Luke 1:71 Commentary and Bible Study

We might think that we can occupy some no-man’s land where we are neutral with regard to all other parties, but no one can live without enemies. Either God is our enemy and we try to make the world our friend, or else we turn to God with all our hearts and the world, the flesh, and the devil become our implacable enemies. If God is our enemy then we are without hope, for to have him as our enemy is to face certain and catastrophic defeat. When God defeats his enemies he does so with an unparalleled thoroughness: our God is a consuming fire. He takes away all comfort and all defence, and he parades his enemies as defeated foes in triumphal procession. He strips them of all good, and exposes their utter weakness. He leaves them with no hope of recovery. And yet we come into the world with rebellious hearts that refuse to accept God’s rule over us; he is our enemy from the start. When we survey our hopeless situation, we do not lay down our arms, but we harden our hearts and refuse to surrender. We clutch hold of the vain idea that we can prevail against him. But in this verse the enemies that Zacharias speaks of are not the enemies of the natural man in heaven, but those enemies which are trying to bar our way to heaven, and deprive us of salvation. Even while we think the world is our friend, it is working to destroy us. It is in fact our greatest source of danger. These are the true enemies of the soul. They start to operate from the moment we are born, for they strive with all their might to turn us away from God and prevent us responding to the gospel. They do this in a cunning way. They do not disturb us too much as long as we remain loyal to the world. Why should Satan trouble us when his goods are in peace? But the moment he notices our interest in the gospel beginning to be aroused, he ups his tempo, and begins a desperate struggle. Even when he has lost control of us, and we now belong to Christ, he does not give up, but practices all the strategies that he has tried to perfect over the long centuries. He is intent on our eternal destruction, even though he knows that it is God’s hand that will act against us. On the physical level Israel faced many enemies in the surrounding nations. They hated God’s people for their implicit condemnation of their idolatry, for their occupation of the land, and because Satan stirred up that hatred. But the spiritual enemies of the church have no less hatred. They are vicious and underhand in their tactics, and they are set on the elimination of the saints. Satan is out to destroy us either by feigning friendship with us as those who belong to him, or by militant opposition to us once we turn to the Lord. But they are unable to do it, for God has determined ‘that we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us.’