Sermon Tone Analysis

! Introduction

      I've always been puzzled by the warning signs that you see on the highway just outside of Calgary which say "wind gusts."

I mean, what is the point of telling you that?

Are you supposed to sit heavier so your vehicle doesn't blow away?

I know, it probably means that you are supposed to hold your steering wheel tighter.

My favorite warning sign is at the end of the street where my mother lives in Arizona.

The sign says, "duck crossing."

The sign is no joke because we have seen ducks, geese and coots cross the road in orderly fashion quite often.

I am thankful that the highways department warns us about upcoming dangers.

Yield signs, stop signs, men working signs, curve ahead signs all help us know of potential dangers that we can avoid if we observe them.

The problem is that sometimes we don't heed them.

The other day Carla and I were driving along the highway and we came up to a sign that said "bump."

I had driven past a number of these signs and nothing happened so I thought they must be meant for someone else.

Well this particular sign wasn't meant for anyone else, it was meant for me and I was sorry that I hadn't slowed down.

God has given us warning signs about the spiritual dangers which we encounter in life.

Ephesians 6:12 says, "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."

This tells us that we are in a battle and that the battle is against a powerful spiritual enemy.

Behind every human attack, is the work of the devil trying to gain a victory.

It is a spiritual battle for our souls.

If we do not remain actively aware that we are in spiritual peril, we will find ourselves yielding to temptation, we will yield to doubts, we will do things that do not please God, we will harm ourselves and others.

How can we have victory over the spiritual dangers which face us regularly?

! I.                   Victory Through Awareness

      I was walking along one winter day, minding my own business, when all of a sudden "whack" I got hit on the side of the head with a snowball.

I was stunned for a moment.

The suddeness of the attack surprised me and for a moment, I didn't know what hit me or where it came from.

If I had known it was coming, I would have been prepared and it probably wouldn't have hit me.

But how do we prepare for surprise attacks?

I get a kick out of the Pink Panther movies.

Inspector Clouseau has a servant whose task it is to attack him at any time in any place.

I suppose this is a way for him to learn to be prepared at all times.

In the battle we are in, we too need to have readiness training and the Bible provides us with it.

Paul says in II Cor.

2:10 that we are not unaware of his schemes.

God has warned us about the ways in which Satan operates and so the first line of defense is as Peter says in I Peter 5:8, "Be self-controlled and alert."

We must live in "unrelaxed self control and alertness."

Satan is described as a lion prowling around looking for someone to devour.

On the Serengeti plain, the lion wakes up every morning with fresh antelope on his mind and the antelope who does not keep alert to this fact will become lunch.

We must be alert to the presence of Satan and also to the tricks that he uses to deceive us and draw us into spiritual danger.

As we are aware, we will be able as Ephesians 4:27 says to "not give the devil a foothold."

!! A.                 Of Our Deceptive Hearts

      One of Satan's primary tricks is to deceive us by our own desires.

Look at James 1:14, 15.

There we read, "but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed..."

      When we used to go camping at the lake, some people who were camping there would go snorkling and had devised a snare for catching fish.

They had a wire loop on a stick and they caught fish like that.

If the game warden would have caught them, they would have been in trouble because a fish is supposed to be caught by presenting it with bait or a lure and the fishes own desires entice him to take the bait and he is caught.

That is exactly what Satan does to us.

He does not have a wire snare to grab us in such a way that we do not have a choice about it.

He lays out the bait and our own desires get us into the trap.

Moffat writes about,  "...the imagination toying with a forbidden idea, and then issuing in a decision of the will."

The Bible has examples of this trick of Satan.

In Acts 5 it describes what happened to Ananias and Sapphira.

"Peter said, "Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land?"

Satan put the bait of looking good in front of others and Ananias bit on it and died.

In I Timothy 6:9 it talks about "People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction."

The desires of those who want to get rich cause them to yield to Satan's bait and to fall.

For such people, their "moral sense becomes blurred as a result of their overmastering passion."

!! B.                 Of Hardships

      Another trick that Satan uses is hardship.

Hardship in itself is not evil and it may in fact be part of what God brings us through to teach us.

But it can also be an occasion of stumbling if we become bitter or if we give up on God because of it.

For example, in Revelation 2:10 it describes how the "devil put some in prison to test them."

The hardship of a prison term was a trick of the devil.

In II Corinthians 12:7, Paul talks about his "thorn in the flesh” as a messenger of Satan.

This trick of Satan is sometimes intensified when we get older.

Physical infirmities increase and hardships seem to multiply and Satan uses these things to try to trap us.

As trials come, we need to remember the warning sign of God that we not allow this to be an occasion for stumbling.

!! C.                 Of Peer Pressure

      Another source of spiritual danger that we need to be aware of is other people.

The source of temptations can sometimes catch us off guard.

When Jesus described his mission to his disciples, they were astonished that he speak about dying.

Peter told Jesus that this could never be and Jesus replied in Matthew 16:23, "Get behind me, Satan!

You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men." "Peter's words caused Jesus to hear again the words of the tempter in the wilderness."

Those close to us are most often our best advisors.

We need them and need to listen to them.

In the case of Peter, however, his words sought to draw Jesus away from what God had called Him to do.

If we know God's will and even those close to us draw us away from God's will, then they become the voice of temptation.

Awareness of this possiblity is the first step in avoiding it.

!! D.                Of Satan's Lies

      Satan is a liar and the father of lies and he will use lies to lead us astray.

Somteimes his lies are very deceptive.

II Corinthians 11:14 tells us that Satan marquerades as an angel of light.

Sometimes the truth will seem to be present because it will be so well disguised.

This is what happened to Eve in the garden.

II Corinthians 11:3 talks about it and says that "...Eve was deceived by the serpent's cunning,..." Paul goes on to describe his fears for the Corinthians that "your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ."

When Jesus was tempted in the wilderness, Satan even used Scripture and twisted it and misapplied it in order to try to deceive Jesus.

Many passages that warn us about overcoming spiritual dangers speak about false teachers who speak what looks like the truth.

Satan will use these to deceive people and lead them astray.

II Thessalonians 2:9 even says that there is a time when Satan will use counterfeit miracles to deceive.

He is a liar and a deceiver and we need to be aware that he uses even the instruments of light in order to deceive.

As we are aware of the tricks of Satan, they need not blindside us.

The fist line of defence is to be alert and in our awareness, resist the devil.

But can we do it?

! II.

Victory Through God's Power

      We were driving home from The Pas one day in winter.

At one point, as I looked down the highway, I saw in the distance that a deer was standing in the middle of the road.

He was far enough away that I could easily stop and so I began applying the brakes.

Suddenly I became aware of something I had not known.

The road was icy.