Know Your Place, Satan!

Three posts in one week is definitely a new one for me but the topic has my mind stirring.

I have visited with two women recently who have been living with shame and guilt. Not just for a day or two but for years. Years of feeling unworthy and ashamed of their past, their sin. Years of trying to stay in the shadows to avoid being further condemned.

Y'all this is NOT ok! This is where Satan wants us. He wants to keep us in bondage; he wants to keep us wallowing in our shame and in our mistakes. If he keeps us in this darkness, we are not able to do the work that God intended for us to do. Believe me, we were all created with gifts and abilities that He can use for the Kingdom. God will pull you out of the filth, out of the muck, you need only ask Him. You only have to invite Him into the struggle.

We must change the inner dialogue. Capture our thoughts that tell us that we are worthless. Satan would have us dwell on the sin, the mistake. He wants it to define our past, present, and future. He wants to leave us in the state of either a villain or of a victim. We are neither of those. If you have invited Jesus into your heart, you are a daughter or a son of the Most High! He empowers you with His spirit.

"But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you."

-John 14:26

Ladies and Gents, this is the same power that raised the dead and parted the seas. You have this living within you. Tap into it. Tap into His promises. Stop playing the same movie over and over in your mind. It is getting you no where, leaving you trapped in the past. The past is the past. It is over; it is your choice if you revisit it or not. You always have a choice. The best part is that you don't have to go at it alone. He is with you, actually at your right hand.

"I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken."

-Psalm 16:8

"My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me."

-Psalm 63:8

"The Lord says to my Lord: 'Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.'"

-Psalm 110:1

Satan is your enemy. He will do anything to keep you silent, to keep you in darkness. We will remain in our captivity of guilt and shame as long as we allow it. He is the father of lies. He is relentless in trying to keep us in bondage.

The night that I was going through "Shredded Again", I told myself over and over that I would not be Satan's pawn. I made that declaration in desperation trying to survive and I hold fast to it today.

"When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies."

-John 8:44

"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full."

John 10:10

It is time to get up and fight! Don't let him rob you of another minute of your life. God promises in the scripture above that He has come so you may have life to the full. Claim this promise. Don't let the evil one destroy you by believing his lies. Anything in your mind that is of shame or guilt is not of God. God is grace and mercy. Of course we have to confess our sin and turn away. We cannot continue in our sin, but once we have laid it at His feet, we can live in the freedom of the cross. The Lord actually places our confessed sin behind His back. He sees it no more. Confess and move on, move forward. If He no longer sees our sin, then why should we continue to carry it with us?

"In your love you kept me from the pit of destruction; you have put all my sins behind your back."

-Isiah 38:17

In the end God is victorious. Light will prevail. Satan is limited in his power over you. You have the power to force him to flee.

"Submit yourselves, then to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you."

-James 4:7

We are all the same. We are flesh, we are human, we are sinners. This has been the case since Satan deceived Eve in the Garden of Eden at the beginning of time and it didn't stop there. Moses was a murderer yet God used him to deliver the Israelites from Egypt and spoke the Ten Commandments to him. David had an affair with Bathsheba and put her husband on the front lines to be killed in order to cover his sin, yet God still loved him as a man after His own heart. Paul was a man who persecuted christians prior to his conversion. He became a disciple and wrote much of the New Testament. Finally, one of the most beautiful examples of God's grace and mercy is the adulterous woman that the Pharisees brought before Jesus to be condemned.

"'Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?'" (John 8:4-5)

"When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, 'If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.' Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground."

"At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, 'Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?'"

"'No one, sir," she said.'"

"'Then neither do I condemn you,'" Jesus declared. 'Go now and leave your life of sin.'"

-John 8:7-11

No stones were thrown; no one was left standing there. They came in with confidence to condemn but Jesus put them in their place. Don't miss Jesus' words to her, "Then neither do I condemn you!" This is proof of God's compassion to all of us, no matter our sin, our faults, our flaws. Make a decision to believe Jesus' promises rather than Satan's lies. Make a decision today to put Satan in his place!