Radiate: Tristan’s blog

Last Sunday (a week ago), I was wrenched awake at 2:30am by the smoke alarm right outside our bedroom. I ran to the sound, not knowing what to expect, and what I found was… nothing. Only the alarm is on a 10-foot ceiling, so I had to find something to stand on in order to rip it off the ceiling and pull the battery. Then I thought I had better double-check the whole house for anything odd, which I did. After that, I tried to go back to sleep, but I was still wide awake thanks to the adrenaline coursing through my veins. Plus I was seriously unsettled, and I couldn’t quite figure out why. I thought perhaps I had been rudely awakened for a reason, so I just started praying for everyone who came to mind. It took about 90 minutes, but eventually I was out again.

I was exhausted the next morning, and we had a lot going at church—resetting the stage for the service since VBS had been that week, a crowd of kids from VBS singing for the service, etc. In our prayer time before the service, my friend Jeff (the pastor who was speaking that day), mentioned that for the previous 24 hours, he had felt spiritually attacked, and he didn’t sleep well the night before. Another person on the praise team said she had been awake until 4:30am, also unable to sleep. Later in the week, I talked with the woman who was in charge of the VBS kids as they sang. She also had a rough Saturday evening.

I don’t say this often, but more than meets the eye was going on there, folks. There was some serious spiritual stuff happening. Satan (or spiritual forces on his side) didn’t want us to worship God that morning. From what we could figure out, we think we were targets because we were all in positions of leadership for that service. And we think that specific Sunday was a target because: 1) one part of Jeff’s sermon was about the literal reality of the devil and how our “bitter envy and selfish ambition” are “devilish” (James 3:15), and 2) there were a lot of unchurched visitors there who came to hear their kids sing. So when we prayed, we prayed fervently for the service, for the effectiveness of the work God would do there, and against anything Satan wanted to do. The service went well, people heard God’s Word, and God was honored. It’s just one more reminder that we’re in a battle. Our work in the Kingdom is serious business. We will be opposed, but we will overcome because “greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world.”