Anticipating the Enemy

For some inexplicable reason, I collected snakes when I was a boy. I don’t know why I liked them so much, but I had quite an exhaustive collection.

A lot of those snakes bit me, and I remember a certain snake that could almost sense my fear. We had a very contentious relationship.

Snakes are just that way, though. You can’t read a snake like you can read dogs, for instance. It’s easy to see where you stand with a dog. You know when dogs are happy or sad. You can pretty much know whatever dogs are feeling because you can read it in their body language.

On the other hand, you always want to be aware of a snake’s threat. That’s how it is with the Devil. You don’t know what he’s going to do next. He’ll snake his way into a given situation.

The Bible tells us that the Devil came in the form of a serpent to Eve. He questioned God’s love, essentially saying, “If God really loved you, He would let you eat from any tree in the garden. So, it must be an indication that He doesn’t really love you at all. And by the way, if you eat from this tree, you’ll become like God. You’ll know the things that only God knows.”

That’s all Eve needed to hear. It appealed to her pride, and she went for it.

In the same way, the Devil is cunning. He won’t come to us and say, “The Bible isn’t the Word of God.” Rather, he’ll say, “You know, it’s really not that bad for you to do that. Other people do. So why can’t you?”

We’ll keep our guard up against the so-called big sins, but then we’ll lower it in areas that we perceive as insignificant. And suddenly we find ourselves defeated.