Satan's Devices - Part 3 — Brian Brodersen

You know, and all of this stuff will come on us. Or, you know, maybe you're going to step out. You've been so excited, you feel like God is calling you to serve Him, and you decided to sign up for the children's ministry.

You're going to go over there and teach the kids. And the next thing you know, a voice is coming along going, you think you could teach those kids? You haven't even taught your own kids. You yell at them at home all the time.

You're such a bad example. You're a terrible parent. You're never going to amount to anything. You better go over and tell Mickey that you're just not going to be able to do it. See, that's the enemy.

Satan’s Condemnation of Believers

That's what he does. And he comes with this condemning thing. But it's so very subtle. And quite often, well, you know what he really is doing in a sense a lot of times? He's sort of mimicking God. He's trying to give the impression to us that it's God who's speaking to us.

Now, after all, hey, if God's condemning me, I'm in big trouble. But that's what he wants to get you to think. But we know that it's not God who's condemning us. How do we know that? Because the Bible tells us.

The Bible says that there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. And Paul asked the question, he says, who is it that condemns? And then he answers. He says, it's not Christ.

Christ died for you. Christ rose for you. Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Christ is actually making intercession for you. So who is it that condemns? Well, it's the devil. He is the one who comes and he whispers these things.

But you see, we've got to stand on that word of God. Now, the reality is, of course, Satan can't really condemn us because we're in Christ and there's no condemnation for those who are in Christ. But if he can get you to think you're condemned, then he has succeeded.

He has succeeded in stopping you from your progress with the Lord in your life with him and your service to him. So that's what he's attempting to do. But it's not only condemnation. He will come along, and this is where the fiery dart thing comes into the picture.

Satan’s Attack on Faith and Confidence in Scripture

He will hurl into our minds things, for example, like the idea that that passage that we read, we can't really trust that to be true. Oh, come on. A man being swallowed by a fish and then being spit out on the beach and going into a city and prophesying, I mean, come on, who can believe that?

Certainly, that's a fairy tale. Certainly, that's mythology. You can't believe this book, the Bible. And Satan will come along and he will try to cast doubt. He will try to get you to doubt God's existence.

He'll try to get you to doubt your own salvation. He'll try to get you to doubt the work that God wants to do in your life. He'll try to get you to doubt the promises that God made to you. And, of course, his primary attack is against God's word.

And he has been very successful in leading people into unbelief. He's been very successful. And he's relentless. He does this continually. And this is something he's been doing from the very beginning.

You know, I have noticed that Satan hasn't really changed his tactics much over the years because they work so effectively. And he's using the same things today that he was using at the very beginning.

Satan’s Doubt in the Garden of Eden

What did he say to Eve in the garden? He came to her suggesting that what God said wasn't really trustworthy. He said, has God really said that you shall not eat of the tree in the midst of the garden?

Is that what God said? Or was it really God who said that? So, you see, he's trying to cast doubt upon the word of God. And he has continued to do that throughout all of these long centuries. He does the same thing today.

Did God really mean that? Are you sure that that's God's word? How do you know the Bible is God's word? You know, isn't it just a compilation of various human authors? And, of course, he's got all kinds of help in these kinds of things.

You turn on the TV and there's a program on there about the Bible. And that's what they pretty much tell you about it. Oh, the Bible is just a collection of stories and myths and things like that. So he tries to cast doubt on the word of God.

And then, you know, it's just a short step to blatantly denying it, just like he did with Eve. He says, has God really said that? She said, well, yes, God told us this. God told us in the day that we ate, we would die.

And the devil's response was, you will not die. And that's what he does. He comes and he contradicts the word of God. But here's what we need to understand. And this is where we get tripped up. You see, the temptation to doubt is not doubt and it's not sin.

Distinguishing Temptation from Sinful Unbelief

And to some degree, you can't help but being tempted. And, you know, these things come, they're thrown at us from the enemy. And here's what he quite often does. He throws this temptation to doubt our way.

We think it's our own doubt. He turns and points the finger and says, oh, you doubted God. You're not trusting God. You're not believing God. You think God's really going to help you? And then we find ourselves in this dilemma.

But we have to be able to identify the devices of Satan. We have to realize that's the enemy right there. That's the devil at work. And we refuse to succumb to that. We refuse to buy into it. So it's not a sin to have the temptation to doubt.

To some extent, you can't help it. I remember hearing Greg Laurie say years ago, he said, you know, you can't stop a bird from flying over your head, but you can stop one from building a nest on it. I thought, you know, that's a good point.

Yes, that's true. And, you know, the thoughts coming into our head, it's like a bird flying over our head. I can't do anything about that. But if a bird landed on my head, I could certainly prevent it from building a nest.

And so, likewise, when these thoughts come into my head, I can't stop that from happening, but I don't have to receive them. I don't have to let them have a place in my mind. I need to recognize that this is the work of the enemy.

Extinguishing Satan’s Fiery Darts by Faith

And remember, in the passage we read in Ephesians 6, he says, concerning the fiery darts, how do we extinguish them? He says, we take up the shield of faith. So you see, we stand firm on God's word. We believe what God has said over the suggestions of the devil.

Fear of the Cost of Obedience

But there's another area that Satan will often attack us in. And another scheme or another one of his wiles, and that is to threaten evil consequences for obedience and to try to strike fear in us, a fear that would cause us to pull back from the Lord instead of press into the Lord.

And he will do this. He will come and he will say, oh, you know, if you surrender. And there you are, you're thinking, you know, I'm going to really... I'm tired of being in this, you know, middle ground sort of a place here.

I want to go for it. I want to give it all to Christ. I want to serve him. I'm going to dedicate my life. And as you're thinking that, as you're moving in that direction, the enemy comes along and says, oh, you better watch it.

You better watch it. You know what's going to happen. You give the Lord everything and he's going to take it all. It's going to cost you your family. It's going to cost you your friends. It's going to cost you your job.

And then you know what God's going to do, right? You know where he's going to put you, right? You know, he's going to stick you right there in the heart of that jungle. You've always been afraid of the jungle.

You've always been worried about that. You know, or just wherever it is, you know, that place. I don't know, when I was a kid, you know, I never wanted to go to prison. That's a good thing. But, you know, I think I saw some movies when I was a kid about prison life and it just, you know, it freaked me out.

It was one of those things like, man, that prison is scary. I never want to go there. And I remember, though, when I was kind of moving in the direction of yielding my life to the Lord, I remember one time when the enemy came, said, you better watch it, you know, God will put you in prison to serve him there.

I thought, oh, boy, that's the last place I want to go. Oh, God. And this is what he does. So he tries to strike fear in us. Evil consequences for obedience. You yield to God and you don't know. And we buy into that.