The Mirror of the Word and other works by C.E. White can be purchased on her website, cewhitebooks.com or on Amazon

“Now the serpent was more cunning than any animal of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, ‘Has God really said, “You shall not eat from any tree of the garden”?’”

—Genesis 3:1

Eve had the entire world at her disposal . . . all except one tree. Satan wanted to keep her focused on that one thing God had kept from her; he also confused and exaggerated the difficulty of God’s restriction so it seemed excessive and unreasonable.

The devil still uses these same tactics; he continually draws our attention away from all the wonderful things the Lord gives us so we will focus anywhere God has said no. We start thinking more and more about the things we can’t or don’t have and how God must not love us because he’s keeping those things from us.

Satan wants us to believe we’re not walking in freedom and that the Lord’s rules are unfair.

But only God’s freedom is truly free. It’s like a fence . . . yes, it keeps us from going beyond it, but everything good is within. It exists because everything outside of it will hurt us in the end.

Satan’s “freedom” would have us climbing the fence and running out into traffic. His main goal is to “steal, kill, and destroy” (John 10:10). He wants us injured, wounded, angry, defeated, trapped, bitter, and divided from God.

When Satan tempts us to look at what God has not allowed us, our defense is to turn our eyes back to all the good God does give and remember that anything our loving Father restricts or withholds is because he knows dangers we cannot see; he would protect us from the pain of discovering them the hard way.

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