Then who can ever stop us? That’s the question worship leader and songwriter Chris Tomlin, along with Passion Conference founder Louie Giglio and music artist Christy Nockels, posed to crowds in October 2011.

The 2011 fall tour turned out to be a huge success for Tomlin, who will begin a 13-date fall tour in August at the Wisconsin State Fair in West Allis, Wis. For tickets, tour dates and destinations visit christomlin.com.

We call God by so many names, and artist Phil Wickham “shouts” the name Yahweh in his single “At Your Name,” featured on his new CD, Response (releasing Oct. 4). It is Wickham’s prayer that whoever hears his song is both inspired to worship God and reminded of His greatness. Wichkam’s 2009 album Heaven & Earth climbed to No. 4 on the Billboard U.S. Christian Albums chart.

Bill Johnson, senior pastor of Bethel Church in Redding, Calif., joins with Global Awakening founder Randy Clark to equip Christians to minister healing in their co-authored book, The Essential Guide to Healing. The team turns to Scripture to point readers to a theological and historical foundation for healing today. This book’s inspirational stories and step-by-step guidance prove that the ministry of healing is not reserved for a select few.

Joel Rosenberg returns with the second title in his New York Times best-selling Twelfth Imam series. Although still fairly new to Christian fiction, Rosenberg has captivated audiences with political thrillers that highlight events in the Middle East. The Tehran Initiative (releasing Oct. 18 from Tyndale) takes true-to-life issues and details them with back-room negotiations, secret meetings, political trade-offs, intelligence missteps and terrorist strikes that boost the thrill factor.

Coexistence is a myth—that’s the bottom line of Robert Stearns’ new book, No, We Can’t. Stearns highlights the core problems in the push toward multiculturalism and religious tolerance, and in the loss of strength in Judeo-Christianity. Stearns challenges readers to prayerfully explore what role they will play in the midst of it all.

In his latest book from Charisma House, international evangelist Perry Stone digs into both biblical prophecies and Islamic tradition to explain what’s going on in the world today. Unleashing the Beast touches on world events that Stone believes could very well be precursors to the end times. Charisma’s exclusive interview with Stone about the end of times can be viewed at stone.charismamag.com.

They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. —Revelation 12:11

If we are going to do spiritual warfare, then we need to know Satan’s tactics in order to overcome them. Satan is out to deceive. Revelation 12:9 describes him as “that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world” (KJV).

How does he set about his deception? In 2 Corinthians 11:14, Satan is called “an angel of light,” which means that he uses apparently respectable means and people to deceive us. He tries to lure us away from the truth and towards the counterfeit. Paul says: “For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him” (2 Cor. 11:4, KJV).

Satan is out to demoralize: “Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night” (Rev. 12:10, KJV).

How does Satan accuse? Sometimes he tells us that we are not saved. Or if he can’t succeed with that, he tries to convince us that God has finished with us and that we are irreparably out of His will. Nothing is more demoralizing to a Christian than this. But let me give you a rule of thumb here: all oppression is of the devil.

Another method of accusing and demoralizing us is to tell us that we are not fit to worship God as we are. The devil reminds us of some weakness or failing in our life, and he says, “You must get that right before you can worship God. You’re not in a fit state to do anything.” He tries to get in during the week, and if he fails there, he tries on Sunday morning. If we lose our temper or give in to some other weakness, he says to us, “You see, you’re not fit.” But God never says that.

So what are we to do in the face of Satan’s strategies? The answer is that we must refuse to give place to him. We must realize that Satan’s strategy is aimed to produce one thing—a grieved Holy Spirit. That is all he wants. And if he achieves that, then he has won.

Excerpted from Worshipping God (Hodder & Stoughton, 2004).

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers … against spiritual wickedness in high places. —Ephesians 6:12, KJV

Satan already knows his doom, and he is also aware that his time is limited.

Something else that is certain about Satan is that he will try to take everybody down with him. He tries to do this by keeping people from being saved. He is called “the god of this world” who blinds “the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them” (2 Cor. 4:4, KJV).

When Satan fails and people are converted, he then does all that he can to keep them from holiness. He will try to get them to grieve and quench the Spirit.

New Christians need to be taught these things. They also need to know the devil will attempt to push us to extreme views about him. He will either try to get us to be overly preoccupied with him or to disregard him completely. If we become preoccupied with the occult, even if it’s on the grounds that we just want to learn more about the dangers of Satan, we open ourselves up to oppression, if not possession, by evil spirits. So we need to be very careful. At the other extreme, if Satan can get us to discount anything to do with the occult as foolishness, he will be very pleased because then we will fail to be on our guard.

Here are nine more things about the devil: he is jealous, insecure, vengeful, and persistent. He is also unteachable (he never learns from his mistakes), a liar and a deceiver, and he is full of hate. But, most of all, he is resistible.

“Resist the devil, and he will flee from you” (James 4:7). That is a promise, and it works!

Excerpted from Worshipping God (Hodder & Stoughton, 2004).

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. —Philippians 4:6

Speaking out of fear always leads to evil (Ps. 37:8). God has not given us a spirit of fear (2 Tim. 1:7). Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18). When we fear—and speak at the same time—what we say will come out wrong and may get us into serious trouble.

Take, for example, Abraham telling people that his wife was his sister. Abraham journeyed to Egypt and, knowing how beautiful his wife, Sarah, was, ordered her to say that she was his sister—so both of them would be spared. Abraham feared that someone would kill him in order to have her. So she did what he commanded.

It worked for a while. She was taken into Pharaoh’s palace, where she was safe, while Abraham prospered. But God stepped in. The Lord inflicted serious diseases on Pharaoh and his household because of Sarah. Pharaoh somehow knew that God had caused these diseases and knew that Sarah was Abraham’s wife. “Why didn’t you tell me she was your wife?” (Gen. 12:18). Abraham and Sarah mercifully were spared. They would never know what God Himself might have done had they trusted Him. Years later Isaac made the same mistake, repeating the error of his father (Gen. 26:7-22).

Speaking out of fear comes from assuming God is not going to look after us—so we speak in unbelief. It is the folly of self-protection. The truth is, God stepped in for both Abraham and Isaac. He will for us, too. But when we give into unbelief and speak—thinking we are justifiably protecting ourselves, our sin has a way of backfiring on us.

Excerpted from Controlling the Tongue (Charisma House, 2007).

When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. —1 Kings 19:13

If someone were to say to you today, “The Lord is going to appear in your life between now and sunset,” you would probably say, “Well, if He really is going to appear, I’m sure I’ll recognize Him.”

Elijah was to see a manifestation of the glory of God unlike anything he had ever seen before (1 Kings 19:9-18). It comes at a time in his life when he is depressed, tired, and on the run from his enemies. As he shelters in a cave in hiding, God tells Elijah to watch and see what He will do: “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by” (v. 11).

First, a great and powerful wind tears the mountain apart and shatters the rocks around him. This has to be the Lord! He has appeared in this way before. But we’re told that “the Lord was not in the wind.” After the wind there is an earthquake. Ah, this must be it! But no—”the Lord was not in the earthquake.” After the earthquake comes a fire. Elijah is sure this is the way it should be, because God had previously manifested Himself through fire. But “the Lord was not in the fire.” After the fire there is “a gentle whisper,” what the King James Version calls “a still small voice.”

I daresay that God wants to appear in my life and in yours. The difficulty is that we tell Him how He can do it. Some of us who have seen God work think, I’ll know Him when He comes because I’ve seen Him before. The truth is, God may come again and ignore all the traditional ways. He has worked through earthquakes. He has worked through wind. He has worked through fire. But this time He may come in a different manner. Will we recognize Him if He does?

Excerpted from When God Shows Up (Renew Books, 1998).