Knowing the roads you travel helps to see how to look at opportunities ahead. Letting God be the pilot is allowing Him to be in control. Scary! Especially, when you want to be in control. One thing which has helped my faith is exercising my faith. Exercising your faith allows you to grow and to discern what is coming at you from the spiritual realm.
Satan likes to attack in three areas of our lives. First is our self worth (Emotions). Notice he went after Christ when he was vulnerable. Christ was hungry. Satan wants us to doubt who we are. He told Jesus, "IF YOU ARE the Son of God" (Matthew 4:3, New International Version). If we know who we are we can always diffuse the situation with the thoughts making them Obedient in Christ and "living on every word that comes from God" (Matthew 4:4, NIV). When we live on the Words of God we are living on truth and not on the twisted lies of deception and doubt of who we are and what we are capable of handling. Satan likes using our emotions to put us into control of things instead of God.
Second way of attack is doubting (Intellect) who God is in our life. When troubles strike we wonder at God's powers to calm the "sea". Satan said to Jesus, "He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands" (Matthew 4:6, NIV). We can't measure God and we should not put Him to the test. Since the first attack didn't work, he goes to the other extreme and tries to test the control of God. He attacks our intellect to see if we are going to trust in God and then blame or become angry with God when it doesn't happen. He wants to see if we are dependent on God to provide us security, safety, and salvation.
Third way of attack is fleshy (Physical) desires. Amazing how Satan knows Jesus came from Heaven and trys to tempt Jesus with temporary pleasure. Satan said to Jesus, "All this I will give you". We have to know who is the True giver. When our emotions are strong in our self worth and knowing that God counts us worthy and that He will provide, Satan will try his second attack. When the second attack is strong in knowing that God provides, then Satan will try to attack us using our physical nature against us.
Finally, Satan left Jesus alone for the time being. We fool ourselves into thinking that Satan will not bother us and that we are safe from attacks. Thus, we are to arm ourselves with the armor of God (another topic to discuss later). We have to be on alert for our adversary. He went after Jesus again through Peter. Peter said, "Forbid it". Satan didn't stop there. It was when Jesus was vulnerable again in the garden that Satan tried his final attack. Overall, Jesus won and so do we!
Think of P.I.E (Physical, Intellect, Emotions) and how well it tastes. God provides us pie to eat, but it depends on how well we exercise our faith. Faith is the shield in the armor of God to deflect the missiles of attacks.God has given to us everything pertaining to life and godliness. It is up to us to choose it. May we keep fighting the battle, but knowing the war has been won!
