“Dear 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”.-1 John 4:1.

The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, or can it do so. Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God-Romans 8:7-8. 

Bring the full tithe into the storehouse that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is not more need.-Malachi 3:10

Submit yourself to God, resist the devil, and He will flee from you.-James 4:7

 

You Have Already Been Redeemed

In my head, I hear jeers and laughter
From the voices condemning me.
They tell me that the love of God
Isn’t strong enough to set me free.
And I begin to drown in panic
At the self-hatred that fills my heart.
Who was I to think I could be saved?
Why would God give me a new start?
All alone with my memories,
Scene by scene I am condemned.
With the wreckage I’ve created
How can I expect my soul to mend?
What I see reflected in the mirror
Is an unredeemed and worthless mess.
Who would want to save me?
No matter what I might confess?

Suddenly a whisper in my ear.
Saying, child, you are no longer lost.
I paid a price to call you mine
And you are more than worth the cost.
Stop dancing to the world’s music.
Follow me and sing a different song.
Don’t believe I can’t redeem you.
For, I can make right from any wrong.

Then comes an unfamiliar feeling;
It seems to flood me from within.
Then my thoughts begin to tell me
Perhaps I can still be welcomed in.
Even though I’ve been offensive,
With the worst kind of behavior.
If I understand the Bible
It’s for the likes of me He sent a Savior.
Right then, on my knees, I pray
God, I am so thankful you sent your Son.
And that on the cross He died for me.
And with His death He declared it done.
That every sin had been forgiven,
Every soul who believes set free.
And with this prayer today
That will finally include me.

Suddenly a whisper in my ear.
Saying, child, you are no longer lost.
I paid a price to call you mine.
And you are more than worth the cost.
Stop dancing to the world’s music
Follow me and sing a different song.
I have already redeemed you.
For I have righted all your wrongs.
©Linda Troxell 10/22/2017

 

The story of the Gospels is a beautiful story, perhaps the most beautiful in the world. What sets it apart from other beautiful stories about saviors is that it is true. But when one is first introduced to the story of the Gospel, it seems much too good to be true. And I think that the worse one’s background is, and the worse one perceives one’s sins to be, the harder it is to believe that one could be forgiven. I think it is very difficult for new believers to wrap their heads around a few things about Jesus, aside from the obvious such as the miracles and people rising from the dead. For example, it is difficult for them to wrap their heads around the fact that Jesus died for the forgiveness of, not only their sins but the sins of the whole world. They have a hard time understanding that Jesus’ death atoned for every sin of every person who ever walked, or ever will walk, the earth.

On the heels of the inability to understand that is the inability to understand why Jesus would die for everyone’s sins. It is difficult to believe that Jesus, who is the son of God and lived a sinless life would willingly die on the cross to save those of us who cannot live a single day free of sin. Why, they ask, why would he do such a thing? Why would he do that for me? It’s so important that each of us settle this question for ourselves once and for all. It’s so important that we believe that God, loves us unconditionally, that Jesus died to redeem our sins, and that once we are reborn of the incorruptible seed we are forgiven and live eternally. We do not need to understand how and we do not need to understand why; but we must believe that God is good, only and wholly good; and that in that goodness His grace has saved us. Because if we are in doubt about any of this, at that place of doubt in our mind, that place where we question God and His goodness, that is where the enemy is most likely to intrude.

Of course, it is very difficult for us to believe, when we are feeling guilty and unworthy, that anyone, much less a holy, perfect, and sinless Lord and Savior would want to befriend us. But it is in this place of doubt that we are most susceptible to having our thoughts manipulated. Ultimately, unless we can reach out to God through prayer for support, our behavior will be determined by our fleshly feelings.  And we know that in turn our feelings will be determined by our thoughts. And so, when we are in doubt of the goodness of God and lacking faith it is through our doubt and lack of faith that the enemy begins to manipulate our thoughts, and ultimately our behavior. The enemy wants us to ask why, why would anyone die for me; why would God help me? Because when he hears these thoughts he knows we are feeling unworthy. And when we feel unworthy we are in the state of mind in which we are most vulnerable to manipulation.

By inserting himself into our thoughts about God Satan can influence our relationship with Him encouraging our lack of faith in God’s love for us. Therefore we must always be vigilant for those thoughts that are being influenced by the enemy. But in order to identify the thoughts of Satan, we must be familiar with his techniques, familiar with, as they say in the world of crime fighting, his modus operandi, his M.O. One of Satan’s M.O.s is distorted information spread by wolves in sheep’s clothing. This is lying but with a twist. The lies are often based on truth only distorted so it can be difficult to spot them. An example would be Satan leading us to think it is okay to sin because we need only tell God we’re sorry and He forgives the sin. It’s true that God forgives when we repent, but God knows our heart and therefore when we’re sincere and when we’re not. So Satan’s information is a distorted truth, a lie based on the truth. It can sound true, especially when you want it to be. A wolf in sheep’s clothing is merely someone who pretends to have your best interest at heart but they don’t. That’s why the apostle John tells us we must test the spirits; “Dear 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”.-1 John 4:1. But how do we know if a spirit is from God? It’s easy really. Just ask yourself if what they’re saying agrees with the word of God. If it doesn’t, it isn’t from God.

Don’t get me wrong, that doesn’t mean that everyone who tells you something that is not Biblically true is a demon of Satan. It may just be that Satan is conveniently using them for his purpose. Still, we must be vigilant about their words and how they affect our thoughts because this distorted information that Satan uses is meant to affect our behavior through the invasion of our thoughts. Once he gets in our head he will use reasoning, albeit reasoning built on faulty logic, to manipulate our human frailties such as pride, self-pity, self-righteousness etc. to manipulate our thinking. This will always lead us to sinful behavior because, as we are told in Romans when the flesh is in control we cannot submit to God and therefore cannot please Him. The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, or can it do so. Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.-Romans 8:7-8.  This is exactly the M.O. that Satan used in the Garden of Eden to manipulate Eve to eat the fruit.

Satan began with a seemingly innocent and subtle question, “Does God really love you?”  Asking this question is the way that he manipulated Eve to consider something she probably had never considered before. She became mildly skeptical about God’s love. From there Satan manipulated her pride suggesting that what God had convinced her was obedience was in truth servitude. This framed God as restrictive and suggested He was depriving Adam and Eve of something unnamed but desirable. This sparked a bit of envy and rebellion leading them to think that the natural desires of their mind and body would better lead them then had God. Once Satan had Adam and Eve’s fleshly desires whipped up he played his trump card by subtly suggesting that God didn’t really want to withhold the fruit of the tree because it would kill them. No, he suggested, God wanted to withhold the fruit because He knew that by eating the fruit they would be in control; they would be able to determine what was right and wrong for themselves. They would be equal to God. And so, by manipulating Adam and Eve’s thoughts through their fleshly desire for control, Satan manipulated them to eat the only thing that God had forbidden them.

Adam and Eve had no reason to doubt the goodness of God. The beauty of the place in which God created for Adam and Eve to live reflected the beauty of His mind. Everything He had created in the garden informed Adam and Eve of God’s goodness. By simply observing how God treated them they were able to tell He had a great love for them and that His intentions were good. Yet, by lying indirectly about God, lying directly about the consequence of eating the fruit, and obscuring the results of so doing, Satan was successful in making Adam and Eve suspicious of God’s intentions and causing them to feel they needed to compete with God.

After thousands and thousands of years of being cut off spiritually from our maker, how much more susceptible to Satan’s M.O. are we than were Adam and Eve? Why is this so important? It’s important not only because we need to guard against Satan’s manipulations, shape our beliefs and our feelings. But also because the expression of our beliefs and feelings shape our interactions, and thus, our relationships with others, such as our co-workers, strangers, friends and most importantly, our intimate relationships with those we love. But the expression of our beliefs and feelings also shape our interactions and thus our relationship with our God. False beliefs about God and His goodness are probably the most destructive force there is for Christians. It is far more destructive than addiction, pornography, or sexual immorality. In fact, false beliefs about God are probably at the core of most of those sins. And the cause of false beliefs about God come largely from the Satan’s manipulations of our thoughts.

So what can we do about this? Well, we can do many things that can make Satans’s manipulation of thought somewhat less effective. They are all things that, as good Christians, we should be doing anyway; all of the things that God wants us to do. We can study the word of God. We can pray. We can do as Paul exhorts in Philippians 4:8 and fill our head with things that are honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, worthy of praise etc., we can associate with others of like mind and who are genuinely concerned with our spiritual growth and well-being; we can be active in our church. But as I said, we should be doing those things as a matter of course.

As for what we can do particularly to stop the enemy from manipulating our thoughts, I have two suggestions and they go hand in hand. The first is one we should already be doing; we can learn the word of God. By this, I don’t necessarily mean memorize the word, but broadly understand the word of God. This is good protection because the better we know the meaning and spirit of God’s word, the easier it is for us to spot when our thoughts are not in alignment with it. The second is to be vigilant for our own thoughts that are not in alignment with the word of God and refute them with the word of God immediately. Let me give you an example.

Let’s say that it is payday and you’re paying the bills. You pay the last one and you notice that you have enough left to by that new T.V. you’ve been wanting, or you have enough to give your full tithe. So you start telling yourself that it’s probably okay for you to not give the full tithe this month. “After all”, you say to yourself, “Did God really mean 10% every time? That was probably just a suggestion or a guideline.” you tell yourself. Suddenly you realize that you are questioning the word of God. You could let the thought go and risk the devil getting a foothold to start manipulating your thinking so that you end up sinning, or you could recognize that the enemy is trying to get a foothold and refute the thought by reciting to yourself and him Malachi 3:10: Bring the full tithe into the storehouse that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is not more need.-Malachi 3:10.

However, it’s also important to know that you don’t need to use an exact scripture or any scripture at all to refute the intrusion of the enemy. Although praying and confessing scripture out loud, I think, is very powerful, it’s just as effective to know the principal or characteristic of the teaching that you will use to refute the enemy. So in the above example, it would be just as effective to tell yourself, “I’m trying to manipulate the words of God to get what I want and that’s no better than the enemy trying to manipulate me to have the thought in the first place. I need to just obey the word of God as it reads in the Bible.”  And then give your full tithe.

So, you can see it is not a mysterious process and the answer, while it may not be easy is very simple. And as with most things with which we struggle, the answer can be found in the word of God. So the next time you find the enemy in your head and trying to manipulate your thoughts, you can try to remember and try to follow the advice of this long article or you can simply remember the words of James when he said: Submit yourself to God, resist the devil, and He will flee from you.-James 4:7

 

Points for Prayer and Pondering

Can you think of one or more times when Satan got in your head and manipulated your thoughts? Write about what thoughts he put in your head.

Do you find that when you are feeling bad about yourself you find it more difficult to believe that God could really love you?  If yes, write about why you think that’s true.

What do you think of the steps discussed to decrease Satan’s ability to manipulate your thoughts?  Do you use any of those steps presently? Do you think you will try some of them?