LEARNING DAILY

 

John 22: 31-32, And the Lord said, “Simon, Simon!  Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.”    Jesus statement to Peter

 

John 10:10, “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy.  I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.”  Jesus

 

John 8:44, “You are of your father the devil and the desires of your father you want to do.  He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him.  When He speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.”

 

The devil, Satan, Lucifer, or whatever you call him is real and at work in the world today.  As you can see from the verses above his purpose is to deceive all people and keep them from giving their lives to Jesus Christ.  He hates everyone, especially Christians, and continues to lie, to kill and/or destroy people’s lives.  I have often used the old cartoons where two angels are talking into the ears of a cartoon character.  One angel is portrayed as a devil who is telling the character to “go ahead and do what you know you shouldn’t”.  The other angel is telling the character “no don’t do it; you know it’s wrong!”  One might think this is cute and funny.  However, it can be a daily routine when a decision between right and wrong must be made.

 

Lying, as seen above, is a characteristic of the devil; he is the source of every deception.  Lying is a sin which is entirely opposed to God, who is truth.  What is the devil’s purpose?  Jesus makes it very plain – the devil wants to do whatever he can to destroy people’s lives, health, and families; by going to the cross, He gives life abundantly to those who believe in Him through His power of redemption.  No one can know this abundant life apart from Jesus Christ and His presence.

 

Jesus said something to Peter that I find extremely interesting and it reveals two important truths.  God allows Satan to tempt and test His followers – “Satan has asked for you”.  Go back and read the first two chapters of Job and read the conversation between God and Job.  I do not believe every problem we face is due to the devil’s testing; many of our problems come because of poor decisions we make and, of course, what our beliefs are. 

 

Secondly, Jesus told Peter, “But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.”   He prays that the faith of His people may not fail!  We have already seen that Jesus is our Paraclete, our Advocate who continually is interceding for us in heaven (See Hebrews 7:25).

 

 Be encouraged to know that whatever you might be facing right now, you have One who is praying that your faith would not fail.  He is praying that when you finally get through it (AND YOU WILL!!) that you will be stronger in your faith and able to help those around you through their difficulties.

 

Our victory over Satan must center in the grace that God offers us through Jesus!  We are unable to defeat him on our own; our faith in Him is the power to defeat what Satan throws at us.  May our faith never fail as we face the trials and temptations!

 

If you receive this blog through email, you can go to the regular blog page by moving your cursor to the top of the page and click on LEARNING DAILY header.  Then you can see the archived articles and comment section. You can also leave a comment by clicking on the date in the Comment Section.