Charles Stanley - The Enemy, A Close Look
If you were a general in the army and you were going to war against another nation, one thing you would do very carefully: You would study the life of the opposing general. You would learn everything you possibly could about him. You'd know all about his birth. You'd know all about his background, all about his childhood, where he was educated, when he got into the military, what kind of accomplishments that he had made. You'd study everything about him because what you would be trying to do is to find out, how does this man think? What motivates him? What causes him to react? What gets him angry? Is he cool-headed? Is he the kind of person who responds quickly? Does he delay in his decisions?
You'd learn everything you possibly could. Because you see, oftentimes it is not who is the most powerful. It is the one who can out-think the other. It is being able to understand how this general thinks. And if you can out-think him, and you can think the way he thinks, then you will know his next move, and more than likely, you'll win that battle. Well, it's interesting how in the military men study very, very thoroughly their opposing enemy. Well, you and I have an opposing enemy and he opposes us at every turn in our life. Everywhere we turn, he is there with his demonic powers in some fashion, in some way to cause us to falter and to fall, to step out of God's will, and to miss His plan for our life.
But isn't it interesting that we can just sorta go through life and somehow never think to realize that it's very important that we understand how the enemy thinks? We have someone who is opposing us, who is against us. It's very clear in the scriptures how he thinks. In fact, you and I have a manual called the Bible that gives us several thousands of years of how this opposing general, how this Satanic power is going to act, how he responds, how he works in the lives of others, how he has failed, and how he has succeeded so often. So, if you and I are going to succeed in the Christian life of living a victorious life, if we're gonna be able to live in the victory that our Lord provided for us, then one of the wisest things we can do is to understand the mind of our opposing general.
And in this message, I want us to talk about "The Enemy: A Close Look". And you'll recall now that the apostle Paul has written these first three chapters of Ephesians to tell us what we have as a result of being a believer, and chapters four through five and a half here of how we ought to live. And now he says, "You have a problem, you have an opposing force". And this is what he says beginning in verse ten: "Finally, be strong in the Lord, and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, that you may be able to stand firm against the schemes of your opposition, your opposing general, your enemy, the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world-forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places".
What the apostle Paul has done in those few verses is to identify to us who our enemy is. What is the believer's enemy? And oftentimes the way we believers act and the way Christians act, you would think that our enemy is each other. And yet the truth is, the real enemy is none other than Satan himself. But if you'll notice in this passage, it isn't just Satan, because the truth is, there's a whole confederacy of opposition. Satan being, of course, the ringleader and the general. But notice what it says. He says, "Stand firm against the schemes of the devil," but then he doesn't stop. He says, "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood," but against what? Not just Satan, but rulers, powers, world-forces of this darkness against spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.
There's a whole host of enemies, and it seems, according to the scripture, though some things are not as clear as we'd like for them to be, that not only do we have an opposing force here, but there is a whole recognized kingdom of these forces, of course, Satan being the primary one. And along with that goes, of course, a position of power, that is, Satan is a powerful being. Now, how do I know that? Well, look at the men and women in the scriptures that he has defeated. Let's start with Eve, for example. She lived in an absolutely perfect environment, a perfect environment. God gave Adam and Eve a free will in order that they may choose to love Him and choose to obey Him. They chose not to do so.
And so, in that perfect environment they fell. And so, Satan in his very seductive and very deceitful way asked a few simple questions. "Well now, did God really say this"? And he's been using the same old tactics down through the years. And so, if you find, for example, let's look at Moses, let's look at David, you go down through the scriptures and you see over and over and over again, and and how many times did Jesus have to get on Peter's case? Now, here's man who loved the Lord. He was in the inner circle, he was one of Jesus's intimates. And what did Jesus say to him? He said, "Peter, you're acting," he says, "Peter, you're just acting like the devil. That didn't come from you, that came from Satan".
Now, Satan can work in the lives of believers, and we will say and do things that certainly do not fit who we are. Now, I want you to remember this also, that Satan has limitations. Satan is not a free-wheeling general of a confederacy of opposing, wicked, vile forces who has all power and who is unlimited in what he can do to you and me. The truth is, Satan cannot do anything to you and me, he can't tamper with anything that you and I possess, he can't tamper with your body, he can't tamper with your mind, he can't tamper with anything in your life and mine other than what Almighty God allows him to tamper with.
And as we've said before, if you and I will respond the right way, no matter what he does, we're gonna come out a winner and he gets defeated. And so, certainly he will do everything in his power to destroy, to mess up the minds, the emotions, and when you think about all the people today who are so confused and frustrated and living in depression and going through all kinds of heartache and problems and oftentimes they think that it's all physical. Oftentimes it is not all physical.
Now, think about it for a moment. When you and I choose to sin against God, and we start living in that sin, and that sin becomes a part of our thinking, our way of life, we're not gonna be happy. We're gonna be miserable and that isn't all the devil because that's the power of the Holy Spirit convicting the child of God. God is not about to allow you and me to be happy living in sin and living in disobedience. And so, there is a limitation to what Satan can do. And God has set that limitation on him. He can only do so much in our life. Now, he is not omnipotent. He is not omniscient. He is not omnipresent. He's not omni-anything, praise God. He is limited. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, amen? That's right. He is absolutely limited in what he can do.
Now, the question is, what is it that he's pursuing in the unbeliever's life? Here's what he's after, here's what he's up to in the unbeliever's life. For example, first of all, he wants to blind them to the truth. Second Corinthians chapter four he talks about, he, listen, I want you to turn to several verses here. You know this one by heart, but I want you to turn anyway, if you will. There's something about seeing it with your own eyes, looking at it and reading it. Listen to what he says. He says, Paul speaking here, and verse three of chapter four, "And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing". He says if they can't understand it, they can't see who is it?
Those who are perishing. "In whose case the god of this world, this world system, has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that they may not see the light of the glory of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God". So, first of all, what's he doing to the unbelievers? One thing he's doing: blinding their eyes so they can't see the truth, won't understand the truth, won't know it. Second thing I want you to notice is something Jesus told us about in a parable. So, I want you to turn, if you will, to Mark chapter four for a moment. And you'll remember this is the chapter and this is the parable about sowing, sowing seed. And you'll recall that Jesus talked about where these seed fell and what happened when they fell.
Look if you will, let's begin in the thirteenth verse of this fourth chapter of Mark. "And He said to them, 'Do you understand this parable? And how will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word. These are the ones who are beside the road where the word is sown; and when they hear, immediately Satan comes and takes away the word which has been sown in them.'"
Now, this is why I say to you, when you come to church, you bring your Bible and bring something to write it down. You know why? Because I'll tell you why. Satan, listen, listen, not only in the unbeliever, but listen, Satan's desire for the unbeliever, of course, has blinded him to the truth. Satan's work in the unbeliever also true in the believer, and that is to steal the Word. And I've learned long time ago, if I wake up in the middle of the night and the Lord lays something on my heart, if I don't write it down, you can bet your life Satan will do his very dead-level best to cause me to forget that. Listen, when God says something, write it down.
If you hear something that's worth applying to your life, write it down. I'll tell you why. Satan will steal God's Word out of your heart. There it is in black and white. And why do you think Jesus gave this parable? He gave this parable to warn us of how Satan operates. Not only does he blind the minds of people to the truth, but he also snatches the Word. He steals the Word. He, listen, Satan opposes the gospel. He opposes the gospel. Now, there are lots and lots of scriptures you and I could, especially in the book of Acts when we see Paul preaching the gospel and the opposition of the Judaizers and so forth. He opposes the preaching and the proclamation of the gospel. But I want you to look also in thinking in terms of this: that he will do everything in his power to keep someone from believing.
So, what is he doing? He's blinding people's eyes, snatching the Word from 'em. And he works through the unbeliever to oppose the preaching and the teaching in the Word of God. But there are many other things he does in the life of the unbeliever but what I want to talk about for a moment is, what does he do in the life of the believer? What Satan's activity in your life and my life? Now, we'll talk about his tactics later. But what does he do? Well, he tempts us to sin. That's one thing he does. And of course, he lays snares for us. Every single child of God needs to develop a spirit of discernment, that is, that we just don't take things on face value. We don't jump just because something looks good. We look at it from a spiritual point of view. We look at it from God's viewpoint.
Listen, everything Satan tempts you and me with, he, listen, he's not gonna tempt us with something that is absolutely horrible, something that is very painful. He's gonna tempt us with things that look good, smell good, feel good, I mean, you name it. It looks like the right thing. He always camouflages it that way. And so, what we have to do is to have enough discerning spirit to say, "You know, that sounds good, but the question is, does it match up with who I am? Secondly, does it match up with the Word of God? Thirdly, is it a violation of any principle of God's Word"?
And so, oftentimes people get in financial trouble, they get in all kinds of difficulty and hardship, why? Because they have no spiritual discernment. It just looks good. They trust somebody else, and they go on with it. We're to have a discerning spirit, why? Because Satan, he is laying one snare after the other to trip us up in some fashion to keep us from being the children of God He wants us to be and to be used of Him. Likewise, he's gonna do everything he can to stunt our spiritual growth and to keep us from growing. So, what happens? How does he do that? He says, "Well, you know what? Now, look, you don't have to read the Bible every night. I mean, after all to be spiritual you don't have to read the Bible every night and you can skip tonight. It's not gonna hurt you".
Well, tomorrow night you're real sleepy and you've been tired, and you've been working hard and what does Satan do? Well, look, Satan's not gonna ever tell you, "Don't ever read the Bible again". He knows better than that. So, he says, "Well look, just don't worry about it tonight. And besides that, just read one of the Psalms, read something you've read before". And so, what happens? He's gonna do everything in his power, listen, to keep, listen to this now, to keep you and me busy doing good things to keep us out of the Word and keep us off our knees. Now, and I hear people say, and I don't know how many Christians this is true of, but many Christians haven't gotten on their knees to pray in so long, they don't even know what it feels like.
They say, "Well, I don't have to kneel down and pray". No, you don't. But it's interesting in the scripture how often people knelt to pray or prostrated themselves before God to pray. There's something about reverencing Holy God, reverencing Holy God, acknowledging who He is. When you and I get alone with Him, to get on our face before Him and get on our knees before Him. And we stand in the church house, and we sing, "We're standing on holy ground," and see, I know that we can't always kneel because of seats and so forth. And people got back problems and all kind of things. But I'll tell you one thing, when you get by yourself at your home, there's no excuse for not getting on your knees and talking to God and reading the Bible, no excuse.
Now, if this were written in Latin or something else, that'd be one thing. It's written in English so you can understand. We got all kind of translations. Living Bible, you know, New King James, King James, New American Standard, NIV, you name, there are all kinds. Listen, we got it in plain English so we can read it. We have time to read it. Listen, we are God's children. This is what we're to feed on. And so, what does Satan do? He's gonna do his best to keep you out of the Word. And listen, keep you out of the Word and to keep you from, listen, from gleaning anything. You come and you sit and listen to a message, for example. If he can, listen, if he can get you thinking about anything while I'm preaching, he's gonna do it.
And especially if I'm coming to something that Satan may... and now he doesn't know what I'm gonna say. But if I'm coming to something, I'm on some trail and I'm heading in some direction that he's sorta thinking about, then he knows if he can get you thinking about something else at the most critical moment, he knows you'll miss it. Now, I'm not saying he's got a demon sitting on your shoulder. I don't believe that. I don't believe any of that kind of stuff. I don't think that's the way it operates. But I do know this: I do know that anything he can do to confuse the mind, and I think sometimes, how many people sitting and looking up this way are thinking about something else?
Satan, listen, he will divide your mind. He will do everything in his power because he wants to mess up your own spiritual growth. Now, likewise, I think what he does, he lulls churches to sleep. Now, how does he lull a church to sleep? Well, he gives 'em a good pastor who makes everybody feel fantastic. He gives 'em enough money that they don't need anything. He gives them enough satisfaction with what they're doing that they're not mission minded. They're not concerned about evangelism, they don't want to mess up their little, listen, oh, they have this wonderful little fellowship and let's don't be adding anybody that'd mess up this fellowship.
Listen, he's got all kinds of ways of causing a church to lose its missionary, evangelistic zeal, why? Because that's the thing he hates. Listen, Satan is not gonna bother any church that has no missionary and no evangelistic zeal to it, why? Because they're doing what he wants them to. Just go to sleep being religious. God hates that kind of stuff. And Satan just loves it. He doesn't care how much you sing as long as you don't do anything about it. He doesn't care how many sermons you hear as long as you don't do anything about it. Just don't get busy for God. That's his deal. Stay busy doing something else.
And you see, this is the devil's way. We're talking about evangelizing the world. We're talking about a concern for lost people who are dying and going to hell. We're talking about obeying the commission of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're talking about a warfare. We're talking about kingdoms at war with each other. And so, we just want to sit around and just enjoy being friends. My friend, not according to the scripture. Listen, Paul didn't float around. Paul, listen, Paul didn't have a sailboat and having some other of his followers just sailing him around on the Mediterranean. He could have, but he didn't do that. He didn't just float around and have a little Bible study here and a little Bible study there. He, listen, he went everywhere he could proclaiming the gospel and suffering almost every single mile of it, why? Because he was obeying the commission of Jesus Christ.
God had anointed him to proclaim the gospel, and he knew that his time was limited, and the truth is, all of our time is limited. You don't get but one trip through this life, just one. We're talking about a warfare that's going on to destroy everything that is godly. And people who know the Word should be in the Word, listen, in the Word, in the church, serving Almighty God, with our focus on Almighty God and listen, their hands to the plow doing the work of God. That's the plan of God.
Well, I think also one of the things he does, and there are many things he does, he certainly attacks the Bible. Satan attacks the Bible. He'll do everything in his power. Somebody says, "Well, you know", and every once in a while, somebody says, "What about all those mistakes"? I love for somebody to say that to me, and so I just say, "Just point 'em out to me. Can't wait to hear 'em". If God is sovereign, if God has everything in space as He does, everything so balanced out so beautifully, if He is in absolute control of everything, why can He not also preserve for us the Word of God down through these years? Because it's the handbook for battle, it's the instruction book for living. God Almighty, who is absolutely holy, can keep it pure. That's the kind of God He is.
So, naturally, Satan is going to attack that. Well, what is his future? There are a lot of other things we could say about that, but let me just say something here about this whole idea of the demon idea. Now, we talked about Satan, how he operates. What about this whole idea of demon possession? Let me say this: When it comes to a believer, you just eliminate this from your category. Demon possession does not exist in the life of a believer. Does not, absolutely cannot. Who's living on the inside of us? The Spirit of the Living God. The Holy Spirit is on the inside of every single believer.
We have a new spirit, and we are God's created beings in-dwelt by the Holy Spirit. He that is within you is greater than he that's in the world. No believer can be possessed by the devil. Just scratch that one from your vocabulary. No such thing. I do not believe there's a single verse anywhere in the Bible that says a child of God can be possessed by a devil, or be possessed by some demonic power. Not possessed. Intimidated by? Yes. Have a tremendous affect upon? Yes. Mess up their lives? Yes. But possess them? No, because possession says, listen, if you mean by possession, that that demon has such absolute control that that person who is a believer does not, listen, that they no longer have the will to do what's right. That wouldn't even be consistent with who God is.
The power that is within us is greater than the power that's in the world. God isn't going to allow some power on the inside of us greater than the power of the Holy Spirit, because there isn't any power that exists. Now, I want to conclude by just mentioning one other thing here. When I think about our relationship to Satan and how we're to respond, I think there are four verses of scripture that I'd give you, and the first one is in First Peter chapter five. You'll recall what Peter said here as he was talking about Satan, our adversary. Here's what he said. He said in verse eight chapter five, "Be of sober spirit, be serious-minded, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour". We need a discerning spirit so listen, we are to be alert to Satan because he is always there to lay a snare if possible.
So, my first responsibility and when it comes to my relationship to him is to be alert, for example, to his very presence. The second thing is Ephesians chapter four verse twenty-seven. A very important passage here. Look at this. He says in our being sensitive to what's going on, verse twenty-seven says, "Do not give the devil an opportunity". Don't give him an opportunity. Be alert. Don't give him an opportunity. Now, what does he mean by that? He simply means this: For example, let's say that when you grew up, your parents, they drank. And so, they always had beer in the refrigerator. And I'm sorry to say that oftentimes that can be true of even believers.
And so, that's what you saw. But you knew better, and so you didn't tamper with that and you didn't become a part of that. So, now your friends invite you out to a party and everybody's gonna be drinking and carousing and carrying on. Now, you possibly can go and not drink. But you know what he says? He says don't even give him an opportunity. There are some places you don't go. There are just some things you don't do. There are some things you don't look at. There are some things you don't let your mind think about. Don't even give him an opportunity. When we, listen, when we head in a direction that we know is not right, you know what we are saying?
Here's what we're setting ourselves up. He's sitting out there waiting for us. We're giving him an opportunity to snare us. He says, "First of all, be very alert". Secondly, he says, "Don't give him an opportunity". Don't even allow him the privilege. Then of course he says in this sixth chapter, he says we're to, listen, we're to wake up in the morning and dress up. We're to dress up, listen, now, we dress up in the clothes that fit whatever we're gonna do for the day. But there's the one suit we should put on every day, and that's the armor of God. And we'll talk about that in a later message. And then in James chapter four, look at that, if you will.
James chapter four. Want you to just notice this verse. He says here, and these two things go together and that's the reason I want you to look at them. He says in chapter four verse seven, here's what I'm to do: I'm to be alert, yes. Don't give him any place, yes. Dress up in army, yes. But verse seven says, "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". But he says we're to resist him. And that's what we've talked about in the first message in this series, and that is standing firm, standing against, resisting him.
So as a believer, what is my relationship to him? Well, I'm certainly to be drawing my strength from my Lord. I am to be, listen, I'm to be standing firm, dressed in the armor. I am to be alert to Satan. I am not to give him any place and I am to resist him. And so, that is our position, that is our relationship to him. Now, if you have never trusted Jesus Christ as your personal Savior. You say, "Well, then what's my relationship to the devil"? It's real simple. He's got you exactly where he wants you. He will tell you that you don't need God. Or he will tell you, if you're going through some difficult time in your life, "Well, God can't help you. You can't pray. He's not gonna answer your prayer".
Well, He may not answer your prayers about other things, but here's one prayer He will answer, because the Bible says it: Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Friend, Almighty God will save you from your sin. The devil will tell you, "He's not gonna forgive you for what you've done, look what you've done". You know what? There's not anything God will not forgive. God will forgive you of your sin no matter what. That's what the cross is all about. The cross is all about Jesus laying down His life at Calvary so that no matter what you've done, no matter where you've been, it's your unbelief. That's the thing that's made you lost.
When you say to Him, "Father, forgive me of my sins. God, forgive me of my sins. I'm placing my trust in Jesus. I do accept His death at Calvary as payment of my sin," the moment you, by faith, receive Him as your personal Savior, you become a child of God, sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise. Or it may be that you've been tampering with something, you read your horoscope. Forget it. Don't do it anymore. Or you've been thinking about asking somebody to tell your fortune. You've already got a fortune. God knows what it is. He'll tell you in due season. Or it may be that you have some area of your life and you've been giving the devil, you've just been giving him one opportunity after the other.
You see, it'd be absolutely foolish for a man who has a problem with gambling to take his vacation in Las Vegas. Now, I'm not knocking Las Vegas. I'm sure it's a nice place. But a man who has that kind of a problem hasn't got any business going there. A person who has a problem with drinking shouldn't be going to a nightclub, shouldn't go there anyway, but I'm saying if he has a problem with drinking, then don't go sit down at the bar, waiting for your table in the restaurant. There are all kinds of opportunities you can give him. Don't do it.
Now, He says, "Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together". We said when we come together it's a training session for the battles we face. Now, I can tell you something. You watch this. You just watch this. This coming week, watch out. Just watch out. I'm telling you. Because Satan says, "Okay, all right, so you've heard all the truth. I've been blasted twice today. So, I'm gonna see if I can't come back and do a little damage".
Tomorrow morning when you get up, here's what you do: You put it on. You just read that sixth chapter of Ephesians about the armor of God. Put it on. Remember that you're gonna stand, that, listen, you're gonna draw your strength from God. You're gonna stand firm against him. You're gonna resist him. You're gonna be alert to him. You're gonna be in the Word of God. You're gonna be on your face before God because you and I live in a world that's at war with Almighty God. And so, we want to walk obediently before Him, trusting Him.