Dear Lord; Good morning Father.\u00a0 Today Lord, I\u2019d like to spend some time talking about discouragement.\u00a0 As You well know, I\u2019ve been dealing with this particular feeling quite a bit recently and it can be an extremely overwhelming emotion if not kept in check.\u00a0 I\u2019ve also received messages from many others struggling against similar demons, so I thought it was worth discussing today.<\/p>\n
In my case, the bulk of my challenges with discouragement are centered around running a business in a radically depressed economy.\u00a0 While we\u2019ve persevered through what I hope is the ugliest part, I was forced to make some very unhappy, but necessary decisions for the survivability of the company.\u00a0 On top of that, the road that always seemed reasonably obvious for me has been clouded by a wide variety of uncertainties, leading to deep feelings of doubt, fear and discouragement.\u00a0 I know that when the dust settles that we\u2019ll be the better for our trials, but in the meantime not allowing Satan to use these moments of earthy weakness to attack my spirit can be a difficult task.<\/p>\n
Of course, there are many other forms of discouragement as well.\u00a0 Each day I see and speak with people struggling with these feelings over problems with schoolwork, dieting, quitting substance addiction and a plethora of others.\u00a0 These situations lead to moments of emotional weakness which can truly leave us vulnerable and wanting, and keep us from hearing Your Voice clearly.<\/p>\n
So Father, how do we combat these attacks on our spirits in times of turmoil?\u00a0 Looking to Your Book for guidance, I find quite a bit to focus and encourage me :<\/p>\n
\u201cI have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.\u201d \u2013 John 16:33<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cHave I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.\u201d \u2013 Joshua 1:9<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cHumble yourselves, therefore, under God\u2019s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.\u00a0 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.\u00a0 Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.\u201d – 1 Peter 5:6-8<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n We were never promised an easy life on earth, but we\u2019re fragile creatures Lord and it\u2019s easy to forget that sometimes.\u00a0 You did promise us however that if we follow in You and honor You, that You will never leave our sides.\u00a0 What an amazing Gift!\u00a0 You\u2019re there celebrating with us in our moments of joy, and You\u2019re there to comfort us in our times of need\u2026 We simply need to quiet the \u201cnoise\u201d in our minds, and open our hearts to Your Voice.<\/p>\n Heavenly Father, I thank You for Your Guiding Presence in our lives.\u00a0 Please help us filter out that emotional \u201cnoise\u201d and focus our hearts on Your Will.\u00a0 Bring comfort and direction to all those struggling with feelings of discouragement and depression, and let them know the true worth they have being one of Your Children.\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n ~Phather Phil<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dear Lord; Good morning Father.\u00a0 Today Lord, I\u2019d like to spend some time talking about discouragement.\u00a0 As You well know, I\u2019ve been dealing with this particular feeling quite a bit recently and it can be an extremely overwhelming emotion if not kept in check.\u00a0 I\u2019ve also received messages from many others struggling against similar demons, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[835,516,101,132,830,27,829,154,798,825,849,833,36,823,7,826,342,6,619,848,42,844,843,842,847,273,251,839,313,222,824,274,576,845,846,392,448,827,840,41,841,615,832,836,95,352,834,828,71,837,838,831,504],"class_list":["post-509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-emails-to-god","tag-addiction","tag-business","tag-challenges","tag-children","tag-clouded","tag-comfort","tag-company","tag-decisions","tag-demons","tag-depressed","tag-depression","tag-dieting","tag-direction","tag-discouragement","tag-doubt","tag-economy","tag-emotion","tag-fear","tag-feeling","tag-filter","tag-focus","tag-follow","tag-forget","tag-fragile","tag-guiding","tag-hearts","tag-honor","tag-john","tag-joshua","tag-joy","tag-messages","tag-minds","tag-necessary","tag-need","tag-noise","tag-obvious","tag-overwhelming","tag-persevered","tag-peter","tag-presence","tag-promised","tag-satan","tag-schoolwork","tag-situations","tag-spirit","tag-struggling","tag-substance","tag-unhappy","tag-voice","tag-vulnerable","tag-wanting","tag-weakness","tag-will"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p18mMc-8d","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=509"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":513,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509\/revisions\/513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}