WHEN THE DEVIL ATTACKS

Raphael Oye Taiwo

Jam 4:7 

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

1Pe 5:8-9 

8. Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: 

9. Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.

When the devil attacks, there is only one thing for you to do as a child of God: resist the devil.

God knows that the Evil one hates us so much that he will always try to molest and strike at us. So, God has given His children the ability to resist the devil whenever the Bad One attacks them.

          If we resist the devil in accordance with the bible’s instructions, the devil won’t have a chance with us. He will flee - run away in terror - from us.

          Many Christians lay the responsibility of dealing with the devil on God. When they are being oppressed by the devil, they wait patiently for God to deal with the devil for them.

“Oh, God,” they pray, “help me deal with the devil … defeat the devil for me … get rid of the power of dankness for me …”

Yet the word of God makes it clear that they are to resist the devil. You must realize that God is not going to resist the devil for you. You are the one to do the resisting. Stop passing the buck to God.

          One day Jesus came to the country of the Gadarenes.  He was met by two demoniacs. When they saw Jesus, the demons in them cried out, using the speech organs of the demoniacs, “What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? Art thou come hither to torment us before the time?”(Matthew 8:28-29).

          The demons recognized Jesus as God in human flesh -their Creator. They reminded Jesus that it was not yet the appointed time when they should be fully imprisoned by God in the tormenting pit of unquenchable fire. They feared Jesus had come to deal with them before the due time.

          Jesus didn’t dispute the fact that the time had not come when the devil and his demons would be cast into hell to be tormented for ever and ever.

          Right now, the devil and his demons are loose on earth. And what God expects of us is to resist them every time they lash at us.

          We shouldn’t fear the devil. When He comes to attack us we should not quake with fear and run. We are to face him with holy boldness and resist him, fighting the good fight of faith like good soldiers of Christ. Remember, ‘ we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.’ Rom 8:37 

          Many years ago in a village, where I had gone to help my father in his farm, I went to the house of somebody. But the only being around the house to welcome me was a dog - an unfriendly, ferocious yapping canine.

          This dog barred my way, glared at me and yapped angrily. The first thought that struck me was to run. I turned round, ready to run as frightening growls rolled out of its throat.

          “Don’t run, don’t run!” someone shouted from somewhere. “If you run she will chase and attack you.”

I complied with the advice and decided against running. I made up my mind to resist. In a second, I searched the place with my eyes for something to use against the aggressor. I found and picked up a short iron rod, raised it and barked at the dog, “Come…come and I’ll break your head with this rod!”

          She must have seen the determined look on my face and guessed correctly that I would rather break it’s head than allow her to sink its poisoned fangs into my flesh. She turned round and fled.

          The devil is like that dog. When he threatens you or attacks you, resist him. If you run he will give chase and get you. But the devil fears the Christian who refuse to run in  the face of his threats but resist in faith. He flees from such Christians.

Don’t play around with the devil. Let him know that you know that God has made available for you weapons whereby the evil one can be resisted, and that you are ready to put the weapons to good use if he dares to strike out at you.

STEPS TO RESISTING THE ENEMY

Know your Enemy

Mat 13:39

The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels.

1Pe 5:8-9

Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:  (9)  Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.

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Until you recognize the devil as your enemy, the Evil One has a big advantage over you. But when you know him for who he is, the battle with him is almost half won. An enemy uncovered is an enemy half-conquered.

          Napoleon, the great French General who shook the whole of Europe for more than a decade, reckoned that one spy in the right place was worth twenty thousand men in the field. This greatest warrior of his time must certainty knows what he was talking about.  Why did such an experienced warrior, war strategist and military leader have such a high opinion for the spy profession?

The secret a country would keep from a known enemy at all cost, the country might keep in the hand of an unknown enemy, in the false hope that it was the right hand. An enemy spy in high position who has access to top-secret information is to be more feared than a brigade of enemy soldiers on the battle-ground.  The enemy soldiers are known as enemies and they are being resisted accordingly on the battle-ground. 

But the spy is not known as an enemy, until he is uncovered. He is generally treated as a friend he’s not. He is allowed to attend meetings which deliberations, if known to the enemy, will give the enemy a great advantage.  He is trusted with sensitive information the enemy shouldn’t have. It is the reason every country has at least a counter espionage department.

Julius Caesar, the great military and political leader in Ancient Rome, was killed by men he thoughts were his friends.  If he had, he would have stayed at home on the Ides of March 44. B.C. as he had been warned by several people to.  In fact, he had decided to stay indoors.  But when his assassins came, he changed his mind, thinking that he was dealing with friends who wished him well. He felt safe in the company of these ‘friends’.  If he had realized these were enemies masquerading as friends, he would have taken measures against their evil plan. 

Many people don’t know who their real enemy is.  When they have problems or run into some troubles or feel the first onrush of sickness, it is to the devil’s people - the herbalists, the white or black magicians, the spiritualists, the occult people – they run for solace and succor. 

They run to the devil for help, failing to realize that the devil is their chief enemy, the cause of their troubles.

          You won’t see the need to reject the devil until you realize that he is your arch-enemy; that he is trying to destroy your body, soul and spirit; that he is working day and night to ruin you – physically and spiritually.

          Some even feels that God is their enemy and not the devil.  One day, as I was browsing though a French journal in a library in Lagos, Nigeria, I came upon a cartoon.  A palm-wine taper had just fallen down from a palm tree.

When he managed to get to his feet, he cast a furious look at heaven and growled, “Ah Non! Dieu, c’est la deuxieme fois. Je n’aime pa ce jeu!”  “Oh, no! God, it is the second time.  I don’t like this game!”

You see that palm wine taper was so sure that it was God  who was responsible for the bad thing that happened to him. The attitude of this wine-taper toward God reflects that of many people. When bad things happen to them they blame God as if He’s responsible for the bad happening. If they fall sick or lose a loved one or run into a serious trouble, God gets the blame.

God is not man’s enemy.  He is the man’s Creator and Friend.  He loves man (John 3:16).  He cares for man (I Peter 5:7). He wants good things to happen to you (James 1:17).  He wants you to enjoy your life in peace and then spend eternity with Him in unspeakable joy.

The troublemaker is the devil, not God.  It is the devil who is trying to keep you from enjoying your life.  He is the one trying to take away your God-given health.  He is the one trying to stop good things from coming your way.  He is the one making bad things happen to you.  He is the one trying to keep you out of heaven and drag you into the burning hell, the place of torment, to spend eternity.

Know That the Devil Can Be Resisted

The Word of God says to resist the devil.  If the devil could not be resisted, God wouldn’t say we should resist him.

The way some Christians talk about the devil, you would think that the Old Serpent is almighty, that there’s nothing the children of God could do to really defeat him.  They crack up his power and might, constantly telling stories of what great strong Christians he has brought down, the great efforts of God’s people he has thwarted, preachers he has got killed, supernatural works he can do.  They convince themselves, that the devil cannot be resisted, but rather should be feared and run away from.

Know that the devil can be resisted.  He is not almighty, Admittedly, he is powerful.  But if you are a child of God through the Lord Jesus Christ,  greater is He (God) who is in you than he (the devil) who is in the world (1 John 4:4).  If God is in you, and if that God is greater than the devil, then you can resist the devil effectively whenever he pitches into you.

The devil will try to blindfold you to this fact. He will want you to believe that he is omnipotent, that there is nothing you do can do to resist him, that once he has decided to do something against you there is nothing you can possibly do to balk him in his plan.

Friends, the blood of Jesus has bought victory for us over the devil (Rev.12:11).  Jesus, our victorious Captain, has equipped us with power to resist the man of hell and his cohorts.

Resist the devil and he will run away from you in terror.

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