When there is a war between God and the devil, the outcome is always clear; God wins, and the devil loses. But why do people have such a hard time winning the war against the devil’s wickedness if the outcome is so clearly defined for us? The answer is simple; people get involved. When people bring their fleshly desires into their walk with God, the devil can win in his campaign against Him. Your chances decrease when you bring your own will into it. When your will gets seduced, you always go against the will of God. This defilement exists because the devil draws you into thinking that you can be exalted like a god while breaking all the commandments of the true God and King. Once you get exalted in your mind, the devil has power against you and God.
In this war of good and evil, where do people fit into all of this? The answer is that we will either humble ourselves and give our will to God or defy God and choose to exalt ourselves while walking according to our own will.
Humility is our greatest asset to overcome the seductions of the devil.
Think about this; why do we try to defend ourselves so much? What is it that makes us want to be right about everything? What drives our need to look good in front of others, even if it’s not who we are? The idea of humiliation wars in our minds to the point that we get seduced to start living a life of lies and self-denial. In this seduction, we appear to be something we are not, so we have a sense of accomplishment before God and others.
The truth is that we may deceive people, but we will never fool God. If you want to break the power of Satan in your life and live free from fear, you need to humble yourself before God and let humility and honesty heal you from the fear of man. Put yourself in the hands of God and let Him glorify His Son Jesus Christ in your life. There is no greater freedom in this life than walking free of man’s opinion of you. Trust me, I know it’s true, and it’s time to sanctify the Lord in our hearts and our churches.
Forget about your pride and live to sanctify and glorify God in your life. What do you have to prove? Even if people speak evil of you, you live for God, not them. Put your life in the hands of God and let him fight your battles against the wickedness of people. When it is all said and done, what you do for God is all that will last anyway. So please Him, and your reward will be eternal and not earthly. There is no greater glory than glorying in the Lord while you are sanctifying His great name. The willingness to be humble before God will please God and cause Him to exalt you before His throne and before all. Not because you deserve anything, but because God is glorified when we humble ourselves before Him. That’s when His gift will work in our life to fulfill the will of God.
To be unthankful is another very deceptive thought that wars against God. This way of thinking will cause you to exalt yourself quicker than anything. It’s because you believe you deserve more than what you have, or you need more credit for the things you have done. You say that what you have is not enough, and what you do have deserves more reward, so you strive to take more and be seen more.
In this case, you work to defend everything about yourself. Justification will begin to work in your life to the point where you need to clarify why you are doing everything you are doing. You want people to see you in a certain light. You begin to worry about what people think of you to the point that you start to fashion your life by how you think people will react. At this point, humility has left you, and to be seen by others has become your desire. You begin to look for ways to be exalted.
The truth is that the devil has deceived you away from God and caused you to follow after your desire to be exalted. You are unthankful because you are never satisfied with the will of God. Now you need to go beyond the blessings of God and make yourself something that you are not.
In this deception is where the heavenly fall. Anyone who exalts themselves will eventually come to a fall. Exaltation gets fueled by deceit and lies. You remain undercover by hiding the truth and keeping everyone deceived to think you are something you are not. For this reason, you surround yourself with people that can’t discern you, but you hide and separate from people that can. Let’s suppose you do hang around people that can discern you. In that case, you either justify your reasons to exalt yourself, or you stay offended at them when they reject you for continually bringing inaccurate truth.
There is a problem with that whole way of thinking. God’s light is too bright for your darkness to keep you covered up. He will expose the exalted thought and bring it to light and then bring it low. God loves humility and will always reward those who choose to humble themselves. But learn this one thing; He will never share His kingdom with thoughts that exalt themselves. If you want proof, look where it got the devil.
God loves humility and will always reward those who choose to humble themselves.
We should all choose the way of humility so that we may exalt God in our life. But if you choose not to humble yourself, you will certainly experience humility one way or the other; it’s just that you might have to learn it the hard way. Why do you want to be humbled by the Lord when you can humble yourself before Him? If you’re walking with me, we will choose to love God and walk in humility.
When God is holy, and Jesus Christ is exalted in you, peace and joy, righteousness and truth, faith and love, will all be the center of your life.