Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. 1 Peter 5:8 Satan and his demons are directly involved in assaulting the lives of men who were once strong in the pulpit. He has rolled up his sleeves and intensified his efforts, […]
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General Facts from God’s Word, Part 2
But the man who commits adultery is an utter fool, for he destroys himself. He will be wounded and disgraced. His shame will never be erased. Proverbs 6:32–33 Yesterday covered two important facts from God’s Word related to the subject of abortion. Below is the third of four. Fact three: Some sins incur greater consequences […]
Read MoreGeneral Facts from God’s Word, Part 1
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God Romans 3:23 NASB I want to draw from the Scripture four statements that you can know for a fact, that you can rely on and ultimately act on. These facts are not limited to the sin of abortion, but they certainly would include […]
Read MoreWitch Hunting, Part One
Flip Wilson’s line, “The Devil made me do it,” was designed to be funny, not phony. Whether the comedian believed in an actual Satan is, for the moment, immaterial. All he was interested in was getting a laugh. But the thing that made it so effective was the real-to-life scenario the guy was acting out. Here’s this character who has done something bad. No one can deny it, it is wrong.
Read MoreJealousy
Like an anger-blind, half-starved rat prowling in the foul-smelling sewers below street level, so is the person caged within the suffocating radius of selfish jealousy. Trapped by resentment and diseased by rage, he feeds on the filth of his own imagination. “Jealousy,” says Proverbs 6:34, “enrages a man.”
Read MoreTeeth Like Swords
This is an excellent time to bring out into the open even the slightest intolerance lurking in your life and place it before the Lord. The book of Proverbs offers a compelling reason to do so by painting a picture of someone we do not want to become. There is a kind of man who curses his father and does not bless his mother.
Read MoreThe War with Evil
Enemy attack? There was a time in my life when I had no enemies. Once I began ministry, however, that changed. It should come as no surprise that many who serve God in full-time ministry become targets of demonic assaults, especially those who serve in regions where the powers of darkness are commonplace. But enemy attacks are by no means limited to those dark corners of the world.
Read MoreTemptation
May I remind you of four of the more powerful perils that can level even the mightiest? They are fortune, fame, power, and pleasure. Each works overtime to win a hearing, to gain a foothold, to woo us in. Whether subliminal, subtle, strong, or supreme, these messages search for chinks in our armor as they appeal to our natural appetites.
Read MoreSuspicion
If the truth were known, there’s a secret “detective spirit” in most of us. With the best of the paperback and television detectives, we vicariously probe for motives, analyze the evidence, and ponder the killer’s next move. Our curiosity forces us to investigate things that are just slightly irregular. Even a child is known to pry deeper because of a built-in bent to inquire.
Read MoreEnvy, Part Two
Shakespeare called it “the green sickness.” Bacon admitted “it has no holidays.” Horace declared that “tyrants never invented a greater torment.” Barrie said envy “is the most corroding of the vices.” Sheridan referred to it in his play The Critic when he wrote, “There is not a passion so strongly rooted in the human heart as this.” Philip Bailey, the eloquent English poet of yesteryear, vividly described it as “a coal [that] comes hissing hot from hell.”
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