“But do remember, the only thing that matters is the extent to which you separate the man from the Enemy. It does not matter how small the sins are provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into the Nothing.”
This is the ultimate goal of the Devil. And yet God’s ultimate purpose and desire is to have a personal and intimate relationship with men. These two agendas are opposed in every way. Where God’s plan is relationship, the Devil’s goal is isolation and discontentment; where God is truth, Satan is lies; where God is perfect goodness, the Devil is perfect evil. Yet it is not always the type of blatant evil we so often imagine.
What I find most insightful, as well as most disturbing, is that “the safest road to hell is the gradual one.” What is so dangerous about Satan’s lies is that they become believable when we are not wearing the armor of God. Lies begin small and seemingly “harmless.” We can give in to one small lie, compromise one small thing, and live our way just once, because it will have no eternal consequence or impact. This is how we are persuaded to think. What I find most disturbing is that Satan is at his best when he eats away at our hearts and spirits’, yet has us convinced that we are “good Christians” because of our outside actions. He may not attack our outside actions until he has our hearts and minds perfectly convinced of a lie. Only then will he move on to influencing our actions. Our actions are always preceded by a thought. This is why the mind is so powerful. And that is why Scriptures gives us this command:
“Demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” -2 Cor. 10:5
In the face of such lies, we must always be aware of the roaring lion seeking to destroy us. But we do not live in fear, because we live in the victory of Christ:
“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” -James 4:7
If we resist these lies at their roots and discern even the smallest lie, we will cease to become Satan’s prey. He will quickly give up on those constantly seeking truth and turn his attention to those who are willing to receive his small seeds of sin.
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Wow, the scripture that you quote here is very profound, and definitely useful in resisting Satan's schemes. It is so important that we follow the example that Jesus set for us and use scripture to combat temptation. I think one thing that makes the Devil even trickier is that he is not very obvious in the opposites that you describe. Even though he is the opposite of truth, he knows how to make lies look like truth. Even though he is the opposite of light, he knows how to make the darkness look like light. And that is why we are so easily pulled down the slippery slope.
ReplyDeleteI love the quote from James you added in, this puts succinctly what we must do to resist the lies and tricks of Satan.
ReplyDeleteIt is certainly very scary that the smallest sins are the ones which ultimately cause us the hardest fall from grace in the end. We must pray without ceasing that we will be given the discernment to recognize even the "smallest lie".