Satan's Lies, Insecurity & Self Reliance - Tuesday Praise & Pray (for others) July 19, 2022

Satan is constantly peddling falsehoods to God's children. He's been doing it from the very beginning and his lies truly hurt Eve, Adam, and all of creation. He deceived Eve (who'd never been lied to and was unprepared), couching the falsehood so it sounded true. Eve and Adam then ate from the forbidden fruit and humans lost their invite to the Garden of Eden.

Millenia later, and satan continues to successfully lie to people. Everyday, he creates elaborate deceptions to trap people in false understanding and paradigms. Unfortunately, we don't realize how bad it is to believe even the smallest lie from satan. Nor do we realize how steep the consequences can be. Take, for example, what happened to the Israelites when the 12 spies returned from scoping out the Promised Land. Ten of them said their army couldn't enter the Promised Land because there were giants there. In Numbers 13:33 these ten said, we seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them. Only Caleb and Joshua believed God would give them the victory. God's response to the people's inability to trust Him was to give them 40 additional years in the wilderness to come to know Him better.

Who told those 10 spies they looked like grasshoppers and therefore would be easily defeated by the original inhabitants of the Promised Land? It was none other than satan. Because the father of lies (satan) convinced them they weren't strong enough, these men forgot how God parted the Red Sea (Exodus 14) and how God brought water out of a rock (Exodus 17). They also forgot how they'd defeated the Amalekite army by the grace and strength of the Lord (Exodus 17).

That's what the devil does. It gets into people's heads whispering lies that sound just true enough to not be questioned. That gives people memory loss and suddenly, everything God did for them previously is forgotten. Satan plants seeds of insecurity in individuals with one primarily objective - to make them doubt God's capacity. And when people doubt God - even a teeny bit - they forget that He is big enough to do all things. Insecurity can morph into impostor syndrome, self-doubt, body dysmorphia, and other unhealthy attitudes towards one's self and others. This then becomes a rejection of God's word in Psalm 139:14 that human beings are fearfully and wonderfully made and the person ignores that they are His "workmanship" (Ephesians 2:10). The devil wants everyone to forget what Jesus declared in Matthew 19:26 that "with God all things are possible" and the proclamation everyone should make, "I can do all this through him who gives me strength" (Philippians 4:13)

Satan's lies cause people to then feel they have to rely solely on themselves or other humans to achieve things. This in turn leads to the very self-reliance the Bible warns against in Proverbs 3:5 - Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. And it gets much worse if you consider the curse contained in Jeremiah 17:5-6 - This is what the LORD says: “Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who draws strength from mere flesh and whose heart turns away from the LORD. That person will be like a bush in the wastelands; they will not see prosperity when it comes. They will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. Don't let the devil punk you into thinking these verses talk about trusting a man or someone else. You can be that very 'man', if you trust in yourself and not the God Almighty!

Last week, we asked ourselves how satan is keeping us from being godly people and we took time to consider what pressure points satan pushes in our lives. This week, we will look at how satan's lies cause us to think less of ourselves, others, and worse, of God. What lies did you believe about God? About yourself? About other people? Today, we're going to worship to enter the Lord's presence, pray for the needs of others, then call on God to help us reject and renounce satan's lies. Join me at 12 Noon for today's Praise & Pray (for others).