Sunday, April 22, 2012

Battle Lies With God’s Word

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden?’” -- Genesis 3:1

The serpent didn’t tempt Eve blatantly. He didn’t urge her to disobey God. In fact, his statement had a measure of truth. God said Adam and Eve could eat from all the trees in the garden -- except one.

The serpent explained that God didn’t want Eve to eat from the tree because her eyes would be opened and she would be like God, knowing good and evil. We see the roots of wanting what we’re told we can’t have. We still haven’t learned that God does know best.

Instead, we’ve allowed Satan to subtly enter our minds. We doubt God’s promises. We doubt that God will take care of us. We doubt that God loves us always. We doubt that we are enough for God.

Maybe if Satan’s lies were blatant we wouldn’t be so apt to be mislead. We can deny so many charges. Most of us are decent people trying to live good lives. But negative comments have a way of lodging themselves in our minds, resurfacing when we are at our weakest. We believe Satan’s lies rather than God’s truth.

How do we fight it? God’s Word. Learn to quote Scripture back at Satan. Jesus modeled this for us when He spent 40 days and nights in the desert being tempted by Satan. Matthew tells us that Jesus quoted God’s Word back to Satan, refusing to give in to Satan’s schemes.

We can do the same thing. When Satan tells us we aren’t good enough, we can remind him and us that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. (Psalm 139:14) When Satan tells us that we are in over our heads, not pretty enough, not smart enough, or any other lie, we can remind him and ourselves that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. (Philippians 4:13)

We aren’t likely to ever conquer insecurity. It’s one of those battles we’ll always fight because we’ll continue to look around us, comparing ourselves to others, and looking down on who we are. But we can refuse to give Satan a foothold. We can battle his every attack with God’s Word.