Are you ever reminded of something that you know you’ve known in the past but had kind of forgotten about? It’s kind of like hearing a song that you know all the words to but that you didn’t even remember existed until you heard it.
I experienced two of those this week. One was thrilling and one was scary and both were about spiritual matters. First, the thrilling reminder: the Holy Spirit is alive and working in real, tangible ways in my life. This past week the Holy Spirit took a piece of scripture that I have read dozens of times, a story that I have heard hundreds of times, and revealed something completely new from it. This leads us to the second revelation of the week, the scary one: Satan is incredibly sneaky.
I was led to Genesis 3 this week as part of a bible study that I’m doing. The author of the study (Priscilla Shirer) said, in a nutshell, “I’m sure you’ve read this a bunch of times, but I bet God can point out something new” and HE DID.
The header for Genesis 3 says The Fall. It is about when Eve was tempted by Satan and brought on the ultimate destruction of mankind. Heavy stuff. We know the story, right? We were taught as kids about how God had created the world and then Adam and Eve. We learned about how God put them in the Garden of Eden and told them they had free reign over it all except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We know how Satan found Eve alone in the garden and how he used his wily ways to tempt her to eat it. We know how it goes.
But over the years I’ve missed just exactly how he did it. I’ve known in my bones he was a sneaky snake but I am not sure I comprehended just how very sneaky he really is and how relevant he is right now.
You see, he didn’t appeal to her five senses. He didn’t try to sell her on how beautiful the fruit was or how delicious it would taste. He didn’t work like an infomercial salesman, building it up like it was the greatest fruit ever, available today only, act quick!! Eve was probably a fairly shrewd lady and might’ve seen right through that. No, he was far more cunning. He didn’t even bring up the forbidden fruit outright. He just eluded to it and lumped it in with all the other fruit.
What a scoundrel. A sneaky, sneaky scoundrel.
Satan said to Eve, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?” Before he asked the question he knew the answer. He knew that only one tree was forbidden but he needed to find his in. He knew Eve and he knew her weakness. He appealed to her pride. He wanted Eve to be forced to admit that God had placed explicit restrictions on one tree but to do so he first questioned the whole garden. And, man oh man, does he work the same way in my life.
You can’t help but notice that our world is warring right now. There are issues and sides everywhere you turn. There are us’s and them’s on every topic imaginable and I’m learning that Satan loves to make me question whole gardens of people. I lump all sorts of folks together into big steaming groups of enemies when really there might just be one or 2 “bad apples” (pun intended) in the group. I have lumped entire political parties, church affiliations, ordinance voters, and opinion havers into gardens of people that I want no part of. “Oh, you’re voting for him?” Unfriend. “Oh, that’s your opinion of the _______ issue?” Delete.
And I’m certain Satan has loved watching it play out. He does this well and has honed his craft over the centuries.
But back to the first point, my thrilling reminder: the Holy Spirit is working in real, tangible ways in my life. He is leading me to see the ways that Satan is working, the tools he is using. And as I am made aware of his tactics, he is losing some of his power. I am learning my own strategies to defend myself. And being reminded that I have the ability to do that has been so empowering.
Read more of Abbie Mabary’s contributions to AllMomDoes here.
