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Nothing is more plainly taught in the Scriptures than that men are exposed to Satanic influence. If God "worketh in Christians to will and to do," Satan is the" spirit that worketh in the children of disobedience." If the sanctified are said to be "filled with the Holy Ghost," "why," said Peter to Ananias, "hath Satan filled thy heart?" This is the being, then, whom we are commanded to resist.

1. And, among other reasons for so doing, I will mention, first, this — our ability to do it. We can resist evil. No one is compelled to sin. To each proposition of virtue and vice you finally say "Yes" or "No." Nothing brings out so sharply the personality of man as some act of sin. It brings him out into the foreground as an agent. He has the universe as the witness to his conduct. His decision is his decision, and against God, in whom all which is assailable by vice finds expression. I wish each of you, in whatever you may purpose of evil, to feel this. Upon the edge of this terrible ability to resist God plant yourself, and behold the abyss at your feet.

2. Out of this thought comes also what might be called the hopefulness of morality. The assurance, "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you," is a blessed and needed one. The thought that you can succeed in keeping your hand and heart clean is a constant inspiration to persevere. The contest, as waged by every man and woman against evil, is no longer a heavy, dragging spiritless contest, but a brave and hopeful one. The current we stand in is deep, swift, and hissing; and who of us, at times, is not swayed and staggered by it? But there is no reason why, by care and effort — a careful placing of the feet, and keeping our powers well collected — we cannot make headway against it. We do make headway. The Light that has come into the world, and shined upon so many hearts, is quickening the germinal capacities of man for virtue. The race is slowly but surely forging ahead. The waters behind are white with the freshening breeze; and the purposes of God, like a mighty wind, will put an increasing pressure upon the sails, and blow them grandly along. As a fleet of great merchant-men, impelled by the steady trade winds — their yards like bars of gold, their ropes like lines of ruby — go sailing at morning towards the east and the rising sun; so the race, in all its powers and motives, will be grandly luminous as it moves on into the light of the millennium. To live ignobly is, therefore, to live unworthy of your clearest possibilities. In the waters of this assurance the dirtiest may wash and be cleansed. Only "resist evil," only stand firm, only try, and whatever of good you in your better moments crave will come to you, and abide with you, as the light of the sun to-day comes to the earth, elicting its manifold fruitage, and illuminating it from pole to pole. Yea, your life shall be like a globe belted and zoned with expressions of life; and never shall there be an hour when some portion of it shall not be in flower and fruitfulness.

3. But again: the wisdom of this injunction, "Resist the devil," is seen when you reflect that in resistance, and resistance alone, is safety. Between this and some other course there is no election; you must fight, or die. On some streams you can drift; but, in the rapids which plunge hellward, no man can lie on his back, and float; he must keep in quick nervous action, or sink.

(W. H. H. Murray.)

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KJV: Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

WEB: Be subject therefore to God. But resist the devil, and he will flee from you.