of God will protect me. With the authority given to me by the one who lives in me, I will rebuke the enemy and move forward in the battle.

I will glorify Him daily and will always be thankful for His grace and sacrifice that make salvation possible.

Warrior Princess

A piece of Eldredge's book "Captivating" that I really love - my wife, Tammy, just attended "Captivating" in Colorado a short time ago. She is my warrior princess...

“Me, a princess?”
“You are the legal heir.”
“I never lead anyone.”
“We will help you to be a princess, to rule. If you refuse to accept the throne then the kingdom will cease to exist as we know it.”
--The Princess Diaries

In God’s name we must fight them!
--Joan of Arc

Women are often portrayed in stories and tales as the “Damsel in Distress.” We are the ones for whom men rise up and slay dragons. We are the “weaker sex”; said to faint at the sight of blood, needing to be spared the gory details of battle whether on the field or in the market place. We are the ones waiting in our flowing gowns for the knight to come and carry us away on the back of his white horse. And yes. There are days when a knight in shining armor would be most welcome. We do long to be fought for; loved enough to be courageously protected. But there is a mighty fierceness set in the heart of women by God. It is true to who we are and what we are created to do.

Women are warriors too.

Redeemed women of God have tender, merciful hearts, backbones of steel and hands that have been trained for battle. There is something incredibly fierce in the heart of a woman that is to be contended with, not dismissed, not disdained, but recognized, honored, welcomed and trained.

(Captivating , 186-188)

The Ambush

I am heading to another Boot Camp in October. This one is facilitated by Ransomed Heart Ministries in Colorado (John Eldredge's Camp - he wrote Wild at Heart). I have made my way to one of the forums for men attending this camp. A good place to ask questions and simply get to know some of the guys going. One of the guys, Brad, started a post today where he was talking about a book called "The Way of te Wild Heart" - another book that Eldredge wrote about the phases of the masculine journey. It is kind of a road map to the masculine soul. He was speaking about his troubles with comparing his father to the book and identiying that his father had fallen short in many respects - as I read through this, the enemy ambushed me. I posted a response on the forum and here is how it went...

Hey Guys,

I was struggling as to whether or not I was going to toss some feedback in to the mix on this one. I read through the initial post here and immediately felt two things – jealousy and then I was mad. To explain why I felt these two emotions, I am going to share some of my story. I am a firm believer in personal transparency and it helps me in my walk. I have read The Way of The Wild Heart as well, and used the book in two ways – to take some[more]of my wounds to the cross with my Father in heaven by my side and to learn about the things I needed to do in future so that I progressed down the masculine path and ensurethat my children are not taken out the way I was.

My father was absent for my entire childhood. I had a step-father that was completely absent except for the times where I was to be punished for something. I have no memory what so ever that I can look back on and call a “good father and son moment”. I grew up not knowing that I was adopted until I was 21 years old and in the Navy. I knew who my birth father was because he was my older brother’s father as well. There was an agreement made that I was never to be told that I was adopted – the reason for the agreement remains vague to this day and frankly is not important to me at all, we all know who was responsible for that. In any event, I did not grow up with a father in my life. The closest thing I had to a father figure was my wife’s father, but he passed away when I was 26 years old.

So when I read the post, I was overcome with a sense of jealousy as I cannot look back on my father and compare him to any phase in The Way Of the Wild Heart. I do not have any of those experiences to reflect on. Whether good or bad experiences, I still found myself a bit jealous for not even going through that thought process. I then began to get pissed. Here we are, men on a journey to restore our hearts and to understand our place in the larger story. God has given us the gifts of Wild at Heart and Fathered by God to help along that journey. The enemy lurks in the shadows and looks for any opportunity to launch an assault on our hearts. The enemy had me feeling like I was in a different spot than most of the other men on the forum and that I should probably not share my feedback, because it would not be meaningful. He also attempted to reopen one of my deepest wounds in the process. I then realized that the enemy was working in this story to take out and re-open wounds that Brad may have by telling him that his father “did not measure up”…. This is a classic attack.

I then began to pray immediately and turned to Ephesians 6…. I asked that God send his angels to watch over and protect Brad all the other men that are headed to Colorado in October. This is just the beginning of the attacks that start to occur before we head in to these camps – the enemy is NOT happy at all that we are going! I then began to pray about my past brokenness - I know that my dad loves me and that he had no intention of wounding me as a child. I know that the experiences created during times in my life that I cannot even remember (around age 2 or 3) were the work of the enemy to take me out. I also know that I have surrendered that to my Father in heaven and forgiven my birth father. I will not continue to let enemy work me over in these corners of my life – I am sober and alert. The enemy almost successfully ambushed me today. Be alert gentlemen – be alert. All the glory goes to our Father. Praise the Lord….

I am feeling pretty good tonight! Chalked up a win.

The Imposter

(Wild at Heart , 107–8)


From the place of our woundedness we construct a false self. We find a few gifts that work for us, and we try to live off them. Stuart found he was good at math and science. He shut down his heart and spent all his energies perfecting his “Spock” persona. There, in the academy, he was safe; he was also recognized and rewarded. “When I was eight,” confesses Brennan Manning, “the impostor, or false self, was born as a defense against pain. The impostor within whispered, ‘Brennan, don’t ever be your real self anymore because nobody likes you as you are. Invent a new self that everybody will admire and nobody will know.’” Notice the key phrase: “as a defense against pain,” as a way of saving himself. The impostor is our plan for salvation.

So God must take it all away. He thwarts our plan for salvation; he shatters the false self. Our plan for redemption is hard to let go of; it clings to our hearts like an octopus.

Why would God do something so terrible as to wound us in the place of our deepest wound? Jesus warned us that “whoever wants to save his life will lose it” (Luke 9:24). Christ is not using the word bios here; he’s not talking about our physical life. The passage is not about trying to save your skin by ducking martyrdom or something like that. The word Christ uses for “life” is the word psyche—the word for our soul, our inner self, our heart. He says that the things we do to save our psyche, our self, those plans to save and protect our inner life—those are the things that will actually destroy us. “There is a way that seems right to a man but in the end it leads to death,” says Proverbs 16:25. The false self, our plan for redemption, seems so right to us. It shields us from pain and secures us a little love and admiration. But the false self is a lie; the whole plan is built on pretense. It’s a deadly trap. God loves us too much to leave us there. So he thwarts us, in many, many different ways.

The Ene(me)

One thing to always keep in mind is that we live in a fallen world. We are at war and warfare is a task for soldiers. I do not claim to be an expert in the area, but I will say that I have been studying this for close to a year straight. Some of what I have found in my research you will find in my blog.
There are certain things a soldier must know in order to be effective on the field of battle. There is no difference when it comes to spiritual warfare. As warriors, we must know the answers to very important questions if we are to fight the war properly. The first and most important question is “who is the enemy?”

There is more than one way that enemy reveals itself to us – for the sake of this blog and where my heart sits today, I am going to focus on ourself. The reason I have chosen this is because without conquering our internal enemy, we cannot defeat the external enemy. I have been on a personal mission to cover myself in the armor of God on a daily basis (Ephesians, Chapter 6) and wage war against a strong and determined enemy. As you can see in recent posts, I have been struggling with my own personal sinful nature – the sinful nature that was bestowed upon me 2000 years ago in a beautiful garden - not placing blame here, its a fact. The bible tells us to take care of our own sin prior to go after the sin of others.

Matthew 7:3-5 (New Living Translation)

“And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying to your friend,‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? 5 Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.

It is very telling that Jesus calls a person who does not deal with his own sin first a “hypocrite”. Hypocrisy is condemned in a number of places in the NT (Mat 7:5, Mat 23:28, Mk 12:15, Lk 6:42, Lk 12:1, Lk 13:15, 1 Ti 4:2, Jam 3:17). I will only mention Luke 12:1 here because it is key in understanding what is happening when we act in hypocrisy.

Luke 12:1 (New Living Translation)

Meanwhile, the crowds grew until thousands were milling about and stepping on each other. Jesus turned first to his disciples and warned them, “Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees—their hypocrisy.

When we are hypocrites we follow the teaching of the Pharisees, not the teaching of Jesus. If we act under any teaching or authority except that of Jesus, we cannot fight the enemy. Look at what happened to the sons of Sceva when they tried to cast out evil spirits . . .

Acts 19:13-16 (New Living Translation)

A group of Jews was traveling from town to town casting out evil spirits. They tried to use the name of the Lord Jesus in their incantation, saying, “I command you in the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, to come out!” Seven sons of Sceva, a leading priest, were doing this. But one time when they tried it, the evil spirit replied, “I know Jesus, and I know Paul, but who are you?” Then the man with the evil spirit leaped on them, overpowered them, and attacked them with such violence that they fled from the house, naked and battered.

When we do not fight our own sin first and act under the authority and teaching of Jesus, we will be overcome by the enemy and lose the battle.

Hipocracy is a formidable opponent in the spiritual battle. How can I expect that I will not be judged if I continue to pass judgment on others.The bible teaches us not to judge and is very specific on this point.

Matthew 7:1 (New Living Translation)

“Do not judge others, and you will not be judged."

I have spoken in previous blogs about my resentment and judgmental behavior toward my extended family and San Diego and this is the sin that I live with. Along the lines of resentment and judgment comes different forms of anger – more sin.

In this war, in this battle, the enemy is entrenched on the battlefield. The confidence of the enemy will be his downfall. As I sit here writing this, my wife sent me a text message that read:

Genesis 20:50

Joseph said to his brothers “You intended to harm me, but God intended it all for good. He brought me to this position so I could save the lives of many people.”

Joseph knew that God had a plan.
Joseph trusted in God,
And now Joseph forgave his brothers.
God planned for Josephs good.

This is exactly the scripture I needed at exactly this point in time. Not that my brothers "intended to harm me", but certainly the enemy did. The take away here is forgiveness and placing faith in God and His plan. My wife and kids are working/attending Vacation Bible School at OCC this week and this is the story they are studying today.

Its important not to beat ourselves up too much as this is also the enemy working in us to keep push us away from our Father. It would be much easier to deal with sin if we were not held accountable you know(?) No matter what sin(s) we have committed – no matter how big or small – we can surrender those and leave them at the cross. What happens after we do that is what most important – sustaining the win. We must never forget that the war is ongoing, there are many battles to won.

As many of you know, I love epic films and watch movies through a lens that allows God to speak to my heart. As I am writing this post, I am reminded of the speech that Lieutenant Colonel Harold “Hal” G. Moore gave when addressing the 7th Cavalry in the movie “We Were Soldiers”. Here is a small piece of this speech that was given just before the soldiers deployed:

“We’re moving into the ‘valley of the shadow of death’ – where you will watch the back of the man next to you, as he will watch yours. And you won’t care what color he is or by what name he calls God. They say we’re leavin’ home. We’re going to what home was always suppose to be. So let us understand the situation. We are going into battle against a tough and determined enemy.”

These soldiers were going to what “home was always suppose to be” – we were always meant to be in the war – in the battle for good. The enemy has convinced us otherwise through his sinister ways… Take a stand and allow the enemy to gain no more ground. I will see you there - I will watch your back!

Love and Warfare

Last night I spent a lot of time with the Holy Spirit. I am finding it somewhat difficult to rid myself of the resentment and judgmental behavior that I have toward my brothers as it relates to my grandmothers passing away. I hate the sin! It seems every time I ask God to reveal to me the sin in my life, this always comes up - the enemy knows how important this is to me and therefore continues to assault me and try to wound me in this area of my life. I read Ephesians 6 for encouragement - this is a spiritual battle. I was in tears last night because I continue to sin by continuing to pass judgment on the perceived actions of my family even though I am consciously trying to rid myself of this behavior - its really hard.

There is one other place in my life that I struggle with as well – my father that lives in Oregon. This also seems to come up every time I ask God to reveal to me those areas of sin in my life that I need to deal with. I was adopted and my birth father lives in Oregon and I just cannot get that relationship off the ground. Part of it is because I feel judged by him and his wife every time I see him. I think that this is what pushed my older brother (same father) and his wife away from them many years ago. I am trying to find a way to tell my father this, but it’s difficult – that arrow is placed deep in the most sensitive corner of heart.

I think as humans living in a fallen world, we all have those areas of sin that are hard to separate us from. As I continue to grow in my faith and become closer and closer to Him, I feel a sense of freedom. Occasionally I can taste the feeling of pure holiness before God. This is what I long for - pure transparency and cleansing of my soul before my Father. The enemy is fully aware of my desire and is using the things that are closest to my heart to trip me up. I long to have a rich relationship with my family - I long to see everybody sitting around the table at my house enjoying the company of one another. I long for God to reveal himself to those that closest to me. I long for my family to know how much I love them and how much I want them to be a part of my life.

“Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.”
1 Peter 5:8-9

The Lord Is a Warrior

Good stuff!

I think even a quick read of the Old Testament would be enough to convince you that war is a central theme of God’s activity. There is the Exodus, where God goes to war to set his captive people free. Blood. Hail. Locusts. Darkness. Death. Plague after plague descends on Egypt like a boxer’s one-two punch, like the blows of some great ax. Pharaoh releases his grip, but only for a moment. The fleeing slaves are pinned against the Red Sea when Egypt makes a last charge, hurtling down on them in chariots. God drowns those soldiers in the sea, every last one of them. Standing in shock and joy on the opposite shore, the Hebrews proclaim, “The LORD is a warrior!” (Ex. 15:3). Yahweh is a warrior.

Then it’s war to get to the Promised Land. Moses and company have to do battle against the Amalekites; again God comes through, and Moses shouts, “The LORD will be at war against the Amalekites from generation to generation” (Ex.17:16). Yahweh will be at war. Indeed. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Then it’s war to get into the Promised Land—Joshua and the battle of Jericho, and all that. After the Jews gain the Promised Land, it’s war after war to keep it. Israel battles the Canaanites, the Philistines, the Midianites, the Egyptians again, the Babylonians—and on and on it goes. Deborah goes to war; Gideon goes to war; King David goes to war. Elijah wars against the prophets of Baal; Jehoshaphat battles the Edomites. Are you getting the picture?

(Waking the Dead, 14–15)