The Church has often neglected one of these statements. It’s easy to be innocent of what is evil if you never talk about sin or the enemy, but it’s also easy to be ignorant of Satan’s schemes if these topics are neglected.¹ On the flip side, it’s easy to glorify the enemy or tempt a believer, when talking about Satan’s schemes. 

           To be innocent of what is evil, requires a knowledge of the audience. A more graphic testimony might be just what is needed for someone neck deep in the same sin. But the details might be inappropriate, for someone who has never considered such a sin. Again, a conversation about porn, is necessary for a teenager, but inappropriate for a 3-year-old.

           With this in mind I want to share a general list of Satan’s schemes, and how to avoid or resist them. But first I want to give a very quick background on Satan. Helead a rebellion of angels, which the bibles refers to as demons or evil spirits (it refers to good angels as, “ministering spirits”).² Because the demons are under Satan’s leadership, I use Satan and demons interchangeably.³ They are carrying out his plans, and using his tactics.

           I also want to break down the sinful nature, which the bible says we inherited from Adam.³ Unfortunately we are all born as offspring of Adam, and we inherited both his sinful tendency to do selfish and rebellious things, and the curses and changes that happened after he sinned.⁴ It amazes me that Adam didn’t even have a knowledge of good and evil before he sinned.⁵ When God cursed Adam, he could no longer walk with God, but instead, he got to walk on earth, with Satan and his demons.⁶ There are many things that changed after Adam’s sin, but I want to focus on what kind’s of things the demons can do to us.

           The first thing to know about Satan, is he can only do what God allows. But depending on God’s plan for our life, he might allow quite a bit. We are born with a natural will to sin. A spider gives birth to spiders, and Adam gave birth to sinners.⁴ We are immediately detestable to God, being by nature his enemies, because he is apposed to sin.⁸ Satan is allowed to do certain things to certain people. God graciously limits Satan’s work in our lives, so as not to hinder God’s plans for us. But because we are sinners, and sin deserves eternal punishment, it’s no surprise that God allows Satan to do quite a bit to us. God says that a person will reap what he sows, and anyone who tries to find his life will loose it.⁹ So Satan set’s us up to sow bad things, and to find our life, so we will loose it, and reap bad things. The bible says Satan hates us, and his goal is to kill, steal and destroy us.¹⁰ The Bible seems to saythat our parents can sow good or bad things into our lives, by how they live.¹¹ Many of us are reaping horrible things that we were born into. For example a prostitute will expose her children to sexual things at an early age, she can’t help it, from the overflow of her heart, she will be corrupting her children’s morals. She won’t be able to hide her sinful tendencies, and God created children to learn from their parents. God often punished a wicked nation’s children alongside them, and the wicked nations weren’t under the old covenant law, like Israel.¹² The Bible makes it clear that God doesn’t transfer the guilt of sins from one person to another, but he doesn’t say we can’t reap the consequences from someone else's sins. I don’t know how God see’s our sinful lineage under the new covenant, but it can’t hurt to ask forgiveness and mercy for our wicked lineage. There is nothing God can’t redeem and use for good, but we should know that Satan can have certain, God given rights to harm us.

           When we become a believer, God sets us free from whatever he see’s fit, and he continues to help us out of other sins and destructive behaviors, as we mature in the ways of Christ.¹⁴ But this process of being set free, isn’t passive. God teaches us to love and obey him, with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.¹⁵ For example, we can lay our anxieties on God and he will give us his peace.¹⁶ But if we don’t tell God our problems and trust him to take care of them, then we get to stay in a worried, anxious mindset, even as believers. If Satan has influenced people to rape me, and I find myself struggling with sexual things, God’s plan has allowed this, but I now have to learn to fight lustful desires at a higher level. Both sin and obedience have an increasingly strong pull on our lives, and it’s not easy to fight either one. For example, if I act out of anger and yell at someone, they will likely be mad at me and take revenge. Because their harsh words and actions will stir up my anger, it’s likely that I will be struggling even more with anger. Not only this, but God will insure that I reap what I sow, even if the person I offended isn’t the way he does it.⁸ On the other hand, the natural response to a loving, kind act, is to do good in return. Jesus said even sinners lend to sinners expecting to get paid back.¹⁷ And if someone does a kind thing back to me I will naturally want to do kind things to them. And even if they don’t show kindness back to me, God will make sure I reap what I sow, one way or another. My point is that, because we were born sinners, we have some work to do, if we want to get out of our sinful ways. The Bible is a step by step instruction manual on how to be set free.¹⁸ Because he is a living God, he will circumstantially help us understand his will. He will be connecting us with the right people, opening our eyes to understand key bible verses, and whatever else he sees fit to do.¹⁹So like Jesus said, we just need to take one day at a time, and do whatever we think would please God most.²⁰  God said, our yoke will be easy and our burden light, not because of the lack of effort God requires, but because he will be doing the work to get us where we need. He will guide us, motivate us, and give us the endurance to complete his will.²¹

           I now want to share some more specific examples of things Satan is allowed to do in a believers life, as well as some specific things God tells us to do, in order to counter them. We know demons want to tempt us to sin, but it’s also important to know how they can tempt us.²³I used to think the Holy Spirit was like an invisible shield around me, and demons couldn’t affect my thoughts or emotions. I knew that our battle was not against flesh and blood but against the spiritual forces of evil, but I didn’t know what the forces of evil were allowed to do to believers. I also didn’t know that every obedience and disobedience, no matter how small, naturally leads to further obedience or disobedience. When I started wasting time on video games, I honestly didn’t even know I wasn’t serving God with all my heart, soul mind and strength. When school got difficult, video games got even more pleasant. I didn’t understand that my selfish use of God’s time was upsetting God, and giving the enemy a foothold in my life.²⁴ Eventually my late night gaming lead to other sinful activities, I was honestly confused why I couldn’t just play mindless games without being tempted sexually. I didn’t know that Satan had built in a coping mechanism that displeased God, and was now using that idle to lead me into other sins.²⁵ Not everyone likes gaming, but both God and Demons have the ability to create and grow desires in us. God is more obvious, beings how he physically made everything, and the Bible says his Holy Spirit wills (also translated desires), and works within us.²⁶But the Bible is a little less clear about how Satan can create and grow desires. Jesus rebuked some religious leaders for doing their father’s (Satan’s) desires.²⁷ They were clueless that self-righteousness pleased Satan. Nor did they realize that Satan had his hand in growing their self-righteous desires.²⁸ Another example, is when Peter rebuked Jesus for saying he was going to die.²⁹ Of course it would make sense to Peter, who was expecting the messiah to rule on earth. But Jesus didn’t just correct peter, he said, “get behind me Satan”.²⁹ This implies that the thought came from an outside origin or influence than peters mind. Another example is when a group of people rejected Jesus, and the disciples asked Jesus if they should call down fire on those people; like Elijah on Ahaziah’s soldiers.³⁰Jesus rebuked them saying, “you know not what kind of spirit you are from”. Again this is implying that their response was influenced by a bad spirit. Could it be that Satan can mess with a believers mind? And if so, can he mess with their emotions too. Desires and thoughts are very similar things, so if demons can meddle with one, it shouldn’t surprise us that they can meddle with the other too. Jesus was filled with the Spirit from birth, but when Satan tempted Jesus, he used visions, which implies that he has the ability to manipulate a human mind.³¹ In this case the Holy Spirit didn’t protect Jesus, in fact the Holy Spirit lead Jesus into this place of testing.³² When Jesus was shown all the kingdoms of the world by Satan, it wouldn’t even have tempted Jesus, unless a sense of power or some other desire was there too. Likewise the disciples probably wouldn’t have spoken to Jesus about calling fire down, unless they were angry. Another example can be seen when Job is attacked by Satan, we know Satan is the one who took all Job’s physical resources and family members, but what about the negative counsel of Job’s friends and wife?³³ They said lies, using twisted truth and scripture, just like Satan spoke to Jesus and Adam, when they were tempted.³⁴ We know they spoke lies because God rebuked them for it, and we know who the father of lies is.³⁵ Further more Satan personally spoke to job almost the exact words his wife told him. Saying, give up on God, because his hardships are unreasonable.³⁶ It’s fair to assume the enemy had an influence on his wife’s advice.

           I’m hesitant to share my own story, because those who don’t believe me, have a way of mocking me and using it against me. But around 7 years ago I noticed an abnormal amount of distracting thoughts when I would try to pray. I asked God to show me what thoughts are from myself, the Holy Spirit, or the enemy? I didn’t know that God’s answer would come from a trial I was about to go through. A little later I had a dream where a demon was moving a curtain in my house, I got angry and grabbed the curtain to rip it down, but when I did, something stronger than me, picked me up, with a physically painful power, I tried to call out to Jesus, but I couldn’t get the words out, eventually I got out “Jesus help”, and woke up. When I woke I was soar everywhere, Just like the painful power had engulfed me everywhere. I was totally surprised that the dream had actually caused me soreness. I learned that I can’t fight demons with my own strength. In hindsight I can see how God was preparing me for something to come. Some months later, I had another dream, where a demonic force was about to enter my room, and I felt the same power coming from it. I immediately called out to Jesus to save me. The power kept coming like waves, and it felt like it was about to engulf me again, so I began screaming for Jesus to help me, but nothing happened. I thought about the Holy Spirit being in me, so I screamed for the Holy Spirit to help, and then as a last resort I started screaming for the Father to help me, but nothing happened. After what felt like about 5 minutes of screaming, a thought came to me, which I now recognize as the Holy Spirit. It was, ‘God is in control of everything including this demonic situation.’ A peace came over me, and the demonic power faded; and I started singing Holy Holy Holy, but before I finished saying the third Holy, I woke up. The dream was so real, I actually tried clearing my throat to see if it was sore from yelling. Then I immediately asked God, what did that mean? It wasn’t for another several months till I would figure it out. I was at a bible study, talking to a well known, godly man. Suddenly a strong impulse came over me to not look him in the eye, it was so strong that I actually turned away. That was the first time I dealt with that kind of demonic impulse, which I deal with to this day (7ish years later). I know it’s demonic for a lot of reasons. I consider it God’s kindness, the way it would come and go for the first few months, because it helped me know that it wasn’t just my emotions. I could feel a physical heaviness come on me and I would struggle with social anxiety. I could just barely fight it with scripture verses or thinking about something, (like Jesus is right here with me). One time, I was falling apart so bad, that I just said the name of Jesus, which is really awkward in the middle of talking to someone, but it went away when I said it. Sometimes I would hum or sing hymns at work and this too helped a little, but the awkwardness is the main reason I stopped. No one wants to look like a crazy person. I tried everything to get rid of this demonic influence, I had Christian leaders meetings pray for me, and lots of other godly men, some of whom had cast out demons before. Interestingly I could sometimes feel something in me moving when they would pray, but it never went away. Of course I prayed and fasted about it, but God never showed me it was not his will. Instead, I got many answers confirming that this was part of his plan, not to mention it perfectly lined up with that dream I had, where I screamed to God, but he showed me it was all in his control. One of the noteworthy answers I got from my prayers, was on a fast in a hotel. All of a sudden it was like I was talking to God, and everything I thought to ask had answers, not audibly, but a peace filled the room, and when I asked him about my current demonic circumstances, the thought came to me that I was only upset because it was hindering my current relationship with someone, other than that, I had so many answers affirming it to be part of God’s plan for me, that I really did know for sure this was his will. Honestly the only reason I fasted at all, was more a matter of can I get rid of it yet? I’m saying all this so you'll listen when I share some of the things I’ve learned about demons, such as, what they can and can’t do, and how we can resist them. There is one other thing that came with this demonic anxiety. About a year in, I started getting tormenting dreams in the night, sometimes violent things would happen to people I cared about, other times I would be tempted to sin, like with greed, lust or anger. And on rare occasions I would feel real physical pain as a demonic thing would hurt me. I knew they were demonic dreams, because I would wake up and see a dark cloud over me, it could change forms, and it would move around my room, before fading away. Interestingly God gave me no fear of the black demon thing, because I knew the Holy Spirit was limiting what it could do. On several occasions God stopped this demonic thing, both at work and in my dreams, so I was almost hoping it would try and do something, so I could see what the Holy Spirit would do in response. I know this fearlessness was from God because I used to be terrified of the dark. One time a shadow, caused by a car light, moved across my wall, and I was literally too afraid to move, until I figured out it was from a passing car.

           Most of the things we can and should do against demons are pretty obvious, and plainly stated in the bible. We are told to pray in all circumstances, and the bible tells us that earnest or reverent prayer is more effective, because God is moved by our emotions and effort.³⁷ I began praying nightly, about my demonic dreams. But I would always mumble it in a casual type way, as I laid on my bed. But when the dreams got worse, I began to plead on my knees that God would intervene. I noticed quite a difference, although my pleading didn’t stop everything, it did make it better. For example I might just be having normal nightmares, instead of seeing crazy violent scenes; or just being tempted to overspend money, rather than temptations to murder or commit some other outrageous sin. I also noticed that if I accidentally fell asleep without praying, the dreams were noticeably worse. 

           I learned the reality, that what we think about, is just as bad as what we do. If I struggled with lust, anger or greed and allowed my mind to wander into some fantasy, I could almost guarantee I would be tempted, and probably actually do, that same kind of sin in my dreams that night. I’m thankful I was praying for God’s help so often, or it could have taken me a while to figure out these correlations, between my sinful thoughts during the day, and my dreams at night. Any kind of sin can give the enemy a stronghold. Balaam couldn’t curse Israel, who is symbolic of believers, until he got them to sin.³⁸

           I’m still struggling with taking every thought captive, but I’ve learned a lot of ways to resist bad thoughts. I learned that just like being around godly people makes you more sensitive and resistant to sinning. In the same way, the more we focus on pleasing God, the more he will draw near to us, and we will gain that same resistant sensitivity toward sin, because we will be more aware that he is with us. Because my mental and physical sins were directly related to the severity of my dreams, I began to realize that God didn’t just care if I never took a second look at a girl, he cared if I was struggling with lustful thoughts on the first glance.⁴⁰ I was so weak in many areas, that it felt impossible not to be triggered into a short sinful fantasy. But as God changes me, I’m learning that when I’m actively trying to please God, rather than just trying not to sin, I have more strength to change the subject of my mind back to pleasing God. Rather than dwelling on how bad it would be if I finished a sinful thought, or getting angry that my mind wonders into sinful thoughts, etc. I began trusting Jesus righteousness, and just trying to focus on God honoring things more often.⁴¹ It’s good to hate sin and think about how we can avoid it, but after we’ve set up some practical things to do,­ the bible tells us to overcome evil with good.⁴² And again, that the things of the Spirit are contrary to the things of the flesh, and if we focus on the things of the Spirit, we will naturally stop doing the things of the flesh.⁴³ Resisting the devil does make him flee, but we need to resist him God’s way, or he doesn’t have to flee.⁴⁴ In fact the verse about resisting the devil also talks about submitting to God and drawing near to him, meaning focus on pleasing him.⁴⁴

           Both God and the enemy try and grow the desires they plant in us, by getting us to focus on them.⁴⁵ To get us to believe the outcome will be as good as they are showing us, and the pros outweigh the cons.⁴⁶ God designed us with the ability to become much more sensitive to whatever we’re focusing on and doing. For example, if I have a torn finger nail, or an obvious zit, I can choose to focus on them, and they can drive me crazy, or I can think of something else, and forget I have them. There are positives and negatives to everything we think about and do. Both sinful and righteous thoughts and actions have pleasing and painful results. God tries to get us to think about and do righteous things, which he says often require painful hardships up front, and pleasing rewards afterward.⁴⁷ And the enemy tries to get us to think about and do sinful things, which God says generally have pleasure up front, and pain afterward.⁴⁸ Those who loose their life for Jesus will find it, but those who try and find their life will loose it.⁴⁹ Both God and the enemy try to convince us that the pleasure of doing their will outweighs any painful results. Of course only one of them is telling the truth. God’s will brings more pleasure than pain, while Satan’s will achieves the opposite.⁵⁰

           I want to spend some time emphasizing how demons can influence anyone's thoughts, not just a unique case like mine. When I got this demonic anxiety, it came with several other things, I could sometimes feel a physical weight on me, and my thoughts became much more impulsively sinful. I would find my normal wondering mind, going down darker scenarios, and I had strong desires to do things that I never in my life struggled with before. I know that miserable circumstances naturally make us more susceptible to anger, and our misery makes greed, lust and other sins seem the more attractive. A miserable person wants pleasure more, just like a hungry person wants food more. But my thoughts were beyond a natural increase. For example, one night I was so depressed, and the thoughts of my mind were so perverted that I stopped what I was doing and went in my room to pray. Between prayers I was striving to fight lustful thoughts, by quoting truth. But the thoughts were rapid, and as soon as I would say, ‘no, Jesus will provide that in his time’, another similar thought would replace it. I was physically exhausted from straining my mind in prayer, and trying to remember relevant verses and truths. In frustration I asked God, “would you rebuke the devil on my behalf”. As soon as I said that the depression was replaced with a peace and then the thoughts stopped. They were two separate events, but only seconds apart. I had already known the enemy could put thoughts in my mind, but that was the first time I realized how many he could put in. I wish you could have experienced the difference. It was literally like getting sprayed with a fire hose, and having someone turn it off. As I considered what I had just experienced, I fell asleep on the floor from exhaustion. This is not the normal way God helps me, but that was not a normal temptation either.

           Like every believer I had struggled with my thoughts before this demonic anxiety thing, but I noticed an unusual increase in the same types of things I used to struggle with. I am convinced that all believers struggle with demonic thoughts, but we categorize them as our own sinful mind. I say this for several reasons.

First, because I noticed the obviously demonic thoughts I struggled with were mostly the same kind as before, just more frequent and vial.

Second, because the demonic thoughts can be small or minor things. God miraculously and unmistakably expose the enemies lies or stopped his thoughts on three other occasions. Once when I was self conscious about the amount of body hair I had; once when I couldn’t sleep because of a similar barrage of thoughts about a relationship; and once regarding a gift I was upset about. In each of these stories God answered specific prayers, in obvious ways, but it would take too long to explain them. My point is anyone could struggle with these things, but I know for sure that each of them was coming from a demonic influence.

Third, because I noticed a lot of circumstances in the bible and my own life, where people tell me to do the opposite thing God has been leading me to do. Like when Herod tried to kill Jesus, or when Delilah tried to destroy Sampson’s strength, or when the Jews from Asia kept resisting Paul’s preaching. Etc.ᵃ

Fourth, because the Bible says the whole world is under the power of the evil one.ᵇ And again we struggle not against flesh and blood but against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realm.ᶜ And again, Jesus tells us to pray for deliverance from the evil one, implying all of us have to deal with him.ᵈ

Last, because the bible says the enemy attacks us at opportune times.ᵉ Meaning he uses his supernatural abilities in sync with bad circumstances in our lives. This makes it really hard to distinguish between our own tendency towards selfishness, and demonic promptings. Now that I’ve learned what demonic things look like, I recognize it more in both my own life, and the lives of others.

           I also want to talk about how demons can manipulate our emotions alongside our thoughts. Anyone who does a lot of outreach or things for God, will get demonic resistance. It could look like fear, laziness, depression, unmotivation, anger or any other emotion that hinders us. One demonic emotion that stood out to me, was when I first met my brothers girlfriend (now wife). I had been trying to date someone, but my anxiety and other things were limiting and suppressing me in unique ways. God was still faithfully guiding me, but it was way harder than I had anticipated it would be. I have never felt jealousy like I did when my brother introduced his girlfriend. It was honestly a foreign struggle to me, I don’t normally want other peoples things. But after that brief meeting, thoughts came into my head like, ‘I’ve tried so hard for so long, and look what God gave him’. I had such a strong desire to have what he had, but it’s hard for me to remember much more than a strong emotion. As soon as they left I went into my room to pray it out, because it was as clear as day, that this was not a natural thought. I honestly was thinking to myself, ‘so that’s what jealousy feels like’. I continued fighting the emotion by saying things like, “God didn’t take anything from me, in order to give it to him”. And after a few hours of prayer the emotion left me. You should know my brother is one of my favorite people, meaning when he’s happy, I’m happy for him. This was such a bizarre reaction that I honestly felt like a spectator to my own reaction. I was fighting it, but never did I agree with it, in fact I get angry just thinking about that time, as if I was emotionally raped, because it felt like someone was forcing their impulses on me.

           Here are somethings I’ve learned about fighting demonic impulses. If I feel a strong demonic impulse, I know better than to try and power my way through the situation, whether it’s anger or some other temptation to dishonor God, I have learned to do several things.

• As I already mentioned prayer is a big one.

• I have also learned to flee from whatever is tempting me, as much as possible, even if it means personal loss, or redoing something. Jesus commands us to flee from sexual immorality, but he also implies fleeing from other temptations, saying, “lead us not into temptation”.ᶠ

• I have also learned that as I look for ways not to sin, God will give me ways out, just like he said in his word. He will not let us get tempted beyond what we can bear, but will provide a way out.ᵍ So we shouldn’t give up, no matter how hopeless we feel about overcoming a particular sin. The way out isn’t always easy or comfortable to take, but once I do it, there will be relief from the temptation. Perhaps it means walking away in the middle of something that will have to be redone, or perhaps it means going to my room and praying. Or maybe it just means taking a break and doing something relaxing. Just recognizing that I’m likely being tempted by supernatural forces, makes me change the way I try not to sin.

• God says to resist the devil and he will flee.ʰ Sometimes resisting requires a physical action, and sometimes it just means changing our thoughts. Sometimes all I have to do is recognize these are not good thoughts, and force myself to think about something good. For example, I can try to figure out what ways God currently loves me, or what it means that his love is unconditional? Or, maybe I’ve been feeling like I should evangelize, and I can just start thinking of some ways to start preparing for it. Different levels of temptation will require different actions to resist, and God will help us figure it out as we try.ⁱ

           I believe one of the reasons God shows me how spiritual things work, is because I ask about it. I watch lots of testimonies, so I have learned from other people’s experiences. Oddly enough, most of the people who teach about demons on YouTube, say that demons can’t see our thoughts, but they’re just good at reading our body language, and they know so much about us, that they can guess what we’re thinking. But I’ve never heard a solid example of why they are so sure about this; either from the bible or personal experience. Because I heard this so many times, by so many people, I thought, maybe they’re right? Maybe demons are just really good at figuring me out? I asked God about it on my prayer walk that night. The same night I had another demonic dream where a combine was trying to run me and my brother over, I darted into a garage just in time, and as I was resting I noticed there was a man with a chainsaw there, all of a sudden I found myself dodging his chainsaw, and looking for ways out of this new situation. Just like any nightmare, he followed and interacted with me, depending on what I did. When I woke, there was a dark cloud over me. I immediately put the pieces together, the enemy had been manipulating my dreams, which are part of my mind. He had been creating new scenarios to torment me based on my reactions in the dream. So I can confidently say, that it is possible for the enemy to see our thoughts. God could have answered my prayer, by reminding me of several other past experiences, which show the same thing, but he chose to use my current trial.

           There are really countless ways to resist the enemy, because there are countless ways we can obey the bible. As long as we’re striving to please God in every way, we are naturally evading and resisting the enemies tricks and temptations.ʲ And God is naturally preparing and helping us to do his will.ᵏ Jesus said if we are obeying what he said, we are like a house on a rock, and when storms and temptations come, we will stand.ˡ The bible also says, “a curse without a cause shall not come”.ʲ Unless God determines to let us go through a season of tempting like Job, or Jesus forty day expedition, we will naturally have God’s protection. Like Satan said, “Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has, on every side?”.ᵐ And again David said, “The Lordis my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.”ⁿ When God does let Satan attack us, God promised to help us, and never leave us.ᵒ Even if we sin, we are free from the power of sin, because Jesus is our righteousness.ᵖ I’m not getting into heaven, because God is so impressed with my perfect life.ʳ I’m getting in because Jesus loved me enough to take the punishment for my failure of a life.ˢ So as we strive to figure out ways to become more like Jesus and stop our sinful patterns, we can also rejoice right where we are. Jesus won the victory for us, we just have to take one day at a time and do our best to please him.ᵗ

① Romans 16:19 / 2 Corinthians 2:11 ② Ephesians 2:2 / Revelation 12:3–4 / Ezekiel 28:14–18 / Isaiah 14:12–17 ③ Ephesians 2:2 ④ Romans 5:12 / 1 Corinthians 15:21-22 / Genesis 3:17–19 ⑤ Genesis 3:5,7,22 ⑥ 1 John 5:19 / Genesis 3:23 ⑦ Romans 5:10 / Isaiah 59:2 ⑧ Galatians 6:7 / Matthew 10:39 ⑨ Mark 10:29-31 ⑩ John 10:10 ⑪ Proverbs 22:6  / 1 Corinthians 15:33 / 2 Samuel 21:1 / Exodus 34:7 / Genesis 49:5-7 / 2 Peter 2:14 / Romans 1:24 ⑫ 1 Samuel 15:3 / Ezekiel 9:6-7 ⑬ Romans 8:1 / Ezekiel 18 / Galatians 3:13 / Ezekiel 9:6-7 ⑭ Hebrews 10:14 ⑮ Matthew 22:37 ⑯ Philippians 4:6-7 ⑰ Luke 6:34 ⑱ John 8:32 ⑲ Hebrews 12:2 ⑳ Matthew 11:28-30 / Matthew 6:34 / 2 Corinthians 5:9 ㉑ Philippians 2:13 / Galatians 2:20 / Colossians 1:29 / John 10:14㉒ Romans 8:28 / Joel 2:25 ㉓ Matthew 4:3 / 1 Peter 5:8 / 2 Corinthians 2:11 ㉔ Romans 14:23 / Ephesians 4:26-27 ㉕ Colossians 3:5 / James 1:15 ㉖ Philippians 2:13 / Colossians 1:16-17㉗ John 8:44㉘ Matthew 16:12 / Matthew 23:27-29㉙ Matthew 16:21-23㉚ 2 Kings 1:9-16 / Luke 9:53-55㉛ Luke 4:5 / Matthew 1:18 ㉜ Matthew 4:1 ㉝ Job 1:11-12 ㉞ Matthew 4:6-7 / Genesis 3:1-5㉟ John 8:44 / Job 42:7 ㊱ Job 4:15-21 / Job 2:9㊲ 1 Thessalonians 5:17 / James 5:17 / 2 Kings 20:5 / Hebrews 5:7 / Luke 18:1–8 / Luke 11:5-13㊳ Numbers 22:9-12 / Numbers 25:1-9 / Ephesians 4:27㊵ Matthew 5:27 / Titus 1:15 / Romans 1:29㊶ Romans 8:1 / Philippians 4:8-9㊷ Romans 12:9 / 2 Corinthians 7:10-11 / Romans 12:21㊸ Galatians 5:16-17㊹ James 4:7-8㊺ Colossians 3:2 / John 8:32 / John 8:44 / Romans 12:2㊻ Genesis 3:1-7 / Genesis 15:5-6㊼ Luke 14:26-33 / Mark 10:29-31㊽ Hebrews 11:24-26 ㊾ Matthew 16:25 / Luke 12:16-21 ㊿ God promised to reward our hardships here on earth ⓐ Matthew 2:16 / Judges 16:19 / Acts 21:27 ⓑ 1 John 5:19 / 2 Corinthians 4:4 ⓒ Ephesians 6:12 ⓓ Matthew 6:13 ⓔ 1 Peter 5:8 / Luke 4:13 ⓕ 1 Corinthians 6:18 / 2 Timothy 2:22 / Matthew 6:13 ⓖ 1 Corinthians 10:13 ⓗ James 4:7 ⓘ Psalm 23:1 / John 15:26 / Matthew 7:7 / Hebrews 5:14ⓙ Proverbs 26:2 ⓚ Philippians 2:13 / Philippians 1:6 ⓛ Matthew 7:24-25 ⓜ Job 1:9-10 ⓝ Psalm 18:2 ⓞ Isaiah 43:2 / Deuteronomy 31:6 ⓟ Romans 6:7 / 1 Corinthians 1:30-31 ⓡ Ephesians 2:8-9 / Romans 3:10 ⓢ Romans 5:7-8 ⓣ 1 Corinthians 15:57 / Matthew 6:34 / 2 Corinthians 5:9