Dethroning the King of Lies

There has been and will probably always be a very popular discussion about God’s involvement in peoples’ lives. Even people who don’t necessarily believe in God as he is shown in the Bible tend to subscribe to the idea of some source of power or personal spiritual element that works in the lives of human beings. There are theories that God is in everything in creation. There are others that claim God created the world and then sat back to watch it rotate into destruction. There are people who say there is no god at all and everything came out of nothing. I have established who I believe God is, how much he knows me, and what I want his role to be in my life. That topic doesn’t interest me as much these days. The conversation that I believe has been sorely neglected is less popular, but I think, equally as important. If we don’t understand who Satan is and what role he has in our lives, whether we want him to have one or not, we really can’t fully understand God’s.

From my twenty-some years of experience as a sinner, I have concluded that absolutely every sin one can commit occurs when that sinner believes a lie. Murder, you have the right to take someone else’s life. Lust, your momentary pleasure is more important than the possible consequences. And my own discontent, my life should have been different than it is. In the Bible, Satan is not called the Murderer or the Hater or the Pervert, he’s called the Deceiver. And there is a very important message to Christians in that title.

The Bible says that to love is the greatest commandment because all other commandments are held in it. If you love God, you will do right by him. If you love people, you will do the right by them. No other Commands are really necessary if you know how to love well. My theory is that, likewise, lies encompass all other sins because you can’t sin unless you believe a lie or choose to ignore the truth.

Just as I know God to be an active and powerful force in my life and the world, I know Satan is as well. The scary thing is how easy that last bit is to forget. 

We are in a battle between our Flesh (Satan) and our Spirit (God). We are constantly being pulled towards our Flesh. It is where our nature directs us. Like a tide in the sea, if we do nothing, we will slowly drift in the wrong direction. We need to wage a war on our Flesh by equipping our Spirit even to stay where we are. It takes a lot more effort to actually move away from destruction. There are several strategies that can be used. Reading our Bibles, praying and meditating regularly, staying in fellowship with other Christians, admitting our failures and changing our actions, are some and are very important. But one thing that I have come to believe is absolutely critical, particularly with that one pesky area of temptation that Satan throws at us over and over again, is knowing how to recognize the lie behind that temptation, and knowing enough truth to be able to counter it. Jesus didn’t ignore the Devil when he was harassing him in the desert. Jesus came back with scripture and Satan shut the hell up (ha, see what I did there???).

Satan is the Deceiver. If we take away his power to deceive, we take away his power. If you think about sin the same way you think about a diet, avoiding temptation and exercising willpower alone are okay, but don’t fix the hunger or the desire. But if you are educated about what foods are both good for you and delicious and keep those handy to pull out at any time, you’re gonna be fitting into those new pants a whole lot sooner than your friends. We can’t escape our desires to sin, but we can equip ourselves with truth that can quench that temptation really quickly.

If you struggle with sexual sin, keep a note in your pocket that explains God’s intentions for sex and what happens to your spirit and your body if you go against that.

If your struggle is with fear, memorize all the Bible verses you can about God’s love and plan for you and pull them out of your mind as soon you find yourself getting panicky.

For me, I have to remind myself that God’s plan is perfect. Even if I don’t like the circumstances, he only can do good, no matter what it looks like. That way, when Satan tells me that things are screwed up and I need to pick a different path, I can have a ready response.

This is also important to remember when we look at the people swimming around in the lost world we live in without truth to guide them. It’s sad. It’s desperate. It’s hopeless without truth. Christians have the responsibility to know the truth and to speak truth lovingly to those who are lost or struggle, and that’s everyone.