AWG Ep 272

What Every Believer Should Know About Spiritual Warfare

Summary

Have you ever wondered what every believer should know about spiritual warfare? If you are battling exhausting mental chatter, hearing negative whispers that tell you you are not good enough, and feeling completely drained from carrying heavy emotional burdens, you are not alone! In this episode of the Arise Women of God podcast, host Tamara K. Anderson is joined by certified grief coach Sandy Falter to discuss the daily reality of spiritual battles.

We dive into Ephesians 6:12 to understand how the enemy rarely uses a direct physical attack, but rather sneaks in the "side door" of our minds. Discover how the adversary targets our physical vulnerabilities—just as he did to Jesus Christ in the wilderness—and learn practical steps to pause, breathe, and combat those lies with daily spoken affirmations.

Sandy shares her deeply moving, personal journey of healing after divorce and heartbreak, illustrating the transformative power of visualizing laying your burdens directly at the Savior's feet (Matthew 11:28-30). You will learn why trying to lean on your own human understanding keeps you off-center, and how true resilience requires practicing forgiveness. Tune in to discover how to surrender your heaviest wounds, patch the chinks in your spiritual armor, and walk boldly in your divine purpose today!

Episode Takeaways

• The Battlefield of the Mind: Spiritual warfare is a daily reality, but the enemy rarely attacks physically. He sneaks into your thoughts to whisper lies and breed insecurity. Combat these attacks by posting spoken affirmations on your mirror to remind yourself of your divine purpose.
• Physical Vulnerabilities (Matthew 4): Just as the adversary waited until Jesus Christ was physically depleted in the wilderness before attacking, the enemy targets you when you are hungry, tired, grieving, or anxious. Stop, take deep breaths, and address your physical needs so you can effectively fight the spiritual battle.
• Stay Centered (Proverbs 3): When we lean on our own human understanding, we get off-balance and overwhelmed by life's heavy loads. We must re-center ourselves by turning back to God's Word and prayer for direction.
• Surrender at the Savior's Feet: You were not meant to carry the crushing weight of betrayal, grief, or unforgiveness. Visualize kneeling and physically handing those burdens over to the Lord. Forgiveness is not a one-time event; it is a repeated practice (70x7) of finding healing.

Guest Information: Sandy Falter

Sandy Falter is a certified grief coach and speaker who equips women with Christ-centered tools to heal and rebuild after heartbreak, divorce, and life's deepest losses.

• Visit her website: sandyfalter.com to download her free guide featuring 20 powerful tools for healing and rebuilding after heartbreak, and to explore her 1-on-1 and group coaching packages!

Free Resource: A Woman's Guide to Spiritual Warfare Get our free A Mother's Spiritual Defense Guide: 6 Empowering Steps to Fortify Home & Family downloadable pdf here: https://www.womenwarriorsoflight.com/A-Mothers-Spiritual-Defense-Guide

Reflection Questions

• What negative "mental chatter" or lies has the adversary been whispering to you recently, and what true, scriptural affirmation can you write on your mirror today to combat it?
• Are you currently trying to fight a spiritual battle while physically depleted (tired, hungry, stressed)? How can you pause and care for your physical body first?
• What heavy burden, betrayal, or unforgiveness do you need to visualize laying at the Savior's feet today?

Host & Guest

Tamara K. Anderson @tamarakanderson

Sandy Falter @sandyfalter_coaching

Sandy Falter is a mother of six children and a proud grandma of 9. After experiencing tremendous loss and healing herself, Sandy found her passion and purpose in helping others who have experienced loss from divorce, death, or unrealized expectations. She believes that God turns all tragedy for our good and she has seen the beauty rise from the ashes in her own life. Sandy Falter is certified grief coach, trainer and speaker. You can find her on her website at https://sandyfalter.com/

Transcript

https://www.womenwarriorsoflight.com/blog/what-every-believer-should-know-about-spiritual-warfare

Hey my friend, have you ever wondered what does every believer really need to know about spiritual warfare?

Because perhaps you are battling exhausting mental chatter, negative whispers telling you you're not good enough and feeling completely drained from carrying heavy emotional burdens. Well, you are not alone in feeling that way.

And by the end of today's episode, you'll know verses that share how the battle is real, how to recognize the mental battle and defeat the enemy's lies, as well as the key of tapping into our most important resource in spiritual warfare. Stay tuned. Ordinary women, Extraordinary faith When God calls, we say yes.

The Arise Women of God Podcast hello and welcome back to the Arise Women of God podcast. I'm your host, Tamara K. Anderson and joining me today is the amazing Sandy Falter.

Sandy is a certified grief coach and a speaker who equips women with Christ centered tools to heal and rebuild after heartbreak, divorce and life's deepest losses.

She is also an amazing mom and grandma and we are so excited to have her back on to talk about some of the most important things every believer needs to know about spiritual warfare. But let's begin with a core foundation. Spiritual warfare is a daily reality, my friend.

In Ephesians 6:12, Paul reminds us, for we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this world. Spiritual warfare is real. But the enemy rarely attacks with an obvious physical presence.

Instead, his favorite battleground seems to be in the mind where he kind of slips in the side door and whispers, who do you think you are? Nobody's going to listen to you. You're a failure. So how do we shut down that mental chatter?

Well, let's listen to Sandy as she shares how she learned to discern the enemy's voice and how she combated his lies with daily affirmations.

And God just, that was the message he kept giving me is you need to help women heal. But then Satan was like, well, who do you think you are? Like, this isn't your background, right?

And so you know, I went through and I became certified. But he loves to come in that, in that side door and whisper and say, oh, nobody's gonna listen to you.

And, and so I think the first thing is that I had to really come to this space where I could turn that off, right? Recognize the voice of God and recognize the voice of the adversary. That was, that has been really important to me.

And one tool that I use to help me and I use this daily and is affirmations. I need to be reminded every day of who I AM and of my purpose. And so I have a list of affirmations that are stuck to my mirror that I remind myself.

I set myself up every day to be able to live in my purpose.

And that has been a huge shift for me and has really helped me, like, fight the adversary and those voices that want to say, who do you think you are? But God knows who I am, and he's given me this. This opportunity to experience really hard things and then be able to use that to glorify him.

And I just have to remember that.

I love that practical tool of putting affirmations on your mirror. When the adversary attacks your thoughts, you have to counter his lies with spoken, declared truth.

Not only does Satan attack our thoughts, but he strategically targets our physical vulnerabilities. Let's take a peek at what happened to our Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew, chapter 4, verses 1 through 3.

When Jesus went into the wilderness, Satan didn't strike on day one. The adversary waited until he had fasted for 40 days and nights and was physically hungry and depleted before launching his temptations.

The enemy operates the exact same way with you and me.

When you are hungry, tired, grieving a loss, or battling anxiety, depression, or ocd, your guard drops and the adversary steps in to exacerbate those physical challenges. And it feels like overwhelm anger, frustration, anxiety, sadness.

And you kind of want to just curl up into a ball and pull the blanket over your head and hope it all just goes away, right? But what do you do in a situation like that?

First you need to pause, take three deep breaths in and out slowly in through your nose and then out through your mouth. Kind of calm all the stress. Then ask God, what do I need?

If you're hungry, eat, tired, take a nap, feeling attacked, cast Satan out in the name of Jesus Christ. Remember Philippians 4:13. I can do all things through Christ, which strengthens me. You will not win this battle on your own human muscle.

You will win by anchoring yourselves in the Lord. But Satan likes to keep us kind of off kilter, and that's why it's important that we stay connected to Jesus.

Let's head back to Sandy as she shares how Proverbs 3 keeps us from getting off center.

I think one of the scriptures that I love that has really helped me is in Proverbs, lean not to your own understanding. And that's where I find myself. I find myself. Oh, I should, I should, I should, right?

But when I start grounding myself in him, centering myself in the Savior and not leaning because if we're leaning to our own understanding, we're off center, right? And so if I re center myself in Christ, the promise of that scripture is that he will guide us, he will direct our paths.

And so I've had to really focus on turning back to him in prayer and being in his word to say, okay, what is it you want me to know? What is it you want me to say? How should I move forward? And we're promised that we'll get that direction.

And so trusting that if I lean on him and not lean to my own understanding and get out of balance, that I will get the direction that I receive. And that has been so helpful.

When we trying to lean on our own understanding, we can easily get overwhelmed trying to carry that heavy load, the hurts, the betrayal, and the grief that our human shoulders were never meant to bear alone. But let's get real, my friend. As believers, we carry all sorts of wounds that are like chinks in our armor when the enemy attacks.

Let's listen to Sandy share a powerful visual practice of kneeling at the Savior's feet to heal and become God strong through the power of Jesus Christ, who is our key to being resilient in this spiritual warfare battle.

I think probably one of the biggest transitional moments of my life was when I was really struggling to forgive. And after experiencing divorce and betrayal, I was struggling.

And God's Word tells us we need to forgive if we want to be forgiven, we need to forgive. And. And I truly wanted to. And. And I'm a very visual person.

And so I just remember visualizing just kneeling at the Savior's feet, and this weight was heavy. I'd been carrying it a long time and I didn't want to carry it, and it wasn't fair. And sometimes it's really hard to forgive when you're a victim.

And so I was trying to wrestle with this, trying to figure out how to do this.

And I just remember praying and just putting it at his feet and just giving him all of it and just praying that he would take it from me and allow my heart to be free of this, because I didn't know how to do it. Just. I mean, I just sobbed and just pictured him right in front of me and me at his feet and crying and giving it to Him.

And when I finished praying, that darkness in my heart was gone all of a sudden. My heart was filled with light and love and, like there was a weight lifted. And I.

And I will say often, you pick it back up, but I got really good at practicing because that's what he wants us to do is practice, not perfection. It's not a one time I forgive and I'm done. That's why it says 70 times 7 because it's something we get to practice over and over.

And so I got to continue to practice going to the Savior and not just forgiveness, but all of my heavy burdens. Instead of carrying them, he's told us he'll carry our burdens.

That is probably one of the biggest transformative experiences of my life. And now I continue to use that visualization to bless me so that I can free my heart again and again so that I can feel his light and love.

What a stunning visual of surrender she painted. And the blessing is the more you heal, the less chinks you will have in your armor for the adversary to attack you. Oh my goodness.

Aren't we thankful for the healing power of Jesus Christ?

So my friend, if you are walking through the aftermath of a divorce, deep relationship conflict or heartbreak, Sandy has created an incredible resource to help you walk through that healing journey step by step. I invite you to visit sandyfalter.com and download her free guide featuring 20 powerful tools for healing and rebuilding after heartbreak.

You can also explore her one on one and group coaching packages designed to help you heal and rediscover your purposeful and joyful life in Jesus Christ.

Oh my dear sister, what every believer must know about spiritual warfare is this.

You are not fighting alone and you are only one prayer away from tapping into Heaven's power.

Also, if you want to take a step by step framework to fortify your home, recognize the enemy's mental traps and invite God's angels into your battles, we at Women warriors of Light want to give you our complete digital guidebook for free. Isn't that exciting?

Down in the show notes below I invite you to click the link and grab your free copy of a mother spiritual defense guide 6 Empowering Steps to Fortify Home and Family. Inside you will find the Cast out the Adversary prayer script to help you clear the darkness and invite peace back in. What are you waiting for?

Go download your free copy today. Oh my dear friend, Although spiritual warfare is real, as a believer you do not have to carry the weight of this world on your shoulders.

Lay your burdens down at the feet of the master healer, Jesus Christ. He knows your wounds. He carries your grief.

And as you draw near to him, his light will shine through your life, turning you into a powerful woman, warrior of light, capable of helping not only yourself, but others as well. Thanks for joining us today. And until next time, may you arise and do it God's way. God strong.

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