Satan's tricks

Recently I was listening to the song Let Us All Press On and I was struck by the line in the chorus, "Fear not, though the enemy deride." It reminded me of 3 Nephi 9:2: "For the devil laugheth."

Specifically, the line reminded me how Satan enjoys making us miserable by counterfeiting the Holy Ghost.

Like most moms, I often feel like I don't know what I'm doing. A message I sometimes get from the Holy Ghost is, "You know, you've been a little hard on your kids lately. You should spend more quality time with them and give them some grace." The message I get from Satan is, "You are really messing this up. Your kids are going to be scarred for life because you are completely messing them up by doing such a terrible job." When I worry it can be hard to remember how to distinguish between those two messages. The difference is that the Holy Ghost's influence is a loving reminder that motivates me to change, whereas Satan's influence fills me with despair and strips away my confidence so that I struggle even more. This is why the line, "though the enemy deride," really stuck out to me this time. I know that the devil really wants me to fail and that he will attack our family and try to bring us all down. But I also know that God has given me the resources I need to raise these children, and he's not going to let me fail if I do my best. I know enough. (I was just looking over that blog post again and I had to laugh out loud, because although I was aware that motherhood was going to have its challenges, I can see now that I had no idea what I was getting into!)