Don't Blame God

Job 1:9-12

The book of Job gives us an inside look at the throne room of God, prior to Jesus’ death at the cross. The first two chapters describe the sons of God and Satan appearing before the Lord, with Satan having just returned from “going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it” (1:7). The Lord asks Satan if he has considered Job, and Satan responds that Job is good because he is blessed, and that if the Lord would attack Job, he would turn on him. Notice that God doesn’t go after Job, but allows Satan to, telling him, “All that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand” (1:12). Later, God will allow Satan to physically harm Job, but not to kill him (2:6).

The Lord did not have to allow the reader to see these events transpire, but He obviously wants you to know that everything that is about to happen to Job will happen as a result of Satan’s attacks. Satan has challenged God’s ability to make a man righteous by faith, as Ezekiel will tell us that Job is (Ezekiel 14:14, 20). The entire book of Job is the playing out of this challenge, and Job passes to perfection, never once doing what Satan said that he would do, which was curse God to His face.

Look at how quickly those men blame God for things that He does not do. When fire falls from the sky and burns up the sheep and the servants of Job, only one man escapes to tell it as, “The fire of God is fallen from heaven” (Job 1:16). Why does he assume that it is the fire of God? Why do insurance companies call tornadoes, hurricanes and earthquakes, “Acts of God”? The scripture clearly shows that God gave Satan all power as it regarded Job (Job 1:12). To this day, a great trick of the enemy is to convince people that the things that he does are actually being done by God.

Job did not see the events of chapters one and two, but he refuses to believe that God is angry with him. His testimony is solid as he identifies the source of these problems, “God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked” (Job 16:11). He knows that it is an attack of Satan, not the righteous retribution of God, stating that these things were, “Not for any injustice in mine hands: also my prayer is pure” (Job 16:17).

The strength of Job’s character is in his faith in the virtue of God, and in a coming redeemer. He knows that he has trusted God, and he believes that God is faithful to that trust, stating, “My witness is in heaven, and my record is on high” (16:19). Then, in a look forward to the New Covenant, he pleads for what you and I have, “O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbor!” (Job 16:21) Saint, you and I have this one to plead for us with God, and His name is Jesus (1 John 2:1).

God rewards this faith by giving Job a glimpse of his soon coming redeemer, and the blessed assurance that Job will meet Jesus in heaven:

“For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God” (Job 19:25, 26).

The believer should have confidence that whatever they are going through shall pass, and that their redeemer is their constant advocate before the Father. He lives, and you shall live with Him!

Read the Whole Thing!

Psalms 91:11-13


Satan tried to use scripture on Jesus when he tempted Him in the wilderness. He took Jesus to a pinnacle of the temple and told Him to jump off because, “It is written, ‘He shall give His angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone” (Matthew 4:6). Jesus quoted scripture in rebuttal to overcome the temptation.

The problem with Satan’s quote is not that it was not accurate, but that it was incomplete. He quoted Psalms 91:11, 12, but he left a little something out. In verse 11, he neglected to finish the verse which says “to keep thee in all thy ways”. Jesus’ ways were the ways of His Father, so to hurl Himself off of the temple would have been a breach of His Father’s way. Satan neglects to mention this, hoping to catch Jesus doing something out of the Father’s will.

That omission would be bad enough, but what Satan fails to quote next seals his fate. Notice that he stops quoting the text at the end of the 12th verse. Read on into verse 13 to see why Satan did not want this verse mentioned:

“Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet” (Psalms 91:13).

Jesus’ promise of victory is found in the very next verse after Satan’s quote! The adversary who roams about “as a roaring lion” (1 Peter 5:8) is “the devil”. He is also the adder, or the serpent of the Garden of Eden. As well, in Revelation 20:2, he is called “the dragon, that old serpent”. God’s promise in Psalms 91 is that the dragon will be trampled underfoot. This speaks to the prophecy that God put forth in the Garden of Eden when He said to the serpent (Satan): “It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise His heel” (Genesis 3:15). The heel of Jesus can only be bruised by the dragon if the foot is trampling him!

The composite whole of Psalms 91 is actually speaking about you and me, the body of Christ. The song begins by telling us that when we dwell in the secret place of the most High, we will be abiding under the shadow of the Almighty (verse 1). We also find that He is our refuge and our fortress (verse 2) and that we have no need to fear the sneak attack or the open attack of the enemy (verse 5). Because He is our protector we can claim with confidence that “A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it will not come nigh thee” (Psalms 91:7).

If the first part of the chapter is for you then so is the last part. Though the text is speaking of Jesus, it is giving us a promise that no matter where our foot may land, our Father has given angels charge to watch over us. The New Testament calls angels, “ministers” (Hebrews 1:7), meaning that God uses them to minister to and for you and me. We must be deeply loved for God to go to such lengths to protect us.

Jesus trampled the enemy so that you might go free. Live in the liberty afforded at the cross, which causes us to fall in love with our Protector all over again.

Hell’s Favorite Verse

Romans 7:9

More than serving as a catchy title, I firmly believe in that statement. Satan knows what the Bible says, though he has no revelation as to what it means. In his knowledge of the Word is an ability to twist and distort scriptures. He did it to Eve in the Garden and he did it again in the wilderness to Jesus. He will do the same to you and I because he is a liar and the father of all liars (John 8:44).

Some verses need no twisting; they simply need removed from context. Take the “text” out of “context” and you are left with “con”, which is exactly where Satan does his finest work. Other verses do not even need that treatment; they can simply be quoted for what they are and within the framework of the information given, Satan can devise a plan.

In Romans 7:9, Paul is talking about the role of the Law in his life. In case you think that he is speaking of some other law than the Mosaic Law, he actually quotes the 10th Commandment in verse 7 and says that sin took occasion (opportunity) by that commandment to work in him all different kinds of lusts. Without the commandment in his life, he found sin to be dead. In other words, the knowledge of the Law actually caused the very thing that the commandment told him not to do, to get stronger. The more he heard, “Don’t lust”, the more he lusted. Thus it is until this day.

Believe you me, Satan has Romans 7:9 memorized. He knows that when the commandment comes, sin will revive and we will die. I am not claiming that he understands it perfectly or that he even cares to, but I guarantee you that every demon in hell knows that if they can use the Law against the believer, they will be able to heap condemnation and guilt upon them. The more that the Law is placed in front of the saint, the more that sin begins to revive and stir within them. If you were the devil, wouldn’t you use this to your advantage?

At the cross, Jesus stripped the Law out of our way and nailed it to His cross. He then pointed at the Law which was nailed to the cross and made fun of the powers of darkness through this triumphant act. That is what Paul is saying when he reminds us that Jesus, “Having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it” (Colossians 2:15). Jesus had removed the one weapon that the enemy had to use against the believer: the Law.

When the pulpit brings emphasis back to the Law, we are weaponizing sin. Have you ever heard of something being “weaponized”? This refers to something being put into a form that it can be used to harm people by. Sin has no authority where there is no law, for without the law, “sin was dead” (Romans 7:8). When we put the Law back up as the standard for people to live by, we weaponize sin, giving it a revival of sorts in our life. Why would we do this? This is lunacy!

Satan works day and night to place believers back under a lifestyle of “do this” and “don’t do that” and he plays cruel tricks with us. When we “do this”, he tells us that we haven’t done enough. When we do what we shouldn’t, he tells us that we are guilty and that we are going to hell. How can we stop this cycle?

Put the Law back where it belongs! Jesus nailed it to the cross and “took it out of the way” (Colossians 2:14). Don’t worry about living right; it is His job to change your heart through the finished work of the cross. Your job is to rest in that finished work and trust Him. Do this and you take the weapon out of the enemy’s hands. Isn’t that what we all want?

Get Behind Me, Satan!

Mark 8:33

Jesus spoke these words to Peter, but he was speaking directly to the devil. Just like the curse against the serpent in Eden, both to the animal and to the devil behind the animal, Jesus speaks to Peter in the flesh, but Satan in the spirit. This is not to insinuate that Peter was demon-possessed, but rather that in this particular moment, he was being influenced of the devil.

Peter had just rebuked Jesus for saying that he was going to die and then rise again. He had no understanding as to the real reason that Jesus was on earth. He was not here to overthrow Rome and restore the Jewish state. He was here, however, to die as the Lamb of God for the sins of the world. The cross was the apex of the mission of Jesus, and Peter rebuking the Lord for saying that He would die was the equivalent of denying the finished work of the cross. It bothered Jesus then, and it bothers Him now!

It was Satan who influenced Peter in this moment, for I believe that Satan was as scared of the cross happening as you and I would be if we knew that we were going to be on it. Many erroneously think that the cross was a victory for Satan, but there is ample evidence to show that he did not understand the import of what was happening at Calvary. Satan no doubt wanted Jesus silenced and stopped, but he also knew that one man would die for the sins of the whole world, and this was most likely that event.

Earlier, at the very beginning of the ministry of Jesus, Satan had offered Jesus the entire world if He would only bow down and worship him (Matthew 4:8,9). Jesus would get the entire world into His hands if He laid His life down on the cross, and He knew it. Certainly Satan must have had an idea of this as well, offering Jesus a chance to have it all without the price of the cross. Why would Satan do this unless he had a good idea about the power of the finished work?

Make no mistake, whether the devil knew what the cross was going to do when it happened or not, he certainly knows what the cross DID. It was the place of his great defeat; the crushing of his skull. When the Bible promised that Satan would bruise the heel of Jesus, it is not insinuating that Satan would have some amount of victory at the cross, for the word for bruise there in Hebrew is “lie in wait for”. Satan could do little more than grab at the heel of Jesus, while Jesus crushed his head on the cross.

Do not think that you are immune from turning your attention away from the power of the finished work just because you have heard it a time or two. There is a need for a constant viewing of Christ’s loveliness if we are to be free in His glorious liberty. Our head needs turned toward Him and His accomplishment, away from our wounds, and onto His. Peter has just declared that Christ was the Son of the living God, and had been commended for receiving this knowledge of the Lord, when he turns right around and rebukes the Lord. In one breath he speaks such beautiful words of our Lords loveliness, and in the next, he is rebuking and being rebuked by the Lord. Be on guard that the finished work stays lovely in your eyes.

Go forth in the righteousness of Christ that defines who you are; careful to keep the beautiful finished work ever more beautiful in your sights.

Mess With the Saint, You Mess With the Savior!

Acts 9:1-5

Saul was “breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord” (Acts 9:1). His mission was to stop this new religion known as “The Way” by taking anyone captive who claimed Jesus as their Savior. This form of intimidation was sponsored by the church but was spawned by Satan to stop the spread of the good news of Jesus Christ.

In choosing Saul to do the dirty work, Satan had went after the most learned of the law teachers in all of Judaism. A Pharisee of Pharisees, Saul was everything that a law-abiding Jew strived through their efforts to be. It is of no little significance that God would choose to bring His message of grace and New Covenant through this one who had trusted in his efforts at keeping the Old Covenant his entire life. By choosing a vessel that was “spotless” in the eyes of the church, God brings credibility to the choice of Paul to be the one to preach pure, radical grace. If the first minister of God’s grace had been one who had sin issues and questionable lifestyle practices, then people would accuse him of preaching grace to cover his failures. This should be noted by us today as we minister and walk in the glorious grace of God.

As Saul (who would later begin to use his Greek name, “Paul”) travelled to Damascus to persecute the early church, he was met by a great light from heaven, which blinded him and stopped his journey. From the midst of the light, he heard the typical greeting of the Father when He speaks tenderly to someone close to His heart, “Saul, Saul” (verse 4). There is nothing as tender to us as the sound of our own name on someone’s lips that loves us. From the Father, it sounds so nice He says it twice! “Samuel, Samuel” (1 Samuel 3:10); “Martha, Martha” (Luke 10:41); “Simon, Simon” (Luke 22:31); “Jerusalem, Jerusalem” (Luke 13:34).

Jesus asks Saul, “Why do you persecute me?”, which must have seemed confusing to Saul, for he did not feel that he was persecuting anyone. Remember, Saul felt that he was doing God’s work in exterminating this new-found faith. Even if he felt that what he was doing was persecution, he surely would not have felt that it was against one individual but rather against the collection of individuals known as “The Way” (later to be referred to as Christians). To be asked, “why do you persecute me?” is to denote that one person is being attacked.

Shocked, Saul asks who is speaking to him, and the reply is, “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest” (Acts 9:5). The persecution that Saul was breathing out was against the Christians, but Jesus claims that it was against Him personally. This humbles Paul and leads to his salvation, for he sees Jesus as the defender of the church and thus personally invested in the lives of His followers.

When Satan attacks a believer, he is essentially attacking Jesus Christ. This is a lost battle for Satan, for he was de-fanged at Calvary, but he continues to roar like a lion anyhow. You and I are no match for Satan on his terms, which will always be performance and works related, so we must rest in the finished work of Christ’s cross to find the victory that Jesus has already won. Allow all attacks by the enemy to lead you back to the resting place in Jesus, for if Satan is coming after you what he should find is Jesus. Praise God!

The Walk of the Believer

Ephesians 4:17-25

Even though the Apostle Paul was a preacher of radical grace, he in no way endorsed sinful lifestyles or failure on the part of believers. He was accused of this sort of doctrine however, as he tells us in Romans 3:8, “…we be slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say, ‘Let us do evil, that good may come’…” However, Paul’s approach towards getting believers to live right was different than what many people then, and just as many now, tend to use. He felt that an introduction of law preaching and teaching into believer’s lives would cause sin to revive in them (Romans 7:9). It is for this cause that when Paul wanted to emphasize a lifestyle problem in his churches, he introduced a different tactic.

Paul maintained that believers were already complete in Christ (Colossians 2:10), but that their minds were lagging behind their hearts. He felt that if a believer thought like a believer, he would live like one, but if he thought like a sinner, then he would see sin take root. He told the church at Ephesus to “walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind” (Ephesians 4:17). Sinners walk according to a mind “void of truth” which is what “vanity” means in Greek. They have their “understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart” (Ephesians 4:18). Again, Paul is showing the saints that in many ways they are acting like sinners through their lifestyles. Now, he appeals to who they truly are:

“But ye have not so learned Christ” (Ephesians 4:20).

With this statement, Paul introduces a three-fold plan for the believer to live right:

1. Put off the old man and the way he lived, which was according to his lusts and desires (verse 22).

2. Renew the way they think, concentrating on who Jesus is in them (verse 23).

3. Put on the righteousness of God which is Jesus Christ (verse 24).

When you do these things, it will lead you to live right which is why the next verses begin to give instruction on not lying, not letting our anger get the best of us, not allowing Satan a foot hold in our life, not stealing, etc. Why doesn’t he just say, “Thou shalt not lie”, or “Thou shalt not steal”? Surely that would be easier, right? That would be Old Covenant preaching, and Paul is better than that. Instead, he appeals to who you are in Christ, and convinces you to change how you think of yourself. When we do this, we put away lying and stealing and everything else because we stop thinking like sinners and start thinking like the sons which we are.

Go in God’s wonderful grace and mercy today, putting off who you used to be by knowing who Jesus has made you to be. Renew your mind on His wonderful finished work. Stop thinking like you thought as a sinner and see your heavenly Father as well pleased with you, His adopted son or daughter.

Captive at Satan's Will

2 Timothy 2:24-26

We have all heard the phrase, “The devil made me do it”. We know that free will is not tampered with, neither by God nor by the enemy, but it is obvious that there are many people doing things that they don’t really want to do. Apostle Paul said, “For I do not understand my own actions – I am baffled, bewildered. I do not practice or accomplish what I wish, but I do the very thing that I loathe (which my moral instinct condemns)” (Romans 7:15, Amplified).

Paul’s struggle was in living victorious over sin and all vice. He wished to walk free from the dominion of the enemy, and his opening to the 8th chapter is the glorious good news that he had been looking for, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). The knowledge that he was not condemned gave him the liberty that he so desired, making him “free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2).

If you and I are free from condemnation from our heavenly Father because of the sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ on the cross, then we should never listen to the voice of condemnation in our life. If He has freed us from condemnation, who else could possibly condemn us? When we dwell in guilt and condemnation, it is either of our own devising, or it has been planted there by the enemy intent on destroying us.

In Paul’s closing lines to young Timothy, he tells him that a preacher must not strive or “argue”; “but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient” (2 Timothy 2:24). This patience is so that we can instruct those who “oppose themselves” (2:25). “Oppose” is not the correct translation here, for the Greek word is “condemn”. Paul is referencing those in the church who condemn themselves. This self-condemnation leads them into the “snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will” (2 Timothy 2:25, 26).

The devil cannot override our will and force us to sin, but according to this statement by Paul he can hold us captive and make us miserable. We give him the right to do so when we condemn ourselves, which ignores the finished work of the cross. When the believer lives in condemnation, they do not cease to be a believer, but they cease to walk in peace and happiness and they are a whipping boy for the whims of the enemy. Oftentimes, we wonder where God is during these moments, even going so far as to ask if He has deserted us. His work is finished, but if we do not accept it as so, we will live in condemnation over our inability to “please God”. Satan swoops in and takes advantage of our ignorance, and as they say, the rest is history.

Accept the gift of no condemnation, just as the woman caught in the act of adultery did in John 8. When Jesus says, “Neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no more”, you have been provided with all of the equipment that you will ever need to live beyond the grip of sin. Silence the voice of condemnation by feasting on the loveliness of Jesus and His love for you. Change your mind about what God thinks about you if you have felt that He was distant and uncaring. Be removed from Satan’s snare and live at peace in your wonderful Savior.

Disarming the Devil

Colossians 2:14-15

For the past several decades there has been talk of nuclear disarmament between nations. This dialogue between rival nations has been to stifle any chance of a nuclear war which would effectively wipe the earth of mankind. When you see the videos of nuclear explosions, it is easy to see why the nations want to rid future wars of these terrible weapons, and common sense says that if you do not possess a certain weapon, there is no opportunity to use it.

Satan has hated mankind from the moment he laid eyes on Adam in the Garden. His objective then was to bring sin into the world through one man’s disobedience, and he succeeded (Romans 5:12). He then fought to stop the Promised Seed from coming by causing multiple rebellions and sins among God’s people, yet Jesus came anyhow, born of a virgin, and fathered by the Holy Spirit. He then lost all of his ability to wage war at the cross when Jesus crushed his head.

You would think that Satan would have conceded defeat when Jesus rolled the stone away from the Garden tomb, but he is still on the prowl, “seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). If we are not aware of the defeat of Satan, we will think that it is still our job to defeat him, and we will turn to our own righteousness to do so. The landscape of the church is littered with the bodies of those who have attempted to overcome the enemy by their religious devices, only to be incinerated by a defeated foe.

When Christ died on the cross, he took the law of Moses, which had inflamed and revived sin within the heart of man for over 1500 years (Romans 5:20; 7:9), and He moved it out of man’s way. The obstacle that had kept man from God was the Law, which was “holy, just and good” (Romans 7:12), though it provided man with no help to become just, holy and good. We know that it was the law that Jesus removed, for Colossians says that he blotted out “the handwriting of ordinances that was against us” (Colossians 2:14). The Law was written by the very hand of God, and it had stood against man for too long.

To remove the law as an obstacle, Jesus nailed it to His cross, thus finalizing its demands and its requirements. He then made a show of the powers of darkness, insulting them with His precious blood by triumphing over them in His victory. This disarmed the devil, taking the one thing away from him that he had been able to use against man for centuries: the law.

Satan is a master of guilt and condemnation. He takes your knowledge of the law and uses it against you, always pointing out to you that you are a failure and condemning you for every act that you do, even the “good” ones. His voice screams at you that you are not doing enough to please God or that you have done too much to ever be any good to heaven. By disarming the devil of the law, God was taking away his leverage. He now has nothing to scream at you, for the law has been fulfilled by Christ.

This is knowledge that Satan has, but do you? If you are not aware that the law has been removed as an obstacle then you will go about every day attempting to do things to please your heavenly Father. Satan will take every available moment to condemn for what you do and do not do. Realize that the law is no hindrance, for Jesus has moved it out of the way. The moment that you see just how finished the finished work is, you will be no slave to condemnation and failure, and Satan will have been de-fanged. Praise God!

Don't Blame God

Job 1:9-12

The book of Job gives us an inside look at the throne room of God, prior to Jesus’ death at the cross. The first two chapters describe the sons of God and Satan appearing before the Lord, with Satan having just returned from “going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it” (1:7). The Lord asks Satan if he has considered Job, and Satan responds that Job is good because he is blessed, and that if the Lord would attack Job, he would turn on him. Notice that God doesn’t go after Job, but allows Satan to, telling him, “All that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand” (1:12). Later, God will allow Satan to physically harm Job, but not to kill him (2:6).

The Lord did not have to allow the reader to see these events transpire, but He obviously wants you to know that everything that is about to happen to Job will happen as a result of Satan’s attacks. Satan has challenged God’s ability to make a man righteous by faith, as Ezekiel will tell us that Job is (Ezekiel 14:14, 20). The entire book of Job is the playing out of this challenge, and Job passes to perfection, never once doing what Satan said that he would do, which was curse God to His face.

Look at how quickly those men blame God for things that He does not do. When fire falls from the sky and burns up the sheep and the servants of Job, only one man escapes to tell it as, “The fire of God is fallen from heaven” (Job 1:16). Why does he assume that it is the fire of God? Why do insurance companies call tornadoes, hurricanes and earthquakes, “Acts of God”? The scripture clearly shows that God gave Satan all power as it regarded Job (Job 1:12). To this day, a great trick of the enemy is to convince people that the things that he does are actually being done by God.

Job did not see the events of chapters one and two, but he refuses to believe that God is angry with him. His testimony is solid as he identifies the source of these problems, “God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked” (Job 16:11). He knows that it is an attack of Satan, not the righteous retribution of God, stating that these things were, “Not for any injustice in mine hands: also my prayer is pure” (Job 16:17).

The strength of Job’s character is in his faith in the virtue of God, and in a coming redeemer. He knows that he has trusted God, and he believes that God is faithful to that trust, stating, “My witness is in heaven, and my record is on high” (16:19). Then, in a look forward to the New Covenant, he pleads for what you and I have, “O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbor!” (Job 16:21) Saint, you and I have this one to plead for us with God, and His name is Jesus (1 John 2:1).

God rewards this faith by giving Job a glimpse of his soon coming redeemer, and the blessed assurance that Job will meet Jesus in heaven:

“For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God” (Job 19:25, 26).

The believer should have confidence that whatever they are going through shall pass, and that their redeemer is their constant advocate before the Father. He lives, and you shall live with Him!

Read the Whole Thing!

Psalms 91:11-13


Satan tried to use scripture on Jesus when he tempted Him in the wilderness. He took Jesus to a pinnacle of the temple and told Him to jump off because, “It is written, ‘He shall give His angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone” (Matthew 4:6). Jesus quoted scripture in rebuttal to overcome the temptation.

The problem with Satan’s quote is not that it was not accurate, but that it was incomplete. He quoted Psalms 91:11, 12, but he left a little something out. In verse 11, he neglected to finish the verse which says “to keep thee in all thy ways”. Jesus’ ways were the ways of His Father, so to hurl Himself off of the temple would have been a breach of His Father’s way. Satan neglects to mention this, hoping to catch Jesus doing something out of the Father’s will.

That omission would be bad enough, but what Satan fails to quote next seals his fate. Notice that he stops quoting the text at the end of the 12th verse. Read on into verse 13 to see why Satan did not want this verse mentioned:

“Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet” (Psalms 91:13).

Jesus’ promise of victory is found in the very next verse after Satan’s quote! The adversary who roams about “as a roaring lion” (1 Peter 5:8) is “the devil”. He is also the adder, or the serpent of the Garden of Eden. As well, in Revelation 20:2, he is called “the dragon, that old serpent”. God’s promise in Psalms 91 is that the dragon will be trampled underfoot. This speaks to the prophecy that God put forth in the Garden of Eden when He said to the serpent (Satan): “It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise His heel” (Genesis 3:15). The heel of Jesus can only be bruised by the dragon if the foot is trampling him!

The composite whole of Psalms 91 is actually speaking about you and me, the body of Christ. The song begins by telling us that when we dwell in the secret place of the most High, we will be abiding under the shadow of the Almighty (verse 1). We also find that He is our refuge and our fortress (verse 2) and that we have no need to fear the sneak attack or the open attack of the enemy (verse 5). Because He is our protector we can claim with confidence that “A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it will not come nigh thee” (Psalms 91:7).

If the first part of the chapter is for you then so is the last part. Though the text is speaking of Jesus, it is giving us a promise that no matter where our foot may land, our Father has given angels charge to watch over us. The New Testament calls angels, “ministers” (Hebrews 1:7), meaning that God uses them to minister to and for you and me. We must be deeply loved for God to go to such lengths to protect us.

Jesus trampled the enemy so that you might go free. Live in the liberty afforded at the cross, which causes us to fall in love with our Protector all over again.

Hell’s Favorite Verse

Romans 7:9

More than serving as a catchy title, I firmly believe in that statement. Satan knows what the Bible says, though he has no revelation as to what it means. In his knowledge of the Word is an ability to twist and distort scriptures. He did it to Eve in the Garden and he did it again in the wilderness to Jesus. He will do the same to you and I because he is a liar and the father of all liars (John 8:44).

Some verses need no twisting; they simply need removed from context. Take the “text” out of “context” and you are left with “con”, which is exactly where Satan does his finest work. Other verses do not even need that treatment; they can simply be quoted for what they are and within the framework of the information given, Satan can devise a plan.

In Romans 7:9, Paul is talking about the role of the Law in his life. In case you think that he is speaking of some other law than the Mosaic Law, he actually quotes the 10th Commandment in verse 7 and says that sin took occasion (opportunity) by that commandment to work in him all different kinds of lusts. Without the commandment in his life, he found sin to be dead. In other words, the knowledge of the Law actually caused the very thing that the commandment told him not to do, to get stronger. The more he heard, “Don’t lust”, the more he lusted. Thus it is until this day.

Believe you me, Satan has Romans 7:9 memorized. He knows that when the commandment comes, sin will revive and we will die. I am not claiming that he understands it perfectly or that he even cares to, but I guarantee you that every demon in hell knows that if they can use the Law against the believer, they will be able to heap condemnation and guilt upon them. The more that the Law is placed in front of the saint, the more that sin begins to revive and stir within them. If you were the devil, wouldn’t you use this to your advantage?

At the cross, Jesus stripped the Law out of our way and nailed it to His cross. He then pointed at the Law which was nailed to the cross and made fun of the powers of darkness through this triumphant act. That is what Paul is saying when he reminds us that Jesus, “Having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it” (Colossians 2:15). Jesus had removed the one weapon that the enemy had to use against the believer: the Law.

When the pulpit brings emphasis back to the Law, we are weaponizing sin. Have you ever heard of something being “weaponized”? This refers to something being put into a form that it can be used to harm people by. Sin has no authority where there is no law, for without the law, “sin was dead” (Romans 7:8). When we put the Law back up as the standard for people to live by, we weaponize sin, giving it a revival of sorts in our life. Why would we do this? This is lunacy!

Satan works day and night to place believers back under a lifestyle of “do this” and “don’t do that” and he plays cruel tricks with us. When we “do this”, he tells us that we haven’t done enough. When we do what we shouldn’t, he tells us that we are guilty and that we are going to hell. How can we stop this cycle?

Put the Law back where it belongs! Jesus nailed it to the cross and “took it out of the way” (Colossians 2:14). Don’t worry about living right; it is His job to change your heart through the finished work of the cross. Your job is to rest in that finished work and trust Him. Do this and you take the weapon out of the enemy’s hands. Isn’t that what we all want?

Get Behind Me, Satan!

Mark 8:33

Jesus spoke these words to Peter, but he was speaking directly to the devil. Just like the curse against the serpent in Eden, both to the animal and to the devil behind the animal, Jesus speaks to Peter in the flesh, but Satan in the spirit. This is not to insinuate that Peter was demon-possessed, but rather that in this particular moment, he was being influenced of the devil.

Peter had just rebuked Jesus for saying that he was going to die and then rise again. He had no understanding as to the real reason that Jesus was on earth. He was not here to overthrow Rome and restore the Jewish state. He was here, however, to die as the Lamb of God for the sins of the world. The cross was the apex of the mission of Jesus, and Peter rebuking the Lord for saying that He would die was the equivalent of denying the finished work of the cross. It bothered Jesus then, and it bothers Him now!

It was Satan who influenced Peter in this moment, for I believe that Satan was as scared of the cross happening as you and I would be if we knew that we were going to be on it. Many erroneously think that the cross was a victory for Satan, but there is ample evidence to show that he did not understand the import of what was happening at Calvary. Satan no doubt wanted Jesus silenced and stopped, but he also knew that one man would die for the sins of the whole world, and this was most likely that event.

Earlier, at the very beginning of the ministry of Jesus, Satan had offered Jesus the entire world if He would only bow down and worship him (Matthew 4:8,9). Jesus would get the entire world into His hands if He laid His life down on the cross, and He knew it. Certainly Satan must have had an idea of this as well, offering Jesus a chance to have it all without the price of the cross. Why would Satan do this unless he had a good idea about the power of the finished work?

Make no mistake, whether the devil knew what the cross was going to do when it happened or not, he certainly knows what the cross DID. It was the place of his great defeat; the crushing of his skull. When the Bible promised that Satan would bruise the heel of Jesus, it is not insinuating that Satan would have some amount of victory at the cross, for the word for bruise there in Hebrew is “lie in wait for”. Satan could do little more than grab at the heel of Jesus, while Jesus crushed his head on the cross.

Do not think that you are immune from turning your attention away from the power of the finished work just because you have heard it a time or two. There is a need for a constant viewing of Christ’s loveliness if we are to be free in His glorious liberty. Our head needs turned toward Him and His accomplishment, away from our wounds, and onto His. Peter has just declared that Christ was the Son of the living God, and had been commended for receiving this knowledge of the Lord, when he turns right around and rebukes the Lord. In one breath he speaks such beautiful words of our Lords loveliness, and in the next, he is rebuking and being rebuked by the Lord. Be on guard that the finished work stays lovely in your eyes.

Go forth in the righteousness of Christ that defines who you are; careful to keep the beautiful finished work ever more beautiful in your sights.

Mess With the Saint, You Mess With the Savior!

Acts 9:1-5

Saul was “breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord” (Acts 9:1). His mission was to stop this new religion known as “The Way” by taking anyone captive who claimed Jesus as their Savior. This form of intimidation was sponsored by the church but was spawned by Satan to stop the spread of the good news of Jesus Christ.

In choosing Saul to do the dirty work, Satan had went after the most learned of the law teachers in all of Judaism. A Pharisee of Pharisees, Saul was everything that a law-abiding Jew strived through their efforts to be. It is of no little significance that God would choose to bring His message of grace and New Covenant through this one who had trusted in his efforts at keeping the Old Covenant his entire life. By choosing a vessel that was “spotless” in the eyes of the church, God brings credibility to the choice of Paul to be the one to preach pure, radical grace. If the first minister of God’s grace had been one who had sin issues and questionable lifestyle practices, then people would accuse him of preaching grace to cover his failures. This should be noted by us today as we minister and walk in the glorious grace of God.

As Saul (who would later begin to use his Greek name, “Paul”) travelled to Damascus to persecute the early church, he was met by a great light from heaven, which blinded him and stopped his journey. From the midst of the light, he heard the typical greeting of the Father when He speaks tenderly to someone close to His heart, “Saul, Saul” (verse 4). There is nothing as tender to us as the sound of our own name on someone’s lips that loves us. From the Father, it sounds so nice He says it twice! “Samuel, Samuel” (1 Samuel 3:10); “Martha, Martha” (Luke 10:41); “Simon, Simon” (Luke 22:31); “Jerusalem, Jerusalem” (Luke 13:34).

Jesus asks Saul, “Why do you persecute me?”, which must have seemed confusing to Saul, for he did not feel that he was persecuting anyone. Remember, Saul felt that he was doing God’s work in exterminating this new-found faith. Even if he felt that what he was doing was persecution, he surely would not have felt that it was against one individual but rather against the collection of individuals known as “The Way” (later to be referred to as Christians). To be asked, “why do you persecute me?” is to denote that one person is being attacked.

Shocked, Saul asks who is speaking to him, and the reply is, “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest” (Acts 9:5). The persecution that Saul was breathing out was against the Christians, but Jesus claims that it was against Him personally. This humbles Paul and leads to his salvation, for he sees Jesus as the defender of the church and thus personally invested in the lives of His followers.

When Satan attacks a believer, he is essentially attacking Jesus Christ. This is a lost battle for Satan, for he was de-fanged at Calvary, but he continues to roar like a lion anyhow. You and I are no match for Satan on his terms, which will always be performance and works related, so we must rest in the finished work of Christ’s cross to find the victory that Jesus has already won. Allow all attacks by the enemy to lead you back to the resting place in Jesus, for if Satan is coming after you what he should find is Jesus. Praise God!

The Walk of the Believer

Ephesians 4:17-25

Even though the Apostle Paul was a preacher of radical grace, he in no way endorsed sinful lifestyles or failure on the part of believers. He was accused of this sort of doctrine however, as he tells us in Romans 3:8, “…we be slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say, ‘Let us do evil, that good may come’…” However, Paul’s approach towards getting believers to live right was different than what many people then, and just as many now, tend to use. He felt that an introduction of law preaching and teaching into believer’s lives would cause sin to revive in them (Romans 7:9). It is for this cause that when Paul wanted to emphasize a lifestyle problem in his churches, he introduced a different tactic.

Paul maintained that believers were already complete in Christ (Colossians 2:10), but that their minds were lagging behind their hearts. He felt that if a believer thought like a believer, he would live like one, but if he thought like a sinner, then he would see sin take root. He told the church at Ephesus to “walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind” (Ephesians 4:17). Sinners walk according to a mind “void of truth” which is what “vanity” means in Greek. They have their “understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart” (Ephesians 4:18). Again, Paul is showing the saints that in many ways they are acting like sinners through their lifestyles. Now, he appeals to who they truly are:

“But ye have not so learned Christ” (Ephesians 4:20).

With this statement, Paul introduces a three-fold plan for the believer to live right:

1. Put off the old man and the way he lived, which was according to his lusts and desires (verse 22).

2. Renew the way they think, concentrating on who Jesus is in them (verse 23).

3. Put on the righteousness of God which is Jesus Christ (verse 24).

When you do these things, it will lead you to live right which is why the next verses begin to give instruction on not lying, not letting our anger get the best of us, not allowing Satan a foot hold in our life, not stealing, etc. Why doesn’t he just say, “Thou shalt not lie”, or “Thou shalt not steal”? Surely that would be easier, right? That would be Old Covenant preaching, and Paul is better than that. Instead, he appeals to who you are in Christ, and convinces you to change how you think of yourself. When we do this, we put away lying and stealing and everything else because we stop thinking like sinners and start thinking like the sons which we are.

Go in God’s wonderful grace and mercy today, putting off who you used to be by knowing who Jesus has made you to be. Renew your mind on His wonderful finished work. Stop thinking like you thought as a sinner and see your heavenly Father as well pleased with you, His adopted son or daughter.

Captive at Satan's Will

2 Timothy 2:24-26

We have all heard the phrase, “The devil made me do it”. We know that free will is not tampered with, neither by God nor by the enemy, but it is obvious that there are many people doing things that they don’t really want to do. Apostle Paul said, “For I do not understand my own actions – I am baffled, bewildered. I do not practice or accomplish what I wish, but I do the very thing that I loathe (which my moral instinct condemns)” (Romans 7:15, Amplified).

Paul’s struggle was in living victorious over sin and all vice. He wished to walk free from the dominion of the enemy, and his opening to the 8th chapter is the glorious good news that he had been looking for, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). The knowledge that he was not condemned gave him the liberty that he so desired, making him “free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2).

If you and I are free from condemnation from our heavenly Father because of the sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ on the cross, then we should never listen to the voice of condemnation in our life. If He has freed us from condemnation, who else could possibly condemn us? When we dwell in guilt and condemnation, it is either of our own devising, or it has been planted there by the enemy intent on destroying us.

In Paul’s closing lines to young Timothy, he tells him that a preacher must not strive or “argue”; “but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient” (2 Timothy 2:24). This patience is so that we can instruct those who “oppose themselves” (2:25). “Oppose” is not the correct translation here, for the Greek word is “condemn”. Paul is referencing those in the church who condemn themselves. This self-condemnation leads them into the “snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will” (2 Timothy 2:25, 26).

The devil cannot override our will and force us to sin, but according to this statement by Paul he can hold us captive and make us miserable. We give him the right to do so when we condemn ourselves, which ignores the finished work of the cross. When the believer lives in condemnation, they do not cease to be a believer, but they cease to walk in peace and happiness and they are a whipping boy for the whims of the enemy. Oftentimes, we wonder where God is during these moments, even going so far as to ask if He has deserted us. His work is finished, but if we do not accept it as so, we will live in condemnation over our inability to “please God”. Satan swoops in and takes advantage of our ignorance, and as they say, the rest is history.

Accept the gift of no condemnation, just as the woman caught in the act of adultery did in John 8. When Jesus says, “Neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no more”, you have been provided with all of the equipment that you will ever need to live beyond the grip of sin. Silence the voice of condemnation by feasting on the loveliness of Jesus and His love for you. Change your mind about what God thinks about you if you have felt that He was distant and uncaring. Be removed from Satan’s snare and live at peace in your wonderful Savior.

Disarming the Devil

Colossians 2:14-15

For the past several decades there has been talk of nuclear disarmament between nations. This dialogue between rival nations has been to stifle any chance of a nuclear war which would effectively wipe the earth of mankind. When you see the videos of nuclear explosions, it is easy to see why the nations want to rid future wars of these terrible weapons, and common sense says that if you do not possess a certain weapon, there is no opportunity to use it.

Satan has hated mankind from the moment he laid eyes on Adam in the Garden. His objective then was to bring sin into the world through one man’s disobedience, and he succeeded (Romans 5:12). He then fought to stop the Promised Seed from coming by causing multiple rebellions and sins among God’s people, yet Jesus came anyhow, born of a virgin, and fathered by the Holy Spirit. He then lost all of his ability to wage war at the cross when Jesus crushed his head.

You would think that Satan would have conceded defeat when Jesus rolled the stone away from the Garden tomb, but he is still on the prowl, “seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). If we are not aware of the defeat of Satan, we will think that it is still our job to defeat him, and we will turn to our own righteousness to do so. The landscape of the church is littered with the bodies of those who have attempted to overcome the enemy by their religious devices, only to be incinerated by a defeated foe.

When Christ died on the cross, he took the law of Moses, which had inflamed and revived sin within the heart of man for over 1500 years (Romans 5:20; 7:9), and He moved it out of man’s way. The obstacle that had kept man from God was the Law, which was “holy, just and good” (Romans 7:12), though it provided man with no help to become just, holy and good. We know that it was the law that Jesus removed, for Colossians says that he blotted out “the handwriting of ordinances that was against us” (Colossians 2:14). The Law was written by the very hand of God, and it had stood against man for too long.

To remove the law as an obstacle, Jesus nailed it to His cross, thus finalizing its demands and its requirements. He then made a show of the powers of darkness, insulting them with His precious blood by triumphing over them in His victory. This disarmed the devil, taking the one thing away from him that he had been able to use against man for centuries: the law.

Satan is a master of guilt and condemnation. He takes your knowledge of the law and uses it against you, always pointing out to you that you are a failure and condemning you for every act that you do, even the “good” ones. His voice screams at you that you are not doing enough to please God or that you have done too much to ever be any good to heaven. By disarming the devil of the law, God was taking away his leverage. He now has nothing to scream at you, for the law has been fulfilled by Christ.

This is knowledge that Satan has, but do you? If you are not aware that the law has been removed as an obstacle then you will go about every day attempting to do things to please your heavenly Father. Satan will take every available moment to condemn for what you do and do not do. Realize that the law is no hindrance, for Jesus has moved it out of the way. The moment that you see just how finished the finished work is, you will be no slave to condemnation and failure, and Satan will have been de-fanged. Praise God!

Don't Blame God

Job 1:9-12

The book of Job gives us an inside look at the throne room of God, prior to Jesus’ death at the cross. The first two chapters describe the sons of God and Satan appearing before the Lord, with Satan having just returned from “going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it” (1:7). The Lord asks Satan if he has considered Job, and Satan responds that Job is good because he is blessed, and that if the Lord would attack Job, he would turn on him. Notice that God doesn’t go after Job, but allows Satan to, telling him, “All that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand” (1:12). Later, God will allow Satan to physically harm Job, but not to kill him (2:6).

The Lord did not have to allow the reader to see these events transpire, but He obviously wants you to know that everything that is about to happen to Job will happen as a result of Satan’s attacks. Satan has challenged God’s ability to make a man righteous by faith, as Ezekiel will tell us that Job is (Ezekiel 14:14, 20). The entire book of Job is the playing out of this challenge, and Job passes to perfection, never once doing what Satan said that he would do, which was curse God to His face.

Look at how quickly those men blame God for things that He does not do. When fire falls from the sky and burns up the sheep and the servants of Job, only one man escapes to tell it as, “The fire of God is fallen from heaven” (Job 1:16). Why does he assume that it is the fire of God? Why do insurance companies call tornadoes, hurricanes and earthquakes, “Acts of God”? The scripture clearly shows that God gave Satan all power as it regarded Job (Job 1:12). To this day, a great trick of the enemy is to convince people that the things that he does are actually being done by God.

Job did not see the events of chapters one and two, but he refuses to believe that God is angry with him. His testimony is solid as he identifies the source of these problems, “God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked” (Job 16:11). He knows that it is an attack of Satan, not the righteous retribution of God, stating that these things were, “Not for any injustice in mine hands: also my prayer is pure” (Job 16:17).

The strength of Job’s character is in his faith in the virtue of God, and in a coming redeemer. He knows that he has trusted God, and he believes that God is faithful to that trust, stating, “My witness is in heaven, and my record is on high” (16:19). Then, in a look forward to the New Covenant, he pleads for what you and I have, “O that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbor!” (Job 16:21) Saint, you and I have this one to plead for us with God, and His name is Jesus (1 John 2:1).

God rewards this faith by giving Job a glimpse of his soon coming redeemer, and the blessed assurance that Job will meet Jesus in heaven:

“For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God” (Job 19:25, 26).

The believer should have confidence that whatever they are going through shall pass, and that their redeemer is their constant advocate before the Father. He lives, and you shall live with Him!