The devil doesn’t sabotage your life with a lie. He attacks with a twisted truth. But God wants to set you free today with HIS truth.
I want to show you today an illustration
from the life of Jesus and I want to
show you how sometimes the enemy doesn’t
sabotage your life with a lie he tells
you a truth and he twists it just enough
and I believe that the Lord desires to
set us free today but only by the truth
can we be set free
you know Jesus knew the truth because He was the truth
He knew the Word of God because He was the Word of God and when the enemy came
to Jesus in Matthew chapter 4 in the
wilderness to tempt him he made the
crucial mistake with the Son of God of
debating the Word of God and it’s a bad
idea to debate the Word of God with the
Word of God John chapter 1 says in the
beginning was the word in the Word was
with God and the Word was God he’s not
arguing with someone who knows about the
Word of God he is arguing with the
embodiment of the Word of God and it
gives us a pure picture of the principle
that is illustrated in Romans 1:25 but
only in reverse in Matthew chapter 4
verse 1 our perspective is immediately
challenged because it says that Jesus
was led by the spirit into the
wilderness to be tempted by the devil
and that is a strange construct that
Jesus was led by God to be tempted by
the devil if you’ve been told that God
won’t lead you into difficult situations
you’ve been lied to if you’ve ever been
told or it’s ever been implied or
inferred that the will of God will
always lead to the path of least
resistance you’ve been lied to if you’ve
ever been told that the proof of the
favor of God on your life is that
situation’s become less difficult and
and more agreeable you’ve been lied to
because Jesus before his ministry was
fully announced was led into the
wilderness to be tempted by the devil
and yet I want us to see that this uh
this passage is as much about trust as
it is about temptation
now let me say this real quickly it’s
not the truth that you can quote it’s
not the truth that you know mentally but
it is the truth that you do that guides
your life to its ultimate outcome I will
never forget watching y’all when I was a
kid with the Jane Fonda workout DVDs
eating a bowl of ice cream
watching the Jane Fonda workout DVDs and
when I asked why aren’t you doing the
DVDs I’m only like eight years old and
my mom and dad are eating Breyers
watching Jane Fonda they said well we’ve
got to know what to do before we can do
it but sometimes if you would do what
you knew my mic isn’t working after fasting forty days and forty nights he was
hungry I nominate this for most obvious
verse in the Bible the tempter came to
him at his weakest moment the tempter
came to him in the area of his appetite
the tempter came to him at a place of
great vulnerability and said if you are
the son of God tell these stones to
become bread
and how many times in my life have I
been tempted in this exact way it’s a
good thing Jesus knew the truth it’s a
good thing Jesus had just been baptized
by John in the Jordan River it’s just
it’s a good thing that Jesus had just
heard his father say this is my beloved
Son in whom I am well pleased it’s a
good thing he had just been told the
truth because when you just encountered
truth when when you know who you are
when when you have a full understanding
of who you are in God’s eyes you don’t
have to prove it in anybody else’s
how many times have I been susceptible
to the temptation to prove who I am by
what I do but when you know that who you are is not dependent on what you do your
value is not assessed by others then you
don’t have to post stuff to prove stuff
I’m gonna set somebody free today you
don’t have to post stuff to prove stuff
when you know the truth about it Jesus
answered it is written man shall not
live on bread alone but on every word
that comes from the mouth of God
one of the hardest years of my life was
2013 my dad was dying our church was
under heavy criticism in the media and I
was going through so many things at once
I felt like rocky when he said I don’t
know which one to hit I see three of
them out there and they said hit the one
in the middle and there were so many
things going on around me I didn’t know
what to do but it was really comforting
to me that the things I had preached to
you I was able to live off of for me the
proof that something is true in your
life is not that you can understand it
or say Amen to it but that you can live
on it that you can live on it sometimes
we’re too impressed with cliches and
sometimes we think something is true
just because it rhymes you know I found
out in preaching sometimes you can make
something rhyme and it can be it can
be totally totally opposite you know you
can make something start with the same
letter curiosity killed the cat hmm
that’s good meow amen actually the original saying
wasn’t curiosity killed the cat it was
care killed the cat and it was used to
mean that they they fed the cat too much
and he died because he was too fat they
cared too much and then they changed it
from care meaning they overfed him to
care he was too worried so now it means
that worried killed the cat but then one
day it just became curiosity killed the
cat now there are no statistical
evidences of
dead felines based on inquisitive
nature’s but it just sounds good and
some stuff sounds good but it ain’t true
just because it sounds good doesn’t mean
it is just because it rhymes just just
because it is aligned with your life
experience up to this point doesn’t make
it true just because it’s the way it’s
always been for you and your mom and it
doesn’t make it true and so then we get
really bad advice and and we say really
bad things that that that sound good on
the surface but beneath them they
they’re really bad belief systems I
thought about calling this message
what’s your BS for belief system what’s
your belief system and I wanted to call
it that because that’s what’s driving
your life they they say they say live
your truth I I heard that before
live your truth that’s the important
thing just live your truth and it sounds
good
but what if my truth is a trap
what if your truth isn’t the truth do
you have to stay stuck in a story and
call it the truth let me go back to
Matthew 4 Jesus said it is written man
shall not live on bread alone but on
every word that comes from the mouth of
God so then the devil he does something that
I was I was very interested to study
this out and if I preached on this
passage ten times before I apologize to
the other ten that I never pointed this
out because I never saw it we always
assume that the enemy comes to us with
lies and then we quote the Word of God
which is the truth and then the lies go
away okay fine whatever but many of us
love God too much to just believe a lie
if we see it as a lie and so then what
the enemy does is he presents you not
with a lie but with the truth the next
thing the enemy does to Jesus remember
he’s hungry he’s in a weakened physical
state he’s he’s on the verge of three
years of ministry that will shake the
world and overturn the Roman Empire he’s
in he’s in a period of preparation he
knows who he is he not only knows truth
but he is truth and so the enemy knows
that the only way that he can fight
truth is with truth and I promise you
I’m not just trying to be confusing a
lot of times what the enemy will attack
you with is a truth a truth
and in this particular instance the
devil took him to the holy city verse 5
and had him stand on the highest point
of the temple if you are the son of God
throw yourself down for it is written
the enemy doesn’t attack Jesus with a
lie he attacks him with a Bible verse he
quotes to Jesus Psalm 91 verse 11 and 12
he quotes the Word of God to the Word of
God for it is written he will command
his angels concerning you and they will
lift you up in their hands so that you
will not strike your foot against a
stone that’s true that’s actually true
this is not made-up this is not
imaginary it is it is it is the Word of
God it is the truth so here’s what I’m
realizing in my life a lot of times I’m
not deciding between a lie and the truth
a lot of times I’m stuck between two
truths one is the truth of my situation
and one is the truth of my revelation
I told you Holly this was gonna be the
best one what is the truth of what I’m
going through and the other is the truth
of who’s standing with me in the fire as
I go through it so I’ve got two truths
I’ve got two truths and what Jesus said
was was so powerful when the enemy tried
to get him to turn the stones into bread
he said it is written because he knew
the temptation to turn something into
something that it’s not a lot of times
we try to do this with relationships we
try to turn them into something that
they’re not we turn people into our God
and and we need their approval more than
we need God’s approval and then when
they disappoint us we lose our hope
because we tried to turn stones into
bread you know some of us try to turn
money into security but your trust was
never supposed to be in resources your
trust was supposed to be in the one your
help comes from the source you were
supposed to lift your eyes to him your
trust was never supposed to be in the
stuff the trust was supposed to be in
the source but when you don’t know the
truth of who you are you will try to
turn stones into bread and you will try
to live off of people’s compliments and
then so you die by their criticism
because you tried to turn it into what
it was not and you trade the truth for a
lie and you trade the truth of God’s
God’s assessment of you for someone
else’s opinion of you serving created
things rather than the Creator who is
forever blessed amen hey thank you for
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