Tony Evans - Making the Devil Flee
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Summary
In this sermon, the preacher stresses that true victory over the devil comes only through first submitting fully to God, then resisting the enemy with the authority of God’s Word, as outlined in James 4:7. He draws from James 4:7-10, emphasizing that God opposes the proud and double-minded but gives grace to the humble who show authentic submission and repentance in action, not just words. The key takeaway is that God wants visible proof of our seriousness—He demands «ID» through consistent, courageous choices to include Him in every part of life, even under pressure from the world.
He wants an idea. He wants to see you move and demonstrate you are serious. He doesn’t want to hear, «I should submit myself to God.» He wants to see you drop down and submit yourself to God. He doesn’t just want to hear, «I love the Lord. He heard my cry.» He wants to see you loving Him in the decisions you make when the world is trying to leave Him out. And when I see you are serious, I give support to those who submit to my authority.
Submit First, Then Resist
Submit, therefore, to God. Verse 7: resist the devil, and he will flee from you. He says, «Submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you.»
Let me say that slowly: submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. The order is everything. It’s not «resist the devil and submit to God.» It’s «submit to God and resist the devil.» Because if you try to resist the devil without having already submitted to God, you don’t have enough juice. You don’t have enough power and potency to get him off your back. You don’t have enough power because God has been opposing you. So the first thing you must do is submit to God.
Submit means to come underneath. You must come underneath divine authority. You must say, «God, you run this show, and this show is my life. I get up this morning, God, and I’m going to give this day to you. You own me today. You are in charge of me today. You’re running my life today. You’re controlling my decisions today. You are leading me today. You are guiding me today. I submit to you.»
Because once you do that, now the devil has to deal with God and not just you. You aren’t God. Not just you. You’re getting up in the morning saying, «Devil, you aren’t going to get me today. Devil, you aren’t going to make me do that today. You aren’t going to make me think that today. You aren’t going to make me mad.» The devil laughs because he knows you by yourself, and he can handle you.
This is why in Matthew chapter 4, before Jesus faced the devil, he fasted 40 days and 40 nights. He had to be tight with the Father to deal with the devil who was going to show up. He didn’t resist the devil without getting tight with God first.
So you start with submission to God because now the devil is fighting God and not just you. Submit to God, resist the devil. Okay? Because he’s still going to show up, even when you submit, and he will flee from you.
Using the Word Against the Enemy
So what did Jesus do in Matthew 4 when the devil came to Him? He quoted the Bible. He said three times, «It is written, it is written, it is written.» God must like baseball—three strikes, you’re out. He fled after Jesus used the Word on him.
All right, now, that means you’ve got to know a Word to use. Then you’ve got to be willing to use the Word you know because the devil is allergic to God’s Word; he’s not allergic to you.
«I think I feel I want this» is just you know. He can handle all that. What he can’t handle is biblical truth. What we need to learn to do is to have Bible studies with the devil. We have a lot of Bible studies with Christians; those are called safe Bible studies. What you need to have is a Bible study with the devil.
Come here and say, «Look, let’s sit down and spend some time in the Word right now, yes you, me, and God. Let’s spend some time here in the Word.» That’s you being with God. We’re just going to sit and hang out with the Word. Can’t we all get along up in here? The devil flees from him because he couldn’t handle God’s presence with the Spirit.
The Spirit of the Lord led Jesus into the wilderness with the Word. It was too much. But if Satan knows you’re not too much, it’s because he just has to deal with you. God is actually opposing you and not helping you. Then we find ourselves becoming victims of his work, becoming victims of his power.
He says, «Submit to God, then you can resist the devil, and he won’t be able to handle you.» Can you imagine the feeling you’ll have when the devil has been beating you up for ten years? That addiction has been there for ten years. That problem has been there for ten years. That depression has been there for ten years, and you get this resistance to the devil.
Then God opens up the faucet a little bit more and provides more grace. You’re submitting to God, and then you just see the devil leave. You just see him leaving. Now you can feel the exit taking place because he’s no longer running the show. He’s no longer controlling the agenda.
Draw Near to God — No Double-Mindedness
He says, «Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. He will draw near to you.» Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and He’s talking to Christians. Purify your hearts, you double-minded. You can’t be an AM and FM—double-minded. That means you want God and the world. You want God on Sunday, the world on Monday, you’ll pick up with God a little bit later. No, no, He said, «No, no, you can’t be double-minded.» You can’t be thinking in both directions at the same time.
He says, «Because if you do, God won’t draw near to you. Be miserable, mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to gloom.» In other words, hurt over your sin because it’s not a joking matter. Hurt over your failure. God knows that we fall. God knows that we fall short. God knows that we don’t always live up. That’s why repentance is the key.
Repentance involves a number of things. First of all, there must be recognition that I have failed God—either overt sin or omission; I fail God. I’ve not committed myself to Him. The second thing after recognition is remorse. He says, «Mourn.» I hurt because I failed God. It’s not that I fail God and I don’t care; I fail God and I don’t like it. I fail God, and it hurts me that I have failed God.
So there’s recognition, then there’s remorse. After this recognition and remorse, there is reversal. It means, «God, I’m going to approach this differently. I’m going at this another way. I’m going to submit to you. I’m going to do a U-turn and I’m going to move in the right direction.» That’s when He no longer opposes you, but now the wind is at your back. He comes along to push you because you’ve turned in the right way. You’re going in the right direction.
He says, «I want you to draw near to God.» I don’t just want you to say it; I want you to show it.
God Wants Proof — Show Your ID
This is show and tell. When you go to the airport, you give them your name. That’s not going to satisfy them; they want to see your ID. «Show me some identification with a picture.» «Yeah, but I’m not lying; I’m telling you the truth. This is my name.» «Well, that may be your name, but I want to see your ID.»
So anybody can say, «I love Jesus. Wave your hand in the air like you just don’t care. Ain’t God good? All the time. All the time God is good.» God wants some ID. He wants an idea. He wants to see you move and demonstrate you are serious. He doesn’t want to hear, «I should submit myself to God.» He wants to see you drop down and submit yourself to God.
He doesn’t just want to hear, «I love the Lord; He heard my cry.» He wants to see you loving Him in the decisions you make when the world is trying to leave Him out. He says, «I want some ID,» and when I see you are serious, I give grace to the humble. I give support to those who submit to my authority. I show up.
In fact, He says at the end of verse 10, «He will exalt you.» He will come and undergird you. He will come and strengthen you. He will come and equip you. He will come and empower you. But not if He’s got to compete with the world.
The world is that system headed by Satan that wants to pressure you and me to leave God out, to not include Him. I’m not talking about preaching a sermon; I’m talking about including Him in the decision-making process. I’m not talking about every time something comes up, you’re whipping out a Bible. There may be appropriate times for that, but it means He is being brought to bear in the decision, in the discussion, in the planning, in the programming. And when they try to kick Him to the curb, you don’t go to the curb too.
Be Authentic — No Spiritual Spanx
The world tries to do this by pressuring us to conform. God does not want us wearing spiritual Spanx. He doesn’t want us just looking like we’re more spiritual than we really are because we know the right words to say and the right places to go. That’s Spanx. Because when you take the Spanx off, reality shows up. God’s not after spiritual Spanx; what God is after is authentic people who are now showing the real them.
Because this is how they roll. This is how they roll. They don’t have to camouflage it because this is how I roll. I am a Christian. I am a follower of Jesus Christ. I don’t mind you knowing that. This is who I am. Everybody else is coming out of the closet; I’m coming out of the closet too. This is who I am. This is me, and you’ve got to deal with this.
A Personal Story of Standing Firm
I know I’ve told you a number of times, but a lot of people haven’t heard the story. When I was asked to pray at the city council, they asked me to come and pray, but they said I can’t mention Jesus. They asked me to pray, but then they tell me I can’t mention Jesus.
All right, so I went down there, and they said, «Dr. Tony Evans, Oakland Bible Fellowship, he will lead us in our prayer for the city council.» I said, «Well, Heavenly Father, I thank you for this opportunity to pray for the city council meeting. They have some great decisions that they need to make, and I’m praying that you will enable them to make good decisions. And you’ve made it clear that the clearest way to make sure that my prayer for them gets to you is if I pray in Jesus’ name. So it’s in Jesus’ name I pray that you will guide them in their decision.»
Then I said, «You told government to pray, and you told government to consult God in Romans 13 by the Apostle Paul who met Jesus on the Damascus Road. I thank you for allowing the city council to be here because you allowed them to be created, and according to Colossians 1, everything that was created was created by Christ Jesus. So I ask you to bless their decision-making in Jesus’ name. Amen.»
If you don’t want to hear about Jesus, don’t ask me to pray. Don’t be asking me to pray; you’re wasting my time. We are to be overt Christians—not bombastic, not mean-spirited, not just forcing people—but don’t deny me.
Anybody who can give me eternal life; God on the cross for me rose from the dead for me, giving me heaven as a home, don’t ask me to be quiet. Don’t ask me not to represent. Don’t ask that.
So brothers and sisters, the world is going to press you. It’s going to try to get you to leave Jesus out, to kick Him to the curb, to put Him on the sideline, even to leave God out. Friendship with the world? Don’t buy that. Don’t settle for the okie-doke. When Satan tries to get you to leave Jesus out, you stand firm in your faith in an appropriate, loving, kind, compassionate way but with biblical clarity.
The Submarine Principle
You know, a submarine can go way down; a boat has to stay on the surface of the water because the further you go down in the sea or the ocean, the more pressure you get. The further you go down, the more pressure you get, and it can crush a boat. But it won’t crush your submarine. The reason why it won’t crush your submarine is because a submarine is pressurized. It has more pressure on the inside than what’s coming at it from the outside, which is why you can’t collapse a submarine.
The further we go into this secular world, the more pressure the world is going to put on us to forsake our faith. That’s why we better have more Jesus on the inside than the pressure coming at us from the outside so that we’re not collapsed by a culture that doesn’t want your God. Because without your God, you won’t make it in this world today.
So let us take our stand for God so that we don’t lose His help, and so that we individually and corporately can have more grace operating in our lives. And all God’s people said, «Amen.»
Prayer
Heavenly Father, thank You for calling us to genuine submission and authentic faith. Help us to stop hiding behind words and start showing You our ID through our daily choices. Give us the courage to resist the devil by first drawing near to You, to stand firm when the world pressures us to leave You out, and to let Your grace flow through us as we live openly for You. In Jesus’ mighty name, Amen.