As the culture of the world becomes friendlier to evil, it is extremely important for the People of God to be able to recognize and understand the ancient ways of Satan. Satan has successfully used the same strategy from the ancient days to today. In Heaven, in the very presence of God, the Evil One was able to convince one third of the angels to follow him as he rebelled against God. Even as Adam and Eve walked with God in the cool of the day, the enemy was still able to deceive Eve and also cause Adam to rebel against the one thing God said not to do. Still today the enemy continues to successfully apply his evil strategy and deceive many every day.  Satan has a way of making a lie look like the ultimate truth and make sin look holy. After all, he still has the ability to present himself as an angel of light.

    In the history of humanity, only one person has really given Satan a beat down! Only one person has beaten Satan in his own game. Only one person took all of Satan’s weapons and not only came out victorious, but he did not even break a sweat…you guessed it: Jesus Christ of Nazareth! The amazing thing about this fight was that Jesus was engaging into this fight outside of His element, as Jesus took the form of a normal man, with all the natural limitations of our dimension of life.  It was like an anticipated heavy weight championship fight…I can imagine the angels in heaven eating popcorn and getting comfortable to watch the greatest of all battles in the history of existence. It was a one-on-one, a “mano a mano,” and the greatest ultimate fight of all times. I can hear the angels telling one another “Watch this…it’s gona be awesome!” Now, everybody knew that Archangel Michael gave Satan a beat down for the soul of Moses back in the day, but they were about to see Jesus fight and that alone was exciting. Matthew 4:1-11 recorded for us this amazing encounter.

    Before we explore Satan’s destructive strategy, let’s take a quick look at what is taking place before the encounter. We see in verse one, that the Holy Spirit purposely led Jesus into the desert with the unique purpose of facing the devil’s temptations. If being tempted is a sin, then Jesus sinned. However, we know that Jesus did not sin, so we must conclude that we will all be tempted with all kinds of worldly desires at one point or another. Temptations ought to be expected in the life of a Christian. I wrote an article entitled: “Prepare for Battle,” and in that article I take some time expanding on the reasons why it was necessary for Jesus to face the enemy in the desert. I also expand on the meaning of some of the symbolism found in this extraordinary event. I strongly recommend that you take a look at this article as we engage together in this journey of getting a deeper understanding of the ways of Satan. I strongly believe that at the end of this series you will be richly blessed and ready to face a very normal path in the life of a Christian: (https://angelcasiano.wordpress.com/2011/01/05/prepare-for-battle/).

TO BE CONTINUED…