Cedric Pisegna - Resist Arrest (01/23/2026)
Welcome to «Live With Passion,» I’m Father Cedric Pisegna, so glad that you tuned in. This reading comes from the First Letter of Peter and he writes, «Cast all your anxieties on God; God cares for you. Be sober, be watchful; your adversary the devil, prowls like a roaring lion, seeking somebody to devour: resist him solid in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of people throughout the world». The name of this episode is «Resist Arrest». I remember watching on television one time, the police came up to this man in the car and they tried to arrest him and he was struggling and fighting and resisting arrest. Finally, they got the handcuffs on him and they took him to jail. The reading that we just heard said, «resist the devil and he will flee from you».
You have to understand that what he’s trying to do is put you under arrest, he’s trying to put the handcuffs on you, if you will, and have dominance over you, jurisdiction over you, but if you resist him, he will flee, he’s very impatient. If he just tempts you one time and you succumb, of course, it’s gonna end up bad for you, but if you resist that first temptation, maybe the second or even the third temptation, he will finally flee because he’s a coward and he’s impatient, «resist the devil and he will flee».
This program is about evil and the fact that evil is real and that all of us, it said in the reading, that everybody throughout the world is undergoing the same suffering. What he meant by that, Peter did, he meant that everybody’s being tempted, everybody’s being oppressed, everybody has battle to do with evil so it’s not just you, it’s everybody. And we have to resist, we have to understand that evil is real. I was invited to be on a panel here in Houston, it was at the Flight Museum. It was an interesting venue there, they had these old airplanes. There was about 250 people in this big hangar and Debbie Georgianni, who’s on one of the Catholic networks, and Adam Blai were giving presentations about the devil and angels.
And I was on the panel and there were questions and answers from the audience, and Adam Blai is a layperson, he’s not ordained. But the interesting thing about him is he’s been through many exorcisms, and to him, it’s no question that the devil is real. He sees it all the time, people that are being possessed, oppressed, attacked, and he goes in there and he exorcises people. Same thing in the Catholic Church, many Catholic priests, some Catholic priests anyway, are exorcists and it proves that the devil is real. You see, I think, for the most part, people don’t even think he exists. And the bottom line is, is that he comes against us, you need to understand that. He oppresses us, not so much possesses us, that’s very rare, but he oppresses everybody and he uses circumstances, people, situations that come against us.
I remember years ago there was a song by the Rolling Stones, I’m sure you’ve all heard it, «Sympathy for the Devil». He’s not gonna get any sympathy from me because he’s the direct cause of every suffering in the world. Remember what is said in the book of Genesis, «he will strike at your heel,» talking about the Messiah, «And he will crush his head». The evil one is always striking, wanting to injure us. Biblically, he appears, he being Satan, appears in the first chapter of the Bible right off the bat. He tempts, he lies, wants to kill, that’s his MO, remember Adam and Eve, of course you do, the fall of humanity. And we fall along with them, that’s a metaphor, Adam and Eve, about what happens in our life too. «We have all fallen short of the glory of God,» we’ve all sinned, that comes right from the letter to the Romans, and we were separated from God. In some way, shape or form, we’ve agreed with the devil. Jesus too was tempted, if you remember in the desert, but he didn’t succumb. He had victory in the desert, this whole series is about victory in God, victory in Jesus, and I wanna help you to have victory over the evil in your life.
He’s after everybody, but you gotta stand fast, resist arrest, resist the devil and he will flee, he will flee, who is he? Satan was a created angel, according to the scriptures, his name was Lucifer. Ironically, he was very beautiful, God created him with a lot of splendor. He was actually the head of worship, of adoration of God and something happened, he got stuck on himself. Remember the proverb, «pride goes before a fall». It’s exactly what happened, he got prideful, and he fell and apparently he took one third of the created angels with him, who also were prideful because they were blinded by their own beauty, and they fell too. And now we’re locked, we being the human race, you and me, we are locked in this spiritual battle of good and evil.
God created us and is giving us the opportunity to live forever, but evil, like I said, envies us, hates us, and he’s trying to pull us away from God, he’s trying to tempt us, trying to bring us down, trying to kill us, really. He hates you and he hates me, and if you don’t think that’s true, think of the suffering that you’ve been through in your life, think of the hardships, the relationship problems, the physical difficulties, the people that you love that have died, he is directly responsible for every part of it. Ephesians 6 puts it clear, and I’m trying to help you to understand right from the Bible. This isn’t just my own philosophy, by the way, folks, I studied scripture, majored in scripture in the seminary.
In Ephesians 6, Paul writes that we’re in a spiritual battle, not so much with flesh and blood, but with angels and principalities and authorities and demons in heavenly places. And while we can’t see it, we can see the effects of it, just read the daily paper, look at your own life. This doesn’t just happen by coincidence, we are in a spiritual battle, folks, please try to understand that. That the devil, yes, is real, and he really hates you, and he really hates me. This comes out in the beginning of Lent, if you’re a Catholic, every first Sunday of Lent, we always have the reading of Jesus in the desert being tempted by the devil. And during the season of Lent, what the church is doing, the Catholic Church, we’re trying to remind people about the truth, we get back to basics.
I don’t think you can get any more basic than the fact that we’re all in a spiritual battle, even though we don’t notice it at times. Every one of us is tempted, we’re tempted toward addictions, we’re tempted toward gluttony, we’re tempted toward lust, tempted toward anger, those are the seven deadly sins, of course. We’re all tempted every day and that just doesn’t come from our own desires and our own wayward heart, comes from the evil one directly trying to tempt us away from God and kill us. And you must understand that, it’s very clear from the scriptures, get back to basics, trying to help you to understand. Wanted to tell you that most people fall into one of two categories, either they don’t think the devil is real, or some people think that there’s a devil under every bush.
We gotta have balance here, «be well balanced,» Peter tells us, 1 Peter, «be well balanced». But most people don’t think there is a devil, and that’s what I’m trying to dispel right now, that certainly the devil is real. And if you know me, many of you have watched my programs for years now, I hardly ever preach about the devil. I’m always preaching about encouraging you and lifting you up and getting you to know God in a deep personal way, but every once in a while I gotta give you the full picture, got to let you know the truth. And the Catholic Church, which has existed for 2,000 years, has always taught that there is a devil, taught about temptation, taught about the seven deadly sins, and taught about the fact that there’s gonna be a judgment, we gotta be ready.
Yes, he’s real, it’s clear in the Bible, he’s a liar and a murderer, and he wants to steal your soul and if he can’t get your soul, he’s gonna try to make you miserable. That’s his strategy, number one, kill you, or number two, at least make your life miserable. Because he wants to steal your joy, he’s a thief, Jesus said, and a murderer and a liar. There’s nothing good about him, he’s gone crazy, he could have been the best. We’ve all seen that happen to actresses and singers and sports people, some of them reach the high pinnacle and then they fall the farthest because they just lose it. And that’s what happened to Lucifer, he could have been the best but he made the wrong choice, and now he’s trying to drag everybody with him.
A friend of mine was about to undergo an operation and she told me, «I know that my operation is gonna be good because I went to my medium and she told me so», I said, «You did what»? She said I went to my medium and she said that it was gonna be a good operation, I said, listen. If you want this operation to go well, don’t be going to any mediums and trying to find out your future from a medium because that is forbidden in the Bible. See, that’s the thing, most people don’t think that there’s a Satan, so they participate in things like reincarnation, yeah, Jesus and reincarnation, just in case, horoscopes, astrology, medium, fortune tellers. No, that’s forbidden, Ouija boards, stuff like that when you participate in stuff like that, what you’re doing is you’re opening the door for evil to come into your life.
And if you are participating in any of that, don’t even read astrology or your horoscope in the paper in the morning. Don’t even read that stuff, be a biblical Christian, solid firm in your faith, resist arrest. Resist the devil and he will flee. You wanna have a good operation, don’t be going to mediums, be going to Jesus and he’ll give you a good operation. We all grew up with that movie «The Exorcist,» and we saw all that terrible possession and the head turning and all that stuff. But it’s not that visible, he doesn’t show you the cards. Rather, he’s sneaky, he’s slippery, he’s sly, he’s a snake in the Bible and he slithers into your life undetected and you have to be careful. In the way I’ve discovered that evil works, he works through people and he works through circumstances.
And I’m gonna talk about those two things. First of all, he works through people, remember when Jesus announced, this is in the gospel, Jesus announced that he was gonna have to go to Jerusalem, he was gonna suffer, be rejected, and put to death, and Peter pipes in. And he said, «God forbid that anything like that should ever happen». And Jesus looked at Peter, first of all, he looked at all the disciples because he wanted them to hear it too. And then he looked at Peter and he said, «Get behind me, Satan». Wow, what a thing to say to the prince of the apostles, Peter, and what was he saying? He was saying that sometimes the devil doesn’t just appear and tempt you, he works through people. He was working through Peter, trying to dissuade Jesus not to go to the cross. And he works through the people in our life, I’ve found that out, that’s for sure.
I think about the negative emails that I get every once in a while, people trying to drag me down. This morning, my Facebook page was hacked. It was hacked by a person who invited me to give an interview, and I was agreeing to it, and he got into my Facebook page and tried to take it over. It’s people like that, that’s evil working, trying to destroy you and the things of your life. And then, of course, I think about the credit cards that are compromised, the scams that are going on. I know people that are friends of mine that have been scammed out of thousands of dollars. He works through people to try to bring us down to try to make our life miserable. I think about some of the things that happened to me and my journey to the priesthood.
In the seminary, for example, I had a peer evaluation. I had many different students, not many, but some students come against me and at that time in my life, I wasn’t sure if I was called to be a priest, and evil was trying to dissuade me and discourage me at that time in my life, even formation directors that came against me. And it all happened early on in my journey to try to stop me even then. That’s exactly what evil tries to do, his main MO is called abortion. We all know what an abortion is and it’s rampant in our society today, millions of abortions just in the United States. That’s exactly what evil tries to do. He tries to abort our dreams, tries to abort your destiny, tries to stop you in your tracks, resist arrest.
And I’m so glad I went on a retreat one time and I understood that I was in a spiritual battle, and I got strengthened by the Holy Spirit. And then he works through circumstances, first of all, through direct contact, second of all through people, then through circumstances. Remember what he’s trying to do, he’s trying to make your life miserable.
I think about noise, noise for me is always a hard thing. I’ll be planning a homily or trying to get a script together and there’ll be blowers and trash trucks and mowers and helicopters and he works through all that stuff to agitate us. You ever seen the agitation mode on a washing machine? It just goes back and forth and back and, forth. That’s what he wants to do, remember what I said? Number one, he tries to steal your soul, and if he can’t get your soul, he will try to make you miserable. And oftentimes I realized that he’s trying to make me miserable, he tries to agitate you, and get in your face, and get you upset, he sets you up to get you upset. What you have to do is stand firm, don’t be intimidated, be strong.
Jesus said, take it one day at a time, cast your care on God, I just read that to you, cause God cares for you. We may have evil coming against us, but the one who lives in us is stronger than the one who lives in the world, and who’s the one that lives in the world? The devil, and who’s the one in us? God, God, the series is all about being victorious in God. And you can stand strong when you’re being tempted, stand strong when he’s oppressing you, stand strong when he’s coming against you through people and circumstances. It’s the same suffering that everybody in the world has to go through. You’re not alone in this, we all have to deal with it. But some are victorious, and I believe that you’re that way because this is the victory that overcomes the world, our faith, our faith in God, that’s right from 1 John.
I remember I went to a play one time, it was called «The Screwtape Letters,» it was by C.S. Lewis, it was about evil, specifically about how evil tries to tempt us. And the main character was a head demon called Screwtape and the novice demon was called Wormwood. And Screwtape told his novice Wormwood, that in order to get his patient tempted, don’t try to get them into excessive sinning like robbing a bank or killing somebody, rather, «You’ll get a few that way, " he said. But the safest road to hell is a gradual one, wow. He said, get them to be mediocre, not an not an excessively wicked sinner, get him to be mediocre.
I heard a story about, if you take a frog and you put them in boiling water, that frog is gonna just jump out, of course, because the water is so boiling. But if you put a frog in lukewarm water, it’ll stay in there, it likes it, but then you keep turning up the heat and turning up the heat, and it’ll gradually get turned up so much that it will become boiling and it’ll kill the frog. And it’s the same way in our life, evil doesn’t just throw us into all these especially wicked sins or tempt us to do that. No, he rather gluttony and drinking too much and gossiping a little and lusting and what you’re watching on TV and on the internet, come on, all that stuff. And then you get hooked on it and he turns it up and he gets that water boiling, before long, you know it, he’ll kill you.
Watch out for temptations, they’re lethal and they’re deadly. I remember what his strategy is, he tries to get a toehold, then he tries to get a foothold, then he tries to get a stronghold, and then he gets a stranglehold. «Resist him solid in your faith». There was a movie out some years ago, it was called «Amadeus». It was about the composer Antonio Salieri, great composer, composed symphonies. He was tremendous until he met Mozart, Mozart was this eccentric kind of a crazy figure, but he was a genius. And Salieri became envious of Mozart. And because of his envy, he was tempted into jealousy and envy. He became a mediocre composer when all the while he had a great gift, but just because Mozart had a better gift, he became mediocre. He was finally committed to a psychiatric hospital. And there was a haunting scene toward the end of the movie, where Salieri looked at all the people around him and he said, «I absolve you of your mediocrity».
How sad, and that’s exactly one of the strategies of the devil. He tries to make us mediocre or lukewarm or watered down, «Yeah, I go to church and yeah, I give,» and what else? I mean, come on, that’s not salvation, going to church. You gotta be fully committed. Of course, you know what it says in the book of Revelation, Jesus says that he said, «I’d rather have you hot or cold, but because you’re mediocre, I’ll spit you out of my mouth». There was a prose called «Desiderata,» Max Ehrmann, and he said that, «If you compare yourself with others, you’ll become vain and bitter, because there’s always greater and lesser persons than yourself,» and I realized that as a preacher, I’ve got a gift, God gave me a gift, but there are better preachers and there are less preachers than me.
And with the better preachers I don’t envy them so much as I try to learn from them. I quit comparing myself, but I try to learn from them. Comparisons are odious they’re ridiculous, all it’s gonna do is make you vain and bitter or end up like Salieri and end up in a psychiatric hospital, that’s one of the strategies of the devil. Don’t compare yourself with your brothers and sisters that you came from in your family, learn from them. And if people are less than you learn from that too, it’s all about learning, not about comparing. Evil tries to tempt us and make us think that he’s not real, oppress us, overwhelm us, negativity, agitation, mediocrity, envy, all the seven deadly sins, we’re all tempted.
The suffering that you and I are going through isn’t unique to us, everybody in the world, scripture just told us, 1 Peter chapter 5, is going through the same thing. Resist arrest, how did Jesus do it, he spoke back. First of all, he realized that the devil was real, that what he was being tempted was the devil. And many people, how are you gonna have victory if you don’t even realize that the devil is real? Sometimes I’ll get tempted, «Cedric, you’re not a good preacher, nobody’s gonna listen to you». And I take Ephesians, «I am God’s masterpiece created for a purpose».
Sometimes the noise or the overwhelming circumstances come against me, I have the peace of Christ, it was bequeathed to me. Sometimes evil will make you think that you’re not saved, even if you’ve given your life to Christ. I love what Job said when he went through his suffering, he said, «I know my redeemer lives». So you gotta speak back to the devil, «You’ll never amount to anything». «I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me». Stand firm, you already have the victory Jesus wanted for you. We are more than conquerors through him who loves us. Read the Word, speak the Word, pray, stand firm, hold up your sword, resist arrest, don’t be lukewarm or mediocre, be passionate and don’t just live, live with passion.