(Clip) A Target of Satan's Envy

I've got a word for those that are going through difficult times, mentally, spiritually, physically, and maybe all three at one time. Now, we are living in very stressful times, and we are living in times when conditions are put upon us that overwhelm us, and we can't understand. Now, I thank God for all of you, but you see, if you're going to seek God with all your heart, if you set your mind to follow Him with no reservation, you've truly set your mind to follow the Lord and obey His Word, you have a hunger and thirst after Him, you're going to immediately and continuously be a target of the envy of the devil himself. You will become the enemy or rather the envy of Satan. Many books have been written about why Christians suffer, especially the godly Christians. Everybody knows how they live, everybody knows that there's something about them, they've been seeking God, and yet it's difficult to understand. Many books, my library is filled with books and bookstores on trying to explain the suffering of the godly. I've not been able to get much help from any of them, because you see, we can read them all, we can hear tapes, we get message after message, but when it comes to bring it down to our own level, to our problem, we find it difficult to apply these truths to our own heart. And we go through things that even though we've been taught and we heard so many sermons, yet something just is not applicable to our situation certain times. It does not seem to affect us. Can you understand why the devil is so stirred by that minority who set themselves apart, begin to pray and say, God, I want to be a seeker, I want to be an intercessor, I want to hear your voice, I want to be intimate with you, and I want to give myself more and more to you. I see the world is going, I see the wickedness, I see the times, and I don't want to go that way. And some of you here are fasting and praying like you've never fasted and prayed before. And I believe you're walking closer to the Lord than you've ever walked before. But if that be the case, I'm telling you that you have stirred the very bowels of hell itself, and Satan will come against you with everything within his arsenal of weaponry. He will come against your mind. He will flood into your heart as you have never experienced before. Paul received this revelation that I just went over with you here in 2 Corinthians. He's in the third heaven. And this man is a praying man. Here's a man who fasts and prays. Here's a man who was the devil's prize. What a prize this man was when he was taking Christians out of various cities and towns and taking them to Jerusalem and trying them and throwing them in jail and persecuting and tormenting believers. Here was a man who really sought God, trained in the word of the Lord. Here was a man who was very zealous, an honest man doing the devil's work. And the devil was there. No question he was there that day when he fell off his horse. And Jesus Christ revealed himself in a blinding light. And can you imagine how hell was shaken when these words were uttered by this servant of Satan? Lord, what would you have me to do? And I can see, I can conceive in my mind a conference in hell with all the principalities and powers of darkness and say something has to be done immediately. He's on his knees now in the city and he's fasting and praying for three days. And he's getting a revelation of Christ like few men have ever had. And Satan determines we have got to send a messenger. And I know that someone was chosen out of hell who was to stay with, who would, Saul would become the apostle Paul. And he was sent on an assignment. You go after him. Now, the Lord would never unleash, would never send a messenger of hell, a messenger of Satan on his own servant. But like Job, sometimes he lets down the wall. There's a reason. And he let down the wall and he allowed Satan to send a messenger who was assigned lifetime, the ball lifetime to buffet him physically, spiritually, mentally. This was physical pain. They claim there are 10 different reasons theologians give for the disease of Paul or the buffeting of Paul from eye problems and all of that. I can't conceive was just like that because they could come at one time and do it. I believe this is a daily bombardment of his mind, reminding him every day, this shirt had to be a part of it, reminding him of every Christian bringing to his face, every past torture, every past thing he did against the name of Jesus Christ, just like he does with you. He does with me, tries to bring thoughts about past failures, past things that are in your life. And the devil would like you to think they're not under the Jesus Christ, that you are still. He will bring thoughts into your mind and try to tell you you're as evil as the thoughts he's planting in your mind to rob you of your faith. This messenger of Satan, you see, Satan's eye was blinded with envy because she Paul is getting everything he lost. Satan could not conceive of a man of lesser being. You see, we're made a little lower than the angels. He could not conceive a lower being lower than the angelic person that he was going into the paradise that he lost. And folks, that's exactly what happens, exactly why he comes after you, because you're coming into the paradise of a clear conscience. You're coming into a paradise of peace and fellowship and intimacy with Christ. And that's the thing that makes the devil envious. That's something he lost and he finds rest, finds a measure of rest, or at least he finds something that gives him pleasure in robbing you of your rest because he lost his. You have nothing to fear. You don't have to believe the lies of the devil. And you should take great peace and comfort in knowing that majority of your suffering, the greatest source of your suffering and your pain is because you set your heart to seek God. So just hold steady and believe, keep praying, keep fasting, stay in the word of God. The enemy cannot hurt you. I'll tell you something, this thrills me. The devil trembles. That's what the Bible says. The devil trembles. And this church has made the devil just tremble and all the imps of hell. We are not afraid. We don't rail against the devil, but we do not fear. You resist him now. Lord, we resist the devil and all the principalities and powers of hell by faith in the finished work of Christ. Devil be gone. You are bound by the word. We don't have to bound you because you've been bound by the word of God. You have to obey the word. You have to obey the word of the living God. Hallelujah. Lord, bring joy, bring victory to the saints of God in this house.