Our devotion this week, Satan’s Go-To Temptation Against You, was written by J.D. Greear can be found online here.
Every army general serious about success enters a battle with a plan. He knows his strengths, his weaknesses, his tactics, his contingencies. Most of all, for his plan to be successful, he must know his enemy. If he doesn’t, even his best intentions won’t keep him from destruction.
When it comes to battling temptation, however, many of us assume that good intentions are sufficient. We really do want to overcome temptation, but we’ve never considered that our temptations are administered at the hands of a skillful, ruthless enemy bent on our destruction. Our good intentions are no match for the corruption of our flesh, much less the cunning of our enemy.
As the apostle Paul noted, as long as we dwell in corruptible bodies, we’re going to have temptations. And we’re going to stumble — sometimes quite often. The greatest saints have despaired over their propensity toward temptation even in their dying days. In his eighties, John Newton confessed how discouraged he was with his lack of spiritual progress and how acute the temptations of his flesh still felt to him. John Bunyan lamented the fear and faithlessness he felt going into the last chapter of his life.
Even so, we don’t have to throw our hands up and simply give in. If we know a little about Satan’s tactics, we can have much more confidence when he attacks.
Pray today that your eyes would be opened to see where you’re being tempted most often.
