“[The moment you decide to follow Jesus] the devil will exert himself with a vengeance to use all his wiles and wickedness to prevent this. If he cannot prevent this, he will endeavor to torment and trouble you, and thus keep you from living a holy and joyful life.”
Wilhelmus à Brakel
A third way Satan can tempt us to doubt God’s mercy is by making us think we should be past this season of warfare. He will say that because we’re still in it maybe God is telling us something.
How does he tempt us?
He will say…
Surely if God loved you then He wouldn’t want you to still feel this way.
Maybe God is trying to tell you something.
Maybe you can’t trust what other Christians or pastors have told you about forgiveness.
Surely if you were allowed to rest in forgiveness then God would’ve taken away the feeling of guilt and shame.
You have to listen to your emotions because they tell you what your reality is.
If your feeling shame then you probably have something you need to fix.
God is most likely still mad at you. Why else would you keep thinking about that moment from your past?
Why else do you think you still have those triggers? That must mean that God is trying to get through to you.
Don’t quench the Spirit. You need to review your life and see what you need to fix.
I’d be scared to think what God would do to you if you kept abusing His grace.
You need to analyze your life more to see what God must be telling you.
You need stop resisting this because it’s useless.
What do we do when we believe these lies?
Illogical suspicion that God is out to get you.
Excessive paranoia that you haven’t made things right with God.
Deepening fear that God isn’t done disciplining you.
That there are things you need to go and do before having permission to rest in forgiveness.
See danger signs in everything.
Always think others have a hidden agenda against you.
Inability to connect with others out of mistrust of what they will think about you when they really know you.
Feel like you’re constantly being watched and analyzed.
You think God is always disappointed in you.
You’ve given up and just live however you want because it doesn’t matter anymore.
You are co-dependent on others.
You are addicted to therapy that explains things away rather than looking to the gospel.
Opening your Bible is horrifying.
Prayer seems impossible.
You think the church is not gracious and will probably reject you.
Further symptoms can be…
Restlessness.
Quiet nights with your thoughts are the worst.
Mind is going a million miles per hour.
Not even sure what you should be anxious about.
Feel haunted by your past as if there is something you’re forgetting.
Feel haunted by the fact that God is going to get back at you at some point.
Feels like you always have to look over your shoulder mentally.
Paranoid that someone is bond to ruin things for you and those you love.
Extreme fear of misrepresentation.
Always trying to figure out why your emotions are out of whack.
Perfectionist tendencies.
This results in:
Spiritually, mentally, emotionally fatigued.
Muscles can seem to be always tense.
Constant grinding teeth when you’re in your thoughts.
Racing heartbeat.
Panic attacks.
Carl Trueman: “The Evil One will cite Scriptures to us, which he takes out of context, and inflate the law while reducing Christ in such a way that the former seems to overwhelm the latter. This too leads to despair and is particularly effective at a time when the Christian might also be suffering or afflicted in some way.”
How do we battle?
Stop thinking about hypotheticals and the “what ifs”.
Stop letting your emotions make you think they are telling you the truth. In Untangling Emotions, Groves & Smith: “When guilt is warped, it becomes self-condemnation, arguing that no forgiveness is possible. When shame is warped, it becomes self-loathing.”
Stop believing the lie that God is still out to get you; look at the Cross!
Realize that Satan loves to bring back up the same battles to overwhelm us.
Loves to haunt us with particular sins from the past.
Loves to make us have a general sense of guilt that makes us paranoid for what we’re overlooking.
Press into the infinite love and goodness of God. Your first duty is to know that Chris is enough for you. Horatius Bonar: "God, pointing to the Cross, says, 'That is enough for me;' the sinner responds, and says, 'It is enough for me.'"
We must fix our eyes on Scripture as our reality! Luther: “Therefore, when the emotions of the flesh rage, the only remedy is to take the sword of the Spirit, that is, the Word of salvation, and to fight against them. If we do this, we shall obtain the victory. But if we do not use the Word, there is no counsel or help remaining.”
Quotes and Scripture to help:
Jn. 19:30 “It is finished.”
Jn. 5:24 “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.”
Jn. 6:37 “And whoever comes to me I will never cast out.”
Mt. 11:29 “I am gentle and lowly in heart.”
à Brakel: “[Satan] may also cause [someone’s] conscience to be very sensitive, so that a person perceives himself as offending in everything he does, causing him to go his way in much spiritual anxiety.”
Luther: “A godly man feels sin more than grace, wrath more than favor, judgment more than redemption.”
Horatius Bonar: “It is not by doubting but by believing that we are saved; it is not by doubting but by believing that we overcome.”
Chad Van Dixhoorn: “The forgiveness of sins is the happiness of the Christian.”
Virgil Walker & Darrell Harrison: “So, when a person comes to faith in Christ, not only are their sins forgiven by God but He obliterates them, wipes them out, he erases them, to never again be remembered against them.”