I just want to read a couple
of verses of scripture. They're in verse 6. There was a day when the sons
of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan came
also among them. And the Lord said unto Satan,
Whence camest thou? Then Satan answered the Lord,
and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking
up and down and in. And the Lord said unto Satan,
has thou considered my servant Job, that there's none like him
in the earth? A perfect and an upright man,
one that fears God and eschews evil. Did Satan answer the Lord
and said, does Job fear God for naught? I want to talk about
our great adversary. Our great adversary. And we've
got an adversary. Of all the mysteries in the world,
one of the greatest mysteries is, where did evil come from? Where did sin come from? Where
did wickedness come from? And who really is in control
in this universe? Who's controlling it? Notice first, I don't care how
prosperous, you know, and here's Job, he's prosperous, he's wealthy,
he's a well-known man, and it doesn't matter How prosperous
and how committed you are, you're not immune to trials. Not immune
to trials. Our Lord, oh how He was tried. Oh how He was tried. And Paul
the Apostle, he was greatly, greatly tried. You can read about
all the things that he went through in one chapter. You know, he
was left out in the ocean three different times. Floated on a
board for I don't know how many times. Put in jail, he was beaten
three times. With stripes, three times. Spent
years in prison. He had, I mean, this is a man
that just from the time that God saved him, he went through
great, great trials. Had men try to kill him. And
so there's, you know, no matter how committed you are, how prosperous
you are, or how poor you are, it doesn't make any difference.
Nobody's immune to trials if they're the Lord's people. Now
here we have an insight into what's going on in the holiest
of holies. God is here. Now when it says
the sons of God came, it's either angels that gathered with him,
because you see it other times that the angels gathered around
him. And he's got the Lord of hosts, you know, he has a great
host that gathers around him. And then it could be the elect
angels gathered around him and the spirits of just men made
perfect. But anyway, you know, you got
Michael and Satan fought over where the body of Moses was in
the book of Daniel. Gabriel was the one who came
a couple of times and delivered God's news. But I'm not surprised
that the sons of God are present. I'm not a bit surprised that
the sons of God are present. But this is surprising, that
Satan would be allowed to come up too. That Satan would be allowed
there too. Now that's incredible. You know,
there's the elect angels, Gabriel, Spirit of just men, but here's
this evil one and he's gathered around in there with them. He
shows up. They're gathered around, the
sons of God. And they come to present themselves and they're
presenting themselves to the Lord. God, you're on the throne. We're going to present ourselves
to you. And I'll tell you, but how to
let Satan into their presence. And I'll tell you, you know,
here's. You know, is God the author of
evil? No, no. Not in this sense. When we talk
about evil, now when it says God, you know, He produces peace
in evil, that means trials. Jacob said, my days were a few
and full of trouble. And here's what we're talking
about here, it's talking about evil, sinfulness, wickedness.
Is God the author of it? No, no, no, no, no, uh-uh. Is there some other personality
that runs the universe? But here we have the foe of foes. I mean he is a, he's an awful,
awful foe. And here's the thing about it,
he really has a personal existence. You know, God spoke to him as
a person. God spoke to him as a person.
Satan came among them and the Lord said, Satan, And you know
it's capitalized, personal noun. Personal pronoun. He called him,
you know. And he spoke to him as a person.
And he answered as a person. So here he is, he's a person.
He has a personality. And some men deny that he exists. They deny that Satan exists.
And the pre-millennials, they think, well, you know, he's not
been turned loose yet. See, when Christ sets up His
throne in Jerusalem for a thousand years, and at the end of that
thousand years, Satan's going to be turned loose for a little
while. Listen, I don't want to be here if he's turned loose,
if things the way they are now. Do you? No, no. But there is
an evil, evil principle. And I'll tell you, they say it's
the dark side of man. But there's an evil, evil, evil
personality. And it originates, and it works,
and it directs evil in this world. You find this so many times in
the scriptures. You find it so many times, especially
in the New Testament. You know, human history and our
own experience just proves that Satan has a personal existence.
Now I've told Shirley, I dread dealing with this subject because
it feels like that I'm giving him too much authority, too much
power. But I'm not. I'm just trying
to tell you what he is. He's a person. He has a personality. But you start with the first
two brothers. The first two brothers. One murdered
the other. The first two brothers that ever
lived on this earth, one murdered the other. What caused him to
murder his brother? If it wasn't, that's a personal
experience of Satan being there. And our Lord Jesus Christ, He
was with, you know, when He just, in Matthew 16, He asked His disciples,
who do men say that I the Son of Man am? Peter ended up saying, get, you
know, said, thou art the Son of God, the Son of the living
God, thou art the Christ. And then about two verses later,
two or three verses later, He said, a son of man must go up
to Jerusalem, must be delivered into the hands of sinful men,
must be crucified and die. And Simon Peter said, Lord, oh
no, that's not gonna happen. That's not gonna happen, forbid
from you. And you know what our Lord said
to him? Get thee behind me, Satan. Now that's an apostle. You think
Satan put that in his mind. Satan won't put their words in
his mouth. And you know why? Because he
wanted Christ without a cross. And you can't have Christ without
a cross. And that's what's the matter
with religion today. They want Christ without his
cross. But you can't have it. You can't have it. And how do
you account for all the atrocious things committed by men in history? You go, what all happened in
the scriptures? How did they slaughter one another by the
thousands? And you talk about the Caesars,
there was so many, Caesars was the title. And that was what
the Roman Emperors was, they called Caesars. And they slaughtered
people by the thousands. Hitler, Hitler, how about Hitler? How many millions did that man
get? Cutting children out of mothers' wombs. People having
unnatural affection. And I tell you, beloved, that
even today, even today, what causes a boy to walk in and commit
murder to a bunch of kids, walk in and shoot a bunch of kids?
If that's not Satan, what is it? What makes these cartels,
and this is what they do, they'll cut off people's heads and roll
them down the road to let everybody know that if you mess with us,
that's what you'll get. It ain't been too long ago that they'd
hung Americans up at bridges over in Iraq and Afghanistan,
hung them up for everybody to see. Put people in cages and
set them on fire. And that's just happened in just
in the last few years. Now you tell me, what makes a
woman kill, she had five children, what's made her kill all five
of her children? If I smell Satan, not a personal
existence of Satan. They say, well, they're sick.
Well, yeah, they're sick. Sick with demons, like that fella,
it's like that man, you know, that had the Gadarene Maniac.
They couldn't tame him. If they'd had him in a mental
hospital today, they'd had him in a straitjacket. If they'd
had him in a room, a padded room, and he'd have just bounced off
of one wall after the other. But they couldn't tame him. He
went around the tombs and he'd cut himself. I would have come
up to him and said, who are they? You know what the first thing
he said, come out of their mind? Jesus, thy holy one, we know
who you are. He said, well, who are you? Well,
we're legion. Legion. I mean, we're many. Had so many devils in them, and
you know, and there was 2,000 in them, because he put them
in 2,000 hogs. 2,000. Well, I mean, you know,
the people, and that's our fault. I heard Brother Henry say one
time, you know, people talk about, well, you know, that I can make
the devil do this, do that, and all that. You know, I'm not,
listen, let me tell you something. He's had 6,000 years experience
turning people like me and you every way but loose. I don't
want a fool with Him. I want Christ to deal with Him.
I want Christ to deal with Him. But I'll tell you the Scriptures
tells us that men are taken captive by Him at His will. And as it
says in 1 Timothy 5.15 that silly women laden with sins They went
from house to house to house to house, bringing reproach and
bearing reproach and telling silly tales. He said they turned
aside after Satan. After Satan. And our own experiences,
our own experiences. Oh my. I don't know. I'll tell y'all something that
I've never, I ain't told nobody, I've only told a couple people
this. Now this actually happened to me. When I was sick years
ago, when I was in bad, bad shape, and I'd already made a profession
of faith, and I wouldn't go to bed till way up in the night
because I couldn't sleep. I dreaded the night coming because
I had to, you know, and then I dreaded the morning coming
because I hated getting up. But one night, I was laying in
bed, and I don't know if it was a demon or whatever it was, but
it's sitting on our dresser. And he laughed at me and said,
I'm gonna get you. I'm gonna get you if it's the
last thing I do. And it terrified me. It terrified
me. Now whether that's a dream or
something, I don't know, but it scared me. I mean, sitting
on my dress and laughing at me. Awful looking thing. Awful, hideous
looking thing. He said, I'm gonna get you. I'm
gonna get you if it's the last thing I do. And ain't you grateful
that God put me under the blood? I'm thankful. You know, listen,
I hope you never have any experience like that. I hope you never do.
But I know I don't want to be on this earth, and if Christ,
and we'll find that later, if Christ doesn't control him, then
you and I are in great trouble. Great trouble. And not only does
he have a personality, he spoke as a person, he answers as a
person, And the scriptures declare it as a personality. You know
he's called Beelzebub. Beelzebub, the prince of the
devils. He's called a serpent. He's called
a dragon. He's called the devil. He's called
Satan. He's called the prince of the
power of the air. He's called an angel of light. He's called
a roaring lion. He's called an adversary. And
our Lord said he was a liar and a murderer from the beginning.
But who do you murder? Our first parents. For first
parents. And I tell you what, let me tell
you something else about him. Every place you find him in the
scriptures, he's involved in religion. He don't have to go
to the honky-tonks. He don't have to go to the honky-tonks.
You know where he goes? He comes to services all the
time. That's where He comes. The first
place you find Him at is in Genesis chapter 3. That's the first place
you find Him. What's He doing? He's talking
about God. He's talking about God. He's
talking about God's Word. He's talking about God's justice.
He's talking about God. And I tell you, He come among
them, so here they are. He's interested in religion. He's interested in what He can
do to God's people. And this isn't the first time
we had him coming from the presence of the Lord. Look over in 1 Kings
with me, chapter 22. 1 Kings 22. 1 Kings 22. I'm in
Genesis. How'd I go over there for? Here we go, 1st Kings 22. If I can get there, here we go.
1st Kings 22, look down at verse 19. Now Jehoshaphat was a king, and
there was a prophet named Nathan. And they said, you know, he's
going to go up to a war. And he said, look, I've got one
more prophet. I want to come and tell us whether
we ought to go up or not. He said, let's get Nathan over
here. Well, Jehoshaphat said, everything he says about me is
not good. He's going to tell evil about
what's going to happen to me. And then verse 19, look what
it says. And he said, hear thou the word of the Lord. Now he's
talking to these kings, Ahab and Jehoshaphat. And he said,
hear therefore the word of the Lord. I saw the Lord sitting
on the throne and all the host of heaven standing by him on
his right hand and on his left, what we just saw. And the Lord
said, who shall persuade Ahab that he may go up and fall and
be lost and defeated at Ramoth Gilead? And one said on this
manner and another said on that manner. And there came forth
a spirit and stood before the Lord. and said, I'll persuade
him, I'll make him go up there so he'll get killed. And the
Lord said, wherewith and how are you gonna do this? And he
said, I'll go forth and I'll be a lion's spirit in the mouth
of all his prophets, and he shall persuade him and prevail. Go
forth and do so. Now therefore, behold, the Lord
has put a lion's spirit in the mouth of all these prophets,
and the Lord has spoken evil concerning thee. So there's a
spirit that said, I know how to do it. He said, I'll go down
there and lie to him. But I'll make all these prophets
lie to him. And he'll go up and beat Kim.
Go up and beat Kim. And I'll tell you, this isn't
the first time we have him in the presence of the Lord. You
know, and our Lord Jesus Christ, Satan came and tried him personally. Oh, he took on the Son of God
personally. He, the Lord Jesus Christ, the
scripture said He had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, didn't
eat anything, didn't drink anything. And He went off into the wilderness.
And about that time, here comes Satan. Here comes Satan. Face to face with the Son of
God. Face to face with God's Christ. Face to face with the
Messiah. Face to face with our Savior.
And he said, listen, you know he was hungry, know he was hungry. And the first thing he said,
if you're really the son of God, you know what you need to do?
He said, you tell that piece, that stone right there turn into
bread, so you have something to eat. So he knows exactly how
to deal with all the things that he dealt with Christ about. And
he dealt with him in four different ways, and he came to our Lord.
And he's also represented as being where God's people are
gathered together. Oh yeah. You know, the scriptures
tell us very, very plainly, very, very plainly that he come, when
the word is sound, who's he that comes to catch the seed away?
Satan gets it away. First thing it says, Satan's
the first one to come take it. Satan is the one who catches
the tares among the wheat. And he's always, always there
to catch away the word. And I'll tell you something,
he's a master at. He is a master at. And that's
why Paul said we're not ignorant of his devices. He's a master
at causing ill feelings to enter into our minds, intrude in our
minds. He attends prayer meetings, goes
to meetings, listens to sermons, And you may miss, but Satan never
misses a service. You know, Paul told him, he said,
I fear that Satan and his subtlety will guide you from the simplicity
that's in Christ. That's what he said about. But
let me tell you something else. He's not a free agent. He can't
come here and he can't go there and he can't do what he wants
to do. You did notice. He had to ask God and God had
to let him do. Huh? And you know when they come
up there, Satan come up there, first thing God said, where'd
you come from? Where'd you come from? Where you coming from? God knows who he is. God knows
where he comes from. God knows where he comes from.
God knows where he's gonna go. God knows that. And then he asked
him this, he said, listen, have you ever considered my servant
Job? He pointed to one of his children and said, have you ever
looked at him and really thought about him? He said, no. He said, well, I'll
tell you what, he only fears you because you put a hedge around
him. And you know, God doesn't ever
ask a question for information. Never, never asks for a question
for information. He has authority over who goes
where and when they go and how long they stay. And what happens
while they're there? That's me, you, and everybody
else in this world. But what he does is he shows
him that you've got to come to me. You have to get your account
from me. You have to be dealt with by
me. You can't go anywhere and can't do anything apart from
me. And I tell you, he has to answer to God. And I don't care
how great a creature, a person is. He still has to give an account
to God Almighty, his maker. And he's a powerful creature.
He's a powerful creature. God of this world. And yet, God
has to, he has to ask God's permission. And let me tell you something
else, and I won't take long on this, because I don't enjoy this
at all. I really don't. I don't like talking about him
this way. But this is what the scripture says about him, just
in the book of Job. I don't know how many times he's
mentioned in the book of Job. I know I see 1, 2, 3, 4, 4 or 5 times just in 3 verses right
there in chapter 2. But let me tell you something,
he's a vagrant in God's universe. He says he goes from to and fro
on the earth. He's restless. He just goes to
and fro. He's like the wicked. The scripture
says, you know, the wicked, there's no rest to the wicked, saith
my God. No rest, no peace to the wicked.
He's homeless. He's homeless. He ain't got a
home. The only place he can live comfortably, let me tell you,
the only place he can live comfortably is in a human being. Do you know
that? When you find him in the New
Testament, he's in somebody. He's in somebody's body. He's
homeless. He's like that unclean spirit
that went out of his house. He dwelt in a house. He dwelt
with a man. He dwelt with a man. He was an
unclean spirit. And he went out. He left. And that Pete left that
house swept and garnished. I mean the fella got him a cross
and put it on, put him a lapel pin on, said I'm a Christian,
got him a Bible, got him some pictures of Jesus. I mean he
got swept and garnished, he got really clean. But that unclean
spirit went all the way over and he couldn't find no rest.
He said, I can't find no rest since I left my house. He said,
I'll tell you what I'll do. He said, I'm going to return.
And when he went back, he took seven other spirits with him. And the state of that house,
the state of that man was worse than anything. And a woman told
me one time, a woman told me one time, her husband, because
he come made a profession, come made a profession, and wanted
Certain things done for him, and done for him, he wanted a
lot of attention. He couldn't get it, so he left. And she told
me one time, said, he's like that fella that when, an unpleased
spirit left him, and now he's got like, he's got seven more,
even worse, he's even worse now than he's ever been. That's just
what she told me about her own husband. But God had mercy on
him. Saved him, saved him, saved him. But he's a homeless. There's
no rest in sin. There's no rest in sin. Oh no. And not only that, but he's zealous.
He's going to and fro. Going to and fro. He's in a hurry. He moves with a swift, swift
step. He's earnest. He's dead earnest about what
he's doing. Goes around his enrolling line. And I tell you, beloved, When you get zealous, and greedy,
and ambitious, and jealous, and envious, and revenge, and get
malicious, none of those things, none of those things are of God.
None of them. And here's another thing he does.
He accuses, he's an accuser of the brethren, he slanders God's
people. Look what he said about Job. When God said, do you ever
consider my servant Job? Then Satan, verse 9, look what
Satan said. Well, does Job fear God for nothing? Huh? He said, what you've done,
you've made a hedge around him, and about his house, and about
him on every side. He said, oh listen, you take
that hedge down, let me get inside that hedge, and he'll cast you
to your face. And oh, here he does, oh you
put a hedge about him, his house, and all that he's done. And let
me show you Genesis 3, 1 through 4. Not only does he, Slander
the Lord's people, but he slanders God he accuses God Look in Genesis
3 with me chapter chapter 3 He accuses God he slanders God
he he says things about God I'm glad God's got a hedge around
me. I certainly am And look what happens here Now the serpent
was more subtle, crafty, crafty, than any beast of the field which
the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, yea,
hath God said, you see the first thing he said, God said something.
He acknowledges God said something. Yea, God said something, he acknowledged
that. And did God say, you shall not eat of every tree of the
garden? That's the first thing he said. He said, God don't want
you to enjoy nothing. He don't want you to enjoy nothing.
He don't want you to live good. He don't want you to be happy.
He don't want you to be enjoyable. And the woman said unto the serpent,
we may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but of the
fruit of the tree, which is in the midst of garden, God has
said, you shall not eat it neither. Now listen to this. Neither shall
you touch it. Now God didn't say not touch
it. He just said don't eat it. Just don't eat it. And lest you
die. And the serpent said unto him,
unto the woman, listen, God's not really just. He's love, he's
merciful, he is so compassionate. Oh, you shall not surely die.
God really, he don't mean for you to die. That's not what he's
talking about. He's surely, surely not gonna
let you die. So he tackles God's justice there.
And then this is what he goes on to say. First of all, he started
with God. And then he said, for God doeth
know that in the day you eat of that tree, your eyes are gonna
be opened. You're gonna see things the way
they really are. And listen to this, you're gonna
be as God's. Knowing good and evil. You see,
the first thing he did, he said, God, God said something. Oh yes,
God said something. And he said, oh no, listen, you're
not gonna die. God may be a just God, but he's
also merciful and he's loving and he ain't gonna let you die.
He's not gonna do that. And I'll tell you why he don't
want you to do that is because he don't want you to get all
the glory. You're gonna be a God and you'll
get some of the glory and you'll see what's really going on in
this world. Oh my, he even comes out against God. And I tell you,
he attacked the love of God, the glory of God, man's need
for God. He's ever at work to make people
doubt. And he's called the accuser of
the brethren. And this is what he accused Job
of. He said, Job fears you, but not because of you. Not because
you're God. Not because you're glorious.
Not because you loved him, and saved him, and redeemed him.
Job fears you because you've blessed him, you protect him,
and you prosper him. And what he is, is he comes and
he uses that. And he's a fool for doing this,
you know why? Because God knows the heart.
He knows exactly how Job's gonna come out in this thing. But oh,
he loves to break the harmony, the peace, the soul. with this relationship with God.
And then let me say this in closing. He's a slave to the sovereign,
infinite God. Look what he said here in verse
12 of chapter 1. And the Lord said unto Satan,
Behold, all that he hath is in your power, only upon himself
put not forth your hand. You know, you're going to go
just as far as I can tell you. You're going to do what I tell
you you can do, and you can't do no more. And I'll tell you
what, and so Satan went forth from the presence of the Lord.
And you all know the rest of the story. And I tell you, he
acts only, only by permission. He's only allowed to go so far.
He could only deal with Job's poverty and his relations, but
he couldn't touch Job. As Greg and his Horrible and
as wicked and as powerful as Satan is he's not independent
He's an instrument in God's hand He's on a chain He's bound to
God's will and God's purpose now. That's right. I know that
and that's why Paul You know he said that he said he was exalted
above measure Lest he be exalted above measure He said, God has
sent a messenger of Satan to buffet me. To buffet me. With a thorn. A thorn. And he said, I asked the Lord
three times to take it away from me. And he never did. But he
said, God sent me. You know why I done it? He said, Lest he be
too big. Paul had great revelations. He
was taken up to paradise. He was in the presence of God.
He's seen Christ himself. Christ himself appeared to him
and talked to him. And he said, lest I be exalted
above measure, a messenger of Satan sent to beat on me and
to be a thorn. And I tell you, beloved, I am
so thankful. Now listen, I believe with all
my heart that he's on a chain. He's on a chain. And I've told
you this before. O'Brien and his pilgrim's partner
as Christian. And it wasn't faithful, somebody
else that was with him. But they come up to this house,
beautiful house, lights all on in it. And there's a long way
up to that house, and they wanted to go to that house and get some
rest and enjoy some fellowship. But when they got up there, there
was just two great big huge lions. When they got up there, two big
huge lions, one over here and one over there, and they just
went to roar and reaching for them, clawing at them, trying
to bite them. And that scared them to death.
Oh, it scared them to death. They backed up and said, oh,
what are we going to do? What are we going to do? And they got up closer and closer.
And they seen that that one, he's on a chain. He can only
go that far. That one's on a chain, he can
go that far. If we go between them, we'll be all right. And
that's the way it is with Satan. He's on a chain. And he's on God's chain. And
God may let him get close enough to you to scratch you every once
in a while, bite you every once in a while, but he's on God's
chain. And I'm thankful that he is.
Every once in a while I hear a great, great roar, and it scares
me. And every once in a while I hear
just a whisper in my ear. And has this ever happened to
you? Do you reckon God really does exist? You reckon we're
really going to get to go to heaven? Do you reckon that there
is really such a thing as heaven and hell? Do you reckon that
maybe that's just something that keeps me quiet and calm? I tell
you, he's going to put some awful stuff in your mind. But you know
what I say? I say, if it ain't true, it sure
done me a world of good while I've lived. Ain't it you? It's made my life 10,000 times
better than it was before I ever knew it. And if this ain't real,
then there's nothing real. If God ain't real, and Christ
ain't real, and faith ain't real, and the blood of Christ cleansing
us ain't real, if heaven ain't real, if this Bible and what
it has to say is not true, then I'm the worst fool person on
the face of this earth. But I'll tell you what, I'm a
happy, happy person. Trusting in Christ and Christ
alone. Now we talked about, we have an adversary. And he's had
6,000 years fooling with us. And that's why our Lord says,
pray. Pray that you enter not into temptation. And Lord, and
he prayed also in John 17, he said, Keep them from the evil
one. Keep them from him. Our Father, the blessed name,
blessed name, precious name, glorious name of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Father, I thank you for the truth. And I thank you that you rule
this universe. That it's not Satan, He has only
the power you let him have. He goes only where you let him
go and does only what you give him permission to do. And Lord,
I pray that you in your wondrous sovereign mercy would preserve
us, preserve us and keep us and do as you did Job, put a hedge
around us. You told us to go to Zion and
behold the wall around Zion. Lord, you're our wall. Steve
Bennett tonight, you're a wall around us. You're a wall around
us. And Lord, you're our wall. You're
our defense. You're our conqueror. You're our great deliverer. And
we thank you for that and bless you for it. And bow our hearts
before you. Oh Lord, keep us and preserve
us for Christ's sake. Amen. Amen. There is a name.