Why the Attack Started the Day You Believed
"The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy." — John 10:10
Traitors Are Treated Differently Than Strangers
There is a logic to what happens after conversion, and once you see it, a great deal of confusing experience becomes clear.
Before you came to Christ, you were not a threat. Whatever assignment existed over your life was proceeding on schedule. There was no need for pressure, because nothing was being resisted.
The day you knelt and confessed Jesus Christ as Lord, the situation changed entirely. In the reckoning of whatever had a claim on you, you defected.
And defectors are not merely allowed to walk away. The response to a broken dedication is a curse of destruction — because if a person cannot be kept, the objective becomes to destroy him.
The Counsel That Does Not Help
Many believers in this situation have gone to their pastors and been told that this is simply the persecution that comes with following Christ.
That answer is partly true and largely inadequate. Yes, persecution is promised. Yes, following Christ costs. But we are far too quick to file everything under that heading, and in doing so we leave people carrying a burden Jesus authorized them to put down.
There is a real difference between the hostility of a world that hates Christ and a specific assignment activated against a specific person at a specific moment. The first is endured. The second is broken.
Telling someone to endure what he could break is not comfort. It is misdiagnosis.
The Signs Worth Noticing
Look at the shape of what happened after your conversion.
Timing. Did the trouble begin within weeks or months of your coming to Christ, in areas that had never been troubled before?
Breadth. Did it hit multiple unrelated areas at once — health, finances, marriage, employment, children — in a way that felt coordinated rather than coincidental?
Intensity. Was there a violence to it that seemed out of proportion to ordinary circumstances?
Interference with growth. Did it specifically target your ability to pray, read Scripture, attend fellowship, or serve?
That last one is the most telling. General misfortune does not care whether you pray. An assignment does.
What to Do
Everything you need was covered in the previous lesson. Confess the sins of your forefathers. Renounce every dedication. Command the associated spirits out. Take authority over the curse of destruction and break it in the name of Jesus Christ. Command every spirit associated with that curse to leave.
Then expect the pressure to change. Not necessarily to vanish overnight — but to change.
You are not being punished for coming to Christ. You are being resisted, and resistance can be answered.
Point to Ponder
Nothing resists a person who is going nowhere. Opposition is not evidence you were wrong. It is often evidence you were right.
Verse to Remember
"The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly." — John 10:10
Question to Consider
Have I been told to endure something Jesus gave me authority to break?
Today's Practice
Write out the first two years after your conversion in as much detail as you can recall. What changed? What began? What ended? What became suddenly difficult that had never been difficult before?
Look especially at anything that hindered your growth — the inability to concentrate on Scripture, the sudden schedule conflicts with fellowship, the exhaustion that arrived only at prayer.
If you see the shape of an assignment, deal with it today using the procedure from the previous lesson. Do not wait for more certainty. You lose nothing by breaking something that was not there.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, thank You that You came so that I might have life abundantly. Whatever has been stealing, killing, and destroying in my life did not come from You.
I confess that I have accepted years of assault as though it were simply the cost of following You. Some of it was. Not all of it was.
I renounce every dedication ever made over my life to any power other than You. I declare that I serve You alone and that I will never return.
In Your name I take authority over every curse of destruction activated in my life when I came to You, and I command it broken now. I command every spirit assigned to destroy me to leave — from my body, my mind, my household, my family, and my work — now, in the name of Jesus Christ.
Restore what has been stolen. Fill what has been emptied. Amen.
You did not become a target by making a mistake. You became a target by changing sides.