Do God and Satan sometimes work as a team? To listen to the “trials & tests” teachings of some, you would think so. But listen to this, from 2 Corinthians 6:14-15 [KJV]: “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?” I see no fellowship, no communion, no concord… NO teamwork. Light doesn’t team up with darkness. Light drives OUT darkness!
Yet I do understand how some well-meaning people come up with these mistaken ideas. They see something really bad happen, and then something really good comes out of it, so they think that God used Satan to fulfill His plan. Yes, God can turn something horrible into something good, but God is perfectly capable of doing something really wonderful on His own, without involving any kind of evil. God doesn’t need anything bad to happen, in order to do something good.
Actually, it’s MAN that so often needs something bad to happen, in order turn them around, to bring forth the good that should have been in their life all along. SO many times in the Word, it is recorded how God’s people strayed from Him in times of peace and prosperity, and only turned back and repented when the enemy came roaring in with death and destruction and cruel bondage. That’s NOT God’s way. It’s MAN’s rebellious way. God’s way is that He would speak to man in a calm, tender voice, and man would listen, believe what He said, and obey; and be continually, abundantly, forever blessed!
I’ve thought of it like a mom who takes her child with her shopping, and keeps telling her child to stay close. But then the child has other ideas, and slips away. The child thinks the freedom is fun, until some guy grabs her. She screams, gets away, and runs back to her mother, and won’t let go of her skirt from then on. (I like happy endings. So does God.) Now, did the mother send the would-be kidnapper to teach her child a lesson, or to draw her closer? No way! The experience may have had a good effect, but that was NOT the mother’s way of teaching her child.
Remember… God is our FATHER. He doesn’t give His children stones, serpents, or scorpions. (See Matthew 7 & Luke 11) God does not have a dark side. James 1:17 [KJV] says, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.”
Now, before we get to thinking life will be a bed of roses, do not forget that we have an adversary, and where there is an adversary, there will be conflict. 1 Peter 5:8-9 [KJV] says, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.” Be sober, be vigilant, resist the devil. Satan wants to devour you. God is FOR you, and wants to deliver you, and protect you, and give you all the weapons and support you need to defeat that roaring lion.
Still more to come, to help sort it all out. God is GOOD! ALL the time!
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