Productivity is good. Stressed busyness is not.
How many people do you know who are running around like chickens of a headless nature, and for what?
If I see one more breathless person saying “Oh… I’m exhausted trying to get myself ready for Christmas!” I shall simply scream.

One of the greatest and yet most subtle assignments of the enemy in these days is to make us too busy to stay close to the Lord.
When we are in close fellowship with Him, demons cannot touch us, but the minute we lose our grip on His grace we are easy prey.

Here are some ways in which the enemy may seek to attack you, subtly but devastatingly, in the next few days:

1. Keep you obsessing about things that don’t matter
2. Tempt you to spend money you don’t have, on things others don’t want.
3. Work longer hours
4. Discourage you from spending quality time with family and friends.
5. Overstimulate your mind with incessant music and noise and activity so you can’t hear from Him.
6. Fill the surfaces of your home with newspapers, magazines and books that subtly but definitely keep you from reading His word.
7. Put glamorous models in your line of vision selling expensive items that make you dissatisfied with how you look or how your partner looks.
8. Make sure you are too exhausted for physical intimacy; that way you may be more tempted to look elsewhere.
9. Involve you in ‘good’ causes so you won’t have any time for ‘eternal’ ones.
10. Make you self-sufficient.

For me, the last one of these is the most dangerous. If the enemy can keep things ‘plodding along’ he will. If we are so busy working in our own strength we will never know the joy of God’s power and provision. Then, my friends, the enemy has won part of the day.

So, if your car breaks down, or your friend hurts you, or your children are obnoxious or your job is threatened, praise Him. He is about to prove to you that He is in control of your life.