Fervent: A Woman's Battle Plan to Serious, Specific, and Strategic Prayer

by Priscilla Shirer

Theoden: I will not risk open war. Aragorn: Open war is upon you, whether you would risk it or not.

A very real enemy has been strategizing and scheming against you, assaulting you, coming after your emotions, your mind, your man, your child, your future. In fact, he’s doing it right this second. Right where you’re sitting. Right where you are.

As a result, we waste a whole lot of years, doing a whole lot of other things.

Praying with precision is key. When we pray about the places where we seriously suspect the enemy is at work—that’s how we keep our prayers focused, not only on particular situations but on biblical truths that are consistent with maintaining victory in the midst of them.

Despite what we may or may not understand about prayer, God has deliberately chosen this particular vehicle as the one that drives His activity in people’s lives.

Ephesians 6—

Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere. And pray . . . (vv. 18–19 nlt)

Strategy 1—Against Your Passion He seeks to dim your whole desire for prayer, dull your interest in spiritual things, and downplay the potency of your most strategic weapons (Eph. 6:10–20).

Strategy 2—Against Your Focus He disguises himself and manipulates your perspective so you end up focusing on the wrong culprit, directing your weapons at the wrong enemy (2 Cor. 11:14).

Strategy 3—Against Your Identity He magnifies your insecurities, leading you to doubt what God says about you and to disregard...

Strategy 4—Against Your Family He wants to disintegrate your family, dividing your home, rendering it chaotic, restl...

Strategy 5—Against Your Confidence He constantly reminds you of your past mistakes and bad choices, hoping to convince you that you’re under God’s judgmen...

Strategy 6—Against Your Calling He amplifies fear, worry, and anxiety until they’re the loudest voices in your head, causing you to deem the adventure of foll...

Strategy 7—Against Your Purity He tries to tempt you toward certain sins, convincing you that you can tolerate them without risking consequence, knowing they’ll only wed...

Strategy 8—Against Your Rest and Contentment He hopes to overload your life and schedule, pressuring you to constantly push beyond your limits, never ...

Strategy 9—Against Your Heart He uses every opportunity to keep old wounds fresh in mind, knowing that anger and hurt and bitterness and unforgiveness will conti...

Strategy 10—Against Your Relationships He creates disruption and disunity within your circle of friends and within the shared communi...

Truth is God’s standard—the unchanging, objective benchmark of the Bible by which we govern and align our lives.

Righteousness means right living—the process by which we apply this truth to our lives and, by His Spirit, produce conduct honoring and pleasing to God.

Peace is the deep, inner, eternal stability the believer possesses by virtue of relationship with Jesus, a sense of balance that’s not subject to external circumstance. It’s also the qualit...

Faith is the application of what one believes—the process of putting feet to our beliefs and living in light ...

Salvation is both our eternal security with Christ, as well as the full inheritance we’ve been given because of our relationship with Him. It includes our blessings, status, and identity—everything we’ve...

The Word of God is His present, relevant, personal Wor...

our prayers need to be fervent and specific, strategic and personal, tied to the specific needs arising at that specific occasion.

And through the bold, mighty name of Jesus, pray that we’ll live with our armor on and not let Satan’s otherworldly forces wreak their havoc in this house, in this heart, on this day.

Physical weapons may work in physical battles. Stuff like . . . trying harder, getting up earlier,

But this ain’t no physical battle we’re dealing with,

We are at spiritual war. So we need spiritual weapons.

And in prayer—in Jesus, with these weapons—guess what: you win! In fact, you’ve already won! Victory is already yours.

Now hear this— Get. Gone.

Repentance: Admit where you’ve been angry and distracted, fighting all the wrong people.

Thus says the Lord to you, “Do not fear or be dismayed because of this great multitude, for the battle is not yours but God’s. . . . Station yourselves, stand and see the salvation of the Lord on your behalf, O Judah and Jerusalem. Do not fear or be dismayed; tomorrow go out and face them, for the Lord is with you. (2 Chron. 20:15, 17)

scarcely need remind you,” he wrote, “that marriage was instituted by God to be an object lesson to the world of the relationship of a believer to Himself. Each of you will play a significant role in living out this lesson.”

But is he the one on the receiving end of your frustration? Is he the one you’re splattering with juicy comebacks, spoken with disgust against the inside glass of your windshield while you’re driving down the road, rehearsing the script for your next altercation?

Because the fact is, he’s most likely the one who’s pulled the wool over your eyes, fooling you with a crafty bait and switch, leading you to focus all your indignation on your man or your kid instead.

He wants you miserable and exhausted and joyl...

let’s show him the kind of resistance that a steady dose of prayer is able to exact against his demolition plans.

Is it your marriage? Then quit trying to be the Holy Spirit in your relationship, responsible for poking and prodding that husband of yours until he finally sees things the same way you see them.

Is it your children? The Bible says our children are “like arrows in the hand of a warrior” (Ps. 127:4). We raise them up to shoot them out into the culture, bearing the image of Christ to the world. Sounds again, then, like a place that would qualify as a major area of concern for an enemy who doesn’t want any vestige of Christian valor and virtue running loose out there where

So don’t be surprised when he starts coming after your kids. And don’t think it’s all because they’re being headstrong or peer dependent or careless or lazy.

Satan knows the parts of their character—both their strengths and their weaknesses—where he can worm in and try stunting their growth, their potential, and their confidence.

One of my sons, for example, has always been prone toward fear and anxiety. Ever since he was a small child, he’s shown a noticeable bent toward this kind of emotional response to external stimuli. Knowing this—spotting this—I’ve been very specific in praying for him, out loud over him, even when he was just a baby. I’ve routinely asked the Holy Spirit to instill courage within hi...

That did it. I started to pray over him even more specifically, to pray over their room while the boys were away, to command this spirit of fear to leave my son alone in the name of Jesus.

An enemy is after your children, I’m telling you. Believe it. Know it. But most important, deal with it—by tunneling deep into your prayer closet and fighting back with every parental and spiritual weapon at your disposal.

But just as much as the devil loves stirring up trouble in churches, he loves stirring up trouble in families. He knows it’s a Christian witness killer, an energy zapper, a time eater, a relationship destroyer.

In order to make sure you’re fully cooperating with Him and with the enormous opportunity embodied in your family structure and its people, they need you to not be on their backs, not be up in their faces, but be down on your knees.

Assume a new fighting position.

You may not be able to control all the discord and unwise choices that occur in the various corners of your house or among the people you share a family with. But you can make sure the only place you engage in combat is in the heavenlies, in prayer, in secret.

If he can’t make us feel judged, he’ll try turning us into judges.

I mean, just look at what He is able to forgive. Even this. Even that. Yes, devil, even THAT! Isn’t God incredible? That He could forgive even that?!