ON GUARD!

Last Saturday evening, I was on the way to mass with my family and I ran out of gas about a mile from church (and about 2 blocks past two gas stations.) I posted about the event on Facebook and jokingly said that it was Satan's fault. The next evening, I did make it to mass at another church and this time I posted that God won. Now, obviously Satan didn't have anything to do with me missing mass. It was my own stupidity for not getting gas when I knew I was low. But that doesn't mean that Satan wasn't pleased that I missed mass. It doesn't mean that the devil doesn't do everything that he can to make us turn away from God. It doesn't mean that it's not a victory for God whenever we turn towards Him, everytime we do good or everytime we love.


Joe at the Defend Us In Battle blog made a post a couple of weeks ago about why it is important to be "battle minded." He points out that we are in a constant state of spiritual warfare, whether we want to believe it or not. He says that from every stop light to the check out counter at the grocery store we are tempted into sin.

This is an important reminder and one we constantly need to be reminded of. The minute we don't think of ourselves as under attack is when Satan strikes. It's what he is looking for. It's the prime opportunity for. He loves it when we think that he doesn't exist. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The devil does exist. We are in a constant state of battle. We have amazing weapons though. We have the church. We have the sacraments. The Bible. The rosary. And most importantly, we have God on our side. Too often, it seems almost like the devil wants us more because he works on us so much. The truth is, we turn away from God and try to make our own decisions. .

So what do we do? Turn to God, obviously. Through prayer. Mass. Reconciliation. Through these means, God gives us the grace to fight the devil and resist temptation. But we should still always be on guard so we can kick the devil's butt (with God's help of course)