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Monday, June 22, 2009

Is the devil rocking your cradle?

I think as Christians, we don’t give satan enough credit sometimes. His agenda is to:

1. hide the gospel message
2. hinder the gospel messenger
3. halt the gospel movement.

Sad thing is, that we just sit back and let this happen. We have to understand that satan’s desire is to keep us in the dark. To keep us lost. To keep us blinded to the Truth.

Unfortunately he doesn’t have to scour too much for the things he has collected in his arsenal. We pretty much give him plenty of ammunition to fight with and use against us.

The devil is very clever and has plenty of helpers in the world willing to join forces with him. He can wiggle his slimy little self into our lives so quickly and so effortlessly. We have to be in constant awareness of him and we have to remain on high alert at all times.

I think we have to be careful not to dismiss him too fast. A lot of Christians think that satan can’t touch them because they are children of God. This just isn’t the case. We have to remember that there are many ways the devil can cause harm to us without ever laying a hand physically on us.

His name literally means, “slanderer” or “false accuser”. He indeed has great power. He has so much strength that even Michael the archangel viewed him as too powerful to oppose in Jude 9.

The devil has worldly influence, uses his evil powers constantly, has many demonic helpers in the world and is highly intelligent. He is clever and about as deceptive as they come.

But… Praise God, even with all those attributes, he has limits! The devils power is restricted by Almighty God. Only God has the power to give life and the power to take it away. God is the one who has provided us Victory over sin. God is the one who gives us the strength to overcome temptation. God is the one who provided a way when there was no other way. God is the one who sits on the Throne.

That doesn’t mean we can let our guard down. We have to be ever watchful for the devils schemes. We have to arm ourselves with the weapons that God has provided for us.

God’s Word is our sword and we have to hold it tight. We have to hide its words in our heart. We have to cherish it. We have to memorize the scripture in it. We need to protect it. We need to be spreading the gospel message of it. We need to emerge from the state we have been lulled into and we need to wake up!

Don’t let the devil rock our cradle and keep us asleep.

Father God, thank you for who you are and thank you for your majesty, power and love. Help us daily to arm ourselves with the Truth of your Word and to stand ready to fight those who oppose us. Help us to keep you first in our lives. Help us to give you praise and honor and to glorify you in all we do and say. Thank you for sending your Son, Jesus, so that we could experience forgiveness of sins, accept your free gift of salvation and receive the gift of eternal life.


Beth

9 comments:

Elizabeth said...

Great reminder! We need to always be careful that we are not letting Satan have a foothold. I'm working on that, by focusing on Philippians 4:8. I've written about it on my homeschool blog, wwwlivelearnorganize.blogspot.com
Have a blessed day!

Beth in NC said...

Amen!!!! So many people don't realize how active satan really is in this world.

There is a reason God provided weapons and armor for us. We are in a battle -- and you're right, WE NEED TO BE AWAKE and ALERT.

Bless you!
Beth

Unknown said...

I think you're right, one of the devils greatest schemes is to lure us to sleep, into apathetic lukewarmness. Awake oh sleeper! BTW, I have tagged you! Please visit my blog if you're inclined to write 6 things you love, that others may find boring. I just did, it was kind of fun! robinsnewsong@blogspot.com

Alleluiabelle said...

Dearest Beth,

What a mighty post again today. Oh he is a slippery, slimey one and you are so right when you said, "Don’t let the devil rock our cradle and keep us asleep." We have to be alert at all times and be armed with our weapons, especially with His Word! This is an excellent post for everyone to read.

Thank you for this today. When I'm feeling vulnerable, I'm always casting him out in the name of Jesus.

I have an award for you at my site. If you feel led to pick it up, please do.

Love and Hugs,
Alleluiabelle

Dontmissyoursunsetlady said...

You and your truthfilled post bless my socks off!! I needed to read this! Thanks Beth!

Lisa said...

I praise God that the enemy has been defeated. We must stand ready to do battle, but God will fight for us! The victory is His. Now is not the time to be caught sleeping.
Blessings ~ Lisa

Beth E. said...

You speak the truth, Beth! The enemy also knows our weaknesses, and will attack us through the weak areas in our lives. I totally agree with Beth in NC, too...we do need to stay awake and alert!

Blessings,
Beth E.

TRUTH SHARER said...

What a great and much needed post, Beth.
I never capitalize his name because he does not deserve than much recognition!

* [s]atan usually sneaks in the back door, unannounced!

* he's always after God's glory.

* he want's the worship that only God deserves.

* he'll stop at nothing to get his way.

* his best tool is 'distraction'

* his best line of fire [his lie] is to tell us that God is withholding something from us - usually gets us every time.

But God's truth says otherwise:
Psalm 84:11
For the LORD God is a sun and shield;
the LORD bestows favor and honor;
NO GOOD THING DOES HE WITHHOLD
from those whose walk is blameless [UPRIGHT].

When satan throws his lies in your face and in our ears - we must speak the TRUTH back to him. We can only replace his lies with God's TRUTH.

I'm glad that God only allows him access to go so far. May we seek to pop his ballon of pride [which was his own downfall].

Glory to God that in Christ we already have the VICTORY!!!

Choosing JOY,
Stephanie
[JESUS - the One I Worship]

elaine @ peace for the journey said...

Just this morning (while sitting amidst the glorious wonder of God's mountains in Gatlinburg) I was reminded about just how far the enemy works to thwart the Gospel of Jesus Christ. So often, we brush his schemes aside, assuming we can handle it on our own ... that things are going OK, so we forget to battle up for the road ahead.

I've been needing to work on an upcoming talk I'll be giving next week but have pushed it aside until this morning. Going into it, I had some ideas, but before I started writing, God challenged me to really fortify myself through intentional prayer that focused on keeping the "enemy" out of the process.

It worked. God is rocking my cradle this morning, not the enemy. Thanks be to God for his marvelous grace and invasion within my heart!

So good to hear about your daughter being in Bolivia. I know that she and my son would have tons to talk about. Does she facebook at all? Maybe would connect them via that route.

You could talk to her about it, and let me know if she's up for that. No pressure. Shoot me an email if you want.

peace~elaine