Sunday: Compromise: Satan’s Subtle Strategy
Daily Lesson for Sunday 14th of April 2024
Compare John 14:6 with John 8:44. What contrast between Jesus’ character and Satan’s is seen in these two passages?
What Jesus says is true because He is the author of truth. Truth proceeds from the heart of an all-wise, all-loving, all-knowing God. He is the foundation of reality and of all truth.
Image © Lars Justinen at Goodsalt.com
In contrast, Satan is a liar and the father of lies. He is prepared to use lies, deceit, misinformation, and a distortion of the truth to lead God’s people astray. He deceived Eve in Eden by distorting truth, creating doubt, and blatantly denying what God said. Satan’s statement, “You shall not surely die,” in the context of eating the fruit, was a clear contradiction of what God had said. Throughout the centuries, Satan has used the same strategy. He undermines confidence in God’s Word, contradicts God’s revealed will, distorts Scripture, and at times misquotes the Bible to his advantage.
Read Proverbs 23:23, John 17:17, and John 8:32. What similarity do you see in these Bible passages regarding the truth of God’s Word? What is their central message?
“Satan well knew that the Holy Scriptures would enable men to discern his deceptions and withstand his power. It was by the word that even the Saviour of the world had resisted his attacks. At every assault, Christ presented the shield of eternal truth, saying, ‘It is written.’ To every suggestion of the adversary, He opposed the wisdom and power of the word. In order for Satan to maintain his sway over men, and establish the authority of the papal usurper, he must keep them in ignorance of the Scriptures. The Bible would exalt God and place finite men in their true position; therefore its sacred truths must be concealed and suppressed. This logic was adopted by the Roman Church. For hundreds of years the circulation of the Bible was prohibited. The people were forbidden to read it or to have it in their houses, and unprincipled priests and prelates interpreted its teachings to sustain their pretensions. Thus the pope came to be almost universally acknowledged as the vicegerent of God on earth, endowed with authority over church and state.”—Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy, p. 51.
Discuss ways that Satan attempts to distort or misinterpret God’s Word today.
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Just last week, in my capacity of IT Officer for the local U3A, I sent out an email to all of our members telling them the nominations for officers for the next year and reminding them to let the secretary know they were coming to the Annual General Meeting, so that they had some idea of numbers for morning tea and so on. When I send these emails out there are always a few people who contact me because they do not understand or whatever. So, it was no surprise when one lovely old lady send me an email and said would I mind helping her by email because she did not have a mobile phone. I responded that I was very happy to help,
Rather surprisingly her response came quickly. She had a friend who was in hospital with cancer and she wanted to help that friend be giving her an iTunes card so she could purchase some music for her phone. She could not get out to the shops and Internet shopping was out of the question for her. She thought I might be able to get a card for her and she would make arrangements to get it from me and pay me.
The moment I read this I smelled a rat and checked her email address in the email against the one I have stored in the database. That is where I noticed the deception – one letter in the email address was different. The scammer had used “ll” instead of “l” in the email name.
We read about scams all the time. They rely on appearing to come from people known to you who are apparently in trouble and need money quickly. And they work. The "friend or family memeber in trouble" scam has tricked people into losiing millions of dollars.
Satan is a scammer; He uses subtle deception and has ways of making you feel guilty if you do not follow his suggestion.
Jesus said:
I love this story because it shows how Satan tries to cover up truth. In this particular society, cultural norms had become corrupted to the point where the traitor was more valued than the one "tricked". Sounds not that different than our own cultures....where, for example, hiding the truth and lying is increasingly being downplayed and even looked up to. However, God made sure that the truth was not completely darkened. One of the Sawi traditions told the gospel story, put the story of Jesus in a familiar context...the tradition for the Chief to give his son in the name of peace...and the news about God and Jesus was understood that way.
We see a similar story of deadened senses when Jesus spoke with the Samaritan woman at the well. When Jesus told her that He could offer her "living water" she missed the spiritual truth meant for her healing and focused only on her immediate physical needs, "Sir give me your water so I don't need to come draw from this well anymore."(John 4:15)
And just like the salvation story came home for the Sawi of New Guinea through a wound, a vulnerable spot....through losing a son for peace...Jesus found the wound in the Samaritan woman that was a doorway to her heart. "Go get your husband (who you don't have)" (John 4:16-18). Now instead of immediately going there to her hurting place with Jesus, she puts up another defense with a philosophical debate.
This tactic is familiar. I have loved ones who once were believers in Jesus as Savior and Lord, and now pick only those of His Words that fit their self-protective philosophies. They don't want to believe in sin or Satan or guilt. And like the Samaritan woman, if I share a passage that Jesus said, like "I am the way, the truth, the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6), they immediately want to debate the reliability of the Bible, or of the history of abuses within the Christian church, or the Israel's conquest of Canaan and what they perceive of as a warring OT God. The Samaritan woman would rather discuss a hot topic of controversy between Samaritans and Jews about where to worship than discuss with Jesus her painful history of relationships. We each in our natural hearts would rather lean on human wisdom than open up to Jesus.
A lesson for me is that Jesus didn't push the issue...He followed her topic about worship, but He was purposeful to go back to what He knew would heal her....back to her heart issue, back to a place that was not yet fully locked and sealed against Himself within her. "How and whom you worship is more important than where." Jesus was showing her to not get sidetracked and distracted by irrelevant controversies. Jesus was respectful and gentle and sensitive, but He told her the truth without blinking: "Salvation is come through the Jews"...John 4:26. (I am Jewish and I am the Messiah and you need Me.)
At some point we must say, "Jesus is the only way to truth. He alone is to be lifted up in our lives and worshiped. Any worldview that denies Jesus' Lordship over all things is false."
Jesus told his disciples that the fields were white ready for harvest and to go out and share. At the right time, led by the Holy Spirit, we are to show with our lives and tell with our words to someone who has not accepted Jesus as Lord, that bowing humbly before Him is the only way to peace and love and healing those thirsty places that are too painful, places that we cover and hide with a million distractions and hot-button topics. Jesus models for us...and also the apostles in Acts....in last week's lesson we saw Stephen bowing before Jesus while getting stoned to death...As we are showing that we humbly bow before Jesus, as His character shines more and more out of us, our words will not be received as judgement or arrogance. We are to be light, Jesus said, to shine on the Truth of who He is. We are not superior, but yes, Jesus is graciously (not arrogantly) superior...superior to Jacob (John 4:12-14) and superior to anyone or anything.
You reminded me of reading Peace Child by Don Richardson decades ago. (Now I'm thinking of taking the time to read it again!)
The original values of the tribe certainly illustrate that Satan was "a murderer from the beginning" (John 8:44), as referenced in the first paragraph of our lesson. I believe the values of the tribe also illustrate where compromise will eventually lead - a place that could not be imagined by those who first engage in compromise, namely a complete reversal of values where evil is deemed admirable and good is deemed laughable. It represents a warning to us who see ourselves immune to obvious evil.
On an individual level, the values of the tribe would describe the sin against the Holy Spirit - that is, hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit as the voice of Satan and hearing the voice of Satan as the voice of God. But God is merciful and still reaches out to people who have been duped by such utterly anti-Christian values. However, such values are being actively promoted in our society today, as you point out. I read one of the 1-star reviews of this book on Amazon, and the writer decried the success of turning the tribes from spirit worship to the worship of the Creator God as destroying the "culture" of those tribes. We have also been warned that such a reversal of values will happen on a world-wide scale in the end-time, our time.
In the recent COVID crisis I saw life-long Adventist Christians demonstrate hatred and condemnation towards those with a different viewpoint than their own regarding measures to combat the crisis. (They had zero compassion for those who lost their livelihood for refusing to violate their conscience, for instance.) How does such hatred begin and grow? Does it begin with the conviction that my view is the only right one - with pride of opinion? Can it get a foothold in my mind? Considering that pride was what turned an angel of light into the messenger of darkness, we should not be surprised that Satan will target our pride to lead us to compromise and eventually oppose the work of God. (I think you illustrated that in your comment as well. Thank you!)
By the way, some of our readers be interested in the Richardson family's visit to the Sawi tribe 50 Years later:
At the beginning of the video, we see the Sawi meeting the Richardson's dressed up similarly to their first meeting - weapons and all. Later we see them as they are now - a peaceful people living together as brothers and sisters. (I admit I'd like to share our message of clean living with them. 😉 But I'm sure God is working in their lives and will continue to effect changes.)
Is it possible to learn the whole truth about God? Yes, He left us with His Word and another super important tool called prayer.
Prayer is God's number, which anyone can call anytime!
Ultimately, everyone can discover that God is Love, and His most relevant demonstration is a person.
"JESUS saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me" (John 14:6).
- The devil know that, and that's why he is doing everything to make sure you never meet with JESUS, that's why he is doing everything to make JESUS appear bad to you, that's why he is doing everything to separate the two of you (I mean JESUS and you), that's why he is doing everything to make sure you don't develop a personal relationship with JESUS, that's why he is doing everything to make sure you see JESUS weak, that's why he is doing everything to turn off JESUS to you.
Wake up... it's time to wake up. We are in the end time.
Martin Luther told an allegory about the devil and his fallen angels gathered
at an assembly where he sought information on how to defeat Christians. A demon said: I saw a church full of believers and I made the roof collapse, killing everyone. The devil looked to him and said: Fool, they were all prepared and they will be saved one day. Another said: I saw a camp of believers and threw a hurricane at them and killed them. The devil said: You are also a fool, most of them were prepared and will save themselves. A demon approached with a sparkle in his eyes, just like the serpent in Eden must have possessed when it tempted Eve and said: Master, for 20 years I harassed a fervent Christian and gradually whispered in his ear so that he could make some concessions, such as: stop reading the Bible one day
it will do harm. Going to a club every now and then won't keep you away from God, because later you pray and ask for forgiveness. Staying asleep on a Sabbath instead of going to church won't let you more sinner, enjoy life a little. Today I am pleased to announce that this fervent believer now he is an “ex-Christian”. He is ours!. There was a huge round of applause in hell and the devil recommended: Concessions, this will be our tactic with the Christians... Keep working!
“Compromise: Satan’s subtle strategy.” I asked myself, which part of my life is most in danger to be compromised, and to what end? What is it that I am willing to compromise and what are possible consequences to such compromises?
I discovered that most if not all acts of compromise regard the ‘dos and don’ts’ in life – rules governing behavior. If I would be willing to compromise ‘rules of behavior’ in any part of my life, does this mean that I potentially can also compromise my faith? I say yes!
So I asked another question: ‘what have all compromises in common’? I found that, most likely, it would be the level of conviction of my faith. I concluded therefore that God's Love ought to solicit a fervent love of our Creator God because He has called us to be His children! It would be an easy thing to tempt those lacking the conviction of their faith – Titus 1:16; Luke 6:46; Matt.7:21-23.
There is great danger in settling with being just a lukewarm Christian – 1 John 2:15-16; Rev.3:15. Only by loving the Truth of God’s Word more than anything else in life are we protected from the whiles of the tempter. The believer's life is already safely hid in Jesus Christ, though it is up to us to make it our most fervent loved and appreciated spiritual home.
We have a task of discerning truth from deceit...Prayer is the only number we can reach God through as we ask for His guidance..Good night everyone.
For you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God.
📖 1 Peter 1:23
The Bread of Life early every morning, by the grace of God, this diet has changed me. Jesus please continue to help me, I can't do it by myself, but-
I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
Philippians 4:13
I HAVE REALLY LEARNT A LOT THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR CONTRIBUTION