Alright, take your Bibles and turn to Revelation chapter 12.
Revelation chapter 12.
And while you're turning there to Revelation 12.
Actually, let me get my timer up here.
I don't want to go 40 minutes like last time.
10 minutes, alright.
Revelation chapter 12.
You guys go there while you're turning there.
Go to 1 Peter 5, 8.
The Bible reads,
Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil,
as a roaring lion walketh about,
seeking whom he may devour.
What does Satan want to do to you?
He wants to devour you.
The title for my sermon is,
Are you being devoured?
Are you right now under the influence of the devil,
Satan, and not even know about it,
being devoured by the devil?
That's his purpose.
And you know, the Bible says in Matthew 16, 21,
quite an interesting story.
It says in Matthew 16, 21,
From that time forth began Jesus
to show unto his disciples,
how that he must go unto Jerusalem
and suffer many things of the elders
and chief priests and scribes,
and be killed and be raised again the third day.
So Jesus is telling his disciples,
look, I'm gonna die,
gonna go to the chief priests,
they're gonna betray me,
they're gonna crucify me,
I'm gonna raise from the dead.
Praise God exactly what he's come for.
But then he says in verse 22,
Then Peter took him and began to rebuke him.
Imagine taking Jesus and rebuking Jesus saying,
be it far from the Lord,
this shall not be unto thee.
Did Peter mean well?
Did he have good intentions?
Absolutely.
He says, Jesus, I don't want you to go through that.
That's not for you.
You know, and he starts to rebuke Jesus.
What does Jesus say?
In verse number 23.
I could have turned there, sorry.
Matthew 16, 23, just bear with me.
I don't wanna misquote it.
Acts 16, verse 23.
And he turned and said unto Peter,
get thee behind me, Peter.
And I says, get thee behind me, Satan,
thou art an offense unto me,
for thou savourest not the things that be of God,
but those that be of men.
You see, Peter came to Jesus with good intentions,
thinking he's doing good,
thinking he's being friendly.
He says, Jesus, that's not for you.
I'm not going to allow you to die.
But Jesus, God, knowing all things,
knows that Satan is behind Peter's words,
knows that Peter has had a weak spot there.
Satan's come, he's devouring Peter as it were,
messing up Peter's mind,
Peter not understanding or forgetting
the importance of Christ's sacrifice.
And Jesus has to rebuke the devil,
has to rebuke Satan from that.
Now listen, brethren,
if a man like Peter,
who's walking with Jesus every day for three years,
is able to be devoured or deceived by the devil,
so can you, okay?
Please don't be so high minded,
so prideful to think,
well, you know, the devil's got nothing on me.
He absolutely knows your weak spots.
And you need to be going to the Lord,
asking him to strengthen you,
to help you on those weak spots.
So I want to not so much preach about the devil,
but for you to know,
does the devil have his claws in me?
Does he have his mouth open?
Is he consuming me?
You may not even know,
just like Peter had no idea,
had no idea that he was being influenced by the devil.
Look at Revelation 12, where you are.
Revelation chapter 12, verse nine.
There are two key things
that the devil is known for here.
Revelation 12, nine.
It says,
and the great dragon was cast out,
that old serpent called the devil,
and Satan, look at this,
which deceiveth the whole world.
What's one of the key things
that Satan does to the whole world?
He's a deceiver.
He deceives the whole world.
Keep that in mind.
He's a deceiver.
He was cast out into the earth,
and his angels were cast out with him.
Verse 10.
And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven,
now is come salvation and strength,
and the kingdom of our God, look at this,
and the power of his Christ,
for the accuser of our brethren is cast down,
which accused them before our God day and night.
What else do we learn about the devil?
Not only does he try to deceive us,
but he's an accuser of the brethren day and night.
Every day, he goes to the Lord and says,
brother so-and-so, sister so-and-so
from New Life Baptist Church,
did you see what they did, God?
Did you see how they broke your commandments today?
Did you see those thoughts that they had in their hearts?
You know, he's an accuser of the brethren,
and brethren, that's why I say to you,
when you sin, what should you do?
You should go to the Lord, confess your sins,
ask for forgiveness.
Be in fellowship with God,
because if you're delaying your confession to God,
guess who else is running up to God?
Getting there before you, God, did you find out?
Did you see what Pastor Kevin did last week?
Hey, did you find out about that, God?
Hey, he's an accuser of the brethren.
What does the devil do?
He deceives, he's deceives,
and he's an accuser of the brethren.
How do you know if you're being devoured?
How do you know you're being a target of Satan
when you're deceived,
and when you're having false accusations, okay?
Coming your way, yes,
but what if you're deceiving your fellow brethren?
What if you're deceiving people?
What if you're an accuser of the brethren?
Guess what?
Get thee behind me, Satan.
That's Satan having an effect on you,
just like he had an effect on Peter.
Brethren, you need to wake up to this,
because it's not just you hurting others,
but the devil's going to devour you.
He's going to destroy you.
If you don't wake up to yourself
and realize the devil is plain,
hey, he's got his claws into me,
he's got something into me,
and you need to go and ask God to help you,
to deliver you from the clutches of Satan.
So what does Satan do?
He accuses and deceives.
You don't need to turn anywhere else
just because we don't have that long,
but Genesis 3, one, of course,
we know the story of the devil.
It says, now the serpent was more subtle
than any beast of the field,
which the Lord God had made,
and he said unto the woman,
yea, have God said,
ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
How does he deceive us?
Point number one, the way he tries to deceive us
is by making us doubt the word of God,
making us doubt the scriptures.
Hey, the scriptures have prophesied
that Jesus would come and die for us,
and Peter doubted it.
Peter had doubts about what was gonna happen, right?
He was wrong.
He was deceived by the devil.
Brethren, whether you agree or not agree
with what's in this book,
that's a side note, okay?
But if you're trying to fight against God's word,
you're trying to fight God's word,
or you're trying to share to other people
in this church things that are contrary to God's word,
you're deceiving your brethren.
You know, you're being devoured by the devil.
That's what's happening to you.
When you take the word of God
and you deceitfully use it,
oh, but I had good intentions.
So what?
So did Peter, okay?
Good tension, good intention, doesn't matter.
Look, you're better off having bad intentions
but getting the Bible right, man, you know?
But of course, you know better,
good intentions and the Bible right,
together, not being deceived,
not being a deceiver, not being a deceiver.
And that's what the serpent does, right?
He deceives Eve.
Eve goes and participates of that food.
Not only does he deceive her,
he just outright lies in verse number four,
when the serpent said unto the woman,
ye shall not surely die.
What did God say?
You will die.
What does the woman say?
I mean, what does the serpent say to the woman?
That you will not surely die.
You know, that's what,
when God says something black and white
for us in the scriptures,
and you turn around and say,
oh, no, I don't believe that.
Oh, no, God would not say that.
Well, that's you being deceived by the devil.
That's you deceiving other people.
You know, do you wanna be used by the devil?
Do you wanna be used by the Holy Ghost?
You know, who are you allowing to influence your lives?
And I'll get you to turn to 1 Timothy 5, actually.
Go to there.
I've got a little bit of time.
1 Timothy 5.
And so my first point was,
you know, when you're deceived
or you're doubting the word of God,
you are being devoured by the devil.
When you're fighting the word of God,
you're being devoured by the devil, okay?
And I'm not saying this
because I want you to be devoured by the devil.
If you're being devoured by the devil today,
if you realize, man,
the devil's got a hold of me,
I want you to get out of there now, okay?
Go and ask the brethren to pray for you, okay?
And go to the Lord, go confess your sins,
whatever you need to do, get right with God
and let the Lord rebuke Satan, right?
The Lord rebuked Satan away from Peter.
Let the Lord rebuke Satan on your behalf as well.
1 Timothy 5.13.
And the next point that I have here is,
you know, don't be deceived
about your proper role in your family, okay?
Don't be deceived about your proper role in the family.
1 Timothy 5.13.
It says, and we've all, speaking about ladies here,
they learn to be idle,
wandering about from house to house.
Hey, what's wrong with going from house to house?
What's wrong with going to go see my friends
wandering about, you know, if I'm using,
well, let's go, and not only idle,
but tattlers also, and busybodies,
speaking things which they ought not.
What does the devil do?
Deceive but accuse, okay?
When you're a tattler, a busybody going house to house,
sharing information about one person to another person,
you are an accuser.
You're doing the work of Satan.
Brethren, do you think this is gonna bring unity
in our church when we're going around
sharing information about one another,
accusing one another?
Hey, maybe even with falsehoods,
things that aren't, oh, but I mean well.
No, no, okay?
The devil's using you.
The devil's using you to create division, okay?
We can't allow the devil to do that for us.
Let's keep going there for verse number 14.
What's the answer to a tattling lady
going house to house, visiting her friends,
speaking things that she ought not?
Verse 14, I will therefore that the younger women marry,
bear children, go to the house,
give none occasion to the adversary
to speak reproachfully.
Who's the adversary, verse 15?
For some are already turned aside after Satan.
You know what's been taught here?
Timothy, there are already ladies in your church
already turned aside unto Satan.
They're already being devout.
They're already going house to house, Timothy.
You gotta sort this out in your church,
Paul is telling Timothy, okay?
You already have people in your church,
you say, I thought this was a problem just in modern day.
No, it's a problem every day.
It's a problem, you know, the Bible's timeless.
There's nothing new under the sun.
The same difficulties that we may face
are the same difficulties that the churches face
since they started in the first century,
the New Testament churches.
So, you know, it's important for us,
how do we avoid being deceived?
How do we avoid being accusers?
You just do the role, do the work
that God has left us to do.
And listen, men can also be tattlers.
Men can also be that way.
The Bible does speak about men in that sense
and we are instructed as men to get out there,
work, get busy, get busy.
Don't become idle, don't become tattlers.
Men can be sometimes be worse.
But I'll end on this one thought.
2 Corinthians 2, 10, 2 Corinthians 2, 10.
The Bible says, to whom you forgive anything,
I forgive also.
And if I forgive anything to whom I forgave it,
for your sakes, forgave I it in the person of Christ.
Brethren, you know, I'm sure there are times
you've had to forgive one another in this church
or you've had to forgive other people in your life.
Don't just forgive them from your perspective.
Like Paul says, forgive it in the person of Christ, okay?
Why is that important?
Because verse 11 says,
lest Satan should get an advantage of us,
for we are not ignorant of his devices.
You know how Satan can come into this church
and take advantage and devour us
is when we don't have forgiveness for one another, okay?
We need to have forgiveness.
Oh, it'd be better if they never offended me.
Well, I'm glad they offended you.
Now you have an opportunity to learn how to forgive.
All right, praise God.
God can use any occasion.
You know, God can use bad occasion.
God can use conflict to help you learn how to forgive.
And don't just forgive from yourself,
forgive in Christ Jesus,
the same way that Christ has forgiven you,
the same way that Christ forgives others, okay?
The same way that he could be on the cross
and say, Father, forgive them, all right?
What amazing words, that's the same attitude.
That's the same level of forgiveness
that we also have for one another.
So let me just finish up on those three things.
How can you know if you're being devoured?
Number one, if you're an accuser,
you're a deceiver.
You've been deceived.
I mean, well, no, no, even then,
you can be under the influence of the devil.
Number two, if you're doubting God's word.
Number three, if you're not fulfilling your role,
your work in the family,
Satan can use that.
And the last one there is a lack of forgiveness.
Let's pray.