By Treva Susuras

Let me tell you one thing, You have an enemy, whether you believe in Jesus or not, whether you are born again or not, and his name is Satan. Satan hates you and is ready to take you out any way he can. We must not be afraid of the enemy.

1 Peter 5:8 says “Satan roams around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.” He does not care who you are, what you do, and he wants you even more if you are not doing things that please him. You might ask how do I please Satan? Well, I’ll tell you, when you do the things that keep you from having a close relationship with God. When you sin. Satan whispers things in your mind, then you carry it out. Like this, Wisper, hear it, think about it, meditate on it, do it. Or, sometimes we just skip all the rest and do it first thing. We don’t even stop to think about it or the consequences we will face afterward.

I don’t know about you but I am tired of Satan running things in my life. No, he does not run everything, but he tries. When he cant get to me, he gets to those around me, you know the ones I love and thats is how he gets to me.

You see Satan has been watching us our whole lives. He knows the buttons to push to get us going. Our mind reacts to things the way it always has. In Romans 12 it says to renew our minds. We need to do this every morning. We need to read the word, to renew the way we think. So we can start to react in a better, Godly way. If we don’t nothing changes. Let’s take a look at some of the things God says for us not to do.

God say’s not to follow our sinful nature.

Galatians 5:19-21

When you follow the desires of our sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition. Dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God.

You see when you open this door you are inviting the enemy to come live in your house (body) Now don’t think for a minute the devil won’t try and kill you, even if you are his friend. The devil does not have any friends. All he knows is he is out to destroy anything God loves. He hates you and he hates me.

Sounds pretty hopeless right, but noooo, it’s not hopeless!!! Not at all! There is something we can do to get power over the devil. He will always try and get us but God sent His Son Jesus to set us free. So, where we read about sin in Galatians 5, Jesus took that sin, that shame, and took it upon Himself to take the punishment for us. Now we are forgiven.

Not only that but when Jesus died on the cross, He left behind the Holy Spirit to live in us.

John 14: 15-31

If you love Me, keep my commands, I will ask the Father, and He will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever. - the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept Him, because it neither sees him not knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.

Yep that’s right, the Holy Spirit lives in me and in you. 1 John 4:4 says “Greater is He that lives in me than he that’s in the world”

Now if the Holy Spirit lives in me how can I be defeated? I can’t. The hard part is believing that. Our actions show if we believe it or not. If we continue to live for our flesh, (our own selfish desires) and hurt the ones around us, then we are feeding the evil one not the Holy Spirit. The Spirit of God will not overtake you and make you be Godly. He is our helper. He is here to give us guidance and strength, wisdom and knowledge. It is up to us who we serve. Who is our master? Who do you feed? When we sin, we feed the enemy, he is pleased with us, and the only way out of that (because he will make you pay for your sin sooner or later) is through the blood of Jesus and help of the Holy Spirit.

Shut the door to sin. Do you realize that everything you do filters out to the ones that love you. It affects everyone you are connected to. You might think what you are doing is not hurting anyone but it is.

We can do all things through Christ who gives me strength. Phil 4 :13

Where does the strength come from? The Holy Spirit. Nothing can stop us if we know who we are in Christ.

From time to time, we will fall. That is no doubt. We can’t be perfect and Jesus is not expecting us to be. He is looking at our heart. Are we really trying? We fall, we get up, we fall, we get up…. Never give up, keep trying,

We can defeat the enemy in our lives if we just try.

The enemy will lie to our minds, he knows just what to say. Learn to say “Satan, I rebuke you, I take every thought captive and bring it into obedience to God. I will no longer listen to you. In Jesus Name”

There is so much mor I could say on this topic and I probably will in another lesson, but for now, try and get this down. It helps if you find someone that can mentor you. Someone you trust. You are not alone; you can make it if you will just try! God bless, and remember I am always a phone call away. 281-868-0537