TOOLS OF THE DEVIL
“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Pet. 5:8). We know his goal! Defeat and devour! We also know his tactics. “Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices” (2 Cor. 2:11). Yet isn’t it amazing how we often succumb to his efforts?
One of the major tools ofthe devil is doubt. Remember in the Garden of Eden the first thing the devil did was ask a question,“…Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?” (Gen. 3:1). Create doubt.
As Christians Satan can gain control by creating doubt. He tried it with Thomas. Thomas wouldn’t believe except he see in his hands the print of the nails (John 20:25). He uses the same technique today. Satan will create doubt in the mind of a young person using their peers. “You are not still
interested in that religious stuff, are you? That is soooo boring.” Satan will use their teachers who teach them that evolution is a fact and create doubt in their minds regarding the truth of the Bible.
It also happens to us as adults. Everything seems to be going well and then all of a sudden something happens in our life and we say, “Whoa, I though God was in control.” Things are turned upside down. For years you follow a pattern of doing something, doing it right but then you begin to question. You say, “Maybe I’ve been doing it wrong all these years.” You change.
The devil says, “gotcha you!” The devil will create doubt by asking, “Do you really think the elders know what they are doing?” “The preacher doesn’t seem to preach the same as he did.”
Preachers can begin to doubt their work. They see mega churches popping up all around and they look at their small humble group and begin to think, “Just maybe I ought to make some changes in the things I preach.”
When you begin to doubt do as Thomas did. He got close to Jesus. When Thomas examined Jesus he proclaimed, “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28).
Larry