Battlefield of the Mind: Winning the Battle in Your Mind

Joyce Meyer is a Christian speaker and Bible teacher who began her public ministry in the 1980s and heads one of the furthest-reaching personal ministries in the United States, as of 2025. She had a difficult childhood, being sexually abused by her father, and her early adulthood was likewise difficult, with a troubled early marriage that ended in divorce. Shortly thereafter, she met and married Dave Meyer, with whom she built a long marriage and a joint model of ministry work. It was in her early thirties that she experienced a transformation in her Christian life, a turning point that set the course for her ministry career.

Meyer started attending church at Life Christian Center, a charismatic church in the St. Louis area. Charismatic Christianity, which shares much of the same theology as evangelical Protestant Christianity, includes an added focus on the work of the Holy Spirit in the believer’s life, often manifested in spiritual experiences and ecstatic abilities (called gifts of the Spirit). Charismatics practice a somewhat more mystical, individually oriented spirituality than do other kinds of Christians, believing and expecting that one’s life will be marked with direct personal interactions with God. Meyer began teaching Bible classes and quickly rose to become an associate pastor at Life Christian Center. Her ministry expanded, by the mid-1980s, to a radio spot at a local St. Louis station and then to distributing audio tapes of her teaching. This was followed in due course by an opening to become a TV Bible teacher for her own program, Enjoying Everyday Life.

By the mid-1990s, already established as one of the rising voices in the charismatic Christian world, Meyer began writing and publishing books. This would eventually become a major arm of her outreach, incorporated as Joyce Meyer Ministries. Battlefield of the Mind was one of her early works, but it helped bring her national attention as a writer, and she went on to write several dozen works of Christian Bible teaching, inspiration, and self-help over the ensuing decades. Meyer’s ministry continued to expand throughout the early 21st century, though she at times came under criticism for the lavish lifestyle that her success has afforded her. These lifestyle concerns are typically raised by those outside the charismatic community, since those within it are generally favorable to a view of Christian teaching called “prosperity gospel,” which holds that God will financially bless those who serve and follow him. Meyer continued ministering publicly well into the 2020s.

Meyer’s firsthand experience of trauma and hardship lends weight to her argumentation in Battle of the Mind, as her emphasis on positivity is hard-won. However, while Meyer has several honorary doctorates, she does not have formal theological training (“Frequently Asked Questions: TV Show and Radio Program.” Joyce Meyer Ministries). While there is a long history of lay ministry in Christianity, this lack of academic grounding leaves Meyer vulnerable to criticism that her interpretation of the Bible is selective, ahistorical, or otherwise misguided; for instance, her emphasis on spiritual warfare as a primarily individual endeavor overlooks Christianity’s historical emphasis on societal and communal transformation.