“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and He will come near to you.”
James 4: 7-8a
There is a lot of talk about the condition of the world we live in and there is no doubt that sin abounds everywhere. The devil is real and tries in every way to get us in his clutches of evil. Sometimes it is in very subtle ways, but make no mistake, the devil wants to pull as many people as possible away from God. James 5:8 gives a warning of this and describes the devil as “prowling around to see whom he can devour.” Yes, Satan wants to destroy you and me and anything that is of God!
But thanks be to God, we have a defender — Jesus! In Romans 8:37 Paul says that through Christ we are “more than conquerors”. Jesus himself encouraged His disciples (and us) with these words, “take heart because I have overcome the world.” So, “if God be for us, who can be against us?” Romans 8:31
When those attacks come and we feel the evil of the world surrounding us, let us draw ever closer to our Lord. Let us pray harder, study His Word more and let the Holy Spirit lead us as we rebuke the evil one with praises to our Lord and Savior. As our praises flow, God will draw closer to us and Satan will run in the other direction in fear and shame.