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We Are Not Ignorant Of Satan’s Devices Or Schemes – Part 5 Series
Contributed by Ron Ferguson on Nov 30, 2023 (message contributor)
Summary: We are not ignorant of the ways and means Satan uses to promote his corruption all over. This time we are talking about The MIND under attack; the Corruption of the Christian religion; the false religion of Islam; and the adoption of Paganism. These are serious issues.
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WE ARE NOT IGNORANT OF SATAN’S DEVICES OR SCHEMES – PART 5
This study continues with the next talk in the series where I look at the schemes I believe Satan uses to implement his hatred again God, against human beings, God’s creation, and against Christians. We look at several of these devices in this next study. The title of these talks derives from the verse that tells us we are not ignorant of Satan’s devices or schemes.
16. ATTACK ON THE MIND IS PARAMOUNT IN DEFEATING CHRISTIANS AND KEEPING THE UNSAVED IN SATAN’S FLOCK
God made us spirit, soul and body. Those three parts Satan attacks. People’s spirits are turned to unrighteousness, kept dead, so they can end in hell, for the devil knows he will end in the lake of fire himself. He must know he cannot prevent that, so he will take along as many as he can to a lost eternity. The soul is the seat of emotion and the mind, and it comes under the greatest attack. Our emotions can be churned and the demonic hosts do their utmost to turn our hearts away from God. The mind is under constant attack with thoughts, data input from all sorts of places, conflict and demonic opposition.
There is an absolute plethora of ways the mind is attacked and turned from God. Darwinism or evolution is paramount here as it is atheistic humanism that warped the mind into rational thinking with “God is dead” so the evolutionary thought is that chaos runs everything. Intellectualism ruins the minds, for that too is humanism and makes man reliant on himself, and the cleverness of his own abilities, dismissing God, and then gropes in blindness to a lost eternity. Universities are the worst offenders here and Satan ensures that Universities are fill with his picked men because the youth are being destroyed. Schools are following on the same track.
The mind is influenced by the media, television, books, contemporary music, the Internet, friends . . . in other words, the mind is a battleground for all Satan’s schemes. Once the devil captures the mind, he has no desire to release the individual from his clutches. The captive mind will grow even stronger in its rejection of God, for evil is growing in the mind and taking it further into the darkness.
Only Christ can break the devilish shackles of the mind in deliverance and freedom, to bring the captive into the redeeming light of God. Christ came to preach deliverance to the captives.
{{Isaiah 42:6-7 “I am the LORD. I have called you in righteousness. I will also hold you by the hand and watch over you, and I will appoint you as a covenant to the people, as a light to the nations, TO OPEN BLIND EYES, TO BRING OUT PRISONERS FROM THE DUNGEON, and those who dwell in darkness from the prison.”}} {{Isaiah 9:2 “THE PEOPLE WHO WALK IN DARKNESS WILL SEE A GREAT LIGHT. Those who live in a dark land, the light will shine on them.”}}
Light overcomes darkness and the light of Christ will not be overtaken by darkness. The darkness did not comprehend it. That is fact, but the Christian must avail himself and herself of that great provision. The Christian’s mind is attacked as never before from all directions, and a few of those I listed above. Our minds are our battleground. We must be on our guard.
There is a lovely verse in {{Psalm 123:2 “Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master; as the eyes of a maid to the hand of her mistress, SO OUR EYES LOOK TO THE LORD OUR GOD, UNTIL HE SHALL BE GRACIOUS TO US.”}}
The eyes of the servants look to the hand of their master and they know their master is kind and provides for them. (That is not always the case for some masters or overlords or managers can be ruthless and nasty). God is never like that. The psalmist must be inferring here that the masters are good ones, parallel to the Lord.
The maid who serves her mistress has the mistress’s trust and her eyes look to the benevolent one for her help when that help is needed. The mistress, it is assumed, is very happy to help the dependent maid. All these examples are the way God cares for His special children of faith. He would never tease them then withdraw what is good for them. He would never be mean.
The greatest gift was given into the hands of men, that of the Lord Jesus Christ, but men’s hands took Him and crucified Him on a cross. The greatest gift of the Lord Jesus shows that God will always give the best to His own people. He is pleased to give the best.