In James chapter 4, I titled
the lesson this morning, How to Resist the Devil. I bet my
title just got everybody's attention. The first thing that comes into
your mind when you hear someone say, teach you how to resist
the devil, you think of someone getting in some battle stance
and saying, you know, devil, I rebuke you. That's not it at
all. But it would be wise for us to
be taught how to resist the devil. Because I know I'm not able to
resist the devil by my own strength. I know that. Satan went through
Job's life like a hot knife through butter, didn't he? Job didn't
know what hit him. He didn't know Satan was coming.
He didn't know what hit him. David, the man after God's own heart,
Satan provoked him to number Israel. Caused three days of
pestilence to be on the land where 70,000 men died. Peter, the apostle Peter, who
was willing to go die with his master, was warned. Satan desires
you to sit and use weed. He knew Satan was coming. It
was no match for him. Well, these men couldn't resist
the devil. How can I resist the devil? Our
text says it must be possible because in verse seven, James
says, submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil and
he will flee from you. How do I do that? Well, God's
word gives us some good instruction on that. I look back at Matthew
chapter four, number one, we resist the devil by trusting
the word of God, by believing the message of the word of God.
And our Lord gives us a wonderful illustration of this in Matthew
four, beginning in verse one. Then was Jesus led up of the
spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And
when he had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, he was afterward and
hungered. And when the tempter came to
him, he said, if thou be the son of God, command these stones
be made bread. But he answered and said, it
is written, thou shalt not live by bread alone, but by every
word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Then the devil
takes him up into the holy city and seteth him on a pinnacle
of the temple and saith unto him, if thou be the son of God,
cast thyself down. For it is written, he should
give his angels charge over thee, and in their hands they should
bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a
stone. Jesus said unto him, it is written again, thou shalt
not tempt the Lord thy God. Again, the devil taketh him up
into an exceeding high mountain and showeth him all the kingdoms
of the world and the glory of them, and saith unto him, all
these things will I give thee, that thou will fall down and
worship me. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan,
for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and
him only shalt thou serve. And the devil leaveth him, and
behold, angels came and ministered unto him. Now did you notice
there how in every temptation the devil set before our Savior,
the Savior answered him with the word of God. And when the
word of God was quoted, Satan went right on to the next thing.
Did you notice that? He never argued against the word
of God, did he? Because he can't, because there's
nothing there. He doesn't have an answer for
the word of God. And eventually he fled from Christ because he
had no answer for the word of God. And if you and I would resist
Satan with the word of God, he'd flee from us too. But now when
I say by using the word of God, I don't mean just just quoting
the word out loud or reading it out loud. The way we resist
Satan with the word of God is by believing it, by believing
the message of it and resting in the message of it. Satan cannot
get any foothold against us in the word of God because the word
of God is perfect. So he'll flee from us always
when we're trusting in the message of the word of God. All you and
I need to do is pray for faith to believe. All right, number
two, look at second Corinthians chapter two. We resist the devil by being
forgiving. Second Corinthians chapter two, verse 10. To whom ye forgive anything,
I forgive also. For if I forgave anything, to
whom I forgave it, for your sakes forgave I it in the person of
Christ. Last, Satan should get an advantage
of us, for we're not ignorant of his devices. Now, Satan is
a crafty enemy, and he will use anything to cause division and
strife in the church. amongst us, give Satan a foothold
in the church. Strife among us, give Satan a
handhold in the church. And he gets that foothold and
that handhold, he can tear the church to pieces. And he's so
crafty. He'll use something good to do
it. He'll use the law. He'll give us an indignation
over somebody else's sin, not our sin, over somebody else's
sin and cause harsh feelings. cause pride, cause self-righteousness
in the church. And he'll make, he's so subtle.
He'll make us think we're serving God by feeling that way. And
when that happens, people will become unforgiving. They'll not
be understanding about the sin of others. And those feelings
give Satan a foothold in the church and it'll tear it to pieces.
So the way to resist the devil, the way to stop him from getting
a foothold in the church is very simple. It's by being forgiving. just by being forgiving. Now
that ought to come naturally to us. How can people who believe
the gospel be unforgiving? God forgives us every day. How
could we be unforgiving? God forbid. But if we're forgiving
with the sin and the faults and the weaknesses of others for
Christ's sake, the devil will flee from us because he won't
be able to get a foothold. All right, number three, look
at second Thessalonians chapter two. We resist the devil by believing
and loving the truth of the gospel. Second Thessalonians two verse
eight. And then should that wicked be
revealed whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his
mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming.
Even him who's coming is after the working of Satan with all
power and signs and live wonders and with all deceivableness of
unrighteousness and them to perish because why they perish because
they receive not the love of the truth that they might be
saved. And for this cause, God shall send them strong delusions
that they should believe a lie that they all might be damned
who believe not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. Now, people who will be damned
will be damned because they received not the love of the truth. They
rejected the love of the truth. That truth, that gospel, that
would be the gospel of their salvation. They rejected it.
They didn't have pleasure in the truth of salvation in Christ. They didn't have pleasure in
the truth of God's grace to sinners in Christ. They didn't find any
pleasure and peace with God, not through what they do, but
through the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ. They didn't
find any pleasure in God's keeping power. They wanted to keep their
own selves. They wanted to contribute something
to it, and they find no pleasure in God's keeping power. But they
had pleasure in unrighteousness. And this unrighteousness now,
this is talking about religious people, people in false religion. He's not talking about open sin,
what we think of as open sin. This unrighteousness is their
own good deeds. It's something that they did
that they thought would make God happy with them. Now you
remember this, those works that we think is going to make God
happy with us, that is the height of unrighteousness. Nothing can
be more unrighteous than that. Because if I think my works can
make God happy with me, I'm saying Christ is not enough. I'm saying
I can do something more than what Christ did to make God happy
with me. That's the height of unrighteousness. And that's what
false religion is. Now this truth is not, is more
than being religious. Satan's seat, Revelation 2 tells
us this, Satan's seat, his seat of power is in false religion. So it's a whole lot more than
just being religious. That false religion hates the
truth and leads men to damnation. But everyone that God elected
to salvation is going to be saved through belief of the truth and
love of the truth. Verse 13, 2 Thessalonians 2.
But we're bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren,
beloved of the Lord, because God has, from the beginning,
chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the spirit
and belief of the truth, whereunto he called you by our gospel,
the gospel of truth, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Therefore, brethren, stand fast in that. Hold the
traditions which you've been taught, whether by word or our
epistle. This is how we resist the devil.
It's by believing the truth of the gospel, the gospel that God
used to call us and to save us, to reveal Christ to us and in
us. Satan cannot stand for that truth. He's got to flee from
that truth. He's the father of lies. He uses
lies to deceive people, but nobody can be deceived by the truth. Can't be deceived that way. So
Satan will flee from us if we believe and love the truth. And
the truth is a whole lot more than a set of doctrines. The
truth is a person, the Lord Jesus Christ. If we believe and we
love the Lord Jesus Christ, the devil has to flee from us. And
we resist the devil by standing fast. See, this is not just a
one-time thing. This is a long-term thing. We resist the devil by
standing fast in the truth, by refusing to leave it, by refusing
to compromise the truth. And we'll be tempted many times
to compromise the truth. But if we refuse by God's grace
to compromise the truth, the devil flee from us because he
hates the truth and he doesn't have any power against it. All
right. Fourthly, look at first Peter
chapter five. We resist the devil by being
steadfast in faith, steadfast in faith in Christ. 1 Peter 5,
verse 6. Humble yourselves, therefore,
under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due
time, casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you. Be
sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, is a roaring
lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour. Whom resists steadfast
in the faith. That's how we resist him, in
the faith. knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished
in your brethren there in the world. But the God of all grace,
this one in whom he is the object of our faith, the God of all
grace who had called us and his eternal glory by Christ Jesus,
after that you've suffered a while, make you perfect, establish,
strengthen, and settle you. To him be glory and dominion
forever and ever. Amen. You notice how Peter and
James are saying almost exactly the same thing. We looked at
this last week in James 4 verse 6. But he giveth more grace.
Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to
the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to
God. Resist the devil and he will
flee from you. Now Satan is a very real enemy. We'd be foolish to
think he's not a real enemy. He's like a roaring lion. He's
always lurking in the high grass. He just crouched down that high
grass lurking waiting for some prey to come by that he can just
easily devour. And Peter tells us we resist
the gospel by faith, simply by trusting Christ. Satan is the
accuser of the brethren. The word devil means a false
accuser, a slanderer. Satan tries to deceive God's
elect. And he does this by falsely accusing
our Savior to us. He slanders the Savior to us.
He tells us, Christ is not enough. He can't save you by himself
without any help from you. That's slandering the Savior,
isn't it? He slanders our Savior by saying, you know, he could
cast you off. He could. He doesn't care enough about
you to keep you. So you better get to work pleasing him. You
better keep working, keeping him happy with you or he'll cast
you out. Now that's a lie. There seems a logic there, doesn't
it? but that's slandering the Savior. He said, I'll never cast
you out. And we resist that false accusation
by remaining steadfast in the faith. We resist that slander
simply by believing Christ, by believing what He's told us about
Himself. And if we steadfastly trust Christ to be all of our
salvation, the devil's eventually going to have to flee from us.
Because he can't make any accusation stick against our Savior. We
just trust him, steadfastly trust him. The devil has to. He can't
bring any accusation that'll stick against our Savior. But
the devil, the slanderer, this false accuser, he also goes to
the Father. He also goes to Christ, slandering
God's elect to him. He brings charges of sin and
rebellion and ugliness against God's elect. But every one of
those charges is a false charge. Every single one of them. Because
the blood of Christ has already washed it white as snow. So the
devil will flee from us if we remain steadfast in trusting
the blood of Christ to cleanse us from all sin. Satan will charge
us with our sin. He'll whisper in our ear how
sinful, how vile we are. It's your accusation. We can't
say it's not true. That's the way we are. And if
we start trying to make up for our sin by what we do, we start
getting worried about how, you know, what we've done, what we
haven't done, start trying to fix our walks of God will be
happy with us. Satan's already devoured us.
He's devoured us the moment we think I got to start making up
for my sin by what I do. But if we simply trust Christ,
trust him who made us righteous, Trust his blood that cleanses
us from all sin. The Satan, he's got nothing to
charge us with because Christ has made his people innocent.
He's washed them white as snow in his blood and that will force
the devil to flee from us. If we steadfastly trust in the
grace of our God, in the Lord Jesus Christ and not our work,
we'll be established in Christ and the devil will have to flee
from us. You'll have to flee from us because he doesn't have
an answer to the gospel. He doesn't have an answer to
grace. He's got an answer to works. His answer to our works
is always it's not enough. It's not good enough. But he
doesn't have an answer to grace. He doesn't have an answer to
righteousness in Christ. Do you know why? Because there's
not one. So if we remain steadfast in
faith, trust in Christ, the devil will have to flee. He'll flee
when the father says they're not guilty. They're righteous
and innocent in my Son. So resisting the devil in faith
is not to deny our sin, it's to say, you're right, everything
you say about me is true, but Christ is my refuge. We're trusting
Christ to be our refuge, the devil's got to flee, because
he can never make an assault against Christ. Resisting the
devil in faith is simply saying, you're right, that's true, but
I'm not trusting my obedience. I'm not trusting my works. I'm
trusting Christ as my righteousness and he's enough. If that's our
trust, if our faith steadfastly remains in Christ, the devil
had to flee from us because he can't find any imperfection in
the righteousness of Christ. See, this faith in Christ, it's
got something to do with submission. It has to do with submitting
ourself to the righteousness of Christ. That's why in James,
He puts submission to God and resisting the devil in the same
verse, in back-to-back sentences, because faith has to do with
submitting to Christ, submitting to His righteousness and quitting
our works. And that's the very way we resist
the devil, by faith in Christ. All right, fifthly, look back
at Zechariah chapter three. We resist the devil by putting
on Christ. by putting on Christ. We resist
the devil by trusting in God's electing love. Zechariah 3 verse
1. And he showed me Joshua the high
priest standing before the angel of the Lord as Satan standing
in his right hand to resist him. And the Lord said unto Satan,
the Lord rebuke thee, O Satan, even the Lord that hath chosen
Jerusalem rebuke thee. Is not this a brand plucked out
of the fire? Now, the brand plucked out of
the fire is the brand that God Almighty chose to reach down
the fire and to pull it out of the fire and to redeem it. Now,
that's what election is. It's God choosing a people, a
brand plucked out of the fire, a brand that deserved to be burned
up, but God chose to pluck it out of the fire and to redeem
it. Now, if you and I try to resist the devil by our decision,
we'll be devoured. But if we resist the devil by
trusting and God's electing love, the devil's gonna have to flee.
He has to, because he knows God will never change his mind. He
knows that. He knows better than you and
I do, God's going to accomplish his will. If his will is the
redemption of his people, nothing can stop it. And if we trust
in God's electing love, put on his electing love, and that's
what our trust and our hope is in, the devil has to flee. And
if we resist the devil, being clothed in Christ's righteousness,
not in our filthy rags of righteousness, our filthy works, the devil will
flee. Look at verse three. Joshua was
clothed with filthy garments and stood before the angel. And
he answered and spake unto those that stood before him saying,
take away the filthy garments from you. And unto him, he said,
behold, I've caused thine iniquity to pass from thee. And I will
clothe thee with change of frame. And I said, let them set a fair
mitre upon his head. So they set a fair mitre upon
his head and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the
Lord stood by and you go read the rest of that chapter. There's
no more. There's no more mention of Satan.
He already fled away. He fled away. Now, when Joshua
was stripped of his filthy rags, those filthy rags pictured his,
his works, his righteousness. And they took those things off
of him and clothed him with those beautiful garments that picture
the righteousness of Christ. The devil fled away. And if we'll
trust Christ as our righteousness, trust him as all of our righteousness,
the devil's going to flee from us too, because he has no answer
for Christ's righteousness. Now this change of Raymond, let's
talk about that for a minute. This change of Raymond, you know,
it's Christ's righteousness. But as brother Scott told us,
this is not Christ's righteousness pasted on us. This is not a robe
that covers the sin and iniquity and embarrassing filth. It's
still there. It's not covering up. It's still
there. I know that's not so because look what the Lord said right
before that. Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass away from
thee. We talk about being clothed in
Christ's righteousness. It's not just a robe that we
put on that covers our unrighteousness. It's to be made righteous. in
the Lord Jesus Christ, because Christ took the iniquity of his
people away from him at Calvary. He took that iniquity into his
own body on the tree, and by his sacrifice, he put it away. That's why he can clothe his
people with Christ's righteousness, make them the righteousness of
God in him. He's not just saying here, I'm
giving you a new set of clothes that you could make dirty again.
What he's saying here is I'm giving you a righteous, holy
nature that cannot sin. So you can't make it dirty. That's
what he's saying. I've taken your iniquity away.
And I've crowned you. I've covered you with Christ's
righteousness. That's what that mitre represents.
It represents the high priest mitre he wore that had a golden
plate across the forehead that read holiness to the Lord. When
the high priest was wearing that, it was a turban of some sort.
And when he was wearing that, everywhere he looked, what people
could see written across his forehead was holiness to the
Lord. That's a picture of Christ's
holiness, crowning, covering his people. And the devil has
to flee away from that holiness because he's unholy. Look over
in Ephesians chapter 6. This is the last place we'll
look. Ephesians chapter 6. The Apostle Paul gives us a little
more detail of this putting on Christ. What we read there in
Zachariah was given to us in picture and Paul spells it out
a little more clearly to us here in Ephesians chapter six. Beginning in verse 10. Finally,
my brethren, be strong in the Lord and the power of his might.
Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand
against the wiles of the devil. We wrestle not against flesh
and blood, but against principality. against powers, against the rulers
of darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high
places. Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God that
ye may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done
all to stand. Stand therefore, stand steadfast,
don't retreat, don't compromise. Stand therefore, having your
loins girt about with truth and having on the breastplate of
righteousness. Now here's the truth again. We
talked about the truth earlier, didn't we? And Paul's talking
about this, the girdle, the belt that would go around their waist
as a symbol of surface. He said, wrap that truth around
your middle. It'll hold up all the other garments.
The truth that you wrap around you, the truth is this. God can
only be worshipped in truth. He can't be worshipped with a
lie. He can't be worshipped in a way that men have made up.
He can't be worshipped with the false gospel. He can only be
worshipped in the Lord Jesus Christ. We can only approach
Him in Christ. That's the truth. Now gird that
about yourself. This truth is the truth of who
God is. It's the truth of who I am. It's
the truth of how God saves sinners in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
And if I'm gird up with that truth, It'll keep me from following
a false hope and the devil will have to flee. And then he tells
us, put on the breastplate of righteousness. This breastplate
covers your chest. It protects your chest, your
heart. Well, this righteousness is Christ's righteousness. It's
his righteousness imputed to me legally, and it's his righteousness
imparted to me, put in me in the new birth. Now, the truth
is my obedience doesn't add to this breastplate at all. My obedience,
my actions don't protect me at all. Don't add anything to Christ's
righteousness at all. It's all Christ. The righteousness
of Christ is perfect. It has no defects in it, no holes
in it. So none of Satan's accusations
can penetrate it and get to my heart. If I put on the breastplate
of Christ's righteousness, my heart will be protected from
error. It'll be protected from self-love.
It'll be protected from self-righteousness. and it'll cause the devil to
believe. So put on Christ. Verse 15, he says, and have your
feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. Have
your feet shod. First, that means to stand. Put
those shoes on and enable you to stand and stand firm in one
place. Stand firm on a foundation, on
the rock, Christ Jesus. Stand there, our only standing
before God, whereby God can accept us is to stand in Christ. Now, if you're standing someplace,
you're not leaving, are you? Stand on Christ. You don't leave
him and the devil will have to flee. But shoes also refer to
our walk. It's where we stand. We stand
in Christ, but also refers to our walk. And the believers walk
is in the gospel. Our walk is in the gospel of
Christ. We walk in forgiveness, forgiveness
in him. Our walk is righteousness, it's
righteousness in Christ. Our walk is peace, it's peace
in Christ, it's peace with God, it's peace with one another.
And if we walk there, the devil's going to have to flee because
Bob, he can't walk there. See that? He'll have to flee.
Verse 16, he says, and above all, taking the shield of faith,
here's faith again, wherewith you should be able to quench
all the fiery darts of the wicked. Faith in Christ, we've mentioned
this earlier, will quench, will answer every fiery accusation
that Satan can hurl at us. Because Christ is all we need.
It puts out every fiery dart. The sacrifice of Christ, you
think about this, the sacrifice of Christ. Christ offered himself
a sacrifice to the Father for the sins of his people. Christ,
our sacrifice, consumed the fire He suffered till the fire went
out. He consumed all of the wrath
of God. You reckon he can quench a fiery
dart, just a dart, of the wicked? Yes, he can. He is enough. And if we'll simply trust Christ
to be our all, the devil's got to flee. Because he can't bring
any accusation against the Savior that will cause us to leave him.
And he can't bring any accusation against us that will cause him
to leave us. It's simply by faith in Christ.
In verse 17, take the helmet of salvation and the sword of
the spirit, which is the word of God. Now take the helmet of
salvation. Now what's a helmet? A helmet
is used to protect your head. If you've got any sins and you
ride a motorcycle, you wear a helmet. Why? Because the helmet protects
your head. See this, this matter of believing
the gospel, it's a heart matter. It's heart matter. You only believe
it when God gives you a new heart, a heart that loves it, a heart
that believes it. We can't love and believe the gospel with the
heart that we got. But believing the gospel, loving Christ is
not just, it's not pure emotion. It's not pure emotion. It's not
ungoverned emotion. There's a reason behind it. And
our heads got to be protected from error. And if we put on
the helmet of salvation, salvation in Christ, who accomplished it?
Why did he accomplish it? Did he get the job done? Where
is he now? I mean, why is he seated in glory?
It's because he got the job done, because he's successful. The
Father accepted him. Put on that helmet of salvation
that Christ has accomplished for his people, that's completely
and utterly victorious, and your head will be protected from error. You just won't believe it. You'll
see the error in it. and take the sword of the word
of God. We're back here to defending
ourselves with the word of God, that sharp two-edged sword. The
devil's always got to flee from that word, from that sword. In
verse 18, he says, praying always with prayer and supplication
in the spirit, watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication
for all saints. Now praying with all supplication
will make the devil flee from us. I told you one more, I lied. Mark chapter nine. This will
be our last scripture we're looking at. Mark chapter nine. Praying
with all supplication will make the devil flee. Here in Mark
chapter nine, the disciples have been casting out evil spirits
and devils, but they got one, an evil spirit that they could
not cast out. And they brought the man to the
Lord and the Lord cast out this evil spirit. And the disciples
asked, Lord, why couldn't we cast him out? Mark 9, verse 29,
look at our Lord's answer. And he said unto them, this kind
can come forth by nothing but prayer and fasting. Prayer and
fasting will make the devil flee. Now this fasting doesn't mean
if you don't eat for a day, then you're going to be able to have
the power to cast out devils. Don't be foolish. You know what
that means. The word fasting there means
to deny the flesh. It means to deny the flesh and
it has to do with the fast on the day of atonement. That's
what the word, the Greek word there he used means. So it means
to deny the flesh, deny the spiritual things that the flesh loves and
the flesh is infatuated with and trust only in the sacrifice
of Christ. That's what the day of atonement
was all about. The sacrifice of Christ. the
blood being offered before the Lord, taken into the holy place
and the Holy of Holies and sprinkled upon the mercy seat. All that
has to do with acceptance with God, forgiveness of sin with
God, not in the things that fascinate the flesh, but in the sacrifice
of Christ and his blood being applied to our heart. And if
we pray that way, based upon the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus
Christ, for Christ's sake, the devil will have to flee from
us. Because he's got no answer for the blood of Christ offered
before the Father. And the blood put on the hearts
of his people. And the devil will have to pay.
All right. Well, I hope the Lord bless that to you and be helpful
for you.