Mitch Moyer retweetledi
What to Say When the Devil Comes Knocking - Seven Passages for Temptation, Testing, and Spiritual Attack
Introduction
One of the first things a Christian ought to learn after he gets saved is this plain truth: the devil does not quit because you got justified. He does not retire because you trusted the blood. He does not throw up a white flag because you believed the gospel of the grace of God. If anything, once a man gets in Christ, the fight changes. Before salvation, the devil is content to keep a man blind, religious, lost, distracted, and comfortable on his way to hell. After salvation, the devil cannot damn the soul, so he goes after the walk, the testimony, the joy, the confidence, the boldness, and the usefulness of that believer. He comes with temptations. He comes with accusations. He comes with fear. He comes with pressure. He comes with weariness. He comes with lies. He comes when you are tired, disappointed, lonely, overconfident, wounded, or caught off guard. That means you had better know what to say when he comes knocking.
Now the average modern Christian has been trained to handle spiritual attack like a man trying to fight a tank with a flyswatter. He has a vague church slogan, a shallow inspirational phrase, a little religious sentiment, and maybe a favorite chorus bouncing around in his head, but when the pressure comes he has no sword in his hand. That is why Paul said, “And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” (Ephesians 6:17). Notice that Book is not a decorative piece. It is not there to sit on a coffee table and collect dust while you admire your leather binding. It is a weapon. Jesus Christ Himself answered the devil in the wilderness with, “It is written” (Matthew 4:4, 4:7, 4:10). If the sinless Son of God answered Satan with Scripture, what in the world makes you think you are going to whip him with your opinions?
This study is built around seven passages every believer ought to know when the devil comes pressing in with temptation, testing, accusation, fear, discouragement, or spiritual pressure. These are not magic words, and they are not lucky charms. This is not superstition. This is faith in what God said. The issue is not your volume, your mood, your tone, or your theatrics. The issue is whether you know what God has spoken and whether you stand on it. A Christian who knows the Book has something to say when hell starts whispering. A Christian who does not know the Book will usually start repeating whatever the devil told him five minutes ago. So let us walk through seven passages that put steel in the backbone and Scripture in the mouth when the enemy starts prowling around your door.
1. It Is Written - Matthew 4:4
The first passage to remind the devil of is the passage our Lord used in the wilderness. “But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). Now that verse is a direct hit against the devil’s old strategy of getting a man to put physical craving above spiritual obedience. Satan came to Christ after forty days of fasting and tempted Him at a point of real hunger. That is how the devil operates. He does not usually show up when everything is calm and easy and your flesh feels no pressure. He waits until there is strain, weakness, desire, appetite, or urgency. Then he says, in effect, “Take care of yourself first. Meet the craving first. Fix the pressure first. Obey your appetite first.” Christ answered with Scripture and established a principle every Christian needs tattooed on his brain: your life is governed by God’s words, not your appetites.
That is a needed truth in a generation trained to obey every impulse like it came down from Sinai. If a man feels lonely, he thinks he must act on it. If he feels angry, he thinks he must vent it. If he feels lust, he thinks he must indulge it. If he feels
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