That’s why you and I must deliberately strategize in prayer
for the daily, ongoing protection of our purity. Prayer keeps us
on guard, our spiritual radar sensitive to the enemy’s ploys and
clever decoys. Without this close contact with the Father, we
become convinced that our careless behavior, our decisions,
our habits, our general sense of what qualifies as worthwhile
entertainment is somehow OK, that it’s “not so bad.” Yet all the
while the enemy’s carefully crafted options of impurity chip
away at our spiritual reserves and effectiveness.
The devil’s strategy is to make us believe impurity is, well... normal... that nobody’s hurt if we keep a few forbidden
things on hand and enjoy them from time to time. No big deal.
But if we were steadily engaged in fervent prayer—with our
strategy counteracting his strategy—we’d see in a snap that
unrighteousness is not “no big deal.” It’s a house of horrors. It
is a totally upside-down way to live.
Speaking of things that are upside-down...When my boys and I go fishing, we like to walk over to a
small pond not far from our house on a friend’s property. And
fairly often when we go there, if we’ve got the time, we’ll
decide not just to fish from the bank but to use the small boat