Good morning and welcome to another week of lock down podcasts. I really hope that during this strange season that you are able to spend time with God each day and that the resources that STC are producing are helping you along the way.

Today I have the pleasure of closing out the first letter from Peter to the churches throughout providences in modern day Turkey. Thanks go to James and Liam for bringing us this far.

REFLECTION:

Today’s passage is 1 Peter 5:8-14. You will hear it in full at the end of this reflection but for now, I am going to focus on v 8-9:

Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

This is one of those passages that often gets quoted… It’s quite famous… not John 3:16 famous, but quite well known. It speaks of roaring lions, the enemy, and the devil…

Peter is in effect saying, “know your enemy, know his tactics, know his end goal”

We have a garden – I mentioned it the last time I was on podcast duty!

Slugs are my enemy, they are small, black and slimy, they slither out in wet weather and they want to eat stuff I am trying to grow…

I know when I need to be particularly vigilant, I know where I might find them and I know exactly what they are after. With this knowledge I am much better prepared to face my gardening nemesis!!

So what about our enemy the devil? Who is he? What are his tactics? And what is his ultimate aim?

So, first up, who is he?

Well the cue is in the name… not so much a name but a description: the devil – the slanderer, the accuser, the one who criticises, the one who condemns… FALSELY.

So what are his tactics?

Put simply, he is a liar! He is the father of lies. He loves darkness and confusion, he delights in miscommunication, half truths, in prejudice and inequality, he is a stirrer of trouble, he will whip up a storm, he will seek to cause a fight where no fight is to be had.

And as a liar and an accuser…

He is the voice in our heads that tells us that we’ve messed up, that we can’t, that we will never amount to anything. The one who reminds us of our faults and our failings, the moments in our past that we are ashamed of, that still cause us shame.

He is our enemy, our adversary in a law court, the one who will present us with the evidence of our lives for us to judge and find ourselves wanting.

And he’s the one who will egg us on when we find fault in others. He wants us to judge, he wants us to condemn, he delights when reject others, writing them off, belittling, ridiculing, slandering and causing hurt and pain. He is the father of racism, of segregation, of inequality and injustice.

And he prowls around like a roaring lion… he is all about getting noticed…

If a roaring lion walked into a crowded room we would notice… now I am not the most observant person on the planet. I can get absorbed in conversations to the extent that I barely notice what else is going on around me… but a lion turning up at a party… even I would spot that…

He’s a roaring lion too… he’s loud, he’s howling, making a scene.

He is going to shout in our ears, dance in our faces, parade our failures and our faults before us. He is not going to let us forget! Not at a party, not when we lie down to sleep in our beds. He’s going to remind us why we don’t trust that person, why they are no good, where they are lacking… he’s in that thought that demands our attention, that just won’t shut up and leave us alone!

And he prowls… he is like a burglar that walks around the whole house, checking doors and windows, looking for a weak point where he can gain access.

And If that is something of who he is and what he does… what is his end goal? What does he want?