When you are ruminating and full of self-doubt pray the surrender prayer to help you break out of the devil’s hold on your mind, emotions, and imagination. You can break free and change your mindset with God’s grace. The devil’s attacks on our identity and our frame of mind are as old as time. St. Anthony the Great, the desert monk of Egypt, teaches us how to resist the devil’s efforts to corrupt our minds and attack our identities in Christ. Let’s take a look at the ways the evil one can attack our minds, our hearts, and try to destroy us through ruminating thoughts of doubt, despair, anger, and resentment. Afterward, pray the Surrender Prayer at the bottom of this page.
The Devil Tempts us with Ruminating Thoughts
St. Anthony the Great teaches us how to pray against the enemy when we are being attacked with temptations in our minds. He teaches that the temptations are strongest when we are on the path to do God’s will and striving to grow in virtue and holiness. St. Anthony the Great spent decades battling spiritual warfare, so he is an expert on identifying the traps the devil uses to steal our peace and drive us into sin.
St. Anthony’s wisdom is over 1,600 years old and works today the same as it did when he was alive. Satan’s evil works are the same, they haven’t changed. To overcome the devil’s effort to make us fall through excessive ruminating thoughts we have to guard our hearts and minds in Christ.
Let’s look at the three ways St. Anthony the Great says the Devil Tempts us through our Minds:
1. Regretting the Past
Satan will constantly replay our old wounds and sins over and over again. The devil reminds us of our past failures, missed opportunities, and the betrayals of others in our life.
The cure for this is to bring all your regrets and failures straight to God. If you don’t, these ruminating thoughts of past failures become a prison in your mind and they cause you to create in your heart a false identity for yourself as a failure, and when you sin and fail, you begin to confirm the lie that you are no good. When we regret mistakes and tell ourselves that we are our failures, this keeps us chained to the past that can’t be changed. The devil wants us in regret and uses our memories to accuse us of being a failure so that we can’t see the blessings God is giving us right now, or overcome our self-doubt.
How do I overcome my regret over past failures and sins? Go to confession, make a sincere prayer of repentance from your heart, and believe in God’s mercy. Once you have repented, forget the sins and failures of your past and move on. When memories return, rebuke the devil and tell yourself you are a son or daughter of God and you have been redeemed.
2. Fear for the Future
Jesus is continually telling us not to fear throughout the Gospels. Fear is not of God. It’s actually a vice that is overcome by the virtues of courage and fortitude. If we live in fear of the future, we are being enslaved by the enemy. Satan uses fear to control us. The devil uses fear to paralyze us when he places worst-case scenarios in our imaginations that will hurt our desires for praise, honor, respect, and a good reputation. When we give into these fears we become entrapped by our weaknesses and vice and turn inward rather than toward God. Jesus teaches us not to fear the future or have anxieties because God is faithful and will give us all the grace we need when we are faced with a trial or test in the future.
How do I overcome my fear of the future? I have to fully surrender to God through prayer and ask him to give me the virtue of faith.
Jesus tells us in Matthew 6:30-34: “If God so clothes the grass of the field, which grows today and is thrown into the oven tomorrow, will he not much more provide for you, O you of little faith? So do not worry and say, ‘What are we to eat?’ or ‘What are we to drink?’ or ‘What are we to wear?’ All these things the pagans seek. Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom [of God] and his righteousness, and all these things will be given you besides. Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil.”
So do as St. Padre Pio suggests, “Pray, hope, and don’t worry.” What does this look like? Stay in the present moment with God and trust in his loving presence. Consecrate your day to God every morning and pray the surrender prayer. When the devil comes to attack you, rebuke him and don’t entertain the negative thought. Rinse and repeat with each attack and watch them wane and disappear.
3. Lack of Gratitude for the Present
Don’t ignore the grace God is giving you right now in your life. Acknowledge and thank him for every good thing, every test and trial, even the temptations you are suffering through your ruminating thoughts. This affirms that you believe he is with you in your suffering, strengthening you and sustaining you as you battle the devil in your mind. Be grateful in all situations.
When we constantly relive past mistakes and have regret on our minds, and when we are feeling fear and a lack of control over our future, we can’t have gratitude to God and this slowly kills our souls over time. Satan knows that without gratitude, we can’t love God or our neighbor. When we can’t say thank you to God, we are blinded by his gifts and we forget his faithfulness, goodness, and loving presence in our lives.
How do I overcome my ingratitude to God? The Bible tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5:13-18: “Be at peace among yourselves. We urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, cheer the fainthearted, support the weak, be patient with all. See that no one returns evil for evil; rather, always seek what is good [both] for each other and for all. Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus.”
Gratitude turns our eyes from past mistakes, regret, and fear of the future to the loving presence of God who is present to us in our suffering and faithfully guiding us in the present moment.
Important Takeaways on how the Devil Tempts us with Regret and Fear
St. Anthony the Great teaches us that a spiritual attack begins as a subtle temptation in the mind designed to lead your heart away from God. When you succeed in falling for this temptation, the next step of the evil one is to incite fear in your heart about the future through your imagination. The goal of the demon is to confuse you and intimidate you into believing that God doesn’t love you and has abandoned you to your own devices. He may even convince you that a calling or grace you were given by God is a lie.
Do not be overwhelmed by these attacks. St. Anthony the Great tells us that the power of demons are limited. They can’t do anything outside of the will of God. As long as you have faith in God and you remain firm in your intellect and will, they can do nothing to you. They cannot stop the divine will of God in your life unless you give in to their deceptions and give them power over you. So remain steadfast in faith and pray without ceasing throughout the day during diabolical attacks against your identity. Your acts of faith in God are a form of prayer. So you resist the devil in your thoughts, words, and deeds throughout the day, and by doing this, you make your life one of ceaseless prayer to God in gratitude for the gifts he has given you and the calling he has given you.
St. Anthony the Great reminds us to do these three things:
- Make regular heartfelt prayers throughout the day to stay in God’s presence, especially during an attack. This strengthens our resolve and opens our hearts to the grace we need to persevere. They can be short ejaculatory prayers from our heart – one sentence is enough!
- Deny yourself during the day. This is an act of love for God and it is a discipline that helps you stay focused on the goal of overcoming temptation. It’s putting your money where your mouth is.
- Confirm your trust in God’s goodness, his power, and his love for you. Remind yourself of his past promises and his faithfulness in your life. Faith overcomes fear and gives us hope that God is with us in our current suffering and will carry us through again.
Make the Sign of the Cross
Finally, St. Anthony the Great talks about the power of making the sign of the Cross. When you can’t pray a vocal prayer but you want to thwart the devil and bring the presence of Christ close to your mind, make the Sign of the Cross. This sign invokes Christ’s victory over sin and death and his power over evil spirits.
Fear is the most potent weapon of demons, but if you are full of faith, hope, and love, fear holds no real power over you. So the next time you are met with a bad memory of a past failure and are being bombarded with thoughts that you are worthless, a loser, damned, or unlovable, stand firm in faith and pray with confidence to God, deny yourself as an act of love toward God, and give him thanks for every blessing in your life, and even your current sufferings. Consecrate each day to him and pray the surrender prayer.
Remember, when demonic attacks on your identity persist, St. Anthony says it’s just a trial meant to strengthen you. God is allowing it for a greater good, because he has given you a vocation and you need to grow in virtue and learn to overcome this weakness in your mind for his glory. Each victory over temptation makes you holier, and in the future you will no longer struggle with the temptations that are currently plaguing you, because you will be closer to becoming the saint that God wills you to be.
The Surrender Prayer to God
God, my Father, I thank you for all that you are, and all that you do for me through your son Jesus Christ. I praise you for my life, for your mercy, and for your Eucharist.
In Jesus’ name, Father, I place myself entirely in your Heart. I surrender to you my whole self, my heart, my mind, my memory, my imagination, my will, my emotions, my passions, my body, my sexuality, my desire for human approval, my weaknesses, my desires, my sins.
I surrender every person in my life to you.
I surrender every situation in my life to you.
I surrender every relationship I am in to you.
I surrender every concern I have to you.
I surrender every fear I have to you.
I surrender every doubt I have to you.
I surrender all confusion I have to you.
I surrender all sadness I am experiencing in my heart to you.
I surrender all my wounds to you.
I surrender all anxiety and worry I have to you.
I surrender all that deceives me in my heart to you.
I trust you to care for me and others in a perfectly loving way. As I have emptied myself, and surrendered everything to you, I ask you now, Father, to fill me with your Holy Spirit and all the gifts and fruits of your Spirit. Holy Spirit you are the source of love, hope, joy, peace, patience, goodness, gentleness, tenderness, faithfulness, humility, and self-control. Purify my desires.
Help me to open my heart to you.
Help me to become perfectly receptive as a pure child.
Help me to believe in your love for me.
Help me to hope in your love.
Help me to receive from the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus all grace and virtues necessary for me to become the person you created me to be.
I ask this in the Name of Jesus Christ, Your son, God Almighty Father.
O Most Holy Immaculate Virgin Mary, I entrust this prayer to you, and ask you to press it to your wounded heart and intercede for me to your Son Jesus. Please help me to be as you are, a perfect disciple, an obedient servant, a true child of God.
AMEN.