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Plainly Speaking
with Karl J. Forehand
Satan’s
Last Meal
by Karl J. Forehand
Satan is not a red guy with a pitch fork. We understand that he might have be
beautiful and have been the director of music before the fall. He was one of the angels that wanted to
take God’s place.
You have probably seen someone being executed
that got the privilege of a last meal.
This week, we will look at Satan’s last meal in the 20th
chapter of Revelation.
And I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key of the abyss
and a great chain in his hand. And he
laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who is the devil and Satan, and
bound him for a thousand years, and
threw him into the abyss, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he
should not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were
completed; after these things he must be released for a short time. (Rev.
20:1-3)
And when the thousand years
are completed, Satan will be released from his prison, and will come out to deceive the nations
which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them
together for the war; the number of them is like the sand of the
seashore. And they came up on the
broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved
city, and fire came down from heaven and devoured them. And the devil who deceived them was thrown
into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet
are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever. (Rev. 20:7-10)
If we have an enemy, I
believe it is important to know the character of our enemy.
1.
Satan is a Deceiver
Satan really has no power
that you don’t give him. He can’t
make you do anything. You have to
open the door. So, he resorts to
deception and tells us things like:
“A little won’t hurt”
“God just doesn’t want you to have any fun.”
“You are the master of your destiny”
“Truth is what YOU think”
Satan deceives us into
dissolving our potent Christian walk by confusing us. The message of the Bible and the Gospel is
really very simple. It is not hard to
understand – it is hard to obey. So,
Satan deceives us – muddies the water – tempts us to destroy our
testimony. If you are a believer,
he can’t take your salvation away; but he can deceive you into living a
mediocre, inconsistent, confused, life.
He can’t rob your eternal life; but he can make you into a miserable
testimony (which keeps others out of heaven).
He’s pretty good at – watch
for him.
2.
Satan is a bully
In this passage, it says that Satan
began to try to surround the armies of God.
It is very similar to how he works in our lives. How does he surround us.
·
He gets a
multitude of people to say the same thing.
That’s how politicians work through the media. But, it also applies to personal lives –
if enough people say the same thing we tend to believe it.
·
He
convinces people to water down the truth when people say things like, “There
are many ways to get to heaven, etc.”
·
He tries
to puff us up by telling us we can believe what we want – planting the idea
that we know more than God. Often a
bully will give you a fat head to set you up for the fat lip.
In God’s economy, many times we must stand
alone. Often, we will be outnumbered
and feel bullied by Satan. We can’t
let him win by giving in to the pressure. We have to realize that we may be physically small or unpopular;
but we do not have to be a weak Christian.
That is a choice we make.
3. Satan is a loser
Satan knows that although he wins some
battles, he will ultimately lose the “war.”
He only has the power that we give him. He is going to lose and he knows it. He never had the power and the position that He wanted. What he wants is to do as much destruction
as possible.
We know, in the end, that he
loses. We know that he deceives us
and bullies us; yet we take comfort that he will be ultimately defeated – he
will lose the war. But, what about
the daily battles I have to fight?
I’m glad you asked. James
tells us:
Submit
therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to
God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify
your hearts, you double-minded. Be miserable and mourn and weep; let your
laughter be turned into mourning, and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in
the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you. (James 4:7-10)
1.
Resist the Devil
I don’t know how you picture this in your mind,
but I picture the “stiff arm.” I was
a blocking fullback in football. Many
of the people that tried to tackle me were bigger than me. I couldn’t take them head on, so many
times I got by them with the old stiff arm.
Literally we have to stiff arm (not strong arm) the Devil daily. To apply the stiff arm, you have to be
aware that he is coming. You also
have to keep your feet under you.
Although you are deflecting his blow, you still absorb some of the
energy. The last thing you must do is
to get on down the road. You have to
keep moving. If you relish the
victory too long, he may get up and tackle you.
The
promise, in this verse, is that he will flee from you. He gives up easy. He may be back tomorrow; but resist him
today and he will flee from you.
There are several choices.
1. Try to fight him. Did you know that the Bible never tells us
to “clank swords” with the Devil?
Why? Because he is powerful –
it’s not our battle to fight. 2. We could get paralyzed with fear; but we
have no reason to fear, if God is on our side. 3. We can avoid and
resist him – this is the Biblical solution.
2.
Draw Near to God
Did you know that God is not that far from you? Even if you are deeply fallen in sin; God
is not that far away. He is waiting
for you to draw near. If you don’t
have a relationship with Him, he stands and knocks. If you do, He is waiting for you to repent and confess your
sins. He WILL draw near to you. Acts 17:27 says that He is “not far from
each of us.”
How does this help us fight Satan? I have a few ideas:
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Satan can’t stand the pure Word of God
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Satan can’t withstand the Power of God
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Satan can’t understand the Will of God
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Satan can’t stand long in the Presence of God
When you draw near to God, you drive Satan away.
3.
Humble Yourself
God works in a specific
way. When we lift ourselves up, He
always humbles us. When we humble
ourselves, He lifts us up. He always does
that – it is His nature. When we
approach God in pride, we are doing just what Satan did. God doesn’t want you to get bright enough
to tell Him what to do. He wants you
to get bright enough to obey. I think
the biggest need of the church worldwide is for humility. Although God is not limited, I think we
limit Him. I would suggest the most
vigorous work being done in most churches is the humbling of the saints. We get prideful and God humbles us – we
get mad at Him for that – sometimes we’re sorry – sometimes we get more
knowledge and get more prideful --- and on and on it goes.
Why don’t we take the initiative and get humble. We must resist the Devil, we must draw
near to God, but we also must get humble.
Karl J. Forehand
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