Resist the Devil by Mario Digangi - Part 2 — Mariano Di Gangi

Peter’s Failure and the Call to Vigilance

Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith. Because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

Now remember who it is that is telling us this. And who is it? Peter, of course. And what is there in Peter's background that makes this something to be underlined? In the 14th chapter of the Gospel according to Mark, and remember behind Mark the author there stands the strong personality of Peter who is dictating his reminiscences of his life with Jesus.

In the Gospel of Mark, remembering that it's dictated to Mark by Peter for the most part, the words of Jesus are recorded. Watch as you enter into temptation. Before the 14th chapter of Mark is over, we have that shameful episode.

Into temptation and denied his Lord not only once, but again and again. It's out of that kind of experience Peter now tells other Christians be self-controlled. Keep a firm grip on yourself. Have the eyes of your understanding wide open to the risks and the dangers in a non-Christian world.

I failed to watch. I failed to pray. I fell into temptation and denied my Lord, and now out of that bitter experience I am telling you, be self-controlled beyond the alert because your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

So the exhortation of Peter is not some abstract advice. It comes out of his own personal experience. He encourages us to do what he failed to do. He experienced heartbreaking. So he says be self-controlled.

Keep a firm grip on yourself and be alert. Have the eyes of your understanding wide open to the dangers that you face in a non-Christian world. Remember that the enemy who sometimes masquerades as an angel of light also prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

The Devil’s Tactics: Doubt and Heresy

Resist him. Resist him standing firm in the faith. Now what does the devil... Let me suggest that according to the scriptures there are several things that he does and does with a great deal of expertise.

First, he loves to insinuate doubt. Is that the way that he approached Lady Eve? Has God really said that something terrible will happen to you if you disobey? In other words, doubt what God said. That is where it always begins.

Doubt concerning what God has revealed in his Word. To insinuate doubt in the mind is the beginning of the driving of the wedge to separate us from God. Then there is the spread of heresy. You begin by denying or doubting the authority of the Bible and then you begin to be fascinated by weird ideas and deviations from sound doctrine.

Discord and the Displacement of Jesus

The devil is to sow discord. For he knows that if Christians remain together they can encourage one another in fighting the enemy. But if he can divide, he can more easily... Divisions in churches among those who claim to believe in the same Lord, those divisions are works of the devil.

He not only insinuates doubt and encourages deviation from sound doctrine, but he sows the tares of discord among the weak in the field of God. If there is anything that the devil loves to do more than all of these, it is to displace the centrality of...

If he can get the eyes of our faith off of Jesus and onto something else, he's already three quarters of the way onto victory. No man save Jesus. Keep the eyes of faith fixed on him as the way to resist the devil.

Standing Firm in God’s Promises and Person

Notice that Peter says that we stand firm and we resist the devil in... What does that mean? It means that when the enemy would insinuate doubt, we keep on believing the promises of God. We keep on taking seriously the commands and the warnings of God ...bound to him by faith in his promises, in his precepts, and in his person.

This is, of course, the statement of Jesus to Peter, who was advising him that there might be a way to glory without going the route of the cross, and our Lord would have nothing at all to do with a deviation from his Father's will.

So, we can resist the devil, according to Peter, if we have our eyes wide open to the dangers that we face, if we are onto the devices of the devil. As Paul puts it, we are not ignorant of his devices, of his mode of operation, of his tactics and his strategies.

...from sound doctrine. We will be on to him when he seeks to sow discord among brothers and sisters.