Satan’s Battle Tactics - Part 1
Scriptures: John 10:10; Luke 8:5-18;
Happy New Year! This is the first Sunday of 2018 and I thank God for allowing us to see this day. If you recall, I closed 2017 with a message on faith. In that series I shared with you how our minds can change the world around us. I told you that our faith cannot act beyond our beliefs. In other words, our belief empowers our faith. Because our faith is crucial to the kingdom of God, there is a battle going on to destroy it. If we understand this battle, we can take steps to ensure that we are on the winning side. This morning I am starting the series I mentioned last week, “Satan’s Battle Tactics” to help us understand his battle plan and what we need to do to maintain our winning position. Satan has a plan that he is working with his army. The battle that he is waging against us is a battle for our minds, how we think, which directly impacts our faith and our ability to overcome him. Paul made the following declarations to the Christians in Rome and Ephesus:
“Therefore I urge you brethren by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:1-2)
“But you did not learn Christ in this way, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus, that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.” (Ephesians 4:20-24)
Paul was consistent in his message that Christians need to renew their minds. In other words, we must change how we think. In this series I will examine several areas where we are under attack and discuss the steps we can take to protect ourselves and those around us. The first battle tactic, and possibly his most effective one, is his ability to steal the Word of God from us because once we lose it we cannot use it! I want you to see this. If you lose something you no longer have access to it – you cannot use it! Once it’s out of your possession you no longer have it. When Satan steals the Word from you, you can’t readily access it because it’s no longer a part of you – it was not implanted within you. Jesus said, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” (John 10:10) That thief is Satan and he is stealing from us!!! This morning as you listen to this message, please keep this question in the forefront of your mind, “Do I have anything that Satan wants to steal?” Turn with me to Luke chapter eight and we will begin reading at verse five.
“The sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell beside the road, and it was trampled underfoot and the birds of the air ate it up. Other seed fell on rocky soil, and as soon as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture. Other seed fell among the thorns; and the thorns grew up with it and choked it out. Other seed fell into the good soil, and grew up, and produced a crop a hundred times as great.’ As He said these things, He would call out, ‘He who has ears to hear, let him hear.’ His disciples began questioning Him as to what this parable meant. And He said, ‘To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to the rest it is in parables, so that SEEING THEY MAY NOT SEE, AND HEARING THEY MAY NOT UNDERSTAND. Now the parable is this: the seed is the word of God. Those beside the road are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart, so that they will not believe and be saved. Those on the rocky soil are those who, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no firm root; they believe for a while, and in time of temptation fall away. The seed which fell among the thorns, these are the ones who have heard, and as they go on their way they are choked with worries and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to maturity. But the seed in the good soil, these are the ones who have heard the word in an honest and good heart, and hold it fast, and bear fruit with perseverance. Now no one after lighting a lamp covers it over with a container, or puts it under a bed; but he puts it on a lampstand, so that those who come in may see the light. For nothing is hidden that will not become evident, nor anything secret that will not be known and come to light. So take care how you listen; for whoever has, to him more shall be given; and whoever does not have, even what he thinks he has shall be taken away from him." (Luke 8:5-18)
In this parable, Jesus explains to the people how the word of truth gets lost with those who do not pay active attention to it. Let’s examine each situation.
Vss. 5 & 12: “The sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell beside the road, and it was trampled underfoot and the birds of the air ate it up.…..Those beside the road are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their heart, so that they will not believe and be saved.” Those seeds that fell beside the road were those who hear the word of God but before it can be planted and grow within them, Satan steals it away from them and they continue to not believe and be saved. Most of us know someone who has heard the word and have chosen not to believe it choosing instead to continue living their life as they choose. These are those of whom Jesus spoke of in this example. Jesus makes it clear that Satan is stealing the word before they can believe it. This is why we must never give up on those we are ministering to because until they accept Christ, Satan will constantly be stealing the word sown within them that would cause them to believe and get saved. Let’s examine the second situation.
Vss. 6 & 13: “Other seed fell on rocky soil, and as soon as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture….. Those on the rocky soil are those who, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no firm root; they believe for a while, and in time of temptation fall away.” In the second example Jesus speaks of people who hear the Word, accept it, get saved and at some point because of temptation, fall away. Please note that these are different from the first seeds because in the first situation the seeds were never received. With these people, they hear and receive the Word, however, they do nothing with it so the Word does not have firm root. These individuals believe in Christ for a while but when temptation strikes, they fall away. We all know people who struggle with their faith when things are bad. Satan knows that if we do not carefully implant the word into our lives, tend to it and allow it to grow that he can shake us when we experience harsh times. Please understand this, Satan does not care “how much of the word we hear” as long as we do nothing with it. This is the reason I struggle sometimes when we come here Sunday after Sunday with nothing in our hands and we expect that the Word is going to jump from the speaker’s into our hearts without any effort coming from us to receive or retain it. If you do not protect the word you receive, you can lose it. This is why people go to Church for years and continue to live the same life they were living before they “accepted Christ” as their personal Savior. The word was received but it never grew within them.
Vss. 7 & 14: “Other seed fell among the thorns; and the thorns grew up with it and choked it out….. The seed which fell among the thorns, these are the ones who have heard, and as they go on their way they are choked with worries and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to maturity.” This one is interesting as Jesus does not tell us the relationship of the person, if they ever believed or not. What we see here though is someone who could be saved or not. This person hears the Word but when they leave Church (or wherever they heard the Word) life kicks in and they forget all about it. This example accurately describes a lot of Christians who are so busy with their lives that they do not have time to study, consistently come to worship or do anything relating to actual ministry work. We always have one more place to be, one more job to work. We are always traveling, we are tired or we worked long hours which is designed to keep us from Church or if we go, from focusing on the word. I want to share this revelation knowledge with you and I am going to say it slowly because of its importance: Satan has to work to steal the word that we hear; however, he does not have to do anything if we never hear the word! When we do not hear the Word or study on our own Satan really does not have anything to steal from us because we have nothing worth stealing!!! Do you understand what I am telling you? He cannot steal something that we never had! That’s why I asked you the question at the beginning, “Do you have anything that Satan wants to steal?” Let’s look at the final example.
Vss. 8 & 15: “Other seed fell into the good soil, and grew up, and produced a crop a hundred times as great……… But the seed in the good soil, these are the ones who have heard the word in an honest and good heart, and hold it fast, and bear fruit with perseverance.” We should be the good soil that receives the seed and implants it within our hearts. This person hears the word, implants it within himself (makes the word a part of him/her) fights to keep the word and with it bears fruit. This person did not only hear the word, they took it and laid a foundation with it. Upon that foundation they began to build and through that work they led others to a relationship with Christ.
As you consider these four situations, only one is optimal for a Christian, the last one where the seeds fell on good soil. Each of these situations apply to Christians. In the first situation when we hear the word and it’s something that we choose not to believe it has the same outcome as that person who heard about Christ and refused to believe. We cannot operate in something we do not believe in. We cannot act on a Word from God if we do not believe or accept it! So even though we may be saved, we can still have areas in our life with dead, rotting seed because we chose not to accept them and plant them in good soil. Whenever the word is rejected (whether by the saved or the unsaved) that word cannot grow within that person. In the second and third situations we can identify with both of them as Christians. In these two situations the person hears the word, receives it and yet does nothing with it. The word is stolen (suppressed or ignored) when the person faces temptation or the person is just too busy living their life to be concerned about the word of God and His work. We cannot gloss over this!!! We need to make some changes for 2018 if we are going to fully experience all that God has for us in this life. These three situations are direct tactics of Satan to steal the word from us; he either steals it directly by our choosing not to believe it; or gets us caught up in temptations; or we are truly trying to do right but we get us caught up in living our lives and making our money.
Think about it. What better way to get someone to not keep the Word than by placing temptations before them which causes them to forget. When temptation comes they have no word to help them managed through because all they did was hear it but did not study it in order to make it a part of their lives. Now if that tactic fails and the person withstands the temptations, then the next best thing is life itself. Just have them focus on living. Give them a promotion that requires them to work more hours and not be able to come to Church or spend quality time alone with God. Give them kids participating in every sport imaginable which keeps the parent and the kids out of participating in anything valuable to God. Do you see where this is going? Satan is distracting us because we are not focused. We are focusing on things that are contrary to the Word. Remember what I said earlier, if Satan can keep us from hearing the word he will never have to fight to steal it away from us! We need to have something available for him to try and steal, so let me give you a few starters for you to implant within you. These are a few promises from the Word of God that all of us should hold on tightly to. But beware, our enemy will try and steal these away from you. So in the spirit of having something for Satan to try and steal, here is a short list of what God has said to us:
“I promise to hear you when you pray” (Psalm 34:15)
“I will fill your heart with peace.” (John 14:27)
“I will give you mental stability.” (2 Timothy 1:7)
“I promise to comfort you in every one of life’s trials.” (Psalm 23:4)
“I will give you all you need to defeat every demonic attack.”
(Ephesians 6:10-18)
“I will never hold you accountable for what I have forgiven.”
(Hebrews 8:12)
“I will heal you.” (1 Peter 2:24)
“I will always help you know what decisions to make.”
(Proverbs 3:5-6)
“I will never be unreliable or undependable.” (Hebrews 13:8)
“I will help you pray the perfect prayer for the fulfillment of My will.”
(Romans 8:26-27)
“I promise to never stop loving you.” (Jeremiah 31:3)
“I promise to provide for you.” (Philippians 4:19)
“I promise to be the perfect Father to you.” (Galatians 3:26)
If you do not have the Word of God implanted within you that actually mean you are failing in your responsibility to God. Satan wants to steal the Word of God from you and he is very effective in doing this because we are helping him! We must get this correct. I want to demonstrate just how important your hearing and implanting the Word of God within you. If you have not taken any notes of anything else that I have said, please write down what I am about to share with you because this will open your eyes to what your enemy is actively doing against you.
Question 1: Why does Satan want to steal the Word of God from you?
Answer: Romans 10:17: “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ.” If you do not hear the Word you cannot have faith. Your faith is linked to and will be proportionate to your knowledge of the Word.
Question 2: Why is our faith so important to Satan?
Answer #1: Hebrews 11:1,6: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen…..And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarded of those who seek Him.”
Answer #2: 1 John 5:4-5: “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world--our faith. Who is the one who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?”
Satan’s best case scenario is for us to not have a personal relationship with Christ. This is what Jesus spoke of with the seeds that fell along side of the road and were trampled on and the birds ate them. His first desire and best case scenario is that we have no relationship with Christ and when we die, join him in hell. His second best scenario is that if we have a relationship with God it is not a good one and we fall away (the seeds that fell on the rocky soil) or we either ignore God altogether (seed that fell among the thorns.) The bottom line is that Satan wants to block or hinder our having a relationship with God and the only way that he can do this is by robbing us of the Word and our acceptance of it. We need to understand this because ultimately our ability to overcome him rests with our faith which rest in what we know of God’s word!
Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. If you are not hearing you have no faith. If you have no faith it’s impossible to please God. If you cannot please God you are pleasing Satan. If you are pleasing Satan then you are not overcoming him! Remember “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” (John 10:10) Do you have any of God’s Word within you that Satan want to steal? Think about it. Until next time, “The Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up His countenance on you and give you peace.” (Numbers 6:24-26)
