May it please the Lord to bless
us together as we consider his word this evening. Let's turn
to the 2nd epistle of Paul to the Corinthians chapter 11 and
the last part of verse 14. The 2nd epistle of Paul to the
Corinthians chapter 11 and the last part of verse 14. For Satan
himself is transformed into an angel of light. This word was, of course, very
true when the apostle wrote it. It is still very, very true today. And how evident it is in our
own lives and all around us, we see that Satan is indeed transformed
into an angel of light. What that really means is that
he pretends to show people that wrong is right. He tries to put
a complexion on it so that people believe a lie. And by nature,
because of our sinful nature, because of our fallen nature,
we are very apt to be taken in by this act of Satan as he transformed
into an angel of light. Now, the apostle was very aware
of this great danger and he was really concerned about the situation
which existed in the church of Corinth. And he says that he
was jealous over them with a godly jealousy. He was so concerned. He was jealous for their spirituality. He was jealous that they might
be healthy in the things of God. And so he says, I am jealous
over you with a godly jealousy. For I have espoused you to one
husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ."
He wanted to present the Church of God, just like that, as a
chaste virgin as Christ. But he says, but I fear, and
he had a right to fear, I fear lest by any means, as the serpent
beguiled Eve through his subtlety. We know of course, I hope we
know anyway, how that poor Eve was beguiled by the subtlety
of Satan. And today we face that same powerful
devil. And he's on the prowl all around
us. He's waiting for an opportunity
in your life and my life to present to us His view of things. A wrong view, a sinful view to
cause us to sin and cause us to turn away from the things
of God. His great determination is to
destroy our souls And we should never believe that the devil
is a small enemy. He is a great adversary and he
is always looking for an opportunity. My friend, sometimes we give
him many opportunities, sadly, in our life. We know how Eve
was beguiled by listening to Satan as he caused her to doubt
God's word. That's one of his greatest skills
of causing us to doubt God's word. That's why we read about
the evil heart of unbelief. The Lord had very clearly spoken
to Adam and Eve that they should not eat of the fruit of that
tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And Eve reiterated
to the devil what God had said. We might think, well that's well
done Eve. You've done well. The devil wasn't finished. No,
he said what has God said. Is that really true? And that
of course is one of his clever approaches. He says to us, well,
is it important? Does it matter? Can you not do
this? Can you not go that way? Can
you not follow that? Can you not turn here or turn
there? And yet, the Lord has set before
us the straight way, the narrow way. There are obstacles, there
are mountains, there are difficulties. And the devil will try and tempt
us to turn out of the way. He'll say, well, this is an easier
place to go. This is not so difficult. You'll find you can get on alright
here. Just turn out of the way. Look, the field's nice, and nice
and green. Everything's pleasant. forget
that difficult way forget that hard way and listen to me I'll
place you in an easier path and the problem is that we think
it's the Spirit of God leading us because the devil is transformed
into an angel of light be very wary of trying to find
an easy way. Be very wary, because the Christian
path is not an easy way. The Christian path has many difficulties,
it has many trials, and many temptations, and many oppositions. And in that pathway, you won't
be able to Get on very well by yourself. You might get on quite well by
yourself in the way the devil have you to go. But in the right
way, you will need some help. You will need the Lord to go
with you. You will need the Lord to strengthen you. You will need
the Lord to make the mountains to flow down at His presence. You'll want him to make the crooked
places straight and you'll need him to guide and direct you. It's a very different path to
the path the devil would have us to go in. And therefore the
temptations are very great. Just coming back for a moment
to Eve. The devil you see pointed out how attractive the fruit
was. Well, it's really quite nice.
Surely it won't do any harm just to have a bite of that fruit. Oh, the devil had her on the
run, didn't he? You see, the devil gets a chink
in our armour. You see, I want to make and do
havoc within. We need that grace. We need that
grace to resist the devil. This one who is transforming
into an angel of light. We need grace to resist the devil. Resist his temptations. The devil is a great tempter.
He tempts us in a way that we don't realize it's the devil. If he came about as an angel
of darkness, we would be aware of who he was. But because he
transforms himself into an angel of light, we are easily taken
in by his cleverness. And we find very quickly we are
serpent bitten. Oh yes, we are served and bitten.
As we spoke recently, as some of you know on that occasion,
the history of Israel, when they just disobeyed the Word of God. They rebelled against the Word
of God. They rebelled against God's way. They complained. and Lord sent
serpents to bite them and many died Moses commanded to make
that brazen serpent to put it on a pole and they were commanded to do
a very simple thing and that was to look to that brazen serpent
many looked and were healed Many failed to look and died. So as we see that in our gospel
day to day. Oh how many there are. And we
amongst them have been serpent bitten. And the only remedy is
to look to the Lord Jesus Christ. It's the only way of healing. And yet so many refuse to do
just that. Because think of it, can't we?
It was just too simple a thing to do. Surely that won't succeed
in healing me of this poison from this serpent. And therefore
they did not follow the command of God. So it is today, so many
people do not look to the Lord Jesus Christ no, they look everywhere
else and they forget the great and glorious words in Isaiah
look unto me and be ye saved all the ends of the earth for
I am God and there is none else well we know that Eve listened
to Satan and we know the result the result was sin. Think of the line of the hymn,
O thou hideous monster sin, what a curse hast thou brought him. Just a very naturally speaking
simple thing, but it wasn't. It was a terrible thing. Disobedient
to almighty God, and Satan had transformed himself into an angel
of light and Eve had believed. Now we are thankful that we have
another occasion in the Word of God and that was when the
Lord Jesus Christ was on the earth and the Saviour had been
baptised and then he was led up into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And my friends, the devil did
all that he could to defeat the Lord Jesus Christ. He brought
before him three different things. And what did the Lord do? He
directed him to the Word of God. And my friend says, he will try
believe you in me you will try to tempt you in me as an angel
of light yes you will he'll bring before us things which we need perhaps or we think we
need and they may appear attractive
to us and we need to know the word of God to be able to answer
him You won't give up on just one occasion. Don't pat yourself
on the back and think that you've succeeded. You have to realise that you've only
been successful through Christ that strengthened you. Otherwise,
you would fall, otherwise you would go in the wrong direction.
You would listen to that great adversary of our souls. for Satan
himself is transformed into an angel of light now in this occasion
more particularly the apostle was concerned that the Corinthians
would not listen to those who preached another gospel yes and
he was concerned about it and how Good it will be for us today
if we are concerned also about not listening to another gospel
again. The devil is very active in this day and age in which
we live. How many false Christs there are. Indeed how easy, how
many places there are up and down our land that pretend to
worship the true God. But in fact we find they are
not truly amongst those who give all the honour and glory to God.
No, they are claiming honour and glory themselves. And we
find there are many false worshippers. The Apostle goes on to tell us
here, he says, But what I do, that I will do, that I may cut
off occasion from them which desire occasion. See, people
are looking for occasion to glorify themselves. That wherein they
glory, that they may be found even as we, for such are false
apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into
the apostles of Christ. Many people today in the professing
Christian world pretend They are some great preacher. They are transforming themselves. What is the effect? It's Satan
himself is transforming them into an angel of light and they
are deceiving many. And he goes on, therefore it
is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed. These are
the devil's ministers. Therefore it is no great thing
if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness.
They are pretending to be ministers of righteousness whose end shall
be according to their works. The apostle is warning the Corinthians
against such people. And we today need to be warned
against such people. And the devil is very clever
in the way that he operates in bringing many to appear to be
preaching righteousness, but it is not the true righteousness. And so he says, I say again,
let no man think me a fool, if otherwise yet as a fool, receive
me, that I may boast myself a little. That which I speak, I speak it
not after the Lord, but as it were foolishly, in this confidence
of boasting, seeing that many glory after the flesh. many glory after the flesh, and
we need to be very aware of that. Not only are those who preach
of glory after the flesh, they desire to take the glory themselves.
Not like the Apostle Paul, he desired to be less than the least
of all saints. He was willing to be nothing,
that Christ might be all and in all, and that really is a
mark of the true servant of God. Someone who is willing to be
less than the least of all saints. Not someone who abhors themselves,
but someone who is important. As the apostles said, by the
grace of God, I am what I am. May we all be able to say that.
By the grace of God, I am what I am. And so, We see then this
evil one, for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of
light. His aim therefore is to present
darkness as light. That is his great aim. To direct
us to view things which quite clearly are wrong. to put on
them such an image, such a face, as we may think, well, perhaps
it's all right. Remember in the days of King
Saul, he was a sad king. He was a sad king. In the days
of King Saul, he was told to go up and fight
the enemy take the city and he was told to kill everything. Everything. And did he do that? No. He kept the best cattle. And when Samuel came to him and
he made out that he gained a great victory and done everything in
accordance with the command of God. And Samuel said, what do
I hear? I hear the lambs and the sheep
bleating. What is that noise? And Samuel said, oh well, I've
kept the best to sacrifice. What was he told? To obey is
better than sacrifice. Yes, the devil, you see, had
gone to Saul and said to him, well, of course, you can just
keep the best. And Saul tried to lay it off
and to blame the people. We might sometimes try and lay
things off and blame other people. Adam tried to lay it off and
blame Eve. You see how subtle the devil
is. He'll try and say, well, of course, you can blame so and
so for that. You can do this and you can do
that and you can lay the blame there. My friend, you and I have
to stand before God. Don't forget that very straight
and direct answer that Samuel gave. To obey is better than
sacrifice. It may be that The devil tempts
us. The angel of light says, well,
you can do this and you can do that and that's a good thing
to do and that will be pleasing to God. And surely that will
be right and good. Weigh it up carefully. Weigh
it up carefully. Make sure you're not disobeying
God. You may be pleasing yourself. What's the motive? What is our
motive? What is rigged deep down in our
heart? What's there residing? Is it the honour and glory of
God? Or is it our own honour and glory? Saul wanted to keep
the best. He didn't want to destroy it.
It may have seemed difficult. It may have seemed hard to do.
It may have seemed, perhaps, opposite
to the right thing. That may be so in our life. We
may sometimes think, well, I must do that. Surely that's the right
way. It appears everything's in accordance
with that. We have to ask ourselves the
question, is it that we are obeying God? People today likely turn
away from God. They likely please themselves. They desire to do their own will. Why is it? I'll tell you why
it is. It's because Satan's transformed
himself into an angel of light and has hooked with us into doing
that which is wrong rather than follow that which is right. We
are told, need not to our own understanding. That's what the
devil wants you to do. Lean to your own understanding.
We're told this in the Proverbs also. There is a way that seemeth
right to a man, but the end thereof are the ways
of death. Be very aware of following a
way that seems right. Is it in accordance with God's
word? Is it following the Lord? Or
is it just the way that seems right? The way thereof is death. For Satan himself is transformed
into an angel of light. You may perhaps ask, well, how
am I to know whether It is Satan directing me as an angel of light
or is it the Lord that is directing me as the true light? You may say, well, how shall
I know? Well, I'll tell you how you will
know. Will it bring honour and glory
to God? Can you ask God's blessing on
it? Will it produce in your life,
like it did in the life of John the Baptist, that desire, he
must increase but I must decrease. Now you can apply those tests
to the situation and see whether it will bring honour and glory
to God Because quite clearly, the only things that bring honour
and glory to God is if you and I are obedient to the Lord. It cannot bring honour and glory
to God if we are disobedient to the Lord, because what it
means is this. We are exalting ourselves above God. And we are following our own
understanding rather than the Word of God. and therefore we find that Satan
himself is transformed into an angel of light. Now the devil
knows what are our weaknesses and be sure of that he will be
very alert to seek an opportunity to attack us in our weaknesses. And one of the things we need
to be very aware of is going on to the devil's ground. What is the devil's ground? The
devil's ground is an unholy ground. It's an unholy ground. And I
don't need to explain that to you, I'm sure. The things of
the world are generally unholy ground. And if we're on unholy
ground, we can be pretty sure that the devil's half succeeded
in making inroads. Because we're already half convinced
to follow him, rather than following the Lord Jesus Christ. The blessing is, If we follow
the Lord Jesus Christ, it is following a despised and crucified
man, not something that our flesh would go after. But the blessing
is, if we do follow that despised and crucified man, we will have
the answer of a good conscience. You will have peace in your heart.
If you follow the devil as the angel of light, you will not
have peace in your heart. You will not have peace in your
heart. And I'm sure you will know that's true. I know that's
true. I walked it myself. My friends, there's no peace
in the way that the Satan leads us in, we may think we can brush
over it we may think it will be alright and we pretend to
ourself that it's okay and we pretend we have peace in our
hearts in reality we are fooling ourselves in reality we are just
going farther down the road of sin and Satan himself is transformed
into an angel of light and we're being taken in by him. Oh, to be blessed with that grace
to follow then a despised and crucified man. Now, the apostles
path in following that way was exceedingly difficult. We read
this account and he's not boasting, he's just telling us the plain
facts. As you and I align ourselves
with what the Apostle endured, I'm sure we would have to confess
that we don't endure anything like what the Apostle did. He wasn't a great orator, as
he said. He did have a good understanding. He wasn't a great speaker. But
he tells us, as he went through that list of beatings, Yes, and
he was weak. Didn't say he was a strong man.
But he was indeed a Hebrew. And he was a minister. And he
was a labourer. And in his labours he was more
abundant. But he also endured much. Five times he received
40 stripes save one. Your young people may wonder
why it's described as 40 stripes, say one, because it means of
course 39 stripes. Well, the Jewish law was very
particular and they were not allowed to give more than the
punishment. So if 40 stripes was a punishment,
they gave one less in case they miscounted. And that's why. and he received 39, but just
think of it, on 5 occasions he received 39 lashes 5 occasions and then he was beating
the rods 3 times, 8 times his body was battered and he was
stoned and then he goes on doesn't he in all the other situations
which he was involved in for Satan himself transformed
into an angel of light but you see the apostle was able to resist
the devil he was given that grace to stand firm against all these
oppositions and then he comes to this he says if I must need
glory I will glory the things which concern mine infirmities. The God and Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ, which is blessed forevermore, knoweth I lie not. If we are listening to this devil,
who goes, who's transformed angel of light, we won't be like that,
will we? We won't be blessing the Lord
forevermore. Oh no, we'll be hard-hearted. we'll be rebellious
and we'll be walking far off and we'll be fleshly and we'll
be worldly and we'll be following the things that please the flesh
we won't be willing to suffer for Christ's sake are we willing today to suffer
for Christ's sake? if we suffer with Him We should
also reign with Him. That's a blessed outcome, isn't
it? Suffering with Christ, reigning
with Christ. Well, I wonder if our religion
really adds up to that. Our real concern is to be with
Christ at the end of our journey. And if it is then, how are we
living our life today? Are we listening to the devil
as he goes and transforms into this angel of light? Or do we
see the greater and more blessed light, which is the Lord Jesus
Christ, who said, didn't he, I am the light of the world And
my friends that light shines so much more brightly than the greatest light the devil
can produce as we view the Lord Jesus Christ
suffering for all our sins. What light it is and that light
will never go out. It is an eternal light. And so
we may see that light. May we view that light. And may
we follow that light. And rejoice in what Christ has
done. And have no confidence in our
flesh. You may remember in the Pilgrim's Progress. Christian
as he journeyed. He came out to stand this bond. Went out on the other side. I
think it was then that Evangelist came to him and he was told,
he said, do you see that shining light? And he was an honest man, it's
good if you and I are honest. And he said, I think I do. I
think I do. Well, perhaps tonight. We can't
say any more than that. But if you are able to say, I
think I do. I hope I do. The Lord Jesus Christ,
the vanisher said, keep that light in view. Looking unto Jesus, the author
and the finisher of our faith. That's the light. That's the
light of the world. That's the light which you and
I are to follow. And we are not to follow this false light. It's just a pretense. The devil
will pretend that it is a light. My friends, it's not a light.
And don't forget, does it bring honour and glory to God? Or is it the opposite, bringing
honour and glory to ourselves? Well, the apostle was indeed
concerned, wasn't he? For the honour and glory of God.
Yes, he was concerned that the churches of God, the churches
of Christ, might indeed be kept from following the wrong way. And therefore he goes, as we
read together, at some length to spell out the importance of
following the true light and not following the full sight
and so tonight may you and I be very concerned in our daily walk
every day of the week not just on Sundays on Sundays as well
the devil tries to make inroads on Sundays you be sure of that
oh yes he'll try and transform us into an angel of light to
allow us to do all things on the Lord's day which are not
in accordance with his purposes and his will. Well, just question
again, do they bring honour and glory to God? And so he says, and no marvel
for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Well, tonight may we be given
that wonderful grace to see the true light. the Lord Jesus Christ
and to keep that light in you until by God's grace we view
that light as the eternal light in glory itself. Amen.