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When God moves, expect backlash

If you look at my post from Monday, you’ll see that we had a phenomenal weekend.  We completed the Breakthru Conference and saw God move in so many lives.  We were soaring on the Spirit’s wind and the fruit of great ministry.  We’d seen the kingdom come and the enemy suffer defeat….
By Seth Barnes
If you look at my post from Monday, you’ll see that we had a phenomenal weekend.  We completed the Breakthru Conference and saw God move in so many lives.  We were soaring on the Spirit’s wind and the fruit of great ministry.  We’d seen the kingdom come and the enemy suffer defeat.
 
After all the years of ministry under my belt, you’d think I’d be smarter about what to expect next.  We experienced a spiritual concept called backlash. Backlash is what happens when our enemy hits back at us immediately after he’s experienced a setback. Here’s a good picture of what it looks like in this blog.
 
I can remember first learning about it when I would return home from an overseas ministry trip.  I’d come home having seen miracles.  In my ignorance, I’d walk through the front door unprepared and oblivious, with signs, wonders, and stories still swirling in my spirit.  Meanwhile, back on the home front, Karen frequently felt like the guy in the movie Platoon whose position had been overrun by North Vietnamese soldiers. 
 
Especially during those years where we had five small children under the age of seven, things would be chaotic.  She just needed me to help her restore order and give her some time to go soak in the tub.  If I expected everyone to be on the same exalted spiritual plane I was floating on, then I had another thing coming.  We would miss each other like ships in the night.  And seeing an opportunity, the enemy would sow the seeds of discord.
 
Typically, within a day, all hell would break loose in our home.  Gone were the blissful spiritual thoughts as the urgency of sheer survival became paramount.
 
And so it went yesterday.  I woke up and before I could even have a quiet time, the chaos and the problems had begun to form a line at my front door.  Multiple people needed to talk to me.  A key ministry partner was under attack and needed prayer.  A leader’s family problems were complicating an initiative of ours.  And it went on from there. 
 
Fortunately, on my voice mail was a key intercessor of mine, Iris Stewart.  She left a message saying that God reminded her that “the kingdom of God suffers violence and the violent take it by force.”  The fog lifted a bit and I had a moment of clarity – this was a counterattack after a victory.  It was backlash clear and simple.  I needed to go and pray. 
 
Which I did. I went running and began declaring what I know to be true – stirring up my spirit and exercising my will.  I praised God and reminded my spirit man of my authority in Christ and my stewardship before God.  And it worked. I hit back at the enemy and we closed out the day with another glorious falling of the Holy Spirit on the training camp in the evening. 
 
It’s a spiritual battle, but this stuff works. We need to wake up and get smart about the devious ways in which our enemy will contest us for territory and try to throw us off our game. The word of the Lord today is, when backlash comes, fight back!

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