It is wonderful to be a Christian, but we must realize that the road to heaven will not be easy, because we have many enemies.
The Bible tells us about three great enemies of the Christian. They are:
1. The world
2. The flesh
3. The devil.
These enemies try to get us to sin and to stray from the path of blessing. But GOD helps us to have victory over them.
1. How to overcome the first enemy – the world?
The Bible uses the word – ‘’world’’ in different ways, sometimes as ‘’earth’’ which is created by God.
Often it refers to the ‘’people’’, as in John 3:16 which says,’ For God so loved the world (of lost men).
A third meaning is found in 1 John 2:15-17, where the Bible says, ‘’Love not the world—–‘’, here the world is viewed as an ‘’evil system organized under the dominion of Satan’’.
Satan is also referred to ‘’the god of this age’’ whose main work is to deceive men blind their minds to God’s truth (2 Corinthians 4:4).
We are further told that ‘’ the whole world (of lost men} lies under the power of the evil one” (1 John 5:19).
When man sinned and fell from the original position with God (in the Garden of Eden), he came under the rule and power of Satan. Thus the entire world system is organized according to the corrupt and fallen state of mankind, and is characterized by ignorance.
2. How to overcome the second enemy – the Flesh?
The Bible uses the word ‘’flesh ‘’in three different ways.
1. Sometimes it refers to the body, whether of animals or persons (see Corinthians 15:3 9).
2. Sometimes it refers to mankind, the human race, as in Isaiah 40:68).
‘’All flesh (mankind) is like grass, and all its glory like the flowers of the field. The grass withers and flowers fall, but the word of our God stand forever’’.
3. But the important way in which the word ‘’flesh’’ is used is in the reference to our ‘fallen sinful nature’.
The moment we believe in Jesus Christ and receive him as our personal Savior, GOD, and the Holy Spirit comes to live within us, and we are given a new nature. But at this point we experience a conflict.
As we read in Galatians5:17—
The flesh (our old sinful nature) sets its desire against the Spirit (of God), and the Spirit is against the flesh; for these are opposition to one another.’’
The old sinful nature remains in the believer, unchanged, until death.
Thus in every Christian, there are two natures: one sinful the other sinless; one born of the flesh (natural), the other born of God (supernatural). These two natures have nothing in common.
They are opposed to each other.
‘‘The flesh sets its desires against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another.’’ This struggle between the old ‘’I’’ and the new’ I’’ is set forth in Romans 7:15-25.
This was Paul’s own experience before he discovered the secret of victory over the flesh. He explains in Galatians5; 16 ‘’This I say then; Walk in the Spirit, and you will not fulfill the desires of the flesh’’.
To ‘’walk in the Spirit ‘’ means the believer maintains an attitude of dependence upon the indwelling Holy Spirit, to overcome the old nature. Paul says that he can do all things through Christ only, who strengthens him. So also our victory over all sin and the old nature is through Christ, only.
3. How to overcome the third enemy – the Devil?
The biggest enemy of the Christian is the devil or Satan.
“….your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour’’ (1 Peter 5:8).
Satan knows that he cannot keep you from going to Heaven, but he will still do all he can to tempt you and get you to sin. Satan tempts us by putting wrong thoughts in to our minds either directly or with the help of filthy reading material or movies and make us to indulge in drug addiction and illegal sex etc.
We alone cannot defeat Satan but the good news is Christ has already defeated Satan for us. Christ rose from the grave (dead) and was victorious over all powers of darkness.
Because Christ lives in us and He is greater and stronger than Satan, we need not to be afraid of Satan any more.
The Bible says; ‘’Resist the devil and he will flee from you’’ (James4:7).
I thank you for having commentary up on this matter,however this last section “how to overcome the third enemy-the devil ” is quite thin and contradictory to an earlier bible quote you made in the same body of writing.You quoted 1 John 5:19 establishing satan’s real power (given by God for a time) over this world we believers live in,to harass,lead astray,deceive,or as John 10 states to steal,kill,and destroy! The bible is clear in several places how to deal with him,as you partially quoted James 4:7 it actually says “SUBMIT YOUR SELVES TO GOD” resist the devil and he will flee from you,if I will not submit myself to God does satan have to flee from me?Earlier text in James states that God resists a proud man but gives grace to the humble,I draw from this ( since the book of James was written to believers) that as a believer if I am proud and unwilling to submit myself to God that I am in fact creating a nice playground for satan to exercise the authority he has been given.We must humbly submit ourselves out of love and reverence to Christ and he will enable us to resist!The other is Rev 12:11 “They over came him ( the devil ) by the blood of the lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives lives so much as to shrink from death”This is the place where we boldly rely on the work done by God “the blood of the lamb” and fearlessly proclaim that finished works power and authority in me and through me,to the world ! “The word of their testimony”please consider these things.
Shalom to you,beloved of God!