1-7-2017

Good Morning All,

         James 4:8; “Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”

      I remember watching a documentary on the History Channel about WW 2.  It was about the Japanese occupation of China.  The Chinese were not powerful enough to fight the Japanese Imperial Army head on.  It could not attack the Japanese Army posts directly so the Chinese would cause small disturbances that the Japanese would send a small detachment of troops to investigate.  When the troops were separated from the main unit, the Chinese would then attack the smaller groups.  It was the only way the Chinese could really fight the Japanese in many places throughout China.  While this tactic did not kill many soldiers, it did cause the Japanese to send much larger sized units of soldiers to patrol and to investigate problems.  This hampered the Japanese war effort in China and bogged the Japanese down.

    In many ways, this is the devil’s strategy with us.  As long as we are near to God, as long as we are surrounded by the saints and by God’s grace, the devil cannot touch us.  Yet the devil entices us to go out on our own, away from the safety of God’s loving protection.  The devil wants to lead us astray so that we are easier targets for him to attack.  The devil can never attack God and if he attacks those who are clinging to God he fails as well.  Yet if he can get you separated from God, then he can succeed.

    The devil might do this by leading us to believe that we are “above” sin.  The devil might try to convince us that whatever we do can be justified because of who we are.  The devil love to play this game with preachers.  This is the cause of so many of the downfalls of prominent or famous preachers; they thought they were too great and too important to sin and whatever action they were doing; whether stealing money or someone else’s wife, they were “allowed” because of who they were.

    Sometimes the devil uses the trick of leading us to think that we aren’t really that far from God so we are safe.  If we go just a few steps away from the base we are still safe, right?  Then maybe just a couple steps more.  We are “only seeing what is out there”; how can we get in trouble?  Yet that is exactly what we get, in trouble.  So we need to stay close to God.  We need to stay in his Word and we need to stay in our prayers.  We need to listen to his call to repentance, to turn from our sin and to stay close to Him.  We are to stay focused and single minded remembering to trust in his Word for all our needs.

Father of all mercy, you are the only true source of our salvation.  Defend us by your Spirit and keep us safe from all the devil’s attacks.  We ask that you especially defend those who are straying from your loving protection.  Bring them back safely to your gracious kingdom.  Bring healing to those who are broken by the weight of sin.  Bring them to the knowledge of your true and loving grace.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret