Lessons in spiritual warfare from a bougainvillea

By Caroline



One day I decided this needed to go:

It’s pretty, I know. But this beauty has an evil side; it has mad thorns that will rip your flesh with one wrong move. It grows like wildfire and you can’t kill it. What began as a small potted gift from a friend had turned into a fiend that was destroying my fence, yard and innocent flowers.

My husband doesn’t let me use electrical tools in the garden because…well, because I’ve given him good reason not to. So– I have been relegated to do whatever I’d like in the garden as long as I don’t sever electrical wires or send myself to the emergency room.

Every summer in the unrelenting Florida heat, I’d trim it back in tiny increments, but the more I trimmed the faster and thicker it grew… until it took over half of the backyard fence.

It was so intricately entwined and out of control that as I stood with my clippers in hand I was at a loss for where to begin. One thing about me …  If I have enough determination to begin something, I will finish it… The job will get done, come what may. That’s my mother’s DNA.


Continue reading at Caroline's blog Bell of the Wanderer.

10 ways to boost your spiritual immunity

By Nancy Ward

Doctor and His Patient by Jan Steen (photo credit: Wikimedia Commons).

Your body’s immune system needs protection from all that attacks and sickens your body. But what about your resistance to spiritual attacks?   How do you combat the constant assaults on your spirituality that leave you emotionally drained, confused and self-centered? Here are ten that work for me:


1.    Plug in. Strengthen your faith by increasing your daily prayer time to connect with God your creator; Jesus, your brother; and the Holy Spirit, your advocate, who keep you grounded in who you are as a spiritual being.


2.     Arm yourself with Ephesians 6:10-17: “Draw your strength from the Lord and from his mighty power. Put on the armor of God so that you may be able to stand firm against the tactics of the devil. For our struggle is not with flesh and blood but with the principalities, with the powers, with the world rulers of this present darkness, with the evil spirits in the heavens. Therefore, put on the armor of God, that you may be able to resist on the evil day and, having done everything, to hold your ground. So stand fast with your loins girded in truth, clothed with righteousness as a breastplate, and your feet shod in readiness for the gospel of peace. In all circumstances, hold faith as a shield, to quench all [the] flaming arrows of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
 

3.      Watch your emotions. Emotional eating, drinking, shopping or other excesses ease your insecurities, but only briefly. They delay lasting fulfillment that comes as you confront your fear, anger and confusion. Instead, trust God with every need and every emotion. Eating that third helping or buying that 50^th pair of shoes quiets your cravings for now but then makes you crave more. Only the Lord can fulfill your deepest desires and hungers.


Read the rest at Nancy's blog  JOY Alive in our hearts.