Chapter 3 – Keeping The Victory Part 3 of 4

C. OUR DEFENSE AGAINST THE DEVIL

1. Three Basic Principles

How do we deal with this problem of condemnation? How can we face the lies and accusations of our deceiver, the devil? The answer involves three basic truths or principles:

1. Turn to Jesus as your refuge;
2. Agree with God that you have fallen short of his expectations;
3. The “Yes – But!” response.

2. The Principles In Detail

Let us study these three truths in more detail. Together they form a strong defense against the attacks of our adversary (enemy), the devil.

1. Turn To Jesus. What do we do when the enemy seeks to make us retreat by firing at us his big guns of accusation and condemnation? We turn at once to Jesus for our refuge. He is our fortress for safety. Kenneth Copeland once said the Lord spoke to him and said: “Son, if you sin, run to me and not away from me”
   When we try to face the enemy on the basis of our holiness or self righteousness, we are being led away from our refuge in Christ. The moment we do, we will be defeated.
   Outside of Jesus we have no defense. In Christ Jesus, however, we are not only safe and secure, but also sure of perfect victory
2. Agree with God that you have fallen short of his expectations. Sometimes we do sin and come short of God’s holy purpose for our lives in Christ. All we have to do is acknowledge or confess that before God. This is not done to inform God of what we did or failed to do, but to let God know that you agree with him that you’ve wrong against him and that that you have repented.
   In Psalm 51:4, David cried out “Against you, you only, have I sinned and done evil in your sight” John the apostle tells us that “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
   Jesus never argued or agreed with the devil. Sometimes the devil confronts us with the truth of our shortcoming. We are not called to argue or agree, but stand on the word of God.
   How does it work? Let us consider a possible example.
3. “Yes – But!” The devil has just accused you of having a dark, evil thought. You respond by saying, “I was wrong in that. BUT…” Now comes the response which will leave the devil totally defeated. “BUT the blood of Jesus Christ has cleansed me from all sin.”
   You can’t stand on the ground of your own righteousness by trying to deny your failure. You know you have failed, and so does the devil. If you try to argue with him on that point you have lost before you start. No, in this example, the ground for our faith is not our goodness, but the righteousness of Christ with which we are clothed.

No Condemnation In Christ. Yes, condemnation is a powerful weapon in the hands of Satan. He is very clever in his use of it. He may even come to us as an “angle of light” (2 Cor 11:14). When he does, he will seek to deceive us into thinking that our feeling of condemnation is from God.

As we said above, God does convict us of sin. The purpose, however, is to bring us to repentance and forgiveness. After we’ve repented and made restitution (if our sin was against someone else), any leftover feelings of guilt are not from God – they are the condemnation of the devil.

God will never condemn us when we sin or fail, if we repent and confess our sin to Jesus (1Jn 1:9).

He will firmly reprove and correct our lives, but always in love. Never will His correction carry even a hint of rejection. Correct us, YES. Reject us, NO! We have been forever accepted in the righteousness of Christ.

“Who dare accuse us, when God has chosen us for his own? Will God? No! He is the one who has forgiven us and given us right standing with himself.

“Who then will condemn us? will Christ? No! He is the very one who died for us, and was raised to the right hand of God where he pleads for us…

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus!” (Rom 8:33,34; Rom 8:1 smf).

Satan is the source of our condemnation. He will find a weak area in our life and bring it before us over and over again. He will use it to hammer into our hearts feelings of guilt, fear, doubt and despair.

Through his lies he will seek to draw us away from our refuge in Christ – our righteousness in Him. If he succeeds, he knows we will not resist or oppose him in faith.

This is the reason we must know what has been taught above. Otherwise we will not be victorious, happy Christians.

Righteous Standing In Christ. Through Christ’s death on the cross we have been saved from the guilt and penalty of our sins. We stand before God JUSTIFIED. (Which means just (as) if I’ d never sinned.)

More than that, we have also been “sanctified” - made holy and righteous in Christ. When God looks upon us, He doesn’t see our sins, weakness or failures, but the righteousness of His son. We are accepted in Him, and have been given the goodness of His life!

We not only stand in Christ before a holy God without fear, but we can also stand up to every evil spirit without fear. Our righteous standing in Christ is the ground of our victory over the devil.

3. A Threefold Defense

Satan knows this, but he doesn’t want us to know it – or live in the power of it. For him, it means defeat.

Therefore, he will seek to destroy our faith and our will to resist him – by using the heavy club of condemnation. No wonder Paul tells us that “we are to be aware of his clever and tricky tactics” (2 Cor 2:11 smf).

We see, therefore, that our defense against the condemnation of the devil is three-fold:

1. Turn to Jesus as your refuge;
2. Agree with God that you have fallen short of his expectations;
3. The “Yes – But!” response.

Now we are ready to press on into victory.

4. The Sword Of The Spirit

The word of God is the Sword of the Spirit (Ephesians 6:17). Jesus is our example for the victorious life. His victory over the devil and demon powers was won by using the Word of God. During His temptations and testings in the wilderness, Jesus refuted and defeated the devil with Scripture. To every temptation He responded, “It is written.”

To “refute” means to prove someone’s word is wrong by speaking the truth. Jesus refuted the words of the devil by speaking the word of God. Jesus won with the Word, and we can too.

The word of God on Condemnation

• “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1
• “He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.” Psalm 103:10, 12
• “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.” 2 Corinthians 5:17
• “God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” John 3:17
• “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.” John 5:24
• “For I will be merciful to their iniquities and I will remember their sins no more.” Hebrews 8:12
• “I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, and I will not remember your sins.” Isaiah 43:25
• “Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the LORD, and He will have compassion on him, and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. Isaiah 55:7
• “I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I did not hide; I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the LORD’; and You forgave the guilt of my sin.” Psalm 32:5
• “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9
• “How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered!” Psalm 32:1
• “Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, ‘Now the salvation, and the power, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, he who accuses them before our God day and night. And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they did not love their life even when faced with death.’” Revelation 12:10, 11
• “Straightening up, Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you?’ She said, ‘No one, Lord.’ And Jesus said, ‘I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more.’” John 8:10, 11
• “They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the LORD, ‘for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.’” Jeremiah 31:34
• “Let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.” Hebrews 10:22
• “For if you return to the LORD, your brothers and your sons will find compassion before those who led them captive and will return to this land. For the LORD your God is gracious and compassionate, and will not turn His face away from you if you return to Him.” 2 Chronicles 30:9