Scripture: James 4:7
"Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you."
If ever there were a clear time for me to get up on my proverbial "soapbox", this would be it. I believe that in these end times, one of THE MOST ABUSED, and misunderstood (certainly misquoted) verses in the Bible is James 4:7.
Here's the scene: A Christian is struggling... perhaps under some sort of enemy attack, and the persecution is severe. In the honest, and well meaning attempt to engage the enemy in spiritual warfare, said Christian decides to go on the offensive, and shouts out this half-prayer, half-battle cry: "Resist the devil and he must flee!!!... Thus sayeth the Lord!!!"
NEWS FLASH: Thus did NOT sayeth the Lord!
Friends, I apologize in advance for the aggressive tone of this devotional. But this is an issue that I see all the time, and when people stand upon what they believe the Word is saying, and it "does not work" the way they expected it to, only because that which they are standing upon is not the Word... I get a bit upset. My anger is not kindled toward those who do not understand, but rather it burns toward the enemy who has rendered many ineffective, because of the omission of the foundation for the verse in question.
Now, let me be quick to state that I am quite aware of the fact that we are constantly in a spiritual battle. Ephesians deals with this in detail in the 6th chapter. (I once attended a crusade where the evangelist made the statement that there is no such thing as "spiritual warfare", because we cannot fight against that which we have already beaten... I wanted to do the Christian thing, and lay hands on that brother!) [grin]
And one of the very most basic things we must understand when we go into battle, is how to be submitted to our authority. I have many friends who serve in the United States Armed Forces, and every single one of them will pontificate on the virtues of understanding, and then following the chain of command. We would be fools to rush in without direction from those who know more than we.
And so it is with our spiritual warfare. We must first submit ourselves to God. That is to say, we must give our lives over to Him... 100%, and allow Him to be the director of our lives, if we have any hope at all of being effective against the principalities and powers of the air.
Failure to do this is tantamount to spiritual stupidity! Again, I apologize for the harsh words used, but friends, I call 'em the way I see 'em... and I have seen many, many believers rendered fairly ineffective by their failure to recognize the Lord's total authority in their lives. I know this, because it has happened to me! Even recently, I allowed myself to withhold a part of my life... thinking (wrongly so) that I was in a better position to handle that part of my life than the Creator. What a presumptuous position, eh?
And, lest you think that I am simply rambling here, I toss out for your consideration an account that I believe clearly demonostrates the need for total submission. In Acts 19:15 the evil spirit in question said, "Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?", and the well meaning Jews were given a whoopin' that they would not soon forget! What went wrong? These men spoke from a position of head knowledge of Christ, whom Paul preached... and not from a position of submission to the Lord. What a huge difference!
So, friends... do yourselves a favor... and don't forget the first part of verse 7 in James chapter 4. Let us all submit ourselves first to God, and THEN resist the devil, and he WILL flee from us! It's the difference between defeat and victory... I know which I will choose!
Copyright © 1996 Eric S. Reamer, all rights reserved