In order to recognize and appreciate our freedom, we have to realize to what we are in bondage. This devotion looks the spiritual bondage all those who are not children of God face.
Nuggets
- Satan knows our weaknesses and how to use them to his advantage.
- Death entered the world when Satan convinced Adam and Eve to sin.
- Satan wants us to blame God.
- A lot of times, the way Satan works our corruption is by promising us something.
Devotions in the What I Believe series
Devotions in the Religious Freedom category
Spiritual Freedom
Jesus the Liberator
What Religious Freedom Doesn’t Mean
This series talks about spiritual freedom. To understand freedom, we have to understand to what we are in bondage — and to whom.
We are in bondage to Satan and sin when we are not a child of God. “Jesus responded, “Truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin” (Jn. 8: 34 CSB).
This could be very difficult for non-believers to understand. When we are witnessing to them, we have to be clear on what we believe so that we can convey that to them.
Luckily, we have several verses that we can use to present the concept. The foundation of this devotion was taken from the Sunday School Times’ sermon entitled Bondage and Freedom. Let’s check it out.
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Let's Put It into Context #1
Freedom is, according to the Holman Bible Dictionary, “the ability of a person or group to be and do what they want instead of being controlled by another.” It is also referred to as liberty.
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We talked about liberty before. We said that it runs the gamut, hitting all the things the worldview stresses.
• We do what we please with no authority over us.
• We make our own choices.
• We don’t have to follow rules or limits.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
Let's Put It into Context #2
Before mankind are children of God, they are sinners. Sinners are all people who have not made a genuine profession of faith — who have not sincerely ABCDed.
Glossary
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
We are sinners because Adam and Eve committed the original sin in the Garden of Eden. Scriptures tell us that they disobeyed the express command of God — do not eat of the fruit from this one tree.
Glossary
Was the tree some magical tree? Maybe. Maybe not.
I see the main issue was their disobedience. Adam and Eve did not submit their will and their lives to God. So, they did the exact opposite of what God told them to do.
Yes, they had help. Satan was there to nudge them into disobedience.
But the choice was all theirs. And mankind has suffered ever since. We have been in bondage ever since.
In Bondage to Satan
“Then they will come to their senses and escape from the devil’s trap. For they have been held captive by him to do whatever he wants” (II Tim. 2: 26 NLT)
Satan is really sneaky. When he tempts us, it is hard for us to identify that it is him doing the talking. He makes it look like it is all our idea.
What is worse is that Satan can use Scriptures against us. He did with Jesus.
“Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, to the highest point of the Temple, and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, jump off! For the Scriptures say, “He will order his angels to protect and guard you. And they will hold you up with their hands so you won’t even hurt your foot on a stone”’” (Lk. 4: 9-11 NLT). If we don’t know the Scriptures and the context passage are used in, we won’t have on some of our armor to fight Satan.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
Barlow explained why Satan is successful in tempting us. He wrote, “He conceives that some are apt to pride, malice, coveteousness, melancholy, mirth, silence, liberalness of speech, and according to our natural inclination he sets his gins for us.”
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In Elaine-speak, Satan knows our weaknesses and how to use them to his advantage.
Look at what Jesus called Satan. “… He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him …” (Jn. 8: 44 CSB).
We say that we are taken captive by Satan. “… For they have been held captive by him to do whatever he wants” (II Tim. 2: 26 NLT).
Satan may be sneaky in tempting us, but his objective is deadly. He wants us to remain spiritually dead. Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin.
Glossary
The purpose of this captivity is so we will do anything Satan wants. What Satan wants is for us to do the exact opposite of what God wants.
In Bondage to the Fear of Death
“Now since the children have flesh and blood in common, Jesus also shared in these, so that through his death he might destroy the one holding the power of death —that is, the devil until we — and free those who were held in slavery all their lives by the fear of death” (Heb. 2: 14-15 CSB).
Ooo, baby. Look what Gouge had to say. He wrote, “… the devil may be said to have the power of death,” which makes him the “… executioner of God’s just judgment …”
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Think about it. The results of sin — poverty, crime, disease, death, etc. — are also the judgments of sin.
Why does Satan have so much power over death? Death entered the world when Satan convinced Adam and Eve to sin. Satan brought death in, so he is considered “holding the power of death …” (Heb. 2: 14 CSB).
Satan enslaves us by getting us to fear death. One thing that has been reinforced with Pastor Chad’s death is we have to be ready regardless of age. Being ready eliminates most of the fear.
Oh, yeah. The mystery and leave-taking that Meyer talked about is still there. The pain may be there. However, we don’t have to fear the afterdeath.
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Spurgeon wrote that Satan had power because he gets disciples to doubt their salvation. Or he will tell us that God really doesn’t forgive and forget the sins we have confessed. Worse yet, Satan may convince us that we will fail in heaven just as we did here.
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But wait a second. We soft peddle fear these days, don’t we? We call it anxiety or stress.
Oh, yeah. It can do bad things to us, but it is mostly because we aren’t handling it well.
No. We need to fear Satan – and not in the love and reverence as we do to God. We need to steer clear of him and hold onto God’s peace.
Glossary
Ooo, baby. Smith got me to thinking. Why do non-believers fear death? Yeah, maybe the pain will last a little bit, but – in their opinion – then everything is over with because there is no afterlife.
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Satan has them thinking about it backwards. The pain of death is only going to last a little bit. The sentences of judgment are going to last for eternity.
In Bondage to Sin
“Don’t you realize that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God, which leads to righteous living” (Rom. 6: 16 NLT).
Sin. It comes down to sin. Sin is actions by humans that disobey God and break one of His laws and commandments, goes against a purpose He has for us, or follows Satan’s promptings.
Glossary
Melvill’s sermon talked about the effects of sin. He wrote, “Every pain to which flesh is heir, every sickness — the decay, and the dissolution of the body, are to be referred to sin as their first origin; and the temptation to sin having been of Satan, they are to be classed among the works of the devil.”
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Yep, Adam and Eve followed Satan’s prompting. Bottom line, they were disobeying God.
We disobey God when we don’t follow His laws and commandments. We disobey when He tells us to move somewhere, do something, or don’t do something – and we don’t, don’t, or do.
Did you ever think about it? Adam and Eve got one chance. They had to obey, or else sin came into the world.
We get more than one chance – even after we become disciples. God will forgive us of our sins when we repent. Repentance is expressing sorrow for breaking God’s laws and commandments by making the commitment to changing ourselves through obedience so that we no longer do the wrong things.
Glossary
Satan wants us to blame God. He isn’t to blame for our ills – Satan is, and we are. We are when we choose to disobey Him.
In Bondage to Corruption
“They promise freedom, but they themselves are slaves of sin and corruption. For you are a slave to whatever controls you” (II Pet. 2: 19 NLT).
The Holman Bible Dictionary defines corruption as “used especially in the [King James Version] KJV to denote the transient nature of the material world —that is, the world’s bent toward change and decay …”
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We talked before how Satan asked for Peter to be given to him. (I know, scary thought.) Jesus told Peter, “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift all of you as wheat” (Lk. 22: 31 NIV).
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
A lot of times, the way Satan works our corruption is by promising us something. It could be through a relationship, a career, a skill – really anything that is attractive to us.
But Satan is a liar. Adams wrote, “All sin is a servitude; and that which flatters men with the greatest opinion of liberty, makes them the most miserable vassals.”
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In Elaine-speak, we generally get what is promised but find out we really didn’t want it at all. Usually, that is because the deceiver purposefully meant to deceive us.
Making the Connections
Snape showed us exactly how Satan’s treachery looks. He wrote, “… so the devil takes men’s souls alive by his subtlety: nay, more, unless they be recovered out of his snares, they must be alive for ever under his sway: lost, yet alive; hopeless, yet alive; tormented, yet alive; ever desiring to die, but never able.
Yeah, Satan is talking out of both sides of his mouth. That makes him even sneakier.
Johnson argued that we all do have liberty. To him, it is called free will. Free will is the ability within us to make decisions, which determine actions that produce character.
Well, Johnson is correct. We all must make our own choices. We either choose to follow God or follow Satan. Not choosing to follow God is a choice for following Satan.
Making the Connections to Self-Discipline
Oh, man. How do we convince someone that Satan is a liar?
We’ve been looking at defending our beliefs when we are witnessing. That means we have to be secure enough to convince someone to accept our beliefs.
Our questions should still serve us to determine on what we need to focus.
- What does the Scriptures say?
- What do I believe?
- Why do I believe the same/differently than the Scriptures?
- What are the talking points when witnessing to a non-believer?
Related Links
I have created a worksheet of the questions above. Click on the button below to access it.
How Do We Apply This?
Barlow warned that Satan uses pleasures and suddenness to set his traps for us. He explained the pleasures this way. He wrote, “He sets a man’s affections on fire, kindles such a heat within him that for the present the object of temptation seems wonderful fair, delightful, honourable; though when he is ensnared he perceives no such thing, but the direct contrary.”
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We have to counteract the suddenness and the intense desires with being focused on God. That focus comes when we seek God.
Searching for and Seeking God
Hearing His Word (Rom. 10: 17).
Reading His Word (Rev. 1: 3).
Praying to Him (Heb. 4: 16).
Studying His Word (Ac. 17: 11).
Meditating on His Word (Ps. 1: 1-2).
Memorizing His Word (Ps. 119: 11).
We know the steps. Yeah, that doesn’t make it any easier sometimes.
Satan is good at what he does. He makes sin very attractive and promising. We just have to keep our eyes on Jesus.
Father. We do not want to be in bondage to Satan. We want to follow You. Amen.
What do you think?
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