"AN ENEMY HAS DONE THIS"

Jesus told the story of a farmer who had an enemy sneak into his field and sow weeds. When the weeds began to grow up, the farmer's servants came to him and pointed out that he had a mixed field. "An enemy has done this," was the response of the discerning farmer.

An enemy has crept in to discourage and distract us this weekend. It was an incredible few days. I'll not point out everything, but here are the highlights: Friday started by cancelling Friday Fun Night, because we didn't have enough adult workers. I threw my back out during my morning class. Then Ellen and I had a court appointment regarding AJ, in which things inched forward for him to be placed into permanent custody. In the meantime, the Enquirer called and wanted an interview and to take our picture. That evening, Kathy's fever spiked, and Ellen took her to the hospital (good thing we weren't trying to do Friday Fun Night alone!).

On Saturday, I hauled a bunch of paint cans and other hazardous waste to a collection point and further strained my back. I missed four baptisms that were scheduled for noon, and we went to an adoption training class all afternoon. In the evening, open worship was cancelled because no one came. My plan had been to worship from the overflow of Saturday night on Sunday morning, but there was nothing but personal study from which to overflow.

Sunday morning, I hobbled to the building so that we could rehearse. For one reason or another, we had still not gotten started after 45 minutes. Then Ellen discovered that someone had broken into our garage and stolen or broken several things. She had to wait for a police officer, and so missed church. Standing in the cold rain, my back went into spasms, and I wasn't able to get back to church, either. Ellen somehow held us all together for the day, getting through our final soccer game and party and nursing Kathy and me. Daniel's soccer team lost their final game, just missing an automatic trip to the state tournament. Topping off his day, when he went to bed, he found fleas (again!), and slept somewhere else for the night. Now we have to bomb the house and wash the animals and try to keep the cats inside. At the end of the day, Ellen bought a paper, to discover that we were the front page cover story. (You have to know how we disliked being part of that confrontation with the county to know how terrible this is.) I called the parents of the primary suspects in our break-in, but was told it couldn't possibly be them.

I'm not one to attribute spiritual warfare lightly, but I believe that someone wanted to divide Ellen and me and wanted to discourage us. We were pushed to the breaking point, but not over it.

Instead, Ellen and I spent extra time together because one of us was staying in one place, and I had an entire afternoon to pray and reflect. Several saints came by to ask how they could help. What the enemy threw at us was irritating, but we are fighting back with giving thanks in all circumstances (We gave thanks that though our garage was broken into, we were not harmed; that though they took everything of value in the garage, there wasn't much there; and that it was our garage and not someone else's. Then we prayed for the criminals.).

When times like this come, we can curl up and feel sorry for ourselves, rehearsing the problems and nursing our wounds. Or, we can see the truth through the eyes of faith and fight spiritual warfare with spiritual weapons.