Genesis 3:8-15
And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
The Lord God said to the serpent,
“Because you have done this,
cursed are you above all livestock
and above all beasts of the field;
on your belly you shall go,
and dust you shall eat
all the days of your life.
I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
and you shall bruise his heel.”
Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. Our Old Testament and our New Testament readings have a whole lot to do with Satan. And so we get to talk a little bit about him today. The Old Testament reading is the result of the first confrontation. And Jesus talks about binding him binding the strong man and the defeat of our greatest enemy. But before we dig into that, there is something that I always get questions about. And every time we read it, it's good to just go over just a little bit. It's this thing that Jesus says about the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, right? Because we look at that, and we go, what? An eternal sin. I better not do that. Right? Yeah, I bet when you all heard that, you're like, oh, whoa. So let's make sure we know exactly what that is. If you take a look at the passage, let's look and see what's going on here. The Pharisees are there. And they say, he is possessed by be eligible. And by the prince of demons, He cast out the demons. And so Jesus then goes, and says, Every sin will be forgiven except for, except for the blaspheme against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but as guilty of an eternal sin. And then it says, it explains, for they had said, he has an unclean spirit. Now, if you talk to different people, they will come up with different explanations for the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. But this explanation from the Gospel of Mark is rather clear. It's when you call the Holy Spirit, an evil spirit. And the work that the Holy Spirit does the work of Satan is pretty straightforward, right? Because it says, For they had said, Jesus has an unclean spirit. When the Spirit IN Jesus was not an unclean spirit. The spirit was the Holy Spirit, that question answered. So unless you're walking around, saying Jesus is filled with the devil, which I doubt many of you have done. I think you're okay. Now, on to our main topic for the sermon. So we are looking at the conflict between Jesus and Satan. And it goes all the way back to that first conflict in the Garden of Eden. God is walking in the garden, Adam and Eve have just eaten the forbidden fruit. They have the famous conversation, what have you done? It was her fault. No, it was the snakes fault. And then God turns to the snake, the serpent, and curses him. And then there's the famous passage, the very beginning of the gospel promise, I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring, he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. And ever since then, there has been a conflict, Satan, trying to get humanity to turn away from God and go our own way to follow Him and be lost and condemned. And the great proclamation of the Christian church in this regard, is that Satan has been defeated. And that defeat began with the very first promise all the way back after the very first sin, that God would send someone to crush the head of Satan. And we know exactly who it is. It is Jesus Christ, our Savior. He talks in our gospel reading about someone binding the strong man. And that is what he did. When Jesus came down to bind Satan, the strong man and defeat his power. And he did it by the strangest method, by death on the cross. Doesn't seem like a powerful way to defeat your enemies going and dying. But that's the kind of thing you do when you're the Son of God. Have you enter into the realm of death, and destroy satan forever. But I don't think that's the best thing about this. I think the best thing about Satan's defeat is that he is so fully defeated by Jesus, that Jesus used Satan to defeat himself. Because who would went into Judas to betray Jesus? It was Satan, right? Who was the one who arranged all of these people and all of the hostility against Jesus, our Savior, and caused him to die on the cross of Satan. Which means that Satan is so fully defeated, and under the crow control and power of our God, that Satan beat himself by killing Jesus on a cross. And Jesus was the one who crushed the head of the serpent, by his death, and resurrection, which means that the devil is the great enemy has no real power over us. He cannot snatch us out of our father's hands, he cannot destroy us, he cannot come at us with a full frontal attack and defeat us, because we are protected by our God, who is so in control. So in power, that he used Satan to destroy satan. Which means the only thing Satan has our tricks can't defeat our God. He cannot stop or overpower or snatches away. All he can do is try to confuse us and cause us to turn away of our own. So we ask, what are Satan's tricks? What are the things that he does? To try to get us so that we don't stay in Christ, but turn away? Instead? think the biggest trick, perhaps the most important one is the one he used on Adam and Eve. The great phrase, Did God really say? Right? That's what he said to them. Did God really say that you should not eat of the forbidden fruit? does? God really say? It's a question that brings doubt into our hearts and our minds about God's word. Did God really say that he created the earth in seven days? Is what everybody else says true? Did God really say the babies in the womb? are human beings too? God really say that I should remain true in my marriage, or that I shouldn't live with my boyfriend. Did God really say that I'm forgiven. When the pastor says I forgive your sins. And there's a lot of doubts and questions that Satan likes to put in our mind. And where it starts then is not turning away. And just like Satan adds a question and all of a sudden we leap off into unfaithfulness. But we start to make a Christianity that is molded after our own minds. Where we can say, well, this piece of the word that I can ignore this piece I need to pay attention to. And it seems innocent enough at first. Until, well, once you start going down that road, all you do is start to knock away the different things that you don't like, until you end up with something that is not Christianity at all. Do we make a religion in our own image, or maybe perhaps in Satan's image? That is mostly just filled with doubt. And when it comes down to it, in the end, you will end up saying, Did God really say that I'm a sinner in need of forgiveness and that you Jesus came and died for me.
And then we get lost. And what we need to do is simply cling to the promises of God, and hear His word and react with joy. And say, Yes, Lord, this is what you have spoken. We need to hear the promises, and simply say, I believe, I believe that Jesus came to die for me, I believe He sends His Holy Spirit to us. I believe he has saved me, because I have received his word and Sacraments and heard the promise. And he has called me by his voice. And because he has done that, I hear and believe the rest of his even if it doesn't make sense to me. And I know, there's parts of his word that don't make sense to you, that you might struggle with, you might say, Wow, this is really hard for me. I admit, there are parts like that for me too. But what we do is we say, I know I have doubts. I know there are things that challenge but God is greater than me. Satan's accusations, statements, questions, Did God really say can't pull me away from his word. Because I know that my God loves me. He sent His Son to die for me. I will hear His word and believe, even as I struggle with it. One of the other tricks that Satan likes to play is that he likes to tell us that God isn't in control. He likes to tell us that he is just as powerful as God, maybe even off on his own doing his own thing. The gods stops him most of the time, but he can scroll around it. And of course, we know that's not true. Jesus defeated him, He crushed his head. And we see it every time Jesus runs into an evil spirit in the Gospels. He doesn't have to have a spiritual battle with them. Like in some anime episode. It just says be gone. And they flee. That's how much power he has. But St Mike's to tell us that he's in control. He likes to offer people things. And in places where they believe that there is a spiritual realm, he actually shows up and possesses people or comes in hauntings. You might come in dreams. And we see that, especially in places like Madagascar, where they believe in animism. And even their God has an answer. They still given his church the power to cast out demons when they show up. God's still in control. And if you want to hear more about that there's a fantastic book called I am not afraid. Get the info after this. God is still in control. But I think the last trick and one of the ones who uses most on us is not that. But the accusation. The name Satan means the accuser. And what he does in our hearts and our minds so often is play the prosecuting attorney on our consciences. He drags up every little piece of our life, every little thing that you've always done. And he says, You're not good enough for God to love you. Or even worse, he says, Yeah, God forgives all of those people sitting next to you on Sunday morning. But you could never forgive that sin. You remember that one that you did 10 years ago that you've never told anyone about? And you're so ashamed of it, that you think about it every day. That one? Nope. That's not going to work. We've all got a sin like that. thing that lurks in our past or our consciences that Satan can pick out and pull it until it becomes a scar and starts to bleed. And sometimes we try to defend ourselves by saying, I'm really a good person. If you tell people, they're sinners out in the world, they say, No, no, I'm a good person. Absolutely. That's what they're trying to do is cover it up. Sometimes we try to do that we defend ourselves. But if we go toe to toe with Satan, and all his accusations, for every one defense we have, he'll come up with 10 more. He'll always win that battle. Which is why we don't. Every Sunday, we confess that we are sinners, who deserve nothing but temporal and eternal punishment. Every Sunday, we stand up and say, There's nothing good about me. I need Jesus. And the classic Luther quote, applies well, he says, so when the devil throws your sins in your face, and declares that you deserve death, and hell tell him this, I admit that I deserve death and hell, what have it for i No one who suffered and made satisfaction on my behalf. His name is Jesus Christ, Son of God. And where he is, there is shall be also very simple defense, to Satan's accusations, that you are a sinner, and that no one should love you, and that you deserve nothing but death and judgment. Just to agree with him. Because he's right. That is true. And that's why we needed a Savior Jesus Christ and that's why he came to forgive you to die so that you could live and because he has risen from the dead and ascended in heaven, we too will get eternal life. Not just after death when our souls go to be with him, but bodies to when he returns on the last day. Satan's accusations shouldn't bother us or surprise us. In fact, we know they're all true. Instead, we cling to our Savior, the only one who is good, the one who defeated the serpent himself, by His death on the cross. In Jesus name, Amen. Please stand
Transcribed by https://otter.ai