Satan’s Strategy for Your Life #12: Destroy You!

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”—John 10:10

The film director, M. Night Shyalaman, recently released the horror film simply called, “Devil.” The film centers on five random strangers stranded in an elevator, one of which is the actual and literal devil that begins to merit out judgment on the other passengers one by one. The film is fiction, and while the devil is portrayed as horrifically evil, the real devil is far worse.

The devil is the most evil being imaginable. Satan will do anything to hinder, disrupt, destroy, or sabotage the work of God and he will devour anyone that will come his way. He wants to destroy you. Yes, you. He wants to destroy your faith, family, career, and anything else that he can get his hands on.

He will do everything in his power to distract you from God and the life that God has planned for you. He will attempt to blind you to the truth of Christ. He may physically attack you. The devil will sidetrack you by making other things look more pressing or more important. He will keep you from prayer, worship, church attendance, evangelism, and reading the Word. He may even try to convince you that he doesn’t exist. He will try and get you to follow cleverly devised philosophies, and versions of the faith that are just giant lies. He gets into colleges and universities by making Christianity sound ridiculous, crude, and extreme. He gets into governments, institutions, towns, and countries. He will make sin look normal and righteousness look strange. He will attempt to distort the Word of God, and he will try and bring confusion and conflict into the church. He will threaten to get a hold of your children, and kill your spouse.

Satan will attempt to slander you, terrify you, and intimidate you. He is so underhanded that he might even try to bless you—yes, bless you. But his blessing is a distraction because he wants to use the gifts to turn you away from the true Giver. Satan wants you to have the American dream because he knows that the American dream can kill faith. If Satan can make you wealthy so that you won’t think about your need for Christ, then he will help make you wealthy. Satan wants you to think the world is a playground, but God wants you to understand that this world is a battleground.

There is no shortage of plans and schemes at his disposal. There is no plan too horrible or evil that he will not try and implement. Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil. And by His death and resurrection He defeated Satan forever. We just wait until that day when His rule will be actualized. We must be on guard against the lies of the devil by being in the Word of God, filling ourselves with the things of the Spirit and continually living a crucified life. A crucified life is a continually surrendered life whereby we die to our flesh and the things of this world (Galatians 2:20).

Are we living a crucified life? Am I surrendered to the Lord? Or am I being duped by the devil? Ask God to show you Himself through His Word and He will show you if you are surrendered or if you have been duped. Ask it and He will answer. Amen.

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