at odds with evil

We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.

1 John 5:19

Is there any more powerful description of the status of the Christian in the world than this simple observation from the apostle John? Christians have been born of God, remade as His agents of glory. We live in a world of evil. Simply put: Christians represent a holy God in a world owned by Satan and his forces. We are at odds with evil. We are opposed by evil. We are God’s people living in a society that is gripped by the devil who seeks to steal, kill, and destroy all that is good.

We have escaped the devil’s grasp. His long, crooked claws cannot hold us any longer. He knows this and is wickedly frustrated by it. So he will keep squeezing the rest of our world around us, and certainly makes life as hard as he can for us. The evil should therefore not surprise us. We aren’t controlling the world and never will. It’s Satan’s playground! Instead, this situation should burden us. We are the holy rebels fighting Satan’s evil empire! We should be alarmed. We should stay alert. God calls us to wear the full armor of God and compels us to bear the light of the gospel in one hand and the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God in the other. Our mission: bring the light of the gospel into the darkest recesses of the devil’s den where we pray that Christ might charge forward and rescue many others from the power of the evil one. We are from God, used by God, for God, to bring Christ into this dark, broken, evil world.

Lord,

The devil has no grip on my life! He is impotent against You and Your Spirit! I am Yours. I pray that I can be useful to bear Your truth in a satanically saturated world that hates You. I do not lie in the power of this evil. I fear no evil because You are with me. But I take seriously this reality. I am from God in Christ. My world is in the grip of a murderous evil. Keep me thinking rescue thoughts! I am grateful for my own rescue by Christ. I am compelled to serve You as You rescue others as You live in me.

Amen