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Before we can consistently enjoy victory in our Christian walks, we must go to the Word and learn something about the strategies the devil is using against us. We must learn how he operates, so we can stop his operations in our lives.

You must find out, for example, exactly where he's going to attack you. After all, you can hardly expect to win the war if you can't even find your way to the battlefield.

Hebrews 12:1-3 will help turn you in the right direction. It says:
Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.
(Heb. 12:1-3)
Defeat by Deceit
Now that you know where the fight is going to take place, you need to know what kind of weapons the devil is going to use against you.

That's not really too tough to figure out. He only has one, and I can describe it to you in one word: deceit.

He has to use deceit because he doesn't have the power to defeat you any other way. He doesn't have the power to win outright. In fact, he doesn't have any power of his own. Jesus stripped him of it all when He arose from the dead and took away from him the keys of hell and death.

He has to win the battle in your soul by tricking you into defeating yourself. He must somehow deceive you into setting aside the victorious life of righteousness and con you into stepping again into the slavery of sin.

"Well now, Brother Copeland," you may say, "I'm certainly not going to fall for that. I've been chairman of the deacons too long to get sucked back into a life of sin!"

There have been a great many believers who said that same thing and yet ended up totally shipwrecked, their lives torn apart by sins they never expected to fall into. Like you, those believers would never have jumped headlong into a life of hardcore sin. But somehow, without even realizing it, they kept inching toward it a little at a time until at last they slipped right over the edge.

You see, sin never starts out big. It begins small and grows. The devil doesn't just come blaring up to you and say, Why don't you live a life of crime? Why don't you be a killer?

He starts by planting a little seed in your mind. He starts by causing you to wonder, for example, what would happen if you cursed just a little bit.

Let me tell you, I'm speaking from experience when I say that because that is exactly how the devil started with me. I was raised in a Christian home. I grew up knowing that it was wrong to curse.

In fact, I figured, as a little boy, that for me it might well be downright dangerous. I didn't know but what God would just strike me dead if I ever said so much as one curse word.

Of course, I knew that other people did it. I had relatives who were practically geniuses at it. I just didn't think God would put up with it out of me.

But one day when I was 9 years old, I started thinking about it. I started wondering just what would happen if I cursed. Now I don't mean I just thought about it once or twice. I thought about it for hours. I absolutely couldn't get it off my mind.

I wrestled with those thoughts way up into the afternoon. Then finally I decided. I was going to do it. If I die, I die. I thought. It took all the courage I had to say just about a half a word. But I did it. Nothing happened. Lightning didn't strike. I didn't drop dead. Nothing. So I finished that word and started another.

Suddenly, the dam broke. I started cursing everything in sight. That doesn't really sound like such a big deal, does it? A 9-year-old boy on a little cussing spree? But I'll tell you, that afternoon something moved in on my life. I knew it even then, although I wouldn't have been able to tell you just what it was. I knew something destructive had moved in on me.

From that point on, it began to take over. It literally began to rule my life. Over the years, it nearly destroyed me spiritually, mentally and physically.

You see, Satan had come and planted the seed of rebellion. It was just a little thing at first. But it grew. Pretty soon I was smoking everything I could get my hands on. At 11 years old, I'd shred cedar bark and smoke it. It didn't taste good either - felt like it set my neck on fire every time. But I did it anyway because something was inside me pushing me to do it.

By the time I was a grown man, I was rebellious to everything that had a legal tone to it. I was rebellious to the law. I was rebellious to my mother and father. I was rebellious to God.

On the one hand, I wanted God. But on the other hand, I didn't because I didn't want to do what He told me to do. I thought that if I threw off those kinds of restraints, I could be free. But the truth was, I was in bondage the whole time.

My flesh-my natural, human appetites and desires-became the boss of everything I did. By receiving that seed of rebellion, I'd set a law in motion and I didn't know how to stop it.

By the time I was 20 years old, I was 100 pounds overweight, smoking over a pack and a half of cigarettes a day - rebellious, self-seeking and made at everybody who loved me. I knew I was headed for destruction, but I couldn't stop it. I was out of control. My body was out of control, and I didn't know how to put on the brakes.

Then, when I finally made Jesus Lord of my life and got delivered from all that, I found I couldn't stay delivered. The Lord would set me free all right. But then Satan would come right in behind, planting those little seeds in my mind. They'd start to grow and then I'd find myself right back in bondage again.

As a born-again believer, I certainly had the power to be an overcome. But because I didn't understand the strategy of the devil, I kept being overcome!

Eventually, though, after searching the Word and seeking answers from the Lord, I began to get wise to that strategy-and I found a way to counter it. It's a way so simple, you can teach it to a child. Yet it is so full of power, it can literally set you free in any area of your life.


Excerpt permission granted by
Eagle Mountain International Church, Inc.
aka:  Kenneth Copeland Ministries

Author Biography

Kenneth Copeland
Web site: Kenneth Copeland Ministries
 
For the last 50 years Kenneth and Gloria Copeland have been passionately teaching Christians all over the world how to apply the principles of faith found in God’s WORD to their lives.
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