Bottom line, the devil HATES the image of God in YOU!
Been a little down-in-the-mouth lately? Discouraged? Don’t seem to be amounting to a whole lot in your life? Have your plans and dreams gone awry?
Join the club, it happens to us all now and then.
But if you are a Christian and you are experiencing these overwhelming feelings of failure often, you may be under Satanic attack and deception, so listen up.
Did you know that the Devil has “a plan for your life,” too? And he won’t rest until he sees you defeated and spiritually ineffective — if you let him.
Remember:
“Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” — 1 Peter 5:8
“Satan has demanded to sift you men like wheat.” — Luke 22:31
“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.” — Ephesians 6:12
Devil’s Problem
So, what is the devil’s “problem” with we humans anyway? Why does he bother messing with little ole you and me? Doesn’t he have bigger fish to fry?
For those answers we need to go back, way back to Genesis 1:26-28:
“Then God said, ‘Let Us make mankind in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the livestock and over all the earth, and over every crawling thing that crawls on the earth.’ So, God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them; and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.’”
“Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.”
1 Peter 5:8
Well, there it is, in black and white! Jealousy, plain and simple.
The devil wanted to rule the Earth, but God gave the job to mankind, a whole new species, and the serpent was really miffed.
Furthermore, this newly minted imager of God was free to roam the Garden of God, an unimaginable place of beauty and earthly delights.
What did the devil do about it?
Simply put, he blinded mankind to the truth of who they are as God’s precious imagers, as shared in 2 Corinthians 4:3-5:
“And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing,in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they will not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”
The’s devil’s primary strategy in the world is to steal our identities and blind us to the truth of the gospel.
In my book, My Origin, My Destiny, I wrote:
“Identity theft is a modern-day scourge that threatens anyone with a Social Security number, driver’s license, or credit card (so, pretty much everybody). Sadly, the dark shadow of criminal intent seems to follow each successive advance in technology, and the results can be devastating, as one person’s identity becomes another person’s means of enrichment. Spiritual identity theft is no less devastating and occurs when the devil can convince anyone that they don’t matter, aren’t precious and have no potential.
“In his book The Sacred Romance, author John Eldredge wrote:
“Cinderella lived with her stepsisters, a shrewish pair who made her sleep with the coal in the furnace room and had her convinced she would never be anything more than a maid. I remember thinking as I looked at the pictures of Cinderella in my child’s storybook,
‘Doesn’t she know how beautiful she is? Can’t she see she is so different from her stepsisters both inside and out? Why doesn’t she just look in the mirror?’”
In Hebrews 2:6-8, Scripture reminds us that we humans are special to God beyond imagining:
“What is man, that You think of him?
Or a son of man, that You are concerned about him?
You have made him for a little while lower than angels;
You have crowned him with glory and honor;
You have put everything in subjection under his feet.”
Finally, would Jesus have abandoned the privileges and comforts of Heaven, crossed light years of space and time, and come to this earth to die for someone who is worthless?
How About You?
Do you believe these words from Ephesians 2:10: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”
Then don’t let the Enemy derail your purpose.
4-1-1
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