IN THE BATTLE

“The devil’s only tool is discouragement. Don’t use it.”

-Tony Firman

I saw former Chaplain Tony Firman at the post office yesterday and he offered the above advice. He knows firsthand how the enemy seeks to stop any sort of hope through discouragement.

This has been a tough week for me so far. I found out some news on Sunday at our chapel service that will potentially change some lives forever. Kids are going home for having too much sex or for dealing drugs or for assault on other students. Someone I care about told me that he was done with Christians and Christianity and not to expect him at anymore campus functions because he’s through with it. It’s as if it has been a practice run up to this point. The enemy is holding nothing back now to break the students and staff and me down by removing any hope of a future.

A student who just arrived Friday was called back into the director’s office this morning because she hasn’t been going to class or even attempting to get plugged into the school for two days now. As we met with her, the director asked her how we could help. Her reply is indicative of just how hopeless some of these kids feel: “You can’t help me. Nobody can help me.” She has been shipped from school to school by a parent who doesn’t care if she ever comes back. There is such a sense of loss and abandonment.

And how do you respond? She has heard all sorts of promises from adults who never come through for her. She has been shuffled from one place to the next because no one knows what to do with her.  I just sat close by and listened as she got angry and cried and lied and treated the adults in the room as if she didn’t care. There have been promises made to her before that have never been followed through on. Actions have not reflected that anyone cares. There was nothing I was going to say that was going to greatly improve her perception of adults. She is already headed back home, another failed attempt for her to find a place where she belonged.

Ephesians 6:12: “For 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.”

I truly believe I am in a spiritual battle right now for this campus. Pray with me that the campus would be freed from the battle that it is experiencing right now. I ask that you pray with me that it would not fall to Satan but that God would have victory here and that the students would begin to feel the hope that only Christ can offer.