Lately I've really been wrestling.  In fact, ever since I came home from Encounter in Saskatchewan I've been really fighting with my self, my sin, my weakness.  It's been a reminder that our enemy is as real as our saviour, and that he's committed to destroying the very things God is working in our lives.  I've been thinking often of this reminder found in 1 Peter 5:

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.  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.

There's so much in these 3 verses.  Encouragement, warning, instruction… ultimately I find it a very sobering reality check for me today.  I am reminded too of Paul's instruction, in Ephesians 6, to "put on the full armor of God."  I find such freedom in the reminder that "our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."  Freedom not because this fight is an easy one, but because faced with it's intensity I'm quick to realize that the fight is not ultimately mine.  I'm released from trying to defeat those things that continually beat me down, and able in the same moment to surrender them to God.

My prayers have been very candid and real, as they often are in midst of a fight.  The wrestle has awakened me yet again to the incredibly real need I have for a saviour.  I've captured that desperate heart of prayer in a song during these past few weeks, and am incredibly grateful for the countless times it has facilitated the pouring out of my heart over the past couple weeks.  I pray it can be a song of honesty and one that allows many to "cast all anxiety on Him".  A song that might help us as we commit to "stand our ground, and after we have done everything, to stand."

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Devil Down by Chad Block c2008 joseph creative 

1 Peter 5.7-9 

Ephesians 6.11-13

special thanks to Adam L for leaving a guitar lying around in a weird tuning!