Who Is Satan? #2

If you're here today and you are not a born-again Christian, you are a slave to Satan. You better care. There is a demonic, evil, wicked being using you for his own ends.

Why wouldn't you want to be free of that? Welcome back to the Truth Pulpit with Don Green, founding pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. Hello, I'm Bill Wright. We're in the midst of a series called Key Questions Answered. And last time, we began looking at the question, who is Satan? We learned that he is a supernatural deceiver and a sadistic destroyer. Today, Don will complete the picture of this great enemy. But Don, is there any good news to glean as we think about Satan?

Well, Bill, there is good news. My brother or sister in Christ, when God saved you, the Bible says that he delivered you from the domain of darkness and transferred you to the kingdom of his beloved Son. Jesus Christ now rules over you, not Satan, and Christ has given you the resources to overcome the devil in your salvation.

Do you want to know how that works? Stay tuned today on the Truth Pulpit. Well, friend, have your Bible open and let's join Don now, teaching God's people God's Word from the Truth Pulpit. Turn over to 2 Timothy, chapter 2, in verse 24.

Remember, our point right now is that Satan is a sadistic destroyer. Verse 24, the Lord's bondservant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth. When somebody comes to you and preaches the gospel of repentance for the forgiveness of sin, he is your friend. He is not your enemy. He is not your enemy because he confronts your sin and convicts you and makes you feel guilty. He is your friend for bringing the truth to bear upon your conscience. The enemy, the enemy is the one hidden behind the scenes. Look at verse 26. That they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will. This is a picture of unsaved people being a slave to the devil and him being a slave master, holding them captive, keeping them in chains, as it were, so that they would not come to the gospel, but instead would be servants of his will.

If you're here today and you are not a born-again Christian, you are a slave to Satan. That's no laughing matter. That's not a joke. That's not something to be lightly dismissed. This is not something to harden your heart against once again and say, I don't care. You better care.

You better care. There is a demonic, evil, wicked being using you for his own ends. Why wouldn't you want to be free of that? Why wouldn't you flee to Christ to be delivered from his hold, his snare? I don't understand.

I do understand. But just in terms of your own self-interest, your hardness to the gospel is utterly mystifying. It makes no sense whatsoever. It's the worst possible thing that you could do if you even cared about your own soul.

Forget about the people around you. This doesn't make sense. That's why, beloved. Look at verse 26 with me again. Your resistance to the gospel shows how insensible you are. Paul says in verse 26, the Lord's servants need to be kind. They need to be patient. Perhaps God will grant their hearers repentance so that they would come to the knowledge of the truth.

And verse 26, that they would come to their senses. You young people especially that are in Christian homes talking to you. Talking to you. Talking to you.

Letting the gospel and the love that your parents show in bringing you the truth just roll off your back day after day, week after week, month after month. You're accountable to this. You're responsible. And you need to come to your senses and realize the awful reality that you were born into. You were born into sin. You were born a captive of the devil and his intent is to destroy your soul. And your hardness to your parents instruction, your hardness to the preaching of the truth is simply an aspect of the foolishness and senselessness of your unsaved youth.

It's time to come out of that. It's time to repent. The power of Satan is enhanced.

It's multiplied because he has subordinates that are ready to further his will as well. Satan is the captain of an evil army of demons. Look at Matthew chapter 25 in verse 41. This is what Jesus will say to unsaved people at the end of the age.

The one who pleads with you now in mercy to come to him for forgiveness and salvation will not always keep the door of the gospel open to you. One day the door is going to be closed and there will be satanic consequences for you if you've not come to Christ. He says in verse 41, Jesus will say to those on his left, Depart from me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels. That there's his angels, that Satan has this cohort of angels that are underneath his authority. And Jesus is going to say to unsaved people, you go and be with your Father forever. Go into the eternal fire that has been prepared for the devil and his angels.

That's your lot. That's where you belong for all of eternity. It's a sign of the wretchedness of my own heart that I'm not weeping in front of you now, pleading with you to take this more seriously than you do. Now, point number three, Satan is sovereignly deterred. He is sovereignly deterred.

Despite the strength and wickedness of Satan and all of his cunning, the Bible gives us hope. First of all, God restrains him. God restrains him. Satan operates only within the bounds which God has set for him.

You saw that earlier in the narrative about Job that we read earlier. Satan couldn't touch Job unless God permitted it to happen. And so there is a sovereign restraint that is placed on Satan. He doesn't operate with complete unhindered glee in the destruction of men.

That should give us a context to process our fears about his work around us. Secondly, God not only restrains him, God will condemn him. God will condemn him.

The most decisive limit, as we consider the power of Satan, is that God has destined him for a judgment which he will most certainly carry out. Turn to the book of Revelation again, Revelation chapter 20. Revelation chapter 20. When the thousand years are completed, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together for the war.

The number of them is like the sand of the seashore. So there's this great final conflict coming. And they came up on the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, and fire came down from heaven and destroyed them. Look at verse 10. And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are also, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever. The ultimate outcome for Satan is defeat. That tells us that our God reigns supreme even over Satan, even over this sadistic destroyer who is the enemy of our souls.

God has destined him for judgment. God will carry it out. Satan will not prevail in the end. That gives us hope.

That gives us confidence. But for now, for now, we're in between, sort of. We're in a period, we're in an age where that has not yet happened, and God has seen fit to allow Satan to continue to operate because he has not yet brought about that final judgment upon him. And so what do we do? And what is the impact of this for you and me?

Point number four here. We'll just title it Satan and You. Satan and You.

We need to take a little bit of extra time to think carefully here. Go back to 2 Corinthians again for chapter 2. 2 Corinthians chapter 2. In verse 11, there's just this interesting statement from Paul that kind of sets the stage for what I want to, gives the context for everything that follows in this final point here.

In verse 10, we'll start it with verse 10. Paul, in his tender apostolic heart, says, but one whom you forgive anything, I forgive also, for indeed what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, I did it for your sakes in the presence of Christ. Somehow a forgiving spirit is key toward resisting the work of the devil so that no advantage would be taken of us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his schemes. Somehow, somehow in a forgiving spirit, there was protection from the schemes of Satan. Somehow in the work of Satan, there are schemes, there are things that he does that are part of his strategy, and Paul says we're not ignorant of those, and so we're going to conduct our lives in a manner that protects us from that, because we're not ignorant of his schemes. Turn to the book of Acts chapter 26. I want you to see that Paul, when he was describing his ministry of the gospel, defined it in terms that addressed the reality of Satan. Paul's describing his conversion on the road to Damascus, and he said in verse 14, We had all fallen to the ground, and I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew dialect, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

It's hard for you to kick against the goads. And I said, Who are you, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But get up and stand on your feet, for this purpose I have appeared to you to appoint you a minister and a witness, not only to the things which you have seen, but also to the things in which I will appear to you. This is Paul's apostolic commission. Remember, Jesus is our authority here.

We can trust him with what he says. He says, I'm going to rescue you from the Jewish people and from the Gentiles to whom I am sending you. What's the condition of unsaved Gentiles?

Like some of you in this room. Verse 18, remember what we said about the blindness from 2 Corinthians 4, about being held captive by Satan in 2 Timothy chapter 2. You see, the same thing here at the core of the gospel is this urgent need to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in me. My unsaved friend, you're in darkness. You're under the dominion of Satan based on the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.

This isn't me talking. This is what Christ said. This is why he set up apostolic ministry is because unlike the sadistic destroyer who controls and animates your soul right now, Christ is a merciful, compassionate deliverer, one who sets men free.

And he set Paul into ministry and said, you go and proclaim the gospel to them so that they would turn from darkness to light, that they would turn from the dominion of Satan to God. If you've never been born again, you're under the dominion of Satan. If you've never been born again, now is the time for you to turn to Christ. I beg you again, turn to Christ. This is what the teaching, the answer to the question, who is Satan?

This is the answer for you. You must turn to Christ now. Don't trifle with this any longer.

The stakes are that great. Now, I'm done talking to non-Christians. Now I'm going to talk to you believers. If you're a Christian, you should be grateful. You have been rescued from this evil threat that Satan poses to the world. God has worked in your life in a way that has allowed you to overcome the world and overcome the devil. The threat, the destiny that belongs to the masses of unsaved people is not your destiny because God had mercy on you. If nothing else with what's going on in your life today, with nothing else, you should be grateful, thankful, relieved, worshipful, that God had mercy on you that you could not have accomplished on your own. In salvation, God transferred you from Satan's domain to his.

Next point. We're saying Satan and you. First of all, if you're a non-Christian, you must turn to Christ. Secondly, if you're a Christian, you should be grateful. Thirdly, if you're a Christian, you should be a reader and a student of God's Word. Where do you find the truth that captivates your thought in obedience? You find it in the Word of God. You saturate your mind with Scripture. We look to the means which God has appointed to shield us from our opponent. And that's what he's given us in his Word.

Now, fourthly, this one's going to sting, but I hope it stings us all and opens our eyes to this. Fourthly, you should be a humble, dependent man or woman of prayer. But Scripture teaches us again and again that the believing disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ should be one who comes to him dependently again and again and says, keep me from the influence of this evil spirit that your Word calls Satan. Fifthly, you should be a humble person of prayer.

Fifthly, you should be a repentant person of holiness. Go back to Ephesians. Ephesians 4.

I'm almost done. Chapter 4, verse 26. Those of you that are prone to angry spirits, to grudges and unforgiving reactions, take note.

Verse 26. Be angry and yet do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and do not give the devil an opportunity. Embedded in your angry spirit is the same destructive kind of malevolent force that Satan perpetrated upon the human race. Your angry spirit is coinciding with and is in shared purpose with the devil. Paul says, the Bible says, don't give root to that. Don't give the devil an opportunity to work his divisive influence through your angry spirit against others. An angry spirit exposes you to the work of the devil in some way that Paul doesn't elaborate on. But just recognize it's enough that the same seed of destruction that was in Genesis 3 is at work in your angry heart.

You need to repent of that. Finally, be alert but be confident. This is the closing point.

We could have made two points out of it. Be alert but be confident. 1 Peter chapter 5. 1 Peter chapter 5. Be alert but be confident. This is not to drive us to crave in fear, but simply to help us live our spiritual lives seriously with a confidence that the ultimate outcome will be good for us who know Christ in the end.

Verse 8. Be of sober spirit. Be on the alert. Peter, why should we be on the alert? Because, verse 8, your adversary to wit, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour.

That's why you need to be on the alert. You must take your spiritual life seriously. You know, and I'm so glad to have all of you here this morning. Most of you come here week after week after week, and I praise the Lord for that, not so much because you're here with Truth Community, but because I recognize that the proclamation of the Word of God establishes a zone of protection on you, and that as you are growing in the Word of God, it is protecting you from this roaring lion who is seeking someone to devour. I have to say, even though they're not here, the people that would most need to hear this, I really worry about those who take church attendance in such a cavalier attitude, who can be here one or two weeks and then gone for three or four.

You don't know what's happened to them, and then they drop back in for a day or two, and then they're gone again, on again, off again. Christians, listen. Listen to me, beloved. Is that being on the alert? Is that being of a sober spirit? Is that taking these things seriously? No, it's not.

It's not. They're placing themselves in a position of vulnerability. And then, you know what happens? When life falls apart ten years from now, they wonder what in the world went wrong. How did this happen?

How did I end up here? And they never make the connection. They valued the things of this world that distracted them away from a commitment to the local church so much that local church was a priority when it fit with their other things that they wanted to do. Go back to 1 Peter 5, verse 8. Be of sober spirit, be on the alert, because your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. So be on the alert in all things.

But here's our final confidence. And as a pastor, I'd rather expand on this, but we just need to be realistic here. Verse 9, understand that you have the power to resist the devil. God has given you the resources to resist him. Verse 9, but resist him.

Takes conscious thought, takes conscious effort. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world. Resist him. You can, as a believer, successfully resist the devil. In fact, James says in James chapter 4, verse 7, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Submit, therefore, to God.

Resist the devil and he will flee from you. We have the power to overcome. In our faithful living, in our resistance to the things of the devil in our commitment, in our faithfulness to the things of the Word of God and the things of prayer, we are resisting him in a way that God promises to bless. Look at 1 Peter chapter 5, verse 10.

And there's a joining conjunction in the original text. After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace who called you to his eternal glory in Christ will himself perfect, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. You know what the outcome of our battle with the devil is?

God himself is going to bring an end to it. God himself, our Lord Jesus Christ, is going to confirm us as believers. He's going to establish us. He's going to strengthen us.

He's going to perfect us. And at the end of it all, at the end of the great conflict through which we have gone in this life, we are going to stand perfected in the presence of Christ having been proven and made victorious over a supernatural sadistic destroyer. And we are going to be the ones who have overcome. And Christ is going to display the perfection of his power through the fact that he brought a weak, sinful creature like you and me to glory even when the supernatural deceiver, the sadistic destroyer, was arrayed against us. And at the end of it all, we are going to be displayed as trophies of victory that belonged to our Lord Jesus Christ. And just as Job was a display of the inherent worth of God at the end of that book after all of his trials, at the end of our destination is glory that we'll enjoy but that will reflect upon the glory, the greatness, the power, the majesty, the goodness of Christ. Because he not only overcame our sin to bring us to glory, he overcame Satan. And Satan will be a vanquished foe in the eternal flames of torment under the feet of Christ. And we'll share in the glory of our captain, the victory of our captain, forever and ever. That's Don Green, founding pastor of Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio, with part two of a message called Who is Satan? as we continue our series, Key Questions Answered. It's been a sobering couple of days on the Truth pulpit, but thankfully our Lord Jesus Christ will give us ultimate victory over this great enemy who is, after all, no match for God.

Well, now Don's back in studio with a few closing comments. Well, my friend, if you're not a Christian, the Bible says that you are a son of the devil and that you're headed to destruction. I know that might sound crazy if you've never really read the scriptures, but it is true because it comes from God's Word. My encouragement to you is this. Jesus Christ died and rose again to deliver people just like you from Satan and the kingdom of darkness.

Won't you turn from sin and ask Christ to save you? Let that be your takeaway from today's broadcast. Thanks, Don. And friend, we invite you to visit thetruthpulpit.com. There you'll find information about free CDs of any of Don's teaching and also a link to Don's Facebook page. Plus, there's so much more, all at thetruthpulpit.com. Now for Don Green, I'm Bill Wright, and we'll see you next time when Don continues teaching God's people God's Word from the Truth Pulpit.