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Sermon

Satan’s Playbook, Revealed

Speaker
Greg Ho
Scripture
1 John 2:15-17

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Note: This transcript and summary was autogenerated. It has not yet been proofread or edited by a human.

Summary

This passage in 1 John 2:15-17 teaches us that Satan has littered this world with sweet-smelling lures laced with spiritual poison, and we are called to identify and resist them. The central command is clear: do not love the world. Though believers have been transformed from slaves of sin into overcomers, we remain susceptible to worldly temptations that can derail our spiritual growth. Satan’s entire playbook is exposed through three strategies—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—and we are shown how Jesus himself defeated each one.

Key Lessons:

  1. Loving the world is spiritual adultery—we cannot serve both God and worldly desires, and harboring love for the world means our devotion to God has grown cold.
  2. Satan’s three weapons—lust of the flesh (desire to consume), lust of the eyes (desire to possess), and pride of life (desire to boast)—have been his playbook since the Garden of Eden, and they target every believer regardless of maturity.
  3. The things of the world are not inherently evil, but they become idols when we are willing to step outside God’s boundaries to acquire or keep them.
  4. Remembering our eternal destiny reframes our value system—temporary pleasures are cheap trinkets compared to the eternal riches God has prepared for us.

Application: We are called to examine our hearts honestly for any love of the world, to crucify fleshly passions and desires, to be generous toward God rather than hoarding wealth, and to use Scripture as our weapon against temptation—just as Jesus did in the wilderness.

Discussion Questions:

  1. In what specific areas of your life might you be willing to step outside God’s boundaries to acquire or keep something—and what does that reveal about what sits on the throne of your heart?
  2. How has our consumer-driven, on-demand culture weakened our ability to deny ourselves, and what practical steps can we take to build up the muscles of self-denial?
  3. Jesus defeated Satan’s three temptations by quoting Scripture—how well do you know God’s Word, and how can you better prepare yourself to use it when temptation comes?

Scripture Focus: 1 John 2:15-17 provides the central command and exposition; Matthew 4:1-11 demonstrates how Jesus defeated the same three temptations; Luke 12:19-21 warns against hoarding wealth; 2 Corinthians 4:18 redirects our focus to eternal things.

Outline

Introduction

It’s a joy to be here again and to be able to open up the word of God with you. Let’s start out with a word of prayer.

Father, we know that we are but sinners. And Lord, even though we are not better than the world around us, we have gotten for some reason an extra share of your grace. We are your children, Lord. You love us and we are thankful that love can never be sundered.

This morning as we come before your word again, we pray that your Holy Spirit would speak to us through your word. We pray that we would become encouraged, that we would fight the good fight, that the evil one would be defeated in our lives, and we would live lives glorifying to Christ. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.

If you haven’t already, from the scripture reading, I would ask you to please turn your Bibles to 1 John 2:1. This is on page 1218 of your pew Bibles.

Satan’s Bait: Sweet Lures with Hidden Poison

A few weeks ago, our family was eating dinner at our dinner table. For those of you who have been over our house, our dining table is black. It is a slab of blackwood. As we were eating, one of our kids—I don’t know which one, I can’t remember—pointed to the table and said, “Look, daddy and aunt.”

I looked closer and though I couldn’t at first see it because the table was black, I’ll never forget what looked like a clean surface was actually moving. The table with the dinner on top was crawling with ants.

That traumatized me. That made me vow to never get a black table again.

After we all finished freaking out, I went into the closet. I got one of those ant baits—those liquid ones with the sort of nectar that smells sweet but is laced with a slow-acting poison.

These things are incredible. If you’ve ever seen one of these things at work, within minutes, hundreds of ants are swarming this bait. It was impressive.

I thought to myself, in the same way, Satan has littered this world with bait for us, bait for humans. Sweet-smelling lures, but with poison hidden inside.

Last week we saw in verses 12 to 14 of this chapter that Satan, referred to here as the evil one, has been given permission by God for a temporary time to rule over the earth.

Satan rules through an evil world system. He set up this system, rigged it against Christians, and has erected false philosophies, heresies, false religion, and false systems of thought to hinder the progress of the gospel. This false system is indeed with us today.

Satan has flooded this world with lures and temptations as part of this false system to cause the people of God to stumble and to make them useless as soldiers for the kingdom of God.

“As believers, you are no longer compelled to go after these lures. You have been given the ability to resist the bait.”

But here is the good news. As believers, you are no longer compelled to go after these lures.

In fact, believers uniquely have been given the ability to resist the bait, to identify the bait, to see past the tricks of Satan, and to resist the devil. The Apostle Paul just told us this last week at the end of verse 14.

If you remember, he tells us that even young men in the faith are strong and that the word of God abides in them and they have overcome the evil one.

That means all true believers—listen to this—all true believers who have acknowledged their sinfulness before God, who have repented of their sins, and who have believed in Jesus Christ as the sinless Son of God. He lived a perfect life, came to the earth, died on the cross to pay the penalty of sins for all who would believe, and then was raised on the third day.

If you believe that, all people who believe that are believers who have been transformed from being a slave to sin, as Jesus calls it in John 8:34, into overcomers, as we saw in our last passage. Since believers are no longer slaves to sin, true and lasting victory is possible.

In your life. In fact, we saw last week that it is actually expected that you will achieve true and lasting victory over sin. This is the normal process of maturation for a true believer.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. You are thinking, “I want to overcome sin, but I don’t know how.”

Well, that is what the Apostle John is going to tell us today in verses 15 to 17 of 1 John 2. He will expose for us Satan’s entire playbook so that we can break these cycles of sin that we seem to be continually suckered into, so that we can stop falling for Satan’s bait, and so that we can live the most victorious life to the glory of God.

Are you interested?

If so, let’s look at verse 15. This is the Apostle John’s entire counter strategy against Satan in a nutshell.

The Command: Do Not Love the World

Do not love the world.

Do not love the world.

“Do not love the world.”

This statement comes as an abrupt change of tone from what he was doing in verses 12 to 14. You may have noticed in verse 12, John was calling them little children.

You are strong. You are overcoming the evil one. But now his tone suddenly changes to a tone of urgency.

If he were writing this today, this might be all caps. He may be writing this in all caps and in bold face.

This is an abrupt change of tone. And this is John’s one nonnegotiable. This is the one thing that we as Christians cannot compromise on.

If we do, no matter where you are in your Christian growth, this will derail you. This is the main threat.

Remember, the Apostle John here is definitely talking to believers. He’s not talking to non-believers. These are the same people that he just called little children.

It is therefore very possible for you and me, even Christians, to harbor in our hearts a love for the world.

What Does ‘the World’ Mean?

Make no mistake, this is a warning for everyone in the room today. Let’s get specific. What does world mean here?

Clearly, this does not mean that we are not to love the people of the world. After all, Jesus himself tells us even to love our enemies. And Jesus in fact demonstrated that love on the cross.

It does not forbid loving God’s creation because 1 Timothy 4:4 tells us everything that God created is good. And 1 Timothy 6:17 tells us that he has given all things for us to enjoy.

Rather, this is a reference to Satan’s evil system. The evil world system that we talked about that Satan has set up. This is the rebellious system that is installed in this world against God.

The backward system of values, the godless philosophies, false religions, systems set up to confuse the world from the true gospel and the glorification and normalization of sin.

“This is the rebellious system installed in this world against God—backward values, godless philosophies, and the normalization of sin.”

Christians who love the world want to appease and to fit in with the world and to adopt the world’s values in open rebellion to God’s commands.

Why would Christians do this?

The Things of the World: Identifying the Lures

Well, the answer is in that next phrase: the things in the world.

That is, one loves the world so that they can acquire the things of the world.

You see, the things of the world are the lures.

That’s the sweet bait for Christians.

And in order to acquire these fruits, we are tempted to compromise with the thinking of the world.

“The things of the world are the lures—the sweet bait for Christians.”

What does that look like? One commentator puts it this way: the compromise looks like this. You court the world’s favor.

You follow its customs. You adopt its ideals.

You covet its prizes.

And you seek its fellowship.

So what are these things? Well, it could be sex, status, money, cars, houses, clothes, looks, social media likes, titles, girlfriends and boyfriends, connections to powerful people.

These very things are the very things that wicked people in the world are climbing over themselves, devouring themselves to get.

But you might notice that these things that I mentioned are not necessarily evil in and of themselves.

And this is an important point.

It’s Not a Sin to Have Things—But Do You Love Them?

John says, “Do not love the world.” But he does not say do not have the things of the world.

We need to be clear. It is not a sin to have the things of the world if God blesses you with them and if you gain them in an honest way.

“It is not a sin to have the things of the world if God blesses you with them and you gain them in an honest way.”

The Apostle John later in this very book makes the assumption that Christians will have some of the things of the world. In 1 John 3:17, he explicitly instructs those who have the world’s goods to share with his brother in need.

How would you share if you do not have?

Well, you may have some of the things of the world. We all have some of the things of the world.

How can I tell if I love them? This is the question you ought to ask yourselves.

Are you willing to step outside of God’s boundaries to acquire and keep them? If you are, then you have fallen for the poison.

You have now made this thing an idol in your heart and you have pushed God off the throne and put this thing in its place.

Loving the World Is Spiritual Adultery

Look back at 1 John 2:15. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

Now, don’t get confused. This is not saying that the Father no longer loves the believer. It’s the opposite of that.

It’s saying that the person who loves the world no longer loves the Father.

This is talking about your devotion, not your salvation.

Your love has grown cold for God when you love the world.

And how could it not? Jesus himself told us in Luke 16:13 that no one can serve two what? Masters.

He will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be devoted to one and despise the other. This means that loving the world is nothing less than spiritual adultery.

Just as you cannot say that you love your spouse while you are cheating on them, you cannot love God while loving the world.

“Just as you cannot love your spouse while cheating on them, you cannot love God while loving the world.”

But true Christians, hopefully everyone in this room, if you are in that state, you will be very uncomfortable.

And this may be why you are depressed, why you are anxious, why you are distressed.

Because God will not allow his children to be in that state for very long. And your feeling that way may be for you the discipline of God.

A Warning for Every One of Us

Now, John is going to drill down even deeper into this truth for us. But before we get there, let me just mention that it is tempting for us—I’ve done this too—to listen to a sermon like this and think to ourselves, “Boy, that person next to me really needs to hear this.”

My wife, my husband really needs to hear this.

No, this is written for you. This is written for all of us.

We all struggle with this. None of us is immune.

After all, 1 John 1:8 tells us that if we say we have no sin, we are what? We are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us.

You may appear to others as externally righteous. You may be good at putting up an act when you come on Sundays.

But what do you do when you go home?

1 Samuel 16:7, “Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at what? The heart.” In the end, really, only you and God know if you love the world.

1 Samuel 16:7: “Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

So then, this passage is a call for all of us to examine our hearts for what we truly love.

Satan’s Three Strategies to Keep Believers Weak

Now let’s get down to the nitty-gritty of this. What ingredients are on the label of Satan’s Christian bait?

Here’s the outline for the rest of our time. We’re going to see Satan’s three best strategies for keeping believers spiritually weak.

“Satan’s three best strategies for keeping believers spiritually weak.”

Let’s look now at verse 16.

Strategy #1: The Lust of the Flesh

For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh. Let’s stop there for now.

The lust of the flesh.

This is Satan’s first strategy to incite in you a temptation to sin. He wants to incite in you a lust for the flesh. This is talking about sexual lust which manifests as pornography, adultery, promiscuity.

But the word lust is not limited to that. It just means strong desire. This is talking about any sensual desire.

“The word lust is not limited to sexual desire—it just means strong desire. This is any sensual desire.”

You could have a lust for excessive food. Today, many of us have a lust for leisure and rest, which manifests as slothfulness or laziness.

Some of us have a lust for entertainment, and that manifests as an addiction to movies and social media and YouTube. Or it could be a lust for partying and substances or drugs and on and on.

In Philippians 3:19, the Apostle Paul puts it in maybe a little bit of a humorous way. He tells us that certain people in the world make their belly their god. Their god is their stomachs. And these people are slaves to their appetites.

We can do that. Following your appetite in an unrestrained way leads you to foolish sin, just like Esau who for a bowl of stew gave up the blessing of God. Yet that is what we do.

Good Gifts Twisted Outside God’s Boundaries

Satan loves the strategy because it is so effective. The reason it is so effective is because it taps into what we think of as necessary and good desires that seem to us to be legitimate.

We can easily deceive ourselves. Some of these desires are legitimate. Food is actually good.

Sex, believe it or not, is good and necessary. Otherwise, none of us would be here.

Even YouTube, I’m sure, is good for something.

But these are good in God’s timing, when enjoyed within God’s boundaries, and when consumed with an attitude of thanksgiving.

When you can say with the Apostle Paul that even in plenty or in want, you can be content, you can glorify God either way.

Yet, we know that Satan is a master at nudging God’s otherwise good gifts to be just slightly outside the boundary.

“Satan is a master at nudging God’s otherwise good gifts to be just slightly outside the boundary.”

This whispers in your ear: you just need to compromise a tiny bit. This always sounds reasonable in the moment.

It’s just a quick glance at pornography. No one will know. I’m not hurting anyone, or it’s just a few drinks to take the edge off. Otherwise, I’ll look uncool in front of my friends and co-workers.

Listen, the moment we are willing to sin to satisfy our flesh, we have now made this thing an idol in our hearts.

Have You Crucified the Flesh?

As a side note, I think that the lust of the flesh is especially effective in our consumer-driven culture in America.

We here are used to convenience and abundance. If you’re hungry, you can order Door Dash. If you’re bored, in the palm of your hand is all the entertainment of the world.

Everything is on demand. Therefore, we never have to deny ourselves anything.

I’m convinced that many of us have failed to build up the muscles necessary to resist the lust of the flesh. In fact, Galatians 5:24 says this: “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its what? Passions and desires.”

I think you need to ask yourself as a Christian, in what sense have you crucified the flesh in any of your passions or desires? And the answer is none.

Galatians 5:24: “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”

There is an issue in your life.

I’m not sure many of us have. No wonder then we can be so susceptible to the lust of the flesh.

Strategy #2: The Lust of the Eyes

But while the lust of the flesh is a strong desire to consume, Satan’s second strategy, the lust of the eyes, is a strong desire to possess.

At the root of the lust of the eyes is the false philosophy of materialism.

You see the nice fancy things of the world and you are impressed. You spend all your time, all your energy, and all your money chasing these things.

And maybe you play a little fast and loose with your accounting so you can get there faster, and you leave in your life no room for God.

You can think of this as the insatiable desire to have what God has not given you or what rightfully belongs to others.

“The lust of the eyes is the insatiable desire to have what God has not given you or what rightfully belongs to others.”

The scripture has many words to describe the lust of the eyes. Some of them are envy, greed, covetousness.

In fact, this is exactly what was forbidden in the tenth commandment. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house.

You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey or anything that belongs to your neighbor.

You see, it is okay if you go into your neighbor’s house to admire it, even to want to improve your own situation.

There’s nothing wrong with that.

But you cross the line when in your heart you start to whisper to yourself, “Why does he get a house like that and I don’t?”

And then you leave an opening for Satan, who then uses that thought to turn your heart from loving your brother and rejoicing with him to resenting your brother and even hating him because he has something you don’t.

Covetousness Destroys Love and Contentment

This is the lust of the eyes. And left unchecked, the lust of the eyes will actually remove from you the capability to love entirely altogether.

At every wedding we’ve been to, 1 Corinthians 13:4 says, “Love is patient, love is kind, and is not jealous.”

You won’t be able to love anyone because in everybody’s life, almost always, you can find something to be jealous of. The problem isn’t other people. The problem is your heart.

And not only does this type of covetousness make you hate those you ought to love, it curses you to be forever discontent no matter how much God blesses you.

“The problem isn’t other people. The problem is your heart. Covetousness curses you to be forever discontent.”

It’s a curse because no matter how much you have, somebody will always have what? More.

And that is why we live in the most prosperous time ever in human history. Yet people are more depressed than ever.

The Envy Machine of Social Media

In fact, social media platforms like Instagram in particular are an envy-generating machine.

It’s well known that these platforms are linked strongly to depression, anxiety, body image problems, and other issues, especially for teenage girls.

And it’s because they are explicitly designed by the smartest designers in the world to stir within you the lust of the eyes.

“Social media is an envy-generating machine, explicitly designed to stir within you the lust of the eyes.”

We should be very careful then as Christians if we spend too much time on these platforms.

The lust of the eyes is hating your brother for what they have.

The pride of life is looking down on your brother for what they don’t have.

Strategy #3: The Boastful Pride of Life

Here we come to Satan’s third weapon: the boastful pride of life.

It’s translated differently in other Bible translations. We have the NAS in front of us, but other translations will translate this as possessions or property, pride of possessions.

The sense here is having a haughty or prideful attitude towards others because they have less stuff than you. They have less prestige than you on that social ladder. And boy, when you think about it, Satan has a trick for if you are poor and he has a trick for if you are rich.

This is materialism again, but from the other side. And this is maybe the most American temptation of all: to spend your time and your effort and your energy climbing the corporate ladder, climbing the social ladder, accumulating a healthy bank account. All so that you can sit back, relax in style with a self-satisfied smirk.

For this person, having more stuff makes you begin to think you are better than others. Instead of giving glory to God, you begin to think that your wealth maybe says something about you and your glory.

“Instead of giving glory to God, you begin to think your wealth says something about you and your glory.”

King Nebuchadnezzar is a good example of this. In Daniel 4:30 he says, “Is this not Babylon the great which I myself have built as a royal residence by the might of my power and for the glory of my majesty?”

Satan’s trick is a very subtle one. It is to take something that is objectively a good thing. Wealth is always a blessing of God. And then he turns your focus subtly away from God and onto the blessing so that you now begin to trust it and love it more than you love God.

And you have turned God’s very blessing to you into a stumbling block. You have kicked God off the throne of your heart and you have replaced him with your bank account.

Money then for you is something to be hoarded, something to be looked at and be satisfied with and spent on yourself instead of spending on God’s purposes. You just want to sit on your throne and enjoy the spoils of your riches away from the unwashed masses, trusting in them to keep you safe and secure.

And this—isn’t this the American dream?

The Parable of the Rich Fool

And it turns out it was also the first century Jewish dream. Jesus tells us a whole parable about this in Luke 12, the parable of the rich fool.

The man in Jesus’s parable is so wealthy that he has a problem, a big problem. He doesn’t have any more places to put his wealth. He’s run out of storage for his wealth.

His overriding concern is not how he can use his wealth to advance the kingdom of God, but how he can build bigger barns to hoard more of it. He says to himself in Luke 12:19, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry.”

That is the attitude that God condemns.

God calls this man a fool in the next verse. He won’t even get to enjoy it. God is going to take him out that night.

The lesson that Jesus wants us to understand is this: if your life is aimed at accumulating and hoarding wealth, that is your love. Jesus is warning you. It’s the same warning that he gives to this rich fool. In Luke 12:21, he says, “You are a fool who stores up treasure for himself and is not rich towards God.”

Jesus then looks you in the eye and asks you point blank. In your finances today, the ones sitting in this room, are you generous towards God or are you only storing up for yourself?

Luke 12:21: “You are a fool who stores up treasure for himself and is not rich towards God.”

Even the poorest among us are unimaginably richer than the man in Jesus’s parable. He had to store up grain to make sure he didn’t run out. We have no such problems.

In general, we are not worried about not having enough food. In fact, our problem sometimes is we have too much food and don’t know what to do with it.

Our biggest problem is worrying about whether we should upgrade to the $800 Android phone or the $1,000 iPhone.

Are You Rich Toward God?

So then I ask you as wealthy Americans, have you been rich towards God?

You see, the choice here is clear. You have two choices. You can either be concerned with the things of God or you can be concerned with the things of the world.

Don’t kid yourself. You can’t do both.

“You can either be concerned with the things of God or the things of the world. Don’t kid yourself—you can’t do both.”

And this is what the Apostle John tells us in our next verse in 1 John 2:16.

He says, “All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.” It’s very simple. You can have the things of the world or you can have the things of God. And you have to choose.

The World Is Passing Away

And just in case you are on the fence, you don’t know which one is the better choice, look at verse 17.

1 John 2:17: “The world is passing away and also its lusts, but the one who does the will of God lives forever.”

All these things we lust after, all these things that seem so important to us now, they are temporary. They are already, even now, passing away.

Don’t live your life pursuing the world’s lusts. Would you invest all your money in a stock that you knew was going to crash? Of course not.

Instead, you ought to commit yourself to doing the will of God because these treasures, John tells us, are worthless.

This verse is not actually to be read as a threat that if you don’t do the will of God, you won’t live forever. Actually, the idea here is that listen—you are going to live forever.

That should change your value system. Do you realize that you’re going to live forever? Why are you concerned about temporary things?

The Secret: Remember You Will Live Forever

See, John is giving us now here the true secret of resisting the temptations of the devil. This is it. We are to remember—we forget this, don’t we?—we are to remember that we as believers will live forever.

As eternal creatures, we ought to be looking for eternal things.

“We are to remember that we as believers will live forever. As eternal creatures, we ought to be looking for eternal things.”

As eternal creatures, we ought to look not at the things that are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:18.

What are these things? What are these things we can look forward to as eternal creatures? Guaranteed eternity.

Well, we know we’re going to live a life without sin, life without death, a life with perfect contentment, happiness, excitement, fellowship, joy, peace, and a closeness with God that would never fade.

But what else is there going to be? We don’t talk about this enough.

Sometimes we can read that list and it can kind of glaze over our eyes because it doesn’t really necessarily mean anything to us. We don’t see it yet.

Think about it this way. As much as you think you will enjoy the lust that you lust after here, heaven will have things better than that.

Heaven will have things that are superior to that in every way.

After all, Jesus already assured us that we will have immeasurable riches in heaven.

But do you believe him?

Do you believe him?

Heaven Will Be Better Than You Can Imagine

I think one of the most effective lies that Satan has ever told, that has made its way into our culture and seeped into our minds even as believers, is to convince us that heaven is going to be like sitting on a cloud playing a harp.

And it just seems so boring.

These lusts, by contrast, seem so interesting.

But nothing could be further from the truth. After all, it is the same God who created this world that’s going to create the next world.

Do you think that the new world is going to be inferior to the old one? No.

If you upgrade your phone, do you expect that to be worse than the one you just had?

Literally, God has been preparing for you good things that you can’t even dream of now. Everything will be better in every way.

These passing lusts, John is telling us here, friends, that is the cheap stuff. That is simply not good enough for people like you who will live forever. Don’t settle for them. They’re disposable trinkets.

“These passing lusts—that is the cheap stuff. It’s simply not good enough for people like you who will live forever.”

These are things of the world which are passing away. They are temporary and they won’t satisfy you the way you think.

Finally, to close our time this morning, I just want to show you one last thing.

Jesus Defeated Satan’s Playbook

I want you to turn in your Bibles, if you will, to Matthew 4.

This will be on page if you are using your pew Bible.

If having reflected on these three weapons of Satan, you realize that you are in fact struggling with these, I believe this may help you. At some point, no one here is sinless. We all struggle with these things in one way or another.

This is the temptation of Jesus. Let me read for you: “Then Satan was led up by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after he had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, he then became hungry.

And the tempter came and said to him, ‘If you are the son of God, command these stones become bread.’” What kind of temptation is that? Lust of the flesh.

“But he answered and said, ‘It is written, man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.’” Then the devil took him into the holy city and had him stand on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, he will command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”

Here the tempter wants Jesus to throw himself down so that he could be lifted by the angel servants for all the holy to see how great he is. And this is the pride of life.

“And Jesus said to him, ‘On the other hand, it is written, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’” Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.

“And he said to him, ‘All these things I will give you if you fall down and worship me.’” This is the lust of the eyes. All you see can be yours.

You see, Satan has been using this same playbook since the Garden of Eden to trap the people of God for thousands of years. And when Jesus came, Satan gave it his best shot. He took out his best weapons, the best tricks he knew.

Did it work?

Verse 10: “Then Jesus said to him, ‘Go Satan, for it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God and serve him only.’ Then the devil what? Left him.

My friends, Jesus overcame Satan and in the process he showed us how to do it. And Jesus used as his weapon the word of God. God’s word exposed the lies of Satan for what they are. And that is how we fight back too.

“Jesus overcame Satan and showed us how to do it. He used the word of God to expose Satan’s lies.”

We need to know the word of God.

How to Overcome the Evil One

So if you’re taking notes, write this down. How can you overcome the evil one?

Two things. One, we saw two strategies.

First, look at eternity. Remember, you’re an eternal creature where the best is yet to come.

Second, when in the middle of temptation, remember God’s word to expose Satan’s lies.

If you still find yourself struggling after that, then perhaps these last words in our sermon from Jesus will give you some comfort. These are the words that Jesus himself told his own disciples before they underwent the greatest temptation of their lives.

Right before Jesus’s crucifixion in John 16:33, Jesus says this to his disciples. The disciples all fell to this temptation, so Jesus says this to encourage them.

Jesus says, “These things I have spoken to you so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have tribulation, but take courage. I have overcome the world.”

John 16:33: “In this world you will have tribulation, but take courage. I have overcome the world.”

Friends, Jesus has done for us the hard part. He’s shown us by example how to do it.

By the power of his name, you too will overcome the world.

Closing Prayer

Let’s pray. Father, we are so grateful for your word. The power of your word is enough to rebuff even the most powerful, time-tested, proven schemes of the devil.

And Lord, we know that even if your apostles fell to the schemes of the evil one at various points in their lives, we are not immune.

We are not so arrogant as to say that we have everything figured out.

And yet, Lord, we have the assurance in your word that victory is within our grasp. In fact, you have done it and you have shown us how.

Lord, we want as Christians to live lives glorifying you. We want our lives to be shining testimonies of your grace and your power and your love. In order to do that, we must overcome the evil one.

We pray, Lord, that this passage of scripture will equip us to do so. Where we have been defeated in the past, we will now by the power of your name find victory. In Christ’s name we pray.

Amen.

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