No one talks about...

Spiritual warfare. Is is just me or do we not talk about spiritual warfare and the real symptoms and effects is has on us? Maybe like me, you have heard this term a thousand times. Like a weird old video game, I picture dark-colored, creepy monsters that try to attack me, but I fight them off with little toy weapons. The whole idea seems kind of cheesy and ambiguous.

Lately, I have experienced it differently.

Low energy, frustration, anxiety, and a swarm of intrusive thoughts. Feeling bummed but not really sure why. Sometimes bummed turned into intense sadness. Tension, doubt, fear. Somatic symptoms. I start feeling all these weird things and genuinely had no idea what was going on. I was embarrassed and wanted to isolate. I had no reason to feel so bad... so why did I? I knew I was not depressed but how else was I to explain all the strange, intrusive, and intense feelings? I started to wonder if something was wrong with me and thought about it constantly. Finally, someone pointed out they thought I was struggling with spiritual warfare. Then it clicked.

It's not that I had never heard of it or was unaware of it, but I was not expecting something so tangible and exhausting. It felt like an oppression. That's the thing. Spiritual warfare does not want us to recognize it. It wants us distracted, looking to ourselves for both the how and the why. For me, it was a mental trap that made me believe something I did caused my struggle and I needed to do something to fix it.

Maybe this is the delusion of spiritual warfare- for us to assume we are alone and crazy, shamed into believing no one else deals with this and it is our sole responsibility to remedy it. It isolates us. But what if bringing these awkward topics up and working through them together is what we need to be set free from the dysfunction of how we normally handle things?

I wonder how many people are either currently or in the past have struggled with spiritual warfare without knowing what in the world was happening. I wonder if, by saying it out loud, talking about it, and navigating it together, we could reduce the detrimental impact that this struggle can have on us?

This is nothing new. The enemy's tactics are old. He knows that by playing with our heads and making us focus on ourselves, feeling alone and overwhelmed, he can distract us from what God is doing both in us and around us. Remember that you are full of purpose. God is using you and will continue to do so. Jesus has promised to walk with us in every trial and struggle and give us the strength we need as we go. This war is real, but we know how it ends. Keep walking, you are doing the dang thing!

I hope today we can openly share and encourage one another. What has your experience with spiritual warfare been? How have you overcome it or how are you currently handling it?