SEEING SATAN IN CHURCH
THEME: BE CAREFUL ABOUT LOOKING FOR SATAN IN THE CHURCH.
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, ready or not, here I come. Satan where are you. Oh, Satan where are you. Some people are looking for Satan in the church.
Some people do not come to church because they are bent on searching for Satan under every rock. People look for Satan in everyone and everything. People look for Satan in the members, the leaders, and the minister. They take it upon themselves to be the Satan detectors of churches.
In fact in C.S. Lewis book the screwtape letters, in which portraits the Devil teaching a young apprentice on how to tempt and destroy man’s faith. In the book there is a section on causing people to be constantly looking for a church that suits them, instead of coming to church to be a disciple and a learner of the ways of the Lord. The people come to church looking for the variety of church that pleases them. This causes the people to totally take their minds off of the true intend to be at worship and puts in on themselves. Satan loves to see people come to church looking for him.
The problem is that if someone begins to look for Satan in church. He is there to be found. Satan is in the church for sure. Acts 5:1-11 “But a certain man named Ananias, with his wife Sapphira, sold a piece of property, and kept back some of the price for himself, with his wife’s full knowledge, and bringing a portion of it, he laid it at the apostles’ feet. But Peter said, "Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit, and to keep back some of the price of the land? "While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not under your control? Why is it that you have conceived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God." And as he heard these words, Ananias fell down and breathed his last; and great fear came upon all who heard of it. And the young men arose and covered him up, and after carrying him out, they buried him. Now there elapsed an interval of about three hours, and his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. And Peter responded to her, "Tell me whether you sold the land for such and such a price?" And she said, "Yes, that was the price." Then Peter said to her, "Why is it that you have agreed together to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they shall carry you out as well." And she fell immediately at his feet, and breathed her last; and the young men came in and found her dead, and they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. And great fear came upon the whole church, and upon all who heard of these things.” If a person wants to find Satan, he can walk into any church building that is meeting on Sunday. Satan will be sitting there in the pews. You may not recognize him because “even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light” (2 Cor. 11:14).
Satan is doing everything he can to hurt the work of God. He loves to use Christian people for his purpose. If he can tempt a Christian man or woman to sin, and then cause that person to be a stumbling block for another person, then Satan is rejoicing. Satan is spending his time destroying churches. He loves hiding behind Christian people to push others away from church. In the parable of the sower, the word of God is preached. There is a receptive soul but Satan is there to take away the word from the heart. “And these are the ones who are beside the road where the word is sown; and when they hear, immediately Satan comes and takes away the word which has been sown in them” (Mark. 4:15). Satan is using Christians to destroy God’s work. He is scaring people away from church with church people who have bowed down to Satan instead of God. “But I am afraid, lest as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ” (2 Cor. 11:3).
Recently, I was reading a book about the restoration movement. It was talking about the split between the churches of Christ and the instrumental Christian churches. The book was detailing the account of the congregation going to court about who owned the building. The case was the instrumentalism against the non-instrumentalism. Both groups were fighting for the control of the property. In fact in a few cases, the group that lost the first case would appeal to a higher court and the ruling was overturned. But after the church went through the ugly court battles, the congregation was devastated to the point that the congregation could no longer grow in the local area. Every one knew about the dirty business of the church. No one wanted to come to a church that fought in court. Pretty much Satan destroyed the cause of Christ in that town. If you want to find Satan you can see him in church at any time.
Satan has the nerve to attack any congregation. No congregation is safe from the influence of Satan. If Satan has the nerve to tempt the Son of God himself, certainly he is going to attack the church full of mankind. In Matthew 4:1-11 it talks about the three temptations that Satan posed for Jesus. Notice that Satan came during Christ’s weakest time. Matthew 4:1-3 “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry. And the tempter came.” Satan loves to come and attack anyone. If Satan tried to mess with Jesus he is going to mess with us.
So if you want to see Satan just come to church. He is there if you are looking for him. But beware if you come with the wrong motives to church. If you are looking at church to find Satan and not Christ this will cause problems. Some people look under every rock in the church to see him. Once someone finds him they feel justified to stop attending church. This is exactly what Satan wants.
There are numerous rocks that people will look under to justify not coming to church. Many people look under the unfriendly rock. People love looking for Satan under this rock. People will come to church to see how friendly everyone is. If people do not fall all over them then they feel guiltless about quitting the church. These people do not realize that the bible states “A man that hath friends must show himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother” (Prov. 18:24). Some times people will have friendliness show downs. People will expect them to talk with them. But it is the same obligation to speak to the other person too. Two people could be staring at each other wondering why the other one is not coming over to talk.
Let’s face it, some congregations are unfriendly. One congregation I went to no one spoke to me. In fact I was sitting in the pew and the first word that was said to me was “Can you please move over.” I guess I was in the way of getting into the pew. There was not greeting or polite communication. Just a get out of the way. The not words were not directed to me. A family came in and I heard the father say, “Now what are we going to do, that kid is in our pew.” That really made me feel welcomed. I could have easily quit attending church there. But I did not. In fact I meet a lot of great people. People took me out to dinner. I even spoke for the congregation and taught a young men’s class on preaching. There was a lot of good works going on in the congregation. But if I just went to find Satan I could have. But I went to look for God.
Just image if someone in the first century went to the Corinthian congregation. If the person went looking for the Devil he would have been easily found. The game of hide and go seek would have been over quickly. Satan was everywhere in the congregation. The church had problems with unity. There were factions and divisions. People were lining up with their favorite preachers. Then there was a young man committing sins that even the heathens would not practice. He was having relations with his father’s wife. There was disorder in the worship. Everyone was fighting to be heard. It did not matter if some else was excising their spiritual gift. If you had the inclination then you would just interrupt. Everyone was speaking out of turn. The congregation did not understand the role of the resurrection. People were denying that it even happened. This congregation had the hand print of Satan all over it. All of the problems in Corinth were from pride which Satan uses to destroy churches. But Paul realizes the problems but he looks for God instead of Satan in the congregation. 1 Corinthians 1:2-4 “to the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, saints by calling, with all who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God always concerning you.” Paul will deal with some of the different areas but he goes into the congregation looking for the influence of God and not Satan.
Everyone must walk into church trying to find God. If you seek the Lord you will find him. But if you seek Satan he will appear. Be careful about who you look for.
Another rock that people look under to find Satan in the church is the rock of hypocrites. These are the people who claim to be Christians but live like the world. These could be deacons that are involved in drinking at the clubs, cursing at work, mistaking loved ones, gambling in town, being a cheat in the community. These are the members who put on a Christian face on Sunday and wear the face of the Devil on Monday. These are the ministers who preach a message that they do not live or the elders that have a bad reputation in town. If you want to find hypocrites, just come to church. I promise you some are here today. If you have come to see hypocrites, they are in the church. Satan is happy to use these people to destroy your soul. He is enjoying. He already has their hearts in his hands. He would love for you to drop out of church because of them. There were hypocrites in Paul’s today and there are hypocrites today. “Some, to be sure, are preaching Christ even from envy and strife, but some also from good will; the latter do it out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel; the former proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition, rather than from pure motives, thinking to cause me distress in my imprisonment” (Phil. 1:15-17). But are you going to let Satan destroy your faith. Or are you going to look for God in the church?
Steve’s parents would not attend the congregation that he was working with. He would invite them but they would not come because of a certain deacon that had a drinking problem. They would state that they are not coming because of that hypocrite. Finally, one day Steve had enough. He said find do not come. And when you go to hell tell him you are there because of him. Be care about who you look for in church. You will ultimately find the person you are looking for in the end.
