Introduction:
One of the fiercest and the deadliest animals in the jungle is the lion. And because of its roar, all the animals are scared of it. Lions may be not that big as giraffe nor the elephants, but because of its strength, loudness of his voice, size doesn’t matter. Lion is still considered the king of the jungle.
Because of this, the Bible speaks of God as the Lion of Judah. There were many verses in the Bible that pertains to the Lion that comes from the tribe of Judah.
Genesis 49:9-10 “9You are a lion’s cub, Judah; you return from the prey, My Son. Like a lion He crouches and lies down, like a lioness—who dares to rouse Him? 10The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between His feet, until He to whom it belongs shall come and the obedience of the nations shall be His.
Revelation 5:5 “Then one of the elders said to me, “Do not weep! See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has triumphed. He is able to open the scroll and its seven seals.”
On these verses, we can see that the Lion which pertains to God who was prophesied in Genesis that the Messiah would come from and in Revelation He is the same Lion Who can start of the apocalypse in the earth. He is the Alpha (Genesis) and the Omega (Revelation).
But since Satan was known to be a fake, copycat god of this world, he tries to be a lion also. But the difference of the Lion of Judah and him is on their roar. Let us find out the roar of this lion that tries to defeat many using…
The Voiceless Roar of Satan
Yes, we heard it right, Satan’s roar is voiceless as compared to the true Lion of Judah. Satan only tries to mimic the true voice of God. He was very successful in the Garden of Eden, when he mimics the voice of God in the ears of Eve and so they were tempted and failed God. Because of that Satan became the god of this world. But his number one tool is only to threat God’s people by twisting the truth, lying and if we let our ears hear him, that’s the only way he can go to our minds and defeat us. But he remained to be voiceless and powerless if we are always in the hands of God. We therefore have to be vigilant or watchful because of his roar.
That is why this month of August, we have our new theme “I am Vigilant, I am Prepared for Eternity” with our theme verse in 1 Peter 5:8. But allow me to read from verse 6 to 10 so we can clearly see the whole context of our monthly verse found in verse 8.
1 Peter 5:6-10
6Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time. 7Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you. 8Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. 9Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings. 10And the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will Himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.
6Kaya magpasakop kayo sa kapangyarihan ng Dios, dahil darating ang araw na pararangalan niya kayo. 7Ipagkatiwala n'yo sa kanya ang lahat ng kabalisahan n'yo, dahil nagmamalasakit siya sa inyo. 8Humanda kayo at mag-ingat, dahil ang kaaway ninyong si Satanas ay umaali-aligid na parang leong umaatungal at naghahanap ng malalapa. 9Patatagin ninyo ang inyong pananampalataya sa Dios at labanan ninyo si Satanas. Alalahanin ninyong hindi lang kayo ang naghihirap kundi pati ang mga kapatid n'yo kay Cristo sa buong mundo. Nararanasan din nila ang mga paghihirap na ito. 10Maikling panahon lang ang paghihirap ninyo. Pagkatapos nito, tutulungan kayo ng Dios para maging ganap ang buhay ninyo. At siya rin ang magpapatatag at magpapalakas sa inyo, dahil siya ang pinagmumulan ng lahat ng pagpapala. Pinili niya kayo upang makabahagi rin sa walang hanggang kaluwalhatian niya sa pamamagitan ng pakikipag-isa ninyo kay Cristo.
Look at verse 8 “Be alert and of sober mind…” In other words, it says “be watchful, be attentive, be on guard”. The word “vigilant” in Greek “Gregoreo” means “watch, be on the alert, be watchful, be careful, be cautious”. Another Greek word “Agrypneo” means “keep or stay awake, keep watch, guard”.
Let us be vigilant to the voiceless roar of Satan. But how can we be vigilant if we don’t know who Satan is and his character?
Satan or the devil is…
A. Proud – (mayabang, palalo) Ezekiel 28:11-19
1 Timothy 3:6 “He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil.”
B. Powerful – (makapangyarihan, malakas)
Jude 9 “But even the archangel Michael, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, did not himself dare to condemn him for slander but said, “The Lord rebuke you!”
C. Deceitful – (madaya)
Ephesians 6:11 “Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.”
D. Subtle – (banayad kung kumilos, tuso)
2 Corinthians 11:3 “But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ.”
E. Fierce and Cruel – (mabangis at malupit)
1 Peter 5:8 “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour”
So, from these characters of Satan, how can we be watchful and be vigilant against his voiceless roar? We should…
1. Respect him because he is still dangerous.
There is a big difference between respect and honor. To respect is to acknowledge the capacity or the ability of an enemy like the lion. When we say respect the roaring lion’s ability means not to belittle or not to consider the capacity of Satan to hurt us in many ways. Remember, Satan is still there to accuse us for the word “Satan” means “adversary” or “slanderer”.
One of the subtle things that Satan does to us is to slander or say bad things to us. He will use people to say bad things to us so we will get angry at those people who spread gossip against us. You see, this is one of the strategies of the devil. But if we know how to respect the capacity of Satan to accuse us, then we will try to avoid being involved in slanderous activities.
Illustration:
It amazes us how electricians can handle power lines with high voltage and current with less effort. Once I heard them saying “well first you have to respect it before you can handle it”.
Same with handling the power and subtleness of Satan in our lives. We cannot just play along with his schemes or else we will fall on his trap. Ex. We play fire with fire is dangerous…
1 Timothy 3:7 “He must also have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil’s trap.” Paul speaks about having a good relationship with others aside from our brethren inside the church.
2 Timothy 2:26 “and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.” Satan will deceive our minds taking our way of normal reasoning towards others.
So, in order to be watchful and vigilant and be able to handle Satan’s subtleness, we need to “watch our words”, by being humble.
Just before verse 6 of our text in 1 Peter 5, we will read in v5b-6 “All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.” 6Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time.”
Earlier I said that there is a big difference between “respect and honor”. For honor means give praise to a person by being humble. Our humility must be expressed through our words and actions and that includes humility.
Luke 6:45 “A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.”
Satan is still dangerous to those who people who is dangerous over him. If our hearts are filled with goodness, then our words are full of humility which poses danger to Satan also.
Illustration:
I once saw a video of a man who was playing with lions and this man was not being attacked by the lions. I noticed why he was not attacked. It’s because what the lions do to their fellow lions, this man also do to them. So, this man was not a danger to them, that’s why they are not attacking the man. As the saying goes “if you can’t beat them, join them.”
Same with us with our relationship with God and our view of Satan. We honor God for His goodness to us and also we should respect the capacity of Satan, so we cannot be careless about it.
I remember the 7 sons of Sceva in Acts 19: we will read in verses 13-16…
13Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon-possessed. They would say, “In the name of the Jesus whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out.” 14Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. 15One day the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I know about, but who are you?” 16Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding.
These sons of Sceva doesn’t honor God by using the name of God indiscriminately and neither respect the power of the devil by rebuking the devil in the name of Jesus and Paul but they were powerless? Why, because they were full of pride considering they were sons of Sceva a Jewish high priest! It must be pride that drives them to do that!
2. Recognize him since he is a great deceiver.
Aside from being dangerous, Satan is also a great deceiver that’s why he is a subtle (banayad) enemy. He counterfeits whatever God does that’s why we are exhorted by Peter to be watchful and be sober.
Satan can use people against us and deceive us later on. According to the Parable of the Weeds, wherever God plants a true Christian, Satan seeks to plant a counterfeit.
Matthew 13:24-30
24 Jesus told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. 26 When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared. 27“The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’ 28“‘An enemy did this,’ he replied. “The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ 29“‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.’”
The weeds here are the people of the Satan and the good seeds are God’s people. In reality, we are surrounded by genuine and fake Christians. But only God can recognize them, especially in the Last Days, when God will gather the good wheat against the bad weeds where the bad weeds will be burned in eternity.
Not only Satan will use fake Christians against us, especially in the Last Days, Satan will use the Anti-Christ to perform miracles, wonders etc. to deceive more so they can join the Anti-Christ and forsake their faith to God.
2 Thessalonians 2:9-12
9 The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with how Satan works. He will use all sorts of displays of power through signs and wonders that serve the lie, 10 and all the ways that wickedness deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11 For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie 12 and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.
If the devil was able to use the Word of God in tempting Jesus, in the Last Days, the lawless one (Anti-Christ) will use it to deceive many so many will perish together with Satan and his cohorts.
So how can we vigilant and be watchful against his deception? We should watch our ways by testing the spirit and stand in the truth. Not just our words and see if there are sins on it but also the ways of getting our blessings. Because good blessings produce good effects in our lives, especially in our faith to God. So how to test the spirit?
1 John 4:1-6
1Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world. 4You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the One Who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. 5 They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. 6We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.
So we should be able to recognize if the spirit is from God or from Satan through the results of these signs, wonders and miracles.
• If it promotes faith to God or to men or the ways of this world
• if it praises God or the ways of men or this world
• if it practically confirms the Word of God and not with extra-Biblical experiences of men
• if it sounds R-O-A-R to us that gives us
R-inging sounds (it creates confusion instead of connection to God)
O-ver-acting reactions (exaggerations instead of simple expectations)
A-nxiety (v7 Cast our cares to Him for He cares for us)
R-estlessness (instead of peace)
The spirit of Satan is based on lies alone. Look what happened to Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5:1-10
1Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. 2With his wife’s full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles’ feet. 3Then Peter said, “Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4Didn’t it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn’t the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied just to human beings but to God.” 5When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened. 6Then some young men came forward, wrapped up his body, and carried him out and buried him. 7About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. 8Peter asked her, “Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?” “Yes,” she said, “that is the price.” 9Peter said to her, “How could you conspire to test the Spirit of the Lord? Listen! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also.” 10At that moment she fell down at his feet and died. Then the young men came in and, finding her dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband.
God hates lies, as He hates sins. If we will let all the lies in our lives, it will all leads to destructions of our lives and loved-ones as well.
Lastly, we should…
3. Resist him and draw near to God.
First, we respect Satan’s power and what he can do to harm us if we are careless, second is we recognize that he can deceive us so we need to be vigilant of the blessings to us, especially it is based on the truth or not, and thirdly, we need to resist Satan and draw near to God.
Verse 9 of our text says “Resist him, standing firm in the faith…” It means that we need to stand firmly on the Word of God where by our faith is being built.
Romans 10:17 “Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word about Christ.”
We need God’s Word to be alive in us, working through within our lives so that all the promises of God that comes from us will be quick and powerful.
Hebrews 4:12 “For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.”
God’s Word is so powerful that no amount of energy of this world and even Satan’s power can negate and neutralize its power.
Isaiah 55:11 “so is My word that goes out from My mouth: It will not return to Me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
Jesus was able to win over the devil using the Word of God, though He was tempted 3x using all kinds of great temptations of this world (lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh and pride of life). He had a head on battle against the devil because He is God. But not so with us…
We need to draw near to God in order to resist him freely. Without God’s strength over us we cannot simply win this constant battle.
James 4:7-8 “7Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8Come near to God and he will come near to you…”
Both Peter and James shared the same exhortation to us “resist him, because Satan is actually resistible” especially if we use God’s Words against Him and if we draw near to His presence. Both of these men of God had similar realizations.
A. We need to submit to God for we can’t withstand the power of the devil all by ourselves. We need God’s Spirit – Zechariah 4:6, 1 John 4:4 “greater is He that is us than he who is in the world”
B. We need to pray for one another so that these trials might be a support for the need of others – v9b “because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.
C. We have our hope that is coming. that is found in v10 of our text “10And the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will Himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.”
We are vigilant because we know God is the God of all grace, who called us to this situation that will end in God’s glory together with us in heaven. Though we suffer temporarily, we know that if not here on earth, we will be restored and will be strong, firm and steady in heaven.
In order to be vigilant, we should watch our worries by being hopeful and faithful to our calling.
Conclusion:
In the life of Joseph, the Dreamer his calling suddenly started during his temptation in the hands of the wife of Potiphar. We can read that in the whole chapter of Genesis 39. But what we can see here is this:
A. Joseph respected his master Potiphar and his wife
B. He recognized that despite being faithful to his master, his wife wasn’t faithful and would like Joseph to be unfaithful too both to Potiphar and to God.
C. Yet Joseph resisted the temptation and RUN away from it. He may have suffered temporarily in prison, but through God’s grace and wisdom, he was able to walk in his calling as the governor of Egypt. Simply because he chooses to respect, recognize and resist his enemies that time.
He may have seen the devil roaring to him that time, but there were no voice coming out from its mouth. Because the truth is…Satan is a voiceless, powerless roaring lion who only seeks to find his prey through the worries, weariness of every Christians.
In order to be vigilant against the voiceless roar of Satan…
We should watch our words by being humble as we respect him.
We should watch our ways and be able to test and stand in the truth as we recognize him.
We should watch our worries by being hopeful and faithful to our calling as we resist.
Now it’s time to end our sufferings caused by Satan himself to us by drawing near the presence of God. Let us RUN to God after we respect, recognize and resist Satan in our lives for he is only a voiceless roaring lion to us.
Illustration:
Writing in Moody Monthly, Carl Armerding recounted his experience of watching a wildcat in a zoo. "As I stood there," he said, "an attendant entered the cage through a door on the opposite side. He had nothing in his hands but a broom. Carefully closing the door, he proceeded to sweep the floor of the cage." He observed that the worker had no weapon to ward off an attack by the beast. In fact, when he got to the corner of the cage where the wildcat was lying, he poked the animal with the broom. The wildcat hissed at him and then lay down in another corner of the enclosure. Armerding remarked to the attendant, "You certainly are a brave man." "No, I ain't brave," he replied as he continued to sweep. "Well, then, that cat must be tame." "No," came the reply, "he ain't tame." "If you aren't brave and the wildcat isn't tame, then I can't understand why he doesn't attack you." Armerding said the man chuckled, then replied with an air of confidence, "Mister, he's old -- and he ain't got no teeth."
Just like that wildcat from the zoo, Satan is old and has a voiceless roar to us! Just stay vigilant!
