So yesterday we really took a long look at God's love, and His love for us. Today we are going to focus on a trick that Satan has used from, well Adam and Eve!
That trick is this: He will do whatever he can to twist God's words, cause doubt to creep into your mind, and make God out to be the bad guy. Let's dig in!
In chapter 2 of Genesis starting at verse 15, God tells Adam that he is free to eat from any tree in the garden - any tree at all, except the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
We talked about how God probably had TONS of trees in the garden, all with amazing fruit. Kind of like this bowl of Skittles! If I told you that you could eat ANY Skittle, except for the white one on the bottom, wouldn't that be a good deal? Isn't there a sufficient amount of Skittles there? We always think that about Eve! Really Eve! Why did you have to test God and take that white Skittle? The other 3,278 aren't good enough for you to eat?
But the truth of the matter is that if we were put in the same situation, we would probably have done the same thing! It's the classic case of a parent telling a kid not to do something. As soon as you say that, the kid want's to do it! Don't play in the road - I wanna play in the road. Don't eat that cookie - what do we want to do?
Satan plays on this when he comes up to Eve in verse 1 of Chapter 3, "Did God really say that you must not eat from any tree in the garden?". That's not what God said! Satan is trying to twist God's words!
It apparently works, because Eve adds to God's words in verse 3 when she added the "fact" that she couldn't touch the tree. She either wasn't listening, or Adam told her additional information. The important point here is that we need to know that what we believe is ABSOLUTELY from God and His Word! That way we won't end up like Eve did!
Then in verses 4 and 5 we see another trick that Satan uses in our lives - half truths. We spent some time on this one, so I won't really expound on it, but it is a very important aspect of life to understand.
Satan tells Eve that she "surely won't die" and "you'll be like God". Were those TOTAL lies, no. Were they the TOTAL truth, absolutely not! When Eve heard that she surely wouldn't die, I believe that she might have thought that if she had eaten the fruit that she would croak on the spot! Satan assures her that won't happen. But the death that she experienced and that we all experience because of her is two fold. We die an earthly death - that's pretty easy to understand! But when she disobeyed God, that ushered a sin nature into humanity that will be around until we are in Heaven.
She also probably took the idea of being like God the wrong way. If someone told me that I could be like God - I would imagine morphing into a Zeus type dude, able to shoot lightning bolts our of my eyeballs, etc. Once again, Satan was kind of correct! She did become like God in the area of knowledge between good and evil - but she definitely wasn't shooting lightning bolts anywhere!
This is one of the most important concepts for you young people to grasp a hold of. To understand that Satan isn't going to come out and tell you exactly what he wants to do to you! If he did, we would run away!!! He won't tell you something that is completely against what you believe about God, because he knows that we would see it for what it is - a lie. Rather, he twists and tweaks things so that they sound SORT OF true. Not really a blatant lie, just a stretch.
The ONLY way that we are going to be able to completely understand what he is trying to sell us is to be neck deep in God's Word, the Bible. When we know the truth, the lies will be easy to spot.
 |
| Spotting Satan's lies aren't this easy!!!! |
Be like the bank tellers - study the real thing! Then the fakes will be easy to spot. That way you won't get your hand caught in the cookie jar, so to speak. Remember, God has given us SOOOOOO much! Let us focus on that verses the one white Skittle that we can't have.
Also, remember that he commands us not to do things because of His love for us. He is our Daddy! He wan't the best for us, remember that!!!
Jeremiah 29:11-14a
11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
14 I will be found by you,” declares the Lord
No comments:
Post a Comment