Phil Beach Jr. emphasizes the need for vigilance against the tactics of the enemy, particularly pride and arrogance, which can create a foothold for the devil in our lives. He calls for a heart surgery through the Holy Spirit to reveal and address any unconfessed sins or negative attitudes that hinder our relationship with God and others. The sermon highlights the importance of humility and the necessity of prayer in overcoming the adversary's schemes, urging believers to recognize that their true battle is not against each other but against spiritual forces. Beach encourages the congregation to be proactive in guarding their hearts and to seek God's grace to foster unity and love within their families and communities.

For the Holy Spirit, who is faithful to reveal to us the heart of God, is faithful to show us the beauty of Jesus Christ. We pray, Lord, that you will give us the capacity to hear today. We are in need of hearing, Lord, and therefore, Lord, it is so necessary that you reveal any pride in our heart and in our mind, any arrogant attitudes that maybe we have harbored during the week and we haven't dealt with. Lord, we know that you resist the proud. We know, Lord, that your face is against the proud in heart, but your grace and your face is toward those who are broken, who are humble, and who realize that they are in utter dependence upon you. And so we pray for the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit to do heart surgery today. We're in need of heart surgery today, Lord. Heart surgery to go into the depths of our being and to discover any unconfessed arrogance and pride, harsh words that we have spoken to our loved ones, critical words that we have spoken and then unwilling to admit it because we're too proud. We've gotten too strong. We beg you today, Lord, to use your word together with the precious Holy Spirit and do heart surgery in us today, Lord, so that we can receive thy brokenness and thy peace and that we can continue on this great journey, Lord, that you've called us to through your Son, Jesus Christ. And we look to you, Father, to accomplish these things in Jesus' name. Amen and amen. 1 Peter, I hope that everyone brought your Bibles today, or if not, then please listen carefully because God has a word for our hearts today, okay? But it may be hard to hear if we don't look to the Lord for grace and humility so that we can receive. As you're turning to 1 Peter, I would like to make mention of something. A number of years ago, and my friend Tim will be able to relate to this, I attended Police Academy. Tim is a former New Jersey State Trooper. One of the, among many things that we were taught in Police Academy is we were basically taught about our enemy or the criminal. As a law enforcement officer, your goal is to enforce the law, and so you're taught about the enemy, the criminal. You're taught about his profile, what he's like, what he'll do. In certain situations, and it's drilled into you to recognize this so that you are not taken by surprise and that you're taught how to conduct yourself in a manner where you're constantly on guard, constantly on guard. Even to this day, when Colette and I and the family go into restaurants, I have to sit with my wall to the back, my back to the wall. It's just a habit. I find myself oftentimes just looking around all the time like this. It's something that's drilled into you because you're taught you have to always be alert. You have to always be watching. Well, just like there is an enemy that a law enforcement officer has to learn about and become acquainted with his mannerisms and what he'll do in certain situations, likewise, brothers and sisters, as a follower of Jesus Christ, as Christians, as those who have been given the gift of life and grace, there is an enemy, there is an adversary who is intending to destroy you and I. He's after you. And we're going to look, by the help of God's grace today, at some of his tactics. 1 Peter 5, beginning in verse number 5, Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder, or those older, those older. Yea, all of you be subject one to another and be clothed with humility, for God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble. Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time. Verse 8, Be sober, sober-minded, sober in thought, be vigilant, be on guard, be on guard. I can remember a few years ago, just stay there now where we're at, I can remember a few years ago, I was at my mom and dad's house, it was a summer afternoon, and they were sitting on their front porch and I had walked up the steps, they were brick, concrete steps, and I had said to my mom, I said, oh mom and dad, do you see your steps here, there's some pieces here that are really loose and there's some chunks that were out and everything, and it's dangerous. And I can't remember the extent of the conversation, but I believe it was either my mother or father, I'm not sure which one, made a comment. And they said, well, it didn't happen all at once, it didn't happen all at once, it was a process. We noticed first this little bit loose, then we noticed this little bit loose, then we noticed the chunk coming out, and she basically said, the condition of the steps that you see now is the result of a process, listen, a process of neglect, neglect. When we first noticed it, we just ignored it. When the scripture says here, be vigilant, be sober, this is the idea that the Holy Spirit is wanting to communicate to us. Be vigilant, be observant, be on guard, don't neglect. Carefully watching, by the help of God's grace, in the light of God's word, the condition of your heart, the condition of your attitudes, the condition of your mind, the condition of your thoughts, don't neglect it. How many men are here today and you've seen things in your home that now you don't even like to look at, you'd like to turn the other way, because it's gotten so bad because of neglect. And you say to yourself, if I had dealt with that last year or the year before, it wouldn't be half as bad. Now it's such a nightmare to look at it. I live in denial. I pretend it's not there. Or how about the inevitable trap of putting on excessive weight? You have a pair of pants, they start to get a little tight. Then you put them on again six months later and they're a little bit more tight. And then before you know it, they're hanging in the closet and you don't touch them anymore because they're too tight to snap or buckle. And each time you say, I got to do something about this. If we would respond the moment we sensed they were too tight, we'd only have a couple weeks and we could get back to where they're comfortable. But instead we neglect over a period of a couple years. And before you know it, you've got two inches, three inches. And then all of a sudden you despair. The reason why is because we were negligent. We weren't on guard. We weren't diligent. We weren't vigilant. Brothers and sisters, listen to what the Word of God and the Spirit of God is saying to us right now. God is calling each and every one of us to a renewed sense of vigilance, a renewed sense of watching, a renewed sense of being on guard. And what we are to ask God to help us focus on is that we are to get back in guard, get back into vigilance regarding the issues of our heart. Regarding the issues of our actions, regarding the issues of our attitudes. Guard your heart. Guard your attitude. Be vigilant about what comes out of your mouth. You remember a few weeks ago we talked about the tongue. And the tongue is an unruly member of the body without its being conquered by the Holy Spirit. And the tongue is like a little match that when the little match is thrown into the forest, it sets a big fire, a little teeny spark. Think about it. A little teeny spark can destroy thousands and thousands and thousands of acres of trees. And that's the way it is with our tongue. The damage that the tongue can do when it's not under the control of the Holy Spirit is untold. And we use the illustration of feathers in the wind. The damage done by the tongue is non-retrievable. It's forgivable, but non-retrievable. If you slander someone and hurt someone and say something to someone, certainly you can go to that person later, and if they have the Spirit of God in their life, they will have to forgive you. If they don't, then they're going to be in disobedience to God. But if they're a Christian, we're commanded to forgive. So let's just say we're Christians. And I ask Jane to forgive me, say, because I said something about her, and she's going to forgive me. And we embrace in Christian love, and I thank God for it. But then Jane reminds me that even though she has forgiven me, the damage that I had done to her, and the poison that I put in the ears of people that I talked to her about, I can't retrieve that. I can't retrieve it. It's done. It's done. And so we are being called today by the Spirit of God to be vigilant, be alert, be on guard. Because the work of God in our midst is growing, not numerically, but it's growing in heart. How many sense that over the past six months, God is doing a deep work in your heart. You're being stirred. You know, you know, you know that there is a God in heaven who is working in your life, who is dealing with situations that hitherto had been impossible. But God is making leeway in your life through the Word of God and through the Spirit of God. And because of that very thing, the adversary is angry. The adversary is prowling around, looking to try and destroy what God is trying to do in your life. And we're going to see here in a moment what it is he's looking for. So the Scripture says, be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the enemy, the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking. He's walking about and he's seeking. He's walking in and out of your home. He's walking in and out of your attitudes. He's observing. He's watching what comes out of your mouth. He's watching how you deal with people. He's watching and he's looking for something that he can devour. He's looking for something that he can devour. Listen, he's looking for a ground in you that corresponds to you. He's looking for a ground in you that corresponds to the appetite in him. He's looking for a ground in you that corresponds to an appetite that's in him. What is his appetite? What does he long to be able to prance upon? What does he long to be able to jump on and devour? He wants to destroy the testimony of Jesus Christ. He wants to destroy the testimony of God. He wants to destroy the expression of Jesus Christ in your life and my life. But how does he do it? Satan has an insatiable hunger for what is like himself. We get that? Satan has an insatiable hunger for what is like himself. And the chief characteristic of the lion, the dragon, the Satan, is his proud, arrogant heart. Satan's heart is filled with the juice of pride. To this day he's in rebellion against his Creator God and defies Him every day by living contrary to what is pleasing to God and seeking to seduce mankind to live in rebellion against God. Pride is the insatiable appetite that Satan has. And when he finds pride, when he finds pride in our life, that becomes the ground, the legal right that he has to begin to work havoc in our lives. That's why in context, when the Scripture speaks about the lion as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour, it's in the context of pride and humility. Verses number five and six. Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God. God resists the proud. Be vigilant, be sober. Your adversary the devil as a roaring lion seeks whom he may devour. So the devouring power of the wicked one is fueled and empowered by a hope that he might find pride, an attitude where we're arrogant. And he gets in there. Ephesians chapter four. Now we're looking at the negative side now of what the enemy's looking for. We probably won't get to this today, but then after this we're going to look for what God is looking for. If the enemy's looking for pride, what is God looking for? What does God want to fill our lives with? But before we do that, we want to cover this thoroughly this morning. Ephesians chapter four. Ephesians chapter four, verse 21. If so be you have heard him and have been taught by him as the truth is in Jesus, that you put off concerning the former way of life, the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore put put away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be angry and sin not. Let not the wrath go down. Let not the sun go down upon your wrath. Listen here. Neither give place to the devil. Verse number 27. Neither give place to the devil. Don't give the devil a foothold. That's what it's saying. Don't give the devil a foothold. Now let me give some practical advice here, and I'm encouraging everyone to please listen carefully. When Colette and I first got married, we implemented a practice. And that practice was this. Anytime we were together, didn't matter where, in home, in the car, wherever, and for some reason, whatever that might be, there developed between us some kind of a misunderstanding that resulted in a breakdown of the heart communication. A breakdown of the heart communication. And we sensed it by heated emotions or misunderstandings. Whatever the reason may be, we began a policy that we stop whatever we were doing. I can remember a few times when we first got married, I'd pull the car over. And Colette was real happy. I would not proceed until we dealt with the problem. We'd talk and we would pray. We have also tried to implement that practice in our family anytime. At the dinner table, during school hours, in the car going somewhere, whenever heated, hot hostility would begin to evidence itself, we'd stop right there and we'd start to pray. Colette has been implementing this in the family environment. Don't give the devil a foothold. Don't give the devil a foothold. The first way you give the devil a foothold is you become unguarded and you fail to recognize what's happening and do something about it. You fail to do something about it. That's how you give the devil a foothold. And so if there's any kind of speech, Norman, any kind that's grieving to God, we stop. It's time to pray. It's time to pray. And we begin to pray and call on the name of God. And we pray for humility. We pray for meekness. We pray for gentleness. We pray that the devil, we identify things in our home. We pray that the devil and the spirit of the devil would be cast out of our midst and out of our hearts and out of our minds and out of our attitudes. We call on ace and ace and a spade a spade. And then we ask, Oh, dear God, please fill us with Thy Holy Spirit. Fill us with Thy Spirit, Lord. And bring gentleness and bring peace and bring kindness and bring love and bring forgiveness. And we pray until we sense there's a peace back in our home. Now, I want to strongly encourage every single family and couple here to pray and ask God to help you implement the same procedure in your home with your relationships in your life, whether it's husband, wife or children or brother and sister. Don't put your head in the sand regarding issues that need to be dealt with. Don't put your head in the sand. Don't be like the ostrich who when danger comes, what does it do? It digs a hole in the sand and sticks its head in the sand and thinks by going into darkness that everything's okay. When in fact, he becomes what? The greatest vulnerable target to the enemy. You ever see a little child when something is happening that's frightening them? They close their eyes and then when they close their eyes, they feel safe. They feel safe. They close their eyes and they think that because they're closing their eyes to the danger, that means the danger disappears. No, the danger doesn't disappear. It just disappears out of their sight. It disappears out of their... It's really there. It's just you think everything's okay because you don't see it anymore. And that's how the enemy beguiles us and seduces us and deceives us. We put blinders on our eyes. Like my parents' steps, we neglect the little signs that things are not right. The little attitudes, the little words, we neglect. We just forget about it. And over a period of time, those little things grow into big things. And then those big things can create horrible havoc. And that gives the roaring lion entrance into our homes and into our families. You know, a little bit of pride, the devil will pounce upon and make it into what? Great arrogance. A little bit of attitude, the devil will come and make it into big attitude. Just a little bit of bitterness. You got a little offended, a little offended at that brother, at that sister. When the devil sees that little offense, he comes with his evil, horrible, cold, rotten spirit and puts it on you. And that little offense turns into a mighty offense. Mighty. Just a little bit of lying. And the devil comes and makes you a chronic liar. Just a little bit of lust, a little bit of pornography, a little bit. And the devil comes upon you and makes you into an addict. God is telling us this morning through His word, dear ones. Be sober, be vigilant, be on guard, work together. The greatest lie the devil ever tells to a husband and a wife or to parents and children is that you're not on the same team. You get warranted against one another. That's a lie. That ought to be an immediate flag that starts. Whenever you start fighting with one another and against one another, you have bought into the lie. You're not adversaries. You're on the same team. The devil is pitting you two against each other to deceive you in order to reflect the attention off of himself onto you. You're not in a battle one with another. And so the moment you sense hostility and it's me, you, me against you. We're us parents against you children. You need to stop, throw out the referee flag, blow the whistle, stop the clock, stop running. There's a penalty. The devil's lied to us. And clear the air through prayer and clear the air through bringing the truth of God's word. Are we hearing neither? Verse 27, verse chapter four, give place to the devil. Don't give place to the devil this morning. Don't give place to the devil this morning. Ephesians chapter six, verse 10. Ephesians six, verse 10. Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil, the schemes of the devil, the strategies of the devil. Don't give place to the devil. Don't give place to the devil. Now, not only are we taking a defensive posture, don't give place to the devil, defend yourself. But now, we're looking at an offensive attack. Not only are we to take a defensive posture, but we are to be on the offense that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. Verse 12 tells us the truth about our warfare. Always remember it. Whenever your eyes and your heart get focused on one another and you start feuding and fighting with each other, whether it's husband, wife, whether it's children, parents, children, whether it's brother, brother, sister, sister in the body of Christ, if it's mother-in-law against son-in-law, any kind of family feuding is deflecting from the true issue of what's going on. Verse 12, listen carefully. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood. That word wrestle means to struggle. We struggle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. The war that is going on against you and I as individuals, particularly if Christ Jesus is living inside of us, it is not a warfare against flesh and blood. Listen carefully, please, brothers and sisters. Any time you begin to think that you're battling with another person, you are being deceived. The battle is not against flesh and blood. And whenever you begin to focus your attention and your mind and your heart on what someone is doing to you, you're being deceived. We're giving the devil a foothold. It's not about one another. It's not about fighting with each other. There is an adversary who wants to pit us against one another in order to hide his lie that he's the real adversary. If you have a football team or a baseball team or a soccer team and the members begin to fight one against another, that's inevitable defeat. That's inevitable defeat. Because you begin to look at your team player as an enemy. How can you look at your team player as an enemy? You'll never work together. You'll never be there for one another. And in order to be a team, you have to be agreed that you're not the adversaries. You're not enemies. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but our warfare is against the devil, against powers of darkness who are seeking to turn us against one another so that we bite and devour one another and consume one another and destroy the testimony of Jesus Christ. And so today by the power of God's Word, we need to say, Lord, correct my thinking. Correct the way I view life. Correct the way I view my family. Help me not fall into the trap of looking at people as my enemy. But help me to see the enemy is the enemy. The devil's the enemy and he's the one working to disguise himself so that we never get to the root of the problem. And the root of the problem is identifying the true source of hostility. The enemy. The possible ground that he has gotten in our lives may be some pride. May be some unconfessed sin. Unforgiveness, bitterness, whatever. And dealing with that by confessing it to Christ. And then together standing against the enemy. Together standing against the adversary. Whenever you are inflamed with feelings of resentment or bitterness or anger or hostility toward your husband, your wife, your children, or any other person, you are being deceived. The enemy is successfully getting your attention off what's really going on. He's hiding. And he loves it. Because if we have those kinds of feelings and we follow him, then we devour one another. And he sits back and laughs. It's time for you and I as Christians to get on our knees and say, Lord, help us to arise in the Spirit of God and stop fighting with one another. And to agree together that we can join together in the Spirit of God and fight the good fight of faith. And resist the devil. And resist the pride in our heart. And together we bow before the Lord and pray that God would drive the devil away. For out of our families and out of our homes and out of our fellowship with one another. Verse 13, Ephesians 6, Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having your loins girded about with truth. Truth. The way that we fight this spiritual battle is not with weapons of carnal, fleshly origin, but we battle it with truth. We together go to the Word of God. We together go to the Word of God. We let God's Word, God's truth prevail in every situation. Every situation. Whenever there's pride in the heart, pride always asserts its own opinion. Pride always asserts what it thinks. You ever get into an argument or a feud with someone and it's, I think that, I think that, I think that, I think that. Well, what does it matter? Let's bow before the Word of God. What does God have to say about this situation? What would God speak to us? How would God deal with this situation? Sweetheart, children, husband, wife, brother, sister in Christ. Don't feud with one another. But bow before the truth of God's Word. Pride loves to hear itself talk. Pride loves to give its opinion. Pride loves to make quick judgments about things. But humility and brokenness goes low before the Lord. Isn't quick to accuse. Isn't quick to judge. Isn't quick to say scathing things. But brokenness and humility is what it wants to suggest. Let's bow before the Lord. Let's ask the Lord to help us in this situation. Let's not fight with one another. Let's stand together and resist the devil. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God. Truth, the first offensive weapon, having on the breastplate of righteousness, righteousness, the second offensive weapon, righteousness is right standing before God based on the blood of Jesus, based on the merits of Christ, based on claiming His righteousness as ours. If you are holding on to the righteousness of God, you are letting go of self-righteousness. Listen, here's how you know if the spirit of self-righteousness is on you. You view your brother or your sister or your husband or your wife or your children in a manner where you think you're better than them. You think you're better than them. You're not taking the righteousness of God when you have that attitude. You have the arrogant, self-righteous, smelly righteousness of claiming your own righteousness, and you don't stand in God's presence with that righteousness. You know whose presence you stand in when you get that righteousness on you? The devil's presence. It's his power that works in self-righteousness. If you are an expert in finding your brother's fault all the time without seeing your own fault, it's like telling your brother about the piece of sawdust in his eye when you've got a telephone pole in yours. That's the devil. That's the devil's gospel right there. That's the devil's tricks. Self-righteousness. Or you always want to show someone what their problem is, but you're unwilling to help be the solution. Something about a mother's love for the little one is amazing. They don't say, now you pooped your pants. Shame on you. Now go change it. What do they do? They change the diaper. How much of your correction that you implement in your family as a husband to a wife, as a wife to a husband, or as parents to children, or as brothers and sisters to one another in the body of Christ, how much of your correction and your reproof and your so-called discernment has with it the desire to want to get in and get dirty and help get things better? Let's say this summer I drive over to Norman's house and I see his lawn is six inches high, eight inches high. And I drive by and I say, boy, Colette, would it really be nice if Norman would take care of his lawn? And I drive away pontificating on how Norman neglects his lawn. But if I didn't have such an arrogant heart, Carl, and if I wasn't sitting as a king pontificating about how terrible my brother is, I might hear the Spirit of God say to me, son, why don't you stop your car? Tell your wife to pick you up in an hour and mow his grass for him. You think God could do that? Oh, wow. How much of our correction has with it the love of Jesus? Because Jesus does not... Listen, the perfect example of this is when Jesus in eternity past saw being with the Father that when man was created, man was going to make a horrible mess of himself. Man was going to rebel against God. And man was going to become so stinking dirty. Dirty, Norman. Dirty, dirty, dirty. And God could have in His own sovereign right as being God, could have sat on the throne of His glory and with a judicial statement, He could have scathed mankind. You filthy, unrighteous dogs. You've rebelled against Me and you are deserving of hell and damnation and judgment. But in My mercy, I'm going to send Michael the archangel and he's going to help you get out of your mess and when you get out of your mess, then maybe I'll come back and talk with you. No, what did God do when He saw the sin of humanity? He told us exactly the truth about ourselves, but then in His love, He said, but I, I, I will leave heaven, become a man, humble myself, and will become sin. I will become your sin. I will take your dirt and put it on Me. I will take your pain and feel it. I will take your sorrow and cry it. Jesus' love gets its hands dirty. Gets its hands dirty. Be sober. Be vigilant. Because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, seeks whom he may devour. What's he looking for? He's looking for you to point out someone's fault. He's looking to you to point out someone's fault, but not have any intention to help in any way. Oh, you're just so able to see so clearly, huh? It stinks. It stinks. If you don't see with God's love, you better pray that God blinds your eyes. Because it's better not to see than to see as a pontificate, to see as some righteous one without being moved with the compassion of Jesus. And this is the enemy's devices. This is his strategy. This is his plan. The Pharisees were experts, weren't they? In the law, they were experts. But Jesus said, you won't make one effort to help. You won't make one effort to help those that you are so candidly pointing out their faults. 2 Corinthians 2, I believe. Beginning in verse 5, If any have caused grief, he hath not grieved me, but in part that I may not overcharge you all. Listen, sufficient to such a man is this punishment, which was inflicted of many. Paul's in here referring to an incident that occurred earlier where a man was in the church and he was involved in fornication. And Paul gathered the church together and said, Listen, don't close your eyes to this sin. Deal with it. Together as a body, deal with it. Open fornication. And so what they did is, they turned this person over to the devil. Now, we're not going to get into a theological argument about what that means, but if you just gather together the scriptures in the New Testament, to turn someone over to the devil is not so much to tell the devil to attack them, it's simply to withdraw your fellowship from them. When you are actively in fellowship with one another, there is a safety. There's a safety that comes as people speak into your life and as the Word of God is spoken into your life and as you have love one with another. And if somebody is cast aside, not as an enemy, but as a brother that needs discipline and the right hand of fellowship is not being extended to them, they're left to their own devices. And that's what happened with this brother who was committing fornication. And then Paul goes on to say, Listen, the punishment that was inflicted by many is sufficient. It did the trick. It brought repentance in this man's life. So verse 7, So that now you ought to forgive him and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one should be swallowed up with too much sorrow. Therefore, I beg you that you would confirm your love toward him. Verse 11, listen, lest Satan should get an advantage over us, for we are not ignorant of his devices. So Paul here is saying that he was not ignorant of Satan's devices. In context, he's talking about if somebody does something that needs correction, needs discipline, it's possible that once this person is disciplined and once this person is corrected, that they might not feel loved. They might not feel accepted anymore. They might feel as if they're a reject. And if we don't reach out to them, if we don't affirm our love to them, if we don't verbally say, Listen, it's okay now. Everything's all right. I love you. Then they can be swallowed up with too much sorrow and Satan will gain an advantage. So here Paul's saying we're not ignorant of Satan's devices. Brothers and sisters, ask yourself this question. Are you ignorant of Satan's devices that are even happening right in your own home? Maybe. What's the devil doing right in your own home? Right among your own brothers and sisters? What is he doing that's destroying and tearing apart? Are you aware of it? Paul said we're not ignorant. Are we ignorant? We need the Lord to open our eyes up, don't we? More and more. We need to see more and more. We need to pray. Lord, reveal to us the devices, the schemes, the strategies that the wicked one, the lion, the devil is implementing against my life, my family's life, my brothers and sisters lives. Show me, Lord. We are not ignorant. And if we do not come to God as a family, families, individual families, if we don't come to God as brothers and sisters in Christ, as the body of Christ, and we don't come to God's Word, and we don't walk in the light of Christ's countenance, the enemy will come as a roaring lion. He will disguise himself. He will beguile us. He will sow all manner of evil in our midst and in our hearts, and he will destroy the work of God. He'll destroy it because he's a thief. He's a robber. He's a murderer. But God, in his faithfulness through his Word, will give us the power. Let's bow our hearts for a moment. Let's all begin to pray. Father, I pray that every man here today, every husband will be enabled by the power of God's Spirit and by the power of the Word of God to begin to see any of the devices, the strategies, the plans, the plots of the wicked one that he may be implementing that might be coming as fiery darts as an attempt to overthrow his love for You, his love for his wife, his love for his brothers and sisters. And I pray in the mighty name of Jesus that every device and strategy would be exposed right now in the presence and light of the face of Jesus Christ. Every device. Every rotten attitude. Every arrogant look. Every arrogant word. Every speck of hardness of harm. Some have begun to get bitter. Some have begun to fester unforgiveness. Some have begun to get cold in their heart. Discouraged. You've withdrawn. You've withdrawn from the battle because you've been hurt. And you say, I'm not going to be hurt anymore. I'm tired of being hurt. But brother, sister, husband, wife, sometimes in a marriage, you get hurt and you say, I'm just going to withdraw emotionally. I'm not going to take it anymore. I'm going to live with you, but I'm not going to be a part of you. That's the device of the wicked one. That's a lie from the serpent. And today, the power of God's Spirit can rescue us from these slippery lies of the devil if we're just willing to identify them. And pray, God, help me. Help me, Lord. I pray, Lord, that the devices of the enemy that have been sown in the hearts of parents toward their children would be exposed and that You would conquer them through the power of truth, the power of the righteousness of Christ, the power of the Word of God which is the sword of the Spirit. Heal relationships with children and their parents. Heal relationships in the body of Christ. Lord, we humble ourselves. And in humility, we resist the adversary. And You've promised that He'll flee from us. In the name of Jesus, the Son of the living God, expose the wicked one's devices and take them out of our lives. Take them out of our homes. I pray You will stop. You will stop dead in their tracks behavior patterns that have been going on for years. Expose the enemy's lie and conquer these things through the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Lord, smash our pride. Smash our pride, Lord. Bring deeper humility and deeper brokenness. Deliver us, Lord, from always wanting to look at our brother's faults but not see that ours are much worse. Deliver us, Lord, from wanting to offer solutions to people's problems and not wanting to get our hands dirty and not wanting to help them and not wanting to walk along with them and help bear their burden. Teach us, Lord, to keep our mouths shut if we're not willing to be ourselves the solution. Help us, Lord, to stop criticizing Hackettstown and all the different types of people that are coming unless we're willing to go out and help them and tell them about Jesus. Lord, teach us what your love is all about. Baptize us with your love today. Bring healing in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, in the mighty name of Jesus Christ. If you're here today and God's Word and God's Spirit has revealed to you a device, a scheme, a strategy of the wicked one, and you see that in being unguarded and in becoming distracted or whatever, you see that this device has gotten into your life and it's beguiled you. It's gotten into your life and it has seduced you and it has begun to work destruction and damage. And you want God to set you free today in the power of the blood of Christ and in the Spirit of the living God, then I want to encourage you to lift your heart up to Him and believe God to meet you today by His power. Father, for that dear soul, bring release in Jesus' name. Bring release in Jesus' name. Let's spend a few moments before the Lord now in quietness and let's let Him confirm His Word, speak to us. Perhaps there may be some who want to extemporaneously pray. Just call upon the name of the Lord. At this time, that'll be fine. Let's let Jesus do this work deep inside of us.