Bible For Foreigners

Satan's Way Is Selfishness

Man yields to the devil by going his own selfish way. Satan’s

nature is characterized by exhalting “self” through fleshly will

power. This is exactly what “humanism” is. Man seeks to be independent

of the power of God. Thus the sins of pride, lust, greed,

covetousness, and all other “self ” interests are part of Satan’s nature.

The nature of God is love. Love is characterized by giving

all.

(John 3:16, For God so loved the world, that he gave his

only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should

not perish, but have everlasting life.)

We are taught in the Scriptures to “deny self.” This means

we are to disown, or refuse to acknowledge our “self will power,”

which seeks only for “self.” We are to give all of our being to God

and love Him with all of our heart, mind, body, strength, and soul.

The degree to which we worship or serve “self” reflects the degree

to which we are yielding to the spirit of Satan. He is a deceiver

and epitomizes self-seeking.

Let us look at another aspect of his work as deceiver. After

we have come to the Lord and committed our lives totally to

God, we no longer wish to displease Him, so we flee from the

obvious works of darkness. The devil then ceases to come to us

with the usual temptations because we have learned to resist and

not yield to him in those areas. 

He must now come in another way

to get us to believe that what he proposes is God’s will for us;

otherwise we would rebuke him. He comes imitating the Holy

Spirit, attempting to make us receive his plan instead of God’s

plan for our lives.