Chosen to Stand Before God — Tim Conway

Chosen in Christ for Holiness and Blamelessness

Ephesians 1, verse 3, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before Him.

I do want to stop right there for a moment and just have you notice the next two words, in love. Tyndale would give you a small eye, no period behind him. Put the period behind love. The in love is modifying our own holiness and blamelessness.

We are holy and blameless and in love before God the Father. Our ESVs, the NAS, put a period behind Him, capitalize I, and connect in love with v. 5. I want to point this out because there's no textual issue going on here.

In other words, in the original, it's the same with the ESV. It's the same with the King James Version. It just has to do with the fact that in the original, it is very difficult to tell what it modifies.

And so some have gone one way with it and some have gone the other way with it. And the reality is that I can prove both to you scripturally. I can prove to you that we will stand before God in perfect holiness and love captures the reality of that holiness.

Love is fulfilling the law. It is a standard of righteousness. I can prove that to you. But then I can also prove to you that it is God's love that predestines us for adoption as sons. Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God.

And so it can go either way. In love, He predestined us. I'm going to resume the text again. In love, He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will to the praise of His glorious grace with which He has blessed us in the beloved.

Election as a Glorious Spiritual Blessing

Now, last week you will remember, we looked at v. 4. We looked at the doctrine of election. We looked at the reality that God chooses who will be in Christ before the foundation of the world. We established that truth.

We looked at it as being what it is. It's good news. It's not bad news. It's a glorious doctrine, not a horrid one if properly understood. Paul is blessing God the Father for these realities. For every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

And the first one that he wants to articulate to us is this reality of God choosing before the foundation of the world. Now, what we never want to do is forget the connection between v. 3 and v. 4. V. 4 starts with a conjunction.

What Paul is doing here is he is going to begin to elaborate and give detail to what these spiritual blessings are that we have been blessed with that are mentioned in v. 3. Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

And they're in the heavenly places because we see that Christ is seated in the heavenly places. And we are seated with Christ in the heavenly places. Heavenly places is where Christ is. And He is the source from which all the treasures, brethren, of wisdom and knowledge, they flow forth from Him.

All of our blessings come through Him. He's there, and that's where they come from. Now, we started v. 4, but we didn't finish v. 4. There's more here. The question that Paul is answering is this. We want to ask the question.

I mean, it's not enough just to say He's blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Because as soon as you hear that, well, that's nice and it sounds glorious, but how has He blessed us?

Isn't that what you want to know? Don't you want to practically know? You can come along and tell me I have every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places because I'm a Christian. But what does that mean?

How does that make me differ from the guy out here that doesn't know the Lord at all? How am I different? There's no question. If you're a Christian, you're different because you've been blessed in a way they haven't been.

But you don't want to just know that generically. What does it mean? How? And Paul doesn't want to leave us just out here in the generic. He wants to take us and show us. And that's what he's doing. He's unfolding these things.

What we saw last week is that he does not begin to elaborate on our blessings just based on, well, where are you going to start? It is interesting that Tawfiq was telling us in the first hour that he looked at all these commentaries and they're telling him that the order of the blessings, the benefits, we've got blessings here and Tawfiq mentioned this text.

Over in Psalm 103, it's his benefits. And he said that he looked at all the commentaries and that there was order there. And you know where it starts? It starts with forgiveness. Paul doesn't start with forgiveness.

Paul doesn't start with when we believe. Paul doesn't start even with Christ coming into this world. He doesn't start with the manger. He doesn't start with Zechariah and John the Baptist. I say that because that's where Luke starts.

He goes to eternity past. He goes back. He takes us back to an eternal plan. And you know as we go through this book of Ephesians, we're going to get to those words. An eternal plan. There is a master plan in the mind of God.

And what I want to do here as we start is just survey that master plan. Sometimes I think it's good just, you know you hear sometimes about the meta-narrative. What is it all about? What is the big picture?

The Father Gives a Chosen People to the Son

Let's just very quickly survey. Turn over in your Bibles to John 17. We don't want to have a small idea of what it means to be saved or of Christianity. We want to step back at times and get the big picture.

What's God doing? You see, it didn't start with when we believed. It didn't start with when man fell. It didn't start at the cross. You have to go back into the foreknowledge of God. You have to go back to the mind of God before the foundation of the world.

And notice John 17. V. 2, this is the high priestly prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ. And I want you to get this feel for what's happening. The Son prays to the Father. V. 2, since You have given Him, the Father has given the Son authority over all flesh.

That's over all humanity. To give eternal life to all whom You have given Him. You see, we have to stop and recognize it's God's choice. We go back to this election, this eternal election according to the foreknowledge of God.

What you have here, notice very carefully. You have the Son. He's given authority by the Father. The Son has been given the authority to bestow eternal life. Not just to anybody and everybody. Not primarily because man determines that he wants eternal life.

This is Christ's choice. His ability to have that choice has been bestowed to Him by the authority of the Father. And notice who He gives eternal life to. To all whom You have given Him. Notice, God has a people and He gifts these people to the Son.

The Son receives these people. It's these people that He says, I have authority to give eternal life to them. I don't have authority to give eternal life to any of the others. Only those who the Father gives to the Son.

Do you know what that tells us? You belong to the Father before you belong to the Son. And belonging to the Father. You see, the Father chose you in eternity past to be in Christ. And because He chose you in Christ, He gives you to Christ.

That's the truth. Go to v. 6. I have manifested Your name. What does that mean to manifest a name? A name has to do with who you are. A name describes you. A name tells of your attributes. You call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.

You call God Jehovah. I Am. He's the ever-existent One. See, names have everything to do with who you are. And what He says is this, notice, I have manifested Your name. To manifest means to bring to light.

It means it was hidden. It wasn't known before. And what this means is this, there was a time you did not know the God of Scripture. There was a time you did not understand who He was. There was a time when the God you had was not the God of Scripture.

Your God was a little God. Your God was a figment of your imagination. And how do you ever get to the place where you actually come to recognize who God is? It's by revelation. Now it's interesting, because on the one hand, Jesus says to Peter, My Father has made that known to you.

And yet right here, it's the Son who is making that known. He's manifesting. I have manifested Your name. To who? To a select people. The people whom you gave Me out of the world. Yours they were. You see, out here in this world, there is a people.

This all has to do with Ephesians 1 .4. A people that He chose in Christ before the foundation of the world. He chose you. He chose you to be His. And what Jesus is saying is what happens in the course of time.

That people who the Father has given to the Son, the Son reveals the Father. You see, if you're saved, you have come to know God. You may be sitting here with no college education. You may be sitting here with no high school degree.

But I can tell you this, if you are a child of God, you know, you have had a revelation of the Father in a way the greatest biblical scholars who are outside of Christ have never known. That's the reality.

Yours they were. You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your Word. Notice v. 9 of John 17. I'm praying for them. I'm not praying for the world, but for those whom You have given Me. For they are Yours.

You see, just because the Father gave them to the Son doesn't mean that we stopped being the fathers. We still are. Who does He pray for? He prays for the people that the Father chose and gave to the Son.

Maybe some of you are saying, wow, I didn't know the Bible taught this. John 17 .24. Father, I desire that they also whom You have given Me may be with Me where I am to see My glory that You have given Me because You loved Me before the foundation of the world.

You see, we are given to Christ to be Christ, gifted to Christ, and to evermore dwell with Christ. Don't you love this? You think about, wow, we were the fathers before we became the sons. It's not primarily something that you and I do.

It's not even primarily something that the Son did. It is the Father chose a people unto Himself. Chose a people to be gifted to the Son. And the Son takes them as His own. Jump over to John 10 .14. John 10 .14 Jesus says, I am the Good Shepherd.

I know My own. Wow! You mean not everybody in the world is His own? Nope. It's these people who have been chosen. And notice what He says. I know My own and My own know Me, just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father.

You see, that's another thing. We not only have had a manifestation of the Father, we have come to know Christ. To know Him. Brethren, let me tell you something. If you're looking for one of the greatest evidences of true Christianity, it's right here.

You're basically walking through the world in darkness. You don't know Christ. And suddenly, your eyes are open. We could go into all the intimacies of this, but just in light of the Jehovah's Witness conference over here, that's one of the things that our eyes...

You come to know Him as God the Son. Deity from everlasting. The before-Abraham-was-I-am person. We know Him. And notice what it says. And I laid down My life for the sheep. Who are the sheep? They're these people.

Not all are sheep. When you read in Scripture, like sheep we've gone astray. Brethren, this isn't talking about the whole world. The world loves to take the Bible and take the promises for the sheep and apply them to themselves, but this really is a book.

I know it's written for evangelistic purposes and to let the Gospel be known to the world. But I tell you, this book is a very personal book. And if you notice, there is a possessiveness that God has.

There is a great possessiveness that Jesus has. Mine. I know My own. The people that were yours and You gave them to Me and I pray for them and I give them eternal life. Them. My own. Yours. Look over at John 6 .39.

Jesus gives these people His prayers. People gives these people eternal life. Jesus gives these people His life. Notice this. John 6 .39, "...And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that I should lose nothing of all that He has given Me, but raise it up at the last day.".

The last day. So you want to see this thing? This eternal plan? There in the foreknowledge of God before the foundation of the world, God has chose a people in Christ. And He gives these people to Christ.

And Christ gives these people eternal life. Christ lays down His life for these people that they might have life. And what He says is, these people, I'm going to raise them up on the last day. And then what happens?

Christ’s Kingdom Delivered to the Father

Oh, jump over to 1 Corinthians 15. 1 Corinthians 15, verse 24. Jesus said back in John 6 .39, all that the Father has given Me, He is going to raise up on the last day. The last day. Think about that last day.

What's the last day? It's the day Christ comes. It's the day this age is over. It's the day this world is done. It's the day this world gets burned up. It's judgment day. It is the end. Not the end of all things.

Because we get raised up who are Christians. It's only the beginning for us. But notice this, 1 Corinthians 15 .24. Then comes the end. When He, that's Christ, delivers the kingdom. Kingdoms are made up of the people that Christ rules over.

His people. We are a kingdom of priests. The kingdom. He delivers the kingdom to God the Father. You notice this. God the Father has a chosen people. He gives those people to Christ. Christ lays down His life for them.

Christ bestows eternal life on them. Christ prays for them. And now here at the end, what does Christ do? He gives these people back to the Father. The whole kingdom. He delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power.

For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death, for God has put all things in subjection under His feet. But when it says all things are put in subjection, it's plain that He, the Father, is accepted who put all things in subjection under Christ.

You see what he's saying here. When everything has been put under the subjection of the feet of Christ, God the Father is accepted. And in fact, when all things are subjected to Him, except the Father, then the Son Himself will subject Himself to the Father who put all things in subjection under Christ that God may be all in all.

That's at the end. It's all turned over to the Father. He's triumphant. Christ came to win a people. And He's done it. There's a big picture for you. Okay, let's go back to Ephesians. I just want you to see and feel the big picture of being chosen.

We are chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world. Brethren, so that after the end of the world, something might be true. There's more to Ephesians 1 -4 than what we covered last week. We looked at election.

He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. But there's more here. Let's read the rest. "...That we should be holy and blameless before Him.". That we should be holy and blameless before Him.

Chosen to Stand in God’s Presence

You see what more there is in this verse. Now some of your minds are going right away to, yeah, I see it. Holiness. Blamelessness. Brethren, I don't want you to miss two words here. I told you this before.

When we're dealing with this first chapter of Ephesians, you've got to notice everything. You've got to notice every prepositional phrase. You've got to notice everything. There's so much going on here.

There's such a richness. I want you to notice these two words. Before Him. He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. That we should be holy and blameless before Him. You see, you have to watch out that you don't get hung up on the modifiers so that you never get to where they're taking us.

Those two words are everything. Don't stop with God choosing us in Christ. Don't stop at God choosing to make these in Christ holy and blameless. You don't want to stop until you get to those words. Before Him.

Think about it. Paul's going to begin to elaborate on all these spiritual blessings in the heavenly places. What's the greatest of all? Where do you start? You see, he's not just starting with holy and blameless.

It's not like he's just taking us and saying to us, hey, look, what I want to show you first in v. 4 is that holiness and blamelessness is the best of the blessings that God gives us. That's not what you want to conclude.

He's not telling us, well, being in Christ is the best blessing. It is the best blessing in as much as it takes us into the presence of God. Holy and blameless is the best of blessings as much as it prepares somebody to stand in the very presence of God.

He doesn't do what the psalmist does, what we saw in the first hour. He doesn't start with forgiveness. He doesn't start with this reality that, well, you're delivered from hell. What he wants to do is elaborate and he wants to give us in detailed fashion what these things are.

This first one, it's the culmination. Before Him. The greatest of the spiritual blessings is culminated here. God chooses you to this end. This is it. The end for which God chooses you. The greatest spiritual blessing of all.

God has chose you to be a people who are going to be able... You have to grasp this. You go to Isaiah 6. You've got seraphim. They've got three sets of wings. You remember? Those beings that antiphonally cry, Holy, Holy, Holy.

There's a Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is full of His glory. They've got three sets of wings and with two of those sets of wings, they cover their faces. Do you recognize? They've never sinned. And what God has chosen us to do is to stand before Him.

That's it. What does that mean? To stand before Him. That means to have access. To come into His presence. And I can tell you this, there is no indication from Scripture that you and I are going to be given any kind of apparatus on our bodies wherewith to cover our eyes.

It seems that the teaching of Scripture is that God has chosen this people with open face to behold the face of God. And to see Him. That's the end. You might say, hey, what's the greatest of all the spiritual blessings?

And if you do a casual cursory reading of v. 4, you might say, well, Paul seems to think it's holiness and blamelessness. You'll only come to that conclusion if you miss those words before him. Don't miss those.

Brethren, what you have to recognize is salvation is not primarily about keeping you out of hell. It is primarily about returning man to the place where he can approach God. That's the culmination. You know, Scripture screams at us, stay back!

Stay back! Man lost the greatest of all of his privileges. Man's sin hid something from him. Genesis is not a fairy tale. Man was put out of the garden. Cherubim with a flaming sword. You know what that sword said?

Stay back! You think of Mount Sinai. There's thunder and there's lightning and there's fire and there's smoke and God's voice and the people are cowering. And you know what all that said? Stay back! You remember King Uzziah?

He took it upon himself to enter the sanctuary to offer incense. And he got leprosy. Uzziah's leprosy says stay back. Uzziah puts out his hand and touches the ark and he's dead. It all is saying stay back!

Stay back! God said when He gave them all the laws concerning the tabernacle, He said, look, only one can go in to that inner sanctum, into the Holy of Holies. Only one. And only one time a year. And if anybody else does, they will die.

Everything about it. Stay back! Stay back! Have you ever thought about hell? It's described as outer. Outer darkness. It's the ultimate stay back. You remember Luke 16? The rich man, Lazarus? The rich man was looking for some mercy.

And what Abraham said to him is there's a great chasm. You know what? We are so used to living with the chasm between us and God, that until you're saved, you hardly know there is one. Men imagine that there isn't one.

Chasm. Outer darkness. Outer. You are confined to a place that's outside. You remember as Jesus gets to the end of the book of Revelation, outside, He says, outside are the dogs and the sorcerers and the sexually immoral.

Outside as over against what? Inside. Outer darkness. Which means you're in a region where you have no access to the inside. The inside. That's what the tabernacle was. You went in. There were all these stages of going in, but nobody could get all the way in.

You see, when the author of Hebrews says that a way has been made, you have to understand what it's saying. It's a way has been made into the very presence of God Himself. Before Him means in His presence.

No more chasms. They're all out of the way. And brethren, I'll tell you, there are still chasms. And there are still chasms even for the redeemed. You say, what? Which one of you have walked in the cool of the day face-to-face with God and talked with Him physically?

Which one of you have done that? I haven't seen His face. I haven't audibly heard His voice. There are still chasms. You see what the first and the greatest of all the spiritual blessings is? Every barrier, every obstacle, that's what you are chosen for.

God chose you to be a people that in Christ would have every obstacle removed to you standing in His very presence. God chose a people in Christ before the foundation of the world to do what the seraphim dare not do.

The Return to Paradise and the Beatific Vision

Brethren, don't turn here, but just listen to this as Revelation is wrapping up. Behold, the dwelling place... this is Revelation 21 .3. The dwelling place of God is with man. God dwells with man. That's where we're headed.

He will dwell with them and they will be His people and God Himself will be with them as their God. And notice Revelation 22 .3 -4. Again, don't turn there, but listen. No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and the Lamb will be in it.

In the city. The city is the people of God. And His servants will worship Him. They will see His face. We better just stop and say, whoa, the seraphim, they're like this. They will see His face. Now you better just think about that.

After the things that you have done in your life, chosen to once again behold the very face of God. Even Moses. There was no more meek man upon the face of this earth. But see, he hadn't gotten to the end yet.

And he wasn't where he could see some of the glory. We can see some of it. Even a greater glory than under that old covenant. But God told him, you cannot see My face or you will die. But you know what we're being told?

We're being told that God has chosen a people who He is going to return to Paradise. There is a return to Eden. Eden. Adam walked with God. And he talked with God. There's a return. A chosen humanity.

That He has chose to be so worked that they're qualified and worthy to be able to stand there directly before God and look into the glory. The glory. Even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless before Him.

Everything God's done for us in salvation takes us to this. Everything. Man once again before God. So the question of the ages has been this. You know that the psalmist said this. Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?

Who shall ascend? Who shall stand in His holy place? What's the answer in Ephesians 1? Chosen for? Those chosen to. Now that's not the answer you're given in Ephesians. That's not the answer you're given in Psalm 24 or in Psalm 15.

But that's the answer you're given here. But notice what they're chosen to. What they're chosen to is what the answer is in Psalm 15 and Psalm 24. And this truth comes at us everywhere. You have this truth in Hebrews that without holiness, what?

Without holiness, what? No man shall see the Lord. Who will ascend the hill of the Lord? Somebody's saying it, but say it louder. Clean hands and a pure heart. You see, God, if He's chosen you to stand before Him, He's chosen you to be what you need to be to be able to stand before Him.

Chosen you that you be holy and blameless before Him in love. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. You see, this truth comes at us over and over and over again. Holiness. Brethren, Genesis 17 .1.

Turn in your Bibles there. Go back to Genesis 17. The Abrahamic covenant. You are children of Abraham and you are partakers of this covenant by faith in Jesus Christ. We are told in Galatians 3. But I want you to see something.

Genesis 17 .1. When Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abraham and said to him, I am God Almighty. Notice this. Walk before Me and be blameless. You see those two words, before Me? Before Me.

Walk before Me. But to do so, you must be blameless. Be blameless. This is the reality of Scripture. Maybe Ephesians 1 .4 is perplexing to some. Is holiness really the first of the spiritual blessings that Paul should have brought out?

I mean, how would you have answered? How are you going to answer that question? If I say, what is the most important spiritual blessing? Well, it's holiness inasmuch as holiness qualifies you. It fits you to stand in the presence.

Because what Scripture tells us is this, God is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. You cannot stand in His presence. And you see, we tend to tone it down. We come across these verses and we say, well, but He wasn't totally perfect.

Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? Well, there's nobody in this world that you can find who absolutely has clean hands and a pure heart. But you see, what God is pointing us to is the standard of perfection.

You come to the New Testament and you are told that. You are told to be holy because He is holy. You are told to be perfect because He is perfect. And you see, when God beholds this people, holy and blameless, standing in His presence, brethren, you have to recognize something.

He's beholding us not as we are short of perfection. He's beholding us as we are in our perfect, pristine, unblemished state. This is where we are moving. And Scripture says it, when you see Christ, then you'll have it.

But, for those that have that hope that when they see Christ and they are as He is, those who have that hope, they purify themselves as He is pure. It's true from the point we were born again until our death, we are in a process.

At our death, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We shall see Him. There's a point of sinlessness. And then there's a point on the last day when our bodies will be raised up and we will be complete human beings again.

Absolutely perfect. And we will see His face. The pure in heart. I know it's true that these things are in process and sometimes Scripture speaks in absolute terminology when it's dealing with the process.

But you have to recognize that ultimately, God sees us as we are. I was thinking about this yesterday. This people who are chosen before the foundation of the world, how God viewed us, perfect, holy, blameless, in Christ, before Him.

He saw us perfect and looking and beholding Him face to face. And I was thinking, remember those days you're living your life. You weren't pursuing that. You weren't even thinking that. In your mind, what did you pursue?

Every one of us pursued maybe different things, but we all pursued the same thing. We pursued what we thought would fulfill us. We pursued what we thought would make us happy. And I'm thinking, God is beholding me perfect in His Son, in His mind.

This has been the plan. This has been the master plan from the moment you were conceived bringing you to this point. There you are. You're chasing that which is empty. You're seeking to spend your money on that which is not bread.

You're giving yourself to that which doesn't satisfy you. Remember, you're chasing the emptiness. Chasing the hollowness. Chasing it. Just chasing it. You remember that? I can still remember thoughts that I had go through my mind when I was lost about the things I wanted.

And we spent our whole life pursuing it. And here's God. He sees us as a chosen people. Do you recognize the face of God is the highest? It's the center. You don't go any more in. No more inside. No closer.

There's nothing better, higher, than the face of God. That's the end all. And here we are doing our stupid little things. Oh, we're thinking to ourselves, oh, if I could only get that, then I'd be happy.

And here's God looking at us totally ravished and satisfied, made pure, made beautiful by Him. That's the reality that we're getting. That's where Paul's taking us to in Ephesians 1 .4. He doesn't want to perplex us.

Brethren, the reality is that those first three chapters of Genesis are no fairy tale. Man lost paradise. Man lost it. He lost the treasure. You look around. Brethren, nobody is out in the garden walking with God.

We lost it. We lost it. But that's if you're chosen. That's where you're headed. Isn't that where you want to be? Face to face. We're not talking something imaginary here. This is not a dream. Face to face.

You recognize. Mike Morrow. Bob Jennings. That's what's happening. The shadow land has passed away. It's gone. We just don't recognize what sin has done. When God says to us, your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God.

Your sins have hidden His face from you. But you see, we love the darkness. We hate the light. It doesn't mean anything. We're at enmity with God, and so the attraction to that in the natural man, it's lost.

It takes God rebirthing us and giving us brains that can begin to behold what's even precious and valuable in this world. We are told evil may not dwell with Him. And so, I can tell you this, that if you're chosen to stand in His presence, you are chosen as objects that are going to receive from God everything that you need to receive from God to make you where you are perfect.

Can you imagine getting to the place where you are absolutely without any fault or blemish? There's nothing wrong. You are absolutely perfect and will be forever. And that's one thing in itself, but what that does is it qualifies you to approach Him.

And there's no more stay back. It's all welcoming. It's all smile. This book is full of frowns and anger and wrath and fire and stay back and lightning and thunder and fear and trembling. But to look at God and it's a smile.

And you're absolutely incapable of ever doing anything ever again to bring the least shadow. You see, if God has chosen you to stand before Him, God has chosen you as an individual that He purposes to rectify every vestige of the fall.

The fall is real, folks. And the fall wrecked us. It wrecked us. And what you have been chosen to is to have every, every last result of that fall removed from you. In fact, so much so that you will be made better than Adam was before the fall.

Because you'll never be capable. He was capable of something that would be displeasing to God. Never will you be capable of that. He has chosen you to completely undo every mark of the fall. And you remember what it says there in 1 John?

1 John 3, verse 8, the purpose of the Son of God. You remember when I preached through this, I called it Christ the Destroyer. This is such interesting imagery. What did Christ come to destroy? The works of the devil.

What are the works of the devil? What He did in causing man to be deceived and to fall. He wrecked it! You recognize? The whole structure of mankind fell. It was wrecked. It was ruined. And what Jesus has come to do is to destroy the works of the devil.