So what happens if temptation arises? What am I to do? Oppose it, withstand it. ‘I am not going to do this. I am not going to allow myself to think like this. I am not allowing this to go any further. I will stop it. Have I the power to stop it? Oh, yes, if I pray. By the help of God, there is no reason why I shouldn’t stop completely this temptation from proceeding any further. I have got to do the resisting but, relying on him, he will give me the strength to see it through and to resist as I ought to do.’ Have you got despondency and doubts – doubts about whether you are a Christian or not? Well, don’t argue with the devil, resist him, shut him out! Express to God your absolute unshakeable faith in him and his goodness to you, and how he has opened your mind and forgiven your sins and shut the devil out.
All over the world Christian people have to suffer the attacks of the devil. Sometimes the devil raises up others, stirs up others to be hostile, persecution. Sometimes direct temptation, sometimes doctrinal attacks upon the teaching of the church.
The word ‘resist’ conceals something precious. The original is ‘stand against’. When you are in combat with Satan and he is tempting you, if there is a human secret – the true secret, of course, is the Holy Spirit – it is to stand. Imagine old time fighting in a war, and there’s a defensive line, and somebody comes to attack the line. Don't leave the defensive line and turn tail and run. Stay where you are; stand firmly and hold your line. If you abandon your defensive line, you will lose advantage of the armour God has provided, which requires you to face your enemy. Likewise, do not step forward from the line to engage in single combat with the devil. When the devil tries to tangle with you, ‘How can you believe that particular doctrine? Here's a difficulty in your faith, here’s a problem’, do you go out and argue with him? He’ll have you twisting this way and that, and tied up in knots all day. You've left your defensive line. Your defensive line is this: ‘God has revealed this in his word. This is the truth.’ In the words of Luther, ‘Here I stand, I can do no other.’
‘Knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren.’ Why doesn’t it simply say ‘are experienced by your brothers and sisters the world over’? Why ‘accomplished'? It is a special word that means God has a purpose in allowing these things. Knowing that all Christians have in them the same trials and temptations fulfilled, because while the devil is trying to bring us down, God has an objective in permitting these things to assail us. He is training us and strengthening our faith.