Our Duty Declared & Danger Described

Introduction: The Stark Contrast of God's Care and Satan's Malice

0:03 The following sermon was delivered on Sunday morning, April 16th, 2000, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:13 1 Peter, and chapter 5, and I shall read verse 5b to the end of verse 9. 1 Peter 5b. Yes, all of you gird yourselves with humility to serve one another, for God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your anxiety upon Him, because He cares for you.

0:57 2 Peter 5b. Be sober. Be wise. Be watchful.

1:01 Your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about, seeking whom he may devour, whom withstands steadfast in your faith, knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished in your brethren who are in the world. What an amazing contrast is set before us in the few verses read in your hearing when comparing them with the several verses. 1 Peter 5b. Yes, all of you gird yourselves with humility to serve one another, for God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

1:33 Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your anxiety upon Him, because He cares for you. Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your anxiety upon Him, knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished in your brethren who are in the world. What an amazing contrast is set before us in the few verses read in your hearing when comparing them with the several verses. 1 Peter 5b.

1:35 On the one hand, as we saw last Lord's Day in studying together verses 6 and 7, on the one hand, the child of God is commanded to humble himself under the mighty hand of God, confident that as he does so, God is committed to exalt him in due season. Further, while humbling himself under God's mighty hand, he is at the same time to be found casting all of his anxieties upon God in the confidence that God constantly cares for him. We saw that the mighty hand of God is joined to the large, caring heart of God in the midst of the peculiar pressures and anxieties and sufferings. We saw that the mighty hand of God is joined to the large, caring heart of God in the midst of the peculiar pressures and anxieties and sufferings that the people of God in this place were experiencing. Here, then, is the emphasis of those verses connected with the duty to humble ourselves with respect to our fellow believers, girding ourselves with the apron of humility that we might serve one another, and the consolation that as we are humbled under the hand of God, He will exalt us. And as we continue to cast all of our anxieties.

2:54 And as we continue to cast all of our anxieties upon Him, He is continually and without ceasing caring for us. That's the one picture. But then, like a thunder rumbling out of a blue sky with a few puffy white clouds floating across that sky, Peter calls these believers to sobriety and wakefulness and active resistance in the light of the presence and activity of another powerful being. Peter calls these believers to sobriety and wakefulness and active resistance in the light of the presence and activity of another powerful being.

3:24 being other than God. Not as powerful, but powerful nonetheless. A being whose only intention is that of a ravenous beast of prey who looks upon afflicted, suffering, and persecuted children of God as nothing more than a main course for his next meal. And do you see the contrast? Here is the God who says, humble yourself under my hand and I will exalt you.

3:54 Cast all of your anxieties upon me because I care for you, this beneficent, large-hearted, loving, heavenly Father of His people. Yet there is this other being concerned with the same people called upon to humble themselves under the mighty hand of God, called upon to cast all their anxieties upon this God. This same group of people are the object of the desires of this other being whose heart is not at rest. This is the same group of people who are the object of the desires of this other being, American's soul is set upon one thing, and that is to make a meal of those people. I say the contrast is a stark contrast. As Peter is desirous to bring his letter to a close within short compass as he writes to these believers in Asia Minor,

4:45 he is not only concerned that they respond to their present circumstances, which, as you've been reminded again and again, form the context of this letter, but he is also concerned now as he brings the letter to a conclusion that they understand the central place of humility on the one hand, and on the other hand of wakefulness and watchfulness in the presence of their adversary, the devil. And so this morning, we move on in our study to consider together just verse 8.

Our Duty Succinctly Declared: Be Sober, Be Watchful

5:20 It was too much to seek to attempt to open up in one message verses 8 and 9, though we have one complete statement within those verses, but we'll consider verse 8 this morning under two very simple headings. First of all, our duty succinctly declared, be sober, be watchful. Verse 9a, whom withstand? Steadfast in your faith.

5:47 We leave off for the message this morning and just concentrate upon the first part of verse 8. Our duty succinctly declared, be sober, be watchful. And then our danger graphically described, your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour. Now here the minds and hearts of God's people are savoring the sweetness of those.

6:16 And the Lord says, My God will exalt me in due time. Whatever is presently pressing in upon me that constitutes the hand of God upon me, whatever the agency may be, as I humble myself beneath that mighty hand, I do so. With a thrilling confidence in due season, that God whose hand is upon me will exalt me. And whatever anxieties come to me in the midst of this combination, of affliction and suffering and persecution and trial, God himself has declared that he wants me to cast all those things upon him because he constantly cares for me.

6:59 And then right when the people of God would be savoring those promises and those perspectives, as I've already intimated, like a thunderclap on a clear day, here come these two terse, succinct imperatives.

7:16 With no introduction. With no introduction to them. No transition from the previous thread of thought. He cares for you.

7:24 Pause. Be sober. Be watchful. And he uses aorist imperatives which give an intensified sense of the urgency of a directive.

7:35 A present imperative, as you've been reminded many times from this pulpit by those of us who minister here, focuses upon sometimes the beginning and the continuance, of a given deed. An aorist imperative focuses upon the critical nature of that which is commanded and calls to immediate and sometimes radical action in response to that imperative. Well, here Peter smacks us then with these two imperatives. We're turning over in our spiritual mouths the sweetness of those two preceding promises.

8:13 He will exalt me. He does care for me. But, the realization of those things is never to lead to spiritual sluggardliness. It's never to lead to carelessness.

8:25 Whenever God makes a commitment to his people in grace, it is to be the incentive to engage all of their faculties in pursuit of the will of God. Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. Why? For it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

8:46 So, we have then these two verbs in the imperative form. Let's look at them for a moment. Be sober. This verb is found only six times in the New Testament, and three of them are here in 1 Peter.

9:01 We encountered it in 1 Peter 1, in verse 13. Wherefore, girding up the loins of your mind, a figure of an oriental man with his robe, and he ties up the loose ends around his middle with a sash, that he may be ready, to run and walk and work without impediment. Be sober. There's our word.

9:22 Be sober and set your hope perfectly on the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Then in chapter 4, in verse 7, we encountered it again. But the end of all things is at hand. Be therefore of a sound mind, and here's our word, be sober unto prayer.

9:43 An old bishop, Layton, commenting on this, said there are times when God's people far more need repetition than they need novelty. Someone could charge Peter with forgetfulness, or just riding one of his pet hobbies, but no, Peter was commissioned by his Lord to feed the sheep, to tend the sheep, to feed the lambs. And Peter knows that it's the things that get emphasized that stick. And having called to this grace of sober-mindedness in earlier portions, he once again now commands them to be sober.

10:21 Now the word, some of you may remember when we did a word study of it in the earlier portions, it means literally to be stone cold sober. To have no influence of alcohol on your brain or any other kind of chemical or whatever else we would take that would keep us out of touch with the reality around us. And therefore, in terms of a less than literal wooden meaning of be sober, that is, never let yourself get tipsy with alcohol, that's taught elsewhere. Drunkenness is condemned by the word of God.

10:58 But here, Peter is saying that you are to be in total possession of all of your faculties in relationship to all the realities that are around you. Listen to one of the commentators, Edmund Clowney, as he calls him, he comments on this, to be sober is to be realistic. Drunkenness brings delusions before stupor sets in. The hallucinations of spiritual drunkenness are not amusing pink elephants, but devouring monsters.

11:31 The ideologies of political oppression, the fantasies of sexual lust, the jealous hatreds of personal spite, the world seeks orgies of perversion before it sinks into the drunken stupor of hopelessness. Sober reflection is the opposite of the carousings of the old life in lustful inebriation. Chapter 1, verse 14, he calls them to a lifestyle that is radically different from their former lifestyle. Sober watchfulness grows with the practice of prayer.

12:03 Chapter 4, in verse 7, and is alert to the assaults of the devil. Chapter 5, verse 8, our text for this morning. Christian realism knows the actuality of sin and the folly of utopian dreams. We are to be sober, fully awake, and nothing dulling our spiritual senses.

12:28 But then the second imperative is be watchful. And this verb is found many times in the New Testament. It's a call to be wakefully active, with a mind clear of the influence of the distorting images of reality, brought by spiritual drunkenness. That keen, alert mind that's not playing tricks upon a man or a woman because of some form of spiritual intoxication, that clear mind is to be informed by wakeful, concentrated, and observant spiritual eyes.

13:06 In trying to show how these two things fit together, this may be a poor illustration, but it's the best I have. Have you ever sat talking to someone whose eyes were wide open, but you knew they weren't hearing a word you were saying? They had that long-ago-and-far-away look. They weren't sleeping, but they were doing what we call daydreaming.

13:27 See, you can only daydream when you're awake. You nightdream when you're asleep. You dream real dreams. In daydreaming, you are awake physically, but you are not intensely concentrating upon the business of the moment, the conversation of the moment.

13:44 So Peter says, in essence, it's not enough that you stay awake and are in the framework of being in touch with reality around you. Being awake, being sober, you must be concentrating in this dimension of mental and spiritual awareness of what is going around you as the people of God. It is this duty of watchfulness that is central in New Testament ethics. Our Lord Jesus makes it central in respect to His second coming, Matthew 24, verses 22 and following.

14:22 He says, therefore, watch. Therefore, watch. Disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane, could you not watch with Me one hour? Could you not remain awake and be wakefully active?

14:36 Could you not remain with Me here and let your mind enter into what I am bearing as I wrestled with My Father? Could you not watch with Me? Watch and pray that you enter not into temptation. So you get the feel of these two words.

14:55 As Peter seeks to give apostolic counsel to these believers in the face of the present pressures and the future ones that will come, he calls them by these two succinct, terse imperatives to be wakeful, and to be watchful. Surely then, the posture of humility under the mighty hand of God, joined to the confidence that He will exalt us in due season, that blessed release from distracting anxieties as we cast all of our cares upon Him, as we are enabled to comply with the previous direction, humbling ourselves under the mighty hand of God. We don't have a spirit agitated that we feel we could order our circumstances differently and better than God has done. We know the rest of heart that comes from resigning ourselves not like a Muslim to this distant, unfeeling God, but to our Heavenly Father. It's the hand of our Father upon us. And when we humble ourselves beneath that hand, we comply with His encouragement to cast all of our anxieties upon Him, then our minds are clear.

16:13 We can be awake, we can be sober, and we can be watchful, rather than being sleepy-eyed with the pressure of our own unresolved anxieties. Rather than being distracted by our own internal conflict with God and His ways with us, there is blessed freedom and release when we humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God while casting all of our anxieties upon Him. Now then, we can indeed be sober. Our minds are not being numbed by the boons of internal rebellion and by the heavy spirits of irritation with God's ways or carrying the burdens upon our own back. From that liberty comes this wholehearted embrace of what God is doing, the realities that God has surrounded us, with which God has surrounded us. And Peter, as a wise pastor, having urged them to humble themselves, casting all their anxieties upon Him, assumes they've taken that directive to heart, and in the context of gracious compliance in the power of the Spirit, he now tells such people, not those who are fighting God, not those who are carrying

17:40 all kinds of burdens they ought not to be carrying, but those who have humbled themselves, casting their anxiety upon them, he tells them now, in this very terse and pointed way, this very succinct way, be sober and be watchful. Now that I'm not reading too much into the conjunction of those two things and the order of them, I just ask you to turn for a minute for a parallel passage in the epistle of James. James is quoted the same verse from Proverbs that Peter quotes in verse 6 of chapter 4 in James. God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

18:21 Be subject therefore unto God, but resist the devil. See which one comes first? Be subject therefore unto God. And when we are subject to God, the Spirit is free from all of the agitation that comes when we've got controversies with God, we're not satisfied with the ways of God with us, His dealings with us in His providence, dark or smiling, whatever they may be, you cannot effectively resist the devil.

18:51 In a sense, he's carrying on his work within your own heart because you're not taking the posture of joyful, conscious resignation to your God. So Peter then sets before these people there in Asia Minor what I have called their duties succinctly declared. Now secondly, let's look in the text as we consider our danger graphically described. Our danger graphically described.

Our Danger Graphically Described: The Identity of Our Enemy

19:23 Now there's no connective, no and, no but, it's a textual question and my judgment has been carried as I've looked into the matter that we should read the text as it is, I believe, in most of the translations you have. Be sober, be watchful, not because or in the light of the fact that. Be sober, be watchful, and here comes this statement of the danger in which the people of God are. All of them, all of us.

19:56 Be sober, be watchful, your adversary the devil is a roaring lion walks about seeking whom he may devour. Now note with me, first of all, the identity of our enemy, then we'll look at the activity of our enemy and then the intention of our enemy, all from this text. First of all, the identity of our enemy. Our great and constant spiritual enemy is identified as our adversary the devil.

20:30 Now this word adversary is used most frequently in the New Testament, the few times it is used to describe an opponent in a law firm. A lawsuit, a literal litigious adversary. Matthew 5.25 Agree with your adversary while you're in the way lest you go into court and he gets more than his share of what you were reluctant to give to him.

20:55 Adversary there is in a legal sense. The parallel passage in Luke 12.58 has the same usage. But here and possibly in Luke 18.3 it may have the less restricted sense and be adversary in terms of one who is opposing us. And the difference really is not of great significance. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew Satan means adversary. Called this in the New Testament 30 plus times.

21:27 He is addressed, he is designated as Satan. Just transliterating from the Hebrew into the Greek. And so Satan, the adversary, is called likewise the devil. Again, over 30 times.

21:44 Diabolos. Now you know where Bunyan got his Diabolians in the Holy War. From this word. And this means a vicious slanderer.

21:54 And there are several uses of it in the New Testament where it's not referring to the devil or to devils, to demons, but to people who are devilish. And they are called Diabolos. 1 Timothy 3 and verse 11. We find these usages primarily, if not exclusively, in the pastoral epistles.

22:14 Women in like manner must be grave. Here's our word. Not devils. Not devils.

22:19 Same word. Not slanderers. Not devils. 2 Timothy 3 and verse 3.

22:25 2 Timothy 3 and verse 3. Without natural affection, implacable slanderers. There it is. Devils.

22:33 Diabolos. So Peter writing to these believers, said your danger is this. You have an enemy. And the identity of that enemy is Satan the slanderer.

22:47 The devil himself is your adversary. He is your adversary in the context of all that you are experiencing as the people of God. Your trials past. Your present fiery trial.

23:03 The opposition of the unconverted. Their wagging tongues. Their unreasonableness. And in a very short time, these people as well as Christians in many parts of the Roman Empire were going to experience concentrated persecution officially launched from the imperial seat there in Rome from which place Peter is writing this epistle.

23:26 In Revelation 12.9, God as it were does a composite of the names by which this one spiritual being is identified. In Revelation 12 and verse 9 we read, And the great dragon, number one, the dragon, was cast down the old serpent, number two, he that is called the devil, number three, and Satan, number four, the deceiver, number five, of the whole world. Here under the guidance of the Spirit, John gathers together all of these names and titles by which this one spiritual being is identified.

24:07 It is this powerful, malevolent, evil being called the devil. Now it is not my purpose to take this text and launch into an exhaustive study on the devil. I've never done that in all my years of ministry. I don't know whether that statement should be viewed as a confession.

24:25 Even preparing for the ministry this morning I wondered have I done well not to bring at least a brief series of messages. I don't know. But if you have all kinds of questions, well, how did the devil become the devil? And when did he become the devil?

24:40 And how can all of the believers be resisting one devil if he is not omnipresent and omnipotent? All kinds of questions. I'm not going to answer those questions. I do commend to you an excellent series of studies by Pastor Robert Fisher from the Southern Family Conference of 1998.

24:59 Excellent material on the subject of spiritual warfare in which he gives a very helpful, biblically-based, sound description of much of what the Scripture teaches concerning this being. Suffice it to say, Peter identifies the enemy of those Christians in Asia Minor and of us as our adversary, the devil, the slanderer. Now then, second issue is the activity of our enemy. Look at what the text says.

Our Danger Graphically Described: The Activity of Our Enemy

25:32 Be sober, be watchful, your adversary, the devil, that's his identity, as a roaring lion walks about seeking whom he may devour. As a lion. Leading off the modifiers for now. As a lion.

25:50 Your adversary, the devil, as a lion. And what did Peter know would immediately come to the minds of those first century listeners when this particular part of the letter was read? Well, they would have immediately suggested that the activity of our adversary, the devil, grows out of his very nature which is likened to that of a vicious, ravenous beast of prey. To say lion in that setting was to say a vicious, ravenous beast of prey.

26:28 And he does what he does because he is what he is. The activity of any beast is determined by the nature of that beast. And God has made the lion a vicious, ravenous beast of prey. And so Peter says, as you think of the activity of this enemy, think of it in the category of a ravenous, evil beast of prey.

26:57 And then he adds, as a roaring lion. Your adversary, the devil, not just as a lion, that's the simile, but as a roaring lion. Now, what's the significance of roaring? Well, I didn't go to the local zoo or into the Bronx Zoo or down to Turtleback Zoo and ask if they had a lion amongst their more tame animals.

27:20 But I went to the Scripture and looked up all the references for roaring lions and the answer to the significance with Peter's mind steeped in the Old Testament is unmistakably clear. Let's look at three or four passages and I think you'll see what aspect of the Old Testament and what aspect of the activity of the devil Peter is highlighting by saying, as a roaring lion. Judges 14 and verse 5. Judges 14 and verse 5.

27:48 This is a section of the Word of God most kids love to have read to them in their early Bible stories. The life of Samson. And we read in Judges 14 and verse 5 these words. Then went Samson down and his father and mother to Timnah and they came to the vineyards of Timnah and behold a young lion roared against him and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him and he rent him as he would have rent a kid and he had nothing in his hand.

28:22 Now the lion's roar was the announcement that he was about to pounce upon his prey. This ravenous beast was hungering and was moving around and when he saw Samson he roared with a view to making Samson his meal. And he got a surprise. Samson tore him apart with his bare hands.

28:47 But do you see the conjunction between the roaring and the lion rising up against him. And then in Psalm 22 the Psalm part of which could never have been David's own personal experience but points to David's own greater son the Lord Jesus. And in the midst of this very graphic description of how he will be treated verse 12 of Psalm 22 many bulls have compassed me strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round they gape upon me with their mouth now notice as a ravening and a roaring lion. The lion that is ravening he's ravenous he has an appetite he's out to make a kill to fill his belly. In conjunction with being a ravenous lion he is a roaring lion. His roar is found in conjunction with his going for the kill. Psalm 104 in verse 21.

29:51 Psalm 104 in verse 21. The young lions now here it becomes so clear the young lions roar after their prey and they seek their food from God. So the roaring again is found in conjunction with the animal being set upon getting his next meal. One other reference in the prophecy of Amos Hosea, Joel, Amos Obadiah, Jonah, Micah alright in the minor prophets Amos chapter 3 in verse 4 Will a lion roar in the forest when he has no prey? Will a young lion cry out of his den if he had taken nothing? The prophet Amos assumes that anyone in Israel who knew anything about lions would know that a lion does not roar in the forest when he has no prey. He roars in conjunction with getting or going after his prey.

31:00 Now whether that fits in with National Geographic filming of concurrent lions in Africa I could care less. My Bible is the infallible interpreter of itself. And so there was in the consciousness of anyone who knew his Old Testament that with the concept of a roaring lion was not a lion trying to impress people with his lung power. Not a beast that was trying to impress people with the thickness of his vocal cords that he could roar more stentorially if there is such a word than any other beast.

31:32 But he roars when he's ready to pounce and consume his prey. And as we think of the activity of our enemy he is not only a ravenous beast like a ravenous beast your adversary the devil as a lion but he is to be understood as a roaring lion constantly prowling about for the kill. Not trying to impress with the sound of his roar and the capacity of his lungs. Look further at the text.

32:02 He is as a roaring lion walking about a present indicative of a common New Testament word peripatetic. We talk of someone being a peripatetic. They're always walking around this place and that place. It comes directly from the Greek verb.

32:19 He is walking about. He's roaring seeking to pounce on his prey but he doesn't stay in one place and hope the prey will just somehow come by his path. He is constantly incessantly restlessly walking about. And while he is not omnipresent nor omnipotent our Bibles in Job chapter one indicate that he is to be found in this aggressive restlessness in his opposition to the people of God.

32:52 You remember the incident described in the book of Job chapter one in verse six. Now it came to pass on the day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord that Satan the adversary also came among them. And when the Lord said unto Satan whence do you come where do you come from whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the Lord and said from going to and fro in the earth and from walking up and down in it.

33:24 And the Lord said to Satan have you considered my servant Job? For there is none like him in all the earth a perfect and an upright man one who fears God turns away from evil. Then Satan answered the Lord and said does Job fear God for nothing? Have you not made a hedge for him about his house?

33:41 You see the devil seemed to be very conversant with many details about Job's life and circumstances. Why? Because he said I'm roaming to and fro throughout the earth. He's not omnipresent.

33:54 The scripture teaches he has a host of his minions his lackeys who do his will numberless evil spirits. And when the scripture says that we have dealings with the devil it does not necessarily mean just with these evil spirits but with every one devil that horrible powerful deceptive malevolent spirit called Satan the old serpent the devil the adversary. But there are times when it's referring not only to him but all of his minions all of his underlings all of the organized host of darkness that are under his direction and ultimately not under his control but they work in concert. Remember Jesus said is Satan divided against himself? He knows better than to divide himself against himself his kingdom would fall. So there is in his wicked kingdom there is this cooperation among these evil spirits and we must understand that there is this constant activity of the devil and his associates there is a restlessness this constant walking about and having then looked at the identity of our enemy the activity of the enemy now note what Peter says about the intention of the enemy what is his intention? And again the language of the text is clear your adversary

Our Danger Graphically Described: The Intention of Our Enemy

35:24 the devil as a roaring lion walks about seeking seeking another present tense constantly seeking whom he may an aorist infinitive whom he may call a gulp down and that particular form of the verb points to the fact that he is content with nothing less than getting you and me in his gut walking about constantly seeking whom he may devour not whom he may simply harass take his paw and leave some claw marks across the side of the face cut him and leave him with a few bruises no he is walking about constantly seeking whom he may devour now this word devour when it is used in the New Testament there are a couple of instances it literally means to swallow down Matthew 23-24 when Jesus is exposing the hypocrisy of the scribes and the Pharisees he said you strain out a gnat and you swallow you gulp down a camel it is a very it is a very humorous as well as a biting analogy you stand there when you open up one of the legs on the wine skin with a piece of muslin underneath it and over the top of your cup so if any flies or any of the sediment that was in the wine when it was tread down prodden down

36:54 in the open wine vats it will get strained out he said you strain out gnats and after you have got your cup of wine you go and you sit down and the camel that is tied up to your tent you turn around and open your mouth and swallow him down in one gnat the Lord uses this gross illustration tinged with sarcasm with irony with humor but it is gulping down that is the verb that is used and in Revelation 12 in verse 16 it is used in a way again that gives us a very clear picture of what it means and the earth helped the woman in the earth opened her mouth and swallowed up the river there is our verb in the Greek translation of the Old Testament Hebrew scriptures this is the word that is used in the Old Testament in the Old Testament in the scriptures this is the verb that is used in Joseph's dreams when he sees the fat ears of corn swallowing up gulping eating ingesting the lean ears of corn and it is the very verb used in that same Greek translation of the Old Testament in Jonah 1 in verse 17 where the Lord prepared a great fish and the fish swallowed Jonah gulped him down now here is the picture that Peter wants to paint in the minds of all the believers in all the churches among whom this letter would circulate your adversary to be identified as the devil Satan the old serpent

38:22 all of the various names by which he is designated that particular evil spiritual being that is your adversary what is his activity it is an activity that reflects his nature it is the nature of a ravenous beast and in expression of that nature he roars he is out to get his prey and in his roaring he is constantly walking about seeking whom he may gulp down now the 64 dollar question comes why why would the devil bother with little old me hadn't he got more important things to do than trying to make me his next meal make you his next meal you never went to the devil and said no but Peter assumes that every believer has an adversary in the devil how come well the answer to that question goes all the way back to Genesis 3 in verse 15 that's where it has its tap roots that's where it has its tap roots remember Adam and Eve have sinned and in their sense of shame and guilt they seek to hide from the presence of God and God comes both in grace and in judgment both in mercy and in judgment and in strictness and he's dealing with the different ones involved in this and in verse 15 or verse 14 we can take up

39:52 the reading God said unto the serpent because you have done this cursed are you above all cattle and above every beast of the field upon your belly you will go and thus shall you eat all the days of your life now notice I Jehovah God says I will put enmity between you and the woman now if you're going to inject enmity between two people what is their condition before you inject it they are in a relationship of amity they are together God is saying in these words to the serpent Eve and by implication Adam have aligned themselves with the devil and God says I'm going to come and break up those alignments I will put enmity there is now amity between a son and a daughter of the devil in their rebellion against God and they would have gone on in that rebellion aligned with the devil through life and through all eternity and gone to that place prepared for the devil and his angels but God comes in grace and says I'm going to break up these alignments I am going to engender enmity between you Satan the adversary the devil the old serpent I will put enmity between you and the woman and the verb assumed I will also put enmity

41:21 between your seed and her seed both the devil and the woman will have a seed they will have a progeny they will have a people that come from their loins and though the devil's seed does not come by his procreation it does come by spiritual alignment and God assumes that the devil will have a seed he will have a people and the woman will have a seed ultimately that seed will be Christ the one spoken of in the latter part of the verse he the coming one shall bruise your head the seed of the woman will bruise the head of the serpent but in the process you shall bruise his heel and so there is this enmity established by God in grace breaking up these alignments and there will be a perpetuation when we come to the book of the revelation that this very theme from Genesis chapter 3 is picked up in describing the opposition which the people of God experience from the devil and the powers of darkness and all of their cohorts verse 17 the woman gives birth to a child and the dragon waxed wroth twelve seventeen with the woman and went away to make war and a woman was born now notice with the rest of her seed

42:49 with the rest of her seed the devil is making war with that seed of the woman and dear brothers and sisters that's why he's your adversary the moment you quit his ranks and your alignments with him were broken up by God's sovereign grace in Christ you became a marked man and a marked woman a marked boy and a marked girl because you are now no longer seed of serpent but you are of the seed of the woman and this one who hated our blessed Lord sought to lead him into temptation Matthew 4 Luke chapter 4 the account of the temptation the face to face hand to hand combat with the prince of darkness himself the one who stirred up Judas the Bible says Satan entered Judas and he went and sold the Lord for thirty pieces of silver that one who hates Christ I say it reverently he can't get to Christ where he now is and the next best thing for him is to get to Christ's seed those united to Christ in a spiritual bond and the devil knows that he cannot pluck us out of the Savior's hands but he's determined none the less to do all nefarious subtle evil

44:18 power to devour us to swallow us down to consume us and Peter knows that in the midst of disappointment and persecution and opposition the devil has a heyday in causing people to turn away from their alignments with Christ because of the hardship that comes to them as the fruition and the result of that alignment and he does not want them to be ignorant of this fact that they have an adversary the moment they were aligned with Christ by a saving response to the gospel wrought by God's own power described at the end of chapter one purifying their souls in their obedience to the truth having been begotten again not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible they have an implacable adversary and until we breathe into the presence of Christ by the door of death or are caught up at his return as that group living at his coming you are the devil's enemy and God wants you to regard him as your enemy so here in this text our duty is succinctly declared before Peter says anything about this wicked powerful adversary

Application 1: Take the Devil Seriously

45:46 and he does so knowing that he is about to tell them about their adversary so we have our duty succinctly declared and then our danger graphically described let me now bring several lines of practical application and the first one is this if we are to live as we ought in the midst of this present we must take the devil seriously the devil becomes the brunt of jokes intelligent I was going to say 20th century people but I'll have everybody against me I can't stand on the pure truth that we are not yet in the 21st century and none of us will be living when we enter it but nonetheless at the beginning of the 21st century there was a cult of satan worship and these people they do believe in a real devil they sell their souls to him to degrees that are frightening but by and large sophisticated people that aren't into some of the bizarre expressions

47:15 of satanism would look down their noses at anyone who engaged him hand to hand in the wilderness he engaged him in the whole event of the cross he said now he says is the power of darkness Colossians 2 15 points to some wrestling and overcoming with the powers of darkness in his death Jesus took the devil seriously he said of a certain woman lo satan hath bound for these demons what is your name he says to that demon possessed that demoniac of the Gadarenes and the Lord speaks face to face or mouth to mouth with these demon powers Jesus Christ our Lord took the devil seriously the Apostles took him seriously and many offhanded remarks by the Apostle remember the end of Ephesians be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might take unto you the whole armor of God why that you may be able to stand in the evil day and having done all to stand why so important to have armor to stand for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against principalities and powers and the world

48:44 rulers of this darkness against spiritual hosts and also against wrath against the unbelievers against the most sorrow against the the most sorrow against the the most sorrow against us against the beginning of the end of the universe he find the apostles took him very seriously. And if you read the risen Lord's seven letters to the seven churches, there are no fewer than three references to the devil as he gives counsel and advice to his people in those various cities and towns in the very area to which Peter sent this letter. Our Lord takes the devil seriously. The apostles take the devil seriously, and you and I are to take him seriously. Stay awake, be sober, concentrate your faculties upon the spiritual realities in which you live and move and have your existence as a Christian. We are to take the devil seriously. Secondly, if we're to

Application 2: Walk in Humility Before God

50:05 deal effectively with the devil, we must be determined to walk in humility before God. If we are effectively to deal with the devil, we must make sure that that spirit which made the devil the devil does not have any willfully welcomed place in our hearts, the spirit of pride. If anything in Scripture tells us how the devil became the devil, it could possibly be. The strange passages, one in Isaiah and one in Ezekiel, and if there is any truth in those passages with reference to how the devil became the devil, it was pride.

50:47 How did he become the devil? He was a kind hearted man, and he was a pure hearted man. He was a kind hearted man. He was a very soft hearted man. His heart was lifted up, he wanted a place higher than the place assigned to him by the living God. I've already emphased here in 1 Peter, the call to humility comes before the call to sobriety and watchfulness in the life of our adversary. James does the same thing as we've seen in reading James 4.7. If the devil sees in you, his own spirit of pride and arrogance, there's a second verse in there, and they kinda have to work the devil in the opposite direction.

51:16 And then, the other two verses are the same thing in the first one. So he says, if the devil sees in you his own spirit of pride and arrogance, then he is going to be the devil. He doesn't have to do anything more in a concentrated way to trip you up. He's already got his built-in ally operative within your breast.

51:25 Why? God resists the proud ones. He continually gives grace to the humble. What kind of grace? All kinds of grace.

51:31 Even the grace to resist the devil. But God only gives grace to the humble. So you can't get away from the emphasis of the preceding verses simply because we've moved on in our study. If you haven't come to grips with that exhortation to humble ourselves before God and man, you will not make progress in effectively dealing with the devil.

Application 3: Maintain a Spirit of Sobriety and Watchfulness

51:53 Third exhortation, based on this text. If we're to deal effectively with the devil, we must maintain a spirit of sobriety and watchfulness. The apostle does not first of all say, you have an adversary, the devil, who as a roaring lion walks about seeking who he may devour. Therefore, be sober and be watchful.

52:18 No, he begins with this terse, condensed, concentrated call to attention. Be sober. Be watchful. And if you don't comply with those directives, you won't be able to reckon with what I'm now about to tell you.

52:34 Your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour, whom resist. He does not picture anyone effectively resisting the devil who has not humbled himself beneath the mighty hand, and is not casting all of his anxieties upon him. It's all one piece.

52:55 And you simply cannot, you cannot, you will not be able effectively to resist the devil if you're full of yourself. And if you are full of sinful anxiety, if you are full of those things which so distract from spiritual concentration that you are unable and rendered ill-equipped to deal with the devil, you will not be able to resist the devil. You will not be able to resist the devil. You will not be able to resist the devil.

53:19 You will not be able to resist the devil. You will not be able to resist the devil.

53:22 And if that's true, dear brothers and sisters, then we have got to start being more honest in evaluating the things we do and don't do in some other category beyond, well, God doesn't forbid it, I'm free to take part in it, it's my liberty, I will take part in it. Ask yourself this question. God forbid it? No.

53:43 Does God command it? No. All right, I am free, but as I'm wrestling with matters of my liberty, let me ask this question. Does this promote, or detract from spiritual sobriety and concentrated spiritual alertness?

53:57 What does this relationship, this friendship, this activity, this desire, this conduit by which I carry on my social relationships, my entertainment, whatever it is, ask yourself this question. Does it promote or detract from my ability to be wide awake spiritually? Not even to have a little buzz on. I'm in, in absolutely stark, frank, real touch with all the reality that's about me.

54:29 I'm sober, stone-cold sober. You see, you may be laughed at when there are certain things you cannot do and maintain your spiritual sobriety and spiritual watchfulness, but who cares? I can remember people in a pastor's conference years ago when it came up, not a pastor's conference here, somewhere else where I was preaching, and we were dealing with the whole matter of keeping a pure mind, and I said that at that time, now we're talking about decades ago now, decades ago, when the standards of common grace were much more pervasive, and we had a subscription to Time magazine. I told these preachers, I don't open the magazine at all until my wife goes through and censors it for me.

55:13 They looked at me like I was weird. Censor, Time magazine, 25 years? Yeah, that's right. Well, isn't that being overly fastidious?

55:22 Maybe for some it would be, but not for me.

55:26 It would dull the edge of my spiritual sobriety by loading my conscience with the sense of defilement that I let my eyes rest a second or third time on bared flesh that it should not have rested upon.

55:41 Oh, that's extreme. Well, maybe for you, but not for me.

55:46 Are you prepared to have even brothers and sisters in this assembly think you're a bit left or right of center in order to obey the injunction? Be sober! I will imbibe nothing through my eyes, my ears, my relationships that in any way give me a spiritual buzz. I'm determined to maintain stone-cold sobriety as a man, as a woman, as a boy or a girl.

56:15 Extreme? No. It shows a heart desirous to please God and wage an effective warfare with the devil. Anything that hinders my wakefulness.

56:26 Let us not sleep, Paul says, as do others. And I should have mentioned I had it in my notes, but I was...

56:32 I was trying to engage you and didn't look at it. It's come back to my mind. In 1 Thessalonians 5, 6, these two words are inverted. You don't have be sober, be watchful, but you have be watchful, be sober.

56:44 Showing again that the two stand or fall together. Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 5, be watchful, concentrate all of your faculties on the spiritual realities about you, especially the reality of the second coming of your Lord. That's the context. Be intensely, mentally and spiritually watchful.

57:07 But if you're seeking to be watchful and your brain is not registering what you see because you're not sober, your watchfulness will not do you good. Vice versa, if you're being sober, it is not an end in itself, you're being sober to the end that you might be intensely watchful and respond as you ought to spiritual realities all around you. And if we're to deal, effectively with the devil, we must maintain a spirit of sobriety and watchfulness at any cost short of sin.

Application to Unbelievers: You Are Children of the Devil

57:44 And then I want to say a word to those of you to whom Peter was not writing. Those of you who do not know what it is to experience all the things Peter's described in this epistle about God's true people, that they've been begotten again to a living hope, they've been made living stones in God's living temple, they've been made a royal priesthood, they are God's chosen generation. You know the devil has a great interest in you as well. In fact, the scripture says, and this is one of the most humbling things for a non-Christian man, woman, boy or girl to hear, but it's true.

58:19 The scripture says, if you have not been aligned with Christ by the new birth, the internal experience, by faith in Jesus Christ alone as your hope of life and salvation, if you are not a Christian, if you are not a child of God, you are a child of the devil. You are being held in the very grip of the devil. Well, where does the Bible say that? Well, John 8 in verse 44, Jesus said to very religious people in his day, you are of your father the devil, and the lust of your father it is your will to do.

58:58 Oh, you say, but that was the extreme sin of these hard-hearted, proud Pharisees. That's not true of everybody. I'm afraid it is. For in Acts 26, the Apostle Paul records what was involved in the commission he received from Christ as an apostle and a preacher of the gospel.

59:16 Listen to these words in Acts 26 and verse 17. Delivering you from the people and from the Gentiles unto whom I send you, now note verse 18, to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God in order, that they may receive remission of sins and an inheritance among them that are sanctified by faith in me. Until you are set apart unto God through faith in Jesus Christ and your sins are forgiven, according to this text, you are not only blind, you are not only in the realm of darkness, but you are under the power of Satan.

60:00 You're a child of the devil.

60:03 In the book of 1 John, John doesn't know a third category. In this, the children of God are manifested. And the children of the devil, children of God, children of devil, no middle territory.

60:17 And sitting here this morning, it is a sad, sad and horrible thing to have to say. Some of you are the devil's children. Why? You're still aligned with him.

60:28 You got aligned with him in Adam. We all did. As in Adam all die. For one man, sin entered the world and death passed upon all men.

60:36 For that all sin in Adam. In Adam we were aligned with the devil. It is only in union with Christ that that alignment is broken up in the blessed exchange whereby God delivers us out of the kingdom of darkness to use the language of Colossians 1 and into the kingdom of his dear son. And you do what you do.

60:59 You think what you think. And you want what you want because you're reflecting the desires of your father, the devil. You have your father, the devil, and the lust of your father. It is your will, it is your will to do.

61:11 You say, well, I don't hear any devil whispering in my ear telling me to do this. You don't need to. You have, as it were, the devil's very nature in who and what you are outside of Christ. A rebel against God for the carnal mind is not subject to the law of God neither indeed can it be.

61:28 2 Timothy 2.26 says they are taken captive by him unto his will. Taken captive unto his will by unconverted friend, boy or girl, man or woman. You're a slave of the devil.

61:41 You're a child of the devil. But the gracious God who in Jesus Christ came to these people in the first century and has come to many of us through the same gospel that holds out an almighty Savior who is true God and true man who perfectly kept the law, who died under the curse of that law when the one who knew no sin was made sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him. In Christ, you can be delivered from the power of the devil and from the disposition of the devil and the regulating influence of the devil upon your life. But the scripture says whom the Son sets free is free indeed. And John could write for this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil. Jesus said no one can plunder the goods of the strong man until a stronger than the strong man comes and binds him and then spins him and spoils his goods. Christ bound him in his cross and in his open tomb.

Conclusion and Prayer

62:48 Run to Christ, the great liberator. You will find deliverance from the kingdom of darkness and blessed admission into the kingdom of his own dear Son. May God help us as his people that we will take seriously what he sets before us in this portion of his word and God willing next week we'll take up the additional directive whom resists, steadfast in your faith, knowing. There's a tremendous word of comfort to suffering saints that comes from knowing something and Peter points to that stock of knowledge.

63:25 Let's pray together. Our Father, we thank you again for your holy word in which you have declared things that we could never discover. In a million years were we to live that long. We could never conceive of them.

63:46 We could never figure them out. But we do thank you that your word has revealed them. And we thank you that you have not left us in the dark as to why there is so much evil and sin and why there is so much that seems to point in a direction other than the fact that you are true and good and loving and holy and just and right in all your ways. And how we praise you for that time coming when the devil and all who serve him shall be cast into the lake of fire.

64:21 And in the new heavens and in the new earth there will dwell nothing but righteousness. Even so, come, Lord Jesus. We pray now that you will seal your word to each of our hearts. May it bear fruit unto a more stable Christian life and in the lives of those who know you not.

64:42 May it bear the fruits of repentance and faith. Even this day we ask through our Lord, Jesus, to pray. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.