The Devil Made Me Do It! Series

From the beginning of our creation, humans have manifested lustful, immoral, shiftless, or self-gratifying attributes. The first occurrence of “the devil made me do it” used as an excuse was in the Garden of Eden. "Eve says, "I was deceived by the serpent, and I ate." Does her explanation exonerate her? No! In fact, not only did she receive God's promise of sorrow and pain, so did Adam suffer the effects?

The Lord said to him, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: “Cursed is the ground for your sake; In toil you shall eat of it All the days of your life. Unfortunately, we are still convicted and in the grips of their original sin. Using Satan as an excuse didn't help them and it won’t help us at all either.

Humankind has always struggled to understand—if the sin we do comes from outside evil influences or the devils residing within us. Could it be that we sin because of our own, inborn, sinful nature? James 1:14 declares, “Each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire” Why then, do we transgress? We sin because we are sinners infected with sin. While demonic, oppressiveness, powers are real, our sinful natures are the primary problems. “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.” Notice, Galatians 5:19-21 says it’s the “works of the flesh,” not the works of the devil.

Do you remember: “The Devil made me do it.” That was a comedic line voiced many times on television last century? Who said it? People who provide that expression in real life are only offering up feeble excuses. They try to shift the blame for yielding to temptations or just plain doing something wrong to someone else.

While we all struggle in the battles of outside influences, this lesson will be speaking to the root causes of the struggles that we face from within. Which begs the question: Can Christians willingly or unwillingly host demons inside our bodies? What do you think?

Yes, the devil and his demons do tempt us to sin. However, the phrase “the devil made me do it” is too often an overused defense in trying to whitewash our own dreadful choices. Except in the rare case of actual demon possession, the devil cannot make us do anything. The devil and his demonic minions are utterly deserving of damnation for much of the evil they do or cause to be done in this world. But using the devil as a perpetual scapegoat for our own sinfulness is counterproductive to achieving victory over sin.

Some religious philosophies insist that any Christian's body cannot have malignant spirits inside. Many a preacher professed that Christians could be influenced by external evil entities but never from within, only from the outside. The foundation used to support this view is that the love of Jesus and the Holy Spirit cannot live inside the same place in which evil spirits reside. Really? Then the illogical branch of that argument could grow to state that there are no demons, no evil, or sin in this world. This is according to Jeremiah Chapter 23, verse 24. “Who can hide in secret places so that I cannot see them?” declares the Lord. “Do not I fill heaven and earth?” declares the Lord.

Jeremiah's words are examples much larger than ourselves. If the Lord fills heaven and earth, how could Lucifer and his ilk constantly prowl our world while God and the Holy Spirit cover and saturate it? Sin is within us just as sin is within the world without shifting the blame to another entity.

A common argument against believers having internal demons comes from misinterpreting 2nd Corinthians 6:14, “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?” Does this mean that light cannot dwell with darkness? Can both light and darkness be seen together? Yes! A righteous light can always pierce darkness. Do you not see God's stars surrounded by inky blackness? This verse is more directed as a warning not to join up with or be negatively influenced by unbelievers.

On the other hand, yes, we are encouraged to associate with unbelievers but only to show them how Christians act by bringing them the Word of God because non-believers are ignorant of true spiritual goals. How can we partner with them if we don't have anything in common spiritually? Can Satan's minions and the Holy Ghost both dwell in a person's life? Yes. Can both influence your life? Yes! That's why we strive to do good, not evil. Can every wrong thing you think of or do be attributed to demons?