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Problems with the Devil?*

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Who doesn’t have? Even before puberty, many children do bad things, from little mischievous ones perhaps tainted with malicious intent to pranks and misdeeds of an immoral, cruel, or even criminal nature. Imitating their progenitors, friends, or characters they admire.

It is well known that Problems with the Devil (Wrong, Evil, the Dark Side) usually increase in number and intensity during the stage of puberty, and, afterward, even more!

Now then, it is one thing to have Problems with the Devil. But a very different one to happily scheme with him, delighting in evil to the fullest, swelling up like a huge balloon, gorged on sinister, even depraved delights and passions. Worse still, to make a “Contract with the Devil,” selling him your body, mind, conscience, heart, soul, and spirit in exchange for his offers.

If you have accepted some kind of kinship with him, as in the phrase “child of the Devil” -hope you have not- proud to have him as a companion, a soulmate, boasting of your intimate relationship with him, then you expose yourself to sharing the consequences, present, future, and eternal, determined for him. The following would be scheduled for you:

Inevitable dangerous conflicts. Particularly, with people of more or less the same mentality and conduct as your own. Frequent aggressive, offensive, violent exchanges, fights, and shedding of blood, yours and/or that of your opponents. Sirens, police, ambulances, courts, judges, judgments, prison, and even the death sentence.

Severe, even fatal diseases and conditions, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. As a result of negative, nihilistic, hateful, pugilistic mindsets, vices, and destructive self-abuse. To name a few: the debilitating, deadly impact of drug addictions and sexual diseases; premature kidney, liver, digestive, and pulmonary system failures; dangerous mental and emotional disorders due to obsessions with pornography and corrosive social media from the Dark Side.

Ruined social, family, and sexual relationships.

Extremely high-stress levels, by day and even more in the evening and at night. The anguished afflictions of an agitated mind full of dark clouds, stormy winds, jagged lightning, and startling thunder; of real fears, and conjured-up ones just as bad or worse; of terrifying dreams and visions; of wispy effluviums of frightful, disjointed fantasies, bone-chilling nightmares, and shocking premonitions of being crazy or somewhat so.

All leading to a premature DEATH brought about by so many evils and excesses.

That is, an inferno of your own creation here on earth, and awaiting you, if you do not straighten up in time, a worse one over there after your physical death!

Blame and curse God? How would you dare? Even though you live in the most infamous barrio, sunk in the deepest darkness, surrounded by humans like fierce beasts, in your heart you know that outside your evil, chaotic, stormy, threatening world there shines a liberating, saving LIGHT. Is that not true?

Don’t like the snapshot of your life as it presently really is? Fortunately, you still have the marvelous option of CHANGING IT!

Is it possible it would take something like a knife thrust into to your live flesh, a bullet smashing one of your bones, a lightning strike from heaven, a terrifically traumatic family tragedy, or a catastrophic illness to move you to change?

Problems with the all-powerful Creator God are what you will have if you do not initiate transforming sea changes to the state of your mind, heart, will, and spirit that result in positive changes in your actions. Astronomically more serious than your problems with the pusillanimous Devil already sentenced by him to eternal HELL! God wants no problems with you; only to save you, loving your soul.

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Thoughts, some good, some bad, others undefined, confused. All, to differing degrees. Each person decides which he will retain and implement.

Precious soul, that life-changing transformation begins in the Heart-Mind Territory, with your THOUGHTS. Combating the Evil. Substituting the Good. A laudatory accomplishment only strong-willed people with disciplined self-control can fully implement, driven by the imperious desire to wisely exercise the power conferred on us humans, as an innate right, to determine the type of person we desire to be.

Do you desire to be BAD? That’s easy: Just let the BAD THOUGHTS in and make them your own, acting on them. Do you desire to be GOOD? Not so hard: Just open the Door of your Heart-Mind to GOOD THOUGHTS and make them your own, acting in accordance with them.

Well then, in truth, maybe the latter option is not so simple and easy, and that is due to the great, complicated conflict between the forces of Good and Evil we humans experience in two dimensions, to wit: The material-carnal-temporal and, on the other side, the mental-spiritual-eternal.

Because of this unavoidable conflict, we have both good
and bad thoughts every day in normal life on this planet
Earth. But here is the key to the victory of the good: The CHOICE is yours, as it is also mine, and that of every responsible human being!

The Devil cannot force me to internalize evil thoughts and act them out in my daily life. Nor does God himself obligate me to choose good thoughts over the bad and live every day according to them. I am an autonomous being. That is, free will is an innate power vouchsafed to me. To you also. Since that is a reality of our being and existence, let us valiantly accept the very personal responsibility of deciding personally and wisely between the Good thoughts and the Bad. Which of them will dominate our lives and determine our actions is the crucial decision of each and every human being, no matter the circumstances into which he/she has been born or finds him/herself in.

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Do “good people” have bad thoughts? Absolutely! Even the most passive and holy have them. Preachers, yes, and evangelists, bishops, and Bible teachers. Indeed, all Christians have them, from the least to the most mature. Even religious hermits have some if not many! And especially priests obligated to be celibate.

Dear friend, if you have allowed bad thoughts to govern your life and don´t like the results, you can make a 180 degree turn by repudiating them, the Devil, and all evil. Verbally,

publicly, and by your actions. Flee from corrupt environments, renounce dishonest, sinful jobs, break with acquaintances who love the world of darkness and refuse to leave it.

Much more than that, you can dethrone dangerous pride, humble yourself, truly repent of all evil in your life, put your faith in God and Christ who love you, confess them publicly, and be baptized for the forgiveness of your sins, that they may be totally washed away, fully embracing all that is good, right, honest, just, pure, virtuous, holy, and praiseworthy. Acts 2:37-47; 22:16; Romans 6:3-7; 1 Corinthians 6:9-11; Philippians 4:6-8

To be sure, you would need to take these steps as soon as you can if you sincerely want to free yourself from evil and its consequences both present and eternal. “Without delay,” as did the Philippian jailor and his family. Acts 16:25-40. You will thus become filled with the glorious LIGHT that perhaps you once saw only distantly, tenuously, beyond the dark curtain of evil.

However, you may count it as certain that these actions, so wise and necessary for the salvation of your soul-spirit, do not put an end to BAD THOUGHTS, synonymous with temptations, for these will continue to enter your mind even to the moment of your physical death. The purpose being to prove the quality and constancy of your faith, once you have embraced faith. 1 Pedro 1:6-9; 4:12-16. Kindly and lovingly, we tell you this, not to discourage but to alert you ahead of time, so that you may understand what is happening to you, why it is, and prepare for it, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, not being fearfully alarmed, maybe somewhat desperate, even thinking something could be seriously wrong with your mind and heart.

Please consider carefully: Strong temptations, expressed by the Devil as bad thoughts, entered the mind-spirit of Jesus Christ himself, precisely, just after he was baptized. Now, take note that, when Jesus forcefully rebuffed the Devil, he “departed from him” but “only for a season.” Lucas 4:1-13. The apostle Peter was also sifted as “wheat” by Satan. Lucas 22:31. And the war against bad, negative thoughts the apostle Paul often had sometimes became truly anguishing and Olympic. Romans 7:7-21.

Are you, am I, greater than these illustrious followers of God? Did they have Problems with the Devil (Evil)? Absolutely! Very serious ones. But they triumphed marvelously, leaving him prostrate on the hard ground of inglorious defeat, by quickly making use of the powerful, spiritual weapons provided by God to refute all diabolical arguments and persuasions, even the “casting down” of evil “strongholds” and “imaginations,” “bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.” 2 Corinthians 10:3-6

“Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the Devil.” Ephesians 6:10-20. Vital, absolutely necessary actions for a decisive victory over the Devil and bad thoughts. You assure yourself of an everlasting triumph by making your very own and using the six pieces of spiritual armor which compose this “whole armor of God.”

"Resist the Devil and he will flee from you.” James 4:6-10. Do not embrace bad thoughts. Do not say: “I have bad thoughts,” if you have not made them yours. Rather say: “They occur to me…  pass through my mind, but I reject them outright, as many times as they materialize.” RESIST EVILS, the Bad, with authority, severity, and finality, for if you do not, your downfall will be imminent. Categorically affirm that you cannot curse, lie, steal, commit adultery, or kill, “because God’s seed [Word] abides” in you and you “CANNOT SIN” because you have been “born of God.” 1 John 3:8-10. No debating it! Walk, then, with your head high, with dignity, supremely confident that your “Problems with the Devil” will soon cease forever!

* NOTE “…with the Devil” means, essentially, “with Evil, the bad,” in all its manifestations, through all the mediums used for its promulgation, including human beings. With an emphasis in this study on bad thoughts. Without implying a visible presence of the Devil himself as such, for he is a spiritual being which the physical eye does not see.

Text and Document Composition by the author Homer Dewayne Shappley. All rights reserved. The only restrictions on the use of this document are the sale of it in any format and proper identification of its origin.

hshappley@yahoo.com 

Category. Light for the Mind and Spirit.

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