I waited patiently for the LORD;
he turned to me and heard my cry.
He lifted me out of the slimy pit,
out of the mud and mire;
he set my feet on a rock
and gave me a firm place to stand.
He put a new song in my mouth,
a hymn of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear
and put their trust in the LORD
Ps 40: 1-3
It has occurred to me how unaware many of us are of the enemy’s schemes. We fall for his schemes and end up in a miry Pit. Of course we don’t start off in the Pit. We take a slippery slope down into the Pit. Or perhaps life just throws us down there. And as if being there isn’t bad enough, getting out is more difficult than falling in. Having been in the Pit, I can accurately describe what it’s like. Not only do you feel weak and confused and don’t know how to get out of the Pit, in that place you lose hope and motivation to get out and walk in freedom. Eventually, you feel a sense of hopelessness as the result of failed attempts to get out. Perhaps as a result of that hopelessness, you also feel apathetic towards God. Though in your head you may know God is the answer, the reality is that you lack the desire to seek and pursue Him.
I want to address something thats really troubling me. I am seeing in my own life and in lives of others around me how many of us have ended up in the Pit as the result of a process that has started long before we fall into the Pit. This, I believe, is where the scheming of the enemy starts. Satan starts the set up for the fall long before it happens. Before the temptation, the Enemy makes us ripe for the picking. He lulls us to sleep so we are unalert, we dont even see whats coming. We neglect intimacy with God out of our prosperity. Then many of us drift away from community. This isolation from God and from God-loving people is a deadly combination. When a weak animal is separated from its pack, the lion is ready to stalk and attack.
Things are not particularly awful, so we think we do not need God. Sadly, when the storm does hit, we are completely unprepared. I think we can all see how this is true in the case of an addiction. The process that makes an individual vulnerable to addiction begins before the action. It’s as if the individual is teetering on the edge of a cliff. All it takes is one incident to push them over the edge. All it takes is a painful life experience and roots of addiction start sinking their teeth into that individual. In this instance, the individual is using sin to self-medicate. They need something to counter the pain.
But why do we limit addiction to drugs and alcohol? Can’t anything today be an addiction? Pornography, sex, shopping, money, romance, relationships, success, etc. We can use anything to self-medicate or meet the needs of our hearts. Addictions become like bandaids on a gaping wound, though they bring relief they cannot heal us of our pain and therefore are inevitably temporary in their fix.
Put simply, though the manifestations of these addictions change, all addictions are addiction to a sin. The fallout of our sin in any case is what becomes the Pit. We chase after things other than God only to get burned. We realize what we thought was so good actually comes at a great cost. What brought us so much pleasure or relief has now hurt close relationships and affected other areas of our lives. Now we become enslaved to our need for the person/thing we are addicted to. And that need only brings more pain.
All sin leads to death even though it promises life. Its been like this since the Fall. Satan offered the apple with a promise of life when the truth was it resulted in death. “But each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.” James 1:14-15
You can fall or slip into the Pit by giving in to temptation. But again, the process starts long before the temptation comes. Every single temptation asks the question: Can you really trust God? You fill in the blank. Can you trust God that He is Who He says He is? Can you trust Him to fulfill your heart’s longings? There is a connection between temptation and delayed gratification. Simply put, as humans we often expect to receive heavenly gratification the same way we receive earthly gratification. In earthly gratification you are quickly satisfied but also quickly unsatisfied. What I mean is you eat a cookie and you receive that immediate gratification, but inevitably you are hungry again. Its not like you eat one cookie and you are good for life. Heavenly gratification usually does not come immediately, but at the same time it is long-lasting.
Recently I read in scripture the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness. I notice several interesting things. I noticed how Satan attacked Jesus’ trust in the Father and Jesus’ identity. Satan starts off every temptation with “If you are the Son of God…” It seems ironic considering the whole reason why he is tempting Jesus IS because He is the Son of God and he wants to stop the plan of redemption. It’s important that in the midst of temptation we see what Satan is doing and what is at stake.
He is also attacking Jesus because He is the Christ, the Anointed One. I’ve notived Satan tends to attack us in the areas where we are most anointed and gifted by the Spirit. If, for example, you are particularly anointed to lead others in purity, you can expect that Satan will attack you with impurity.
I’ve also noticed temptation is strongest in the areas where we feel we can trust God the least. I see this particularly in the area of spouses. Many people will date or marry someone they know they shouldnt simply out of fear. Fear that God will have them remain single or not bring along the right person. They fear that God just doesnt care enough about them so they have to make it happen on their own.
If they want that longing met they’ve got to do it on their own even if that means settling because God does not care enough or is simply not reliable enough. Fear and doubt will attack trust. In the areas where you are most fearful you will be most tempted.You cant surrender control to someone you dont trust. You cant be close to someone you dont trust. Trust is at the heart of every relationship.
Satan begins the test: “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” Here Satan is tempting Him to meet a legitimate need in an illegitimate way. Jesus responded “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”
Satan probes again. Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written: ‘He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’” Satan is tempting Jesus to use God to accomplish His own ends. Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’
Satan tries one last time. “The devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. ‘All this I will give you,’ he said, ‘if you will bow down and worship me.’” Satan is trying to entice Jesus into doing the right thing at the wrong time and in the wrong way. In other words, he is saying “Don’t die on the cross. Take a shortcut. Yeah it may be wrong but you will get what you want right now.” Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’”
Jesus had a lot at stake. We have the same things at stake: our relationship with God, our future, our faith, and our relationships with others. Jesus chose to suffer and delay gratification. He chose The Father above all else.
How did Jesus fight Satan? With the Word. Because the words that come out of the mouth of the Father are spiritual food, they give life to the spirit.
