2 Corinthians 11:3 But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ.
This fall has been a busy time of year. To go along with my teaching and preaching responsibilities my dad responsibilities have kept the end of each week busy with football games. One of my sons is playing junior high football on Thursday nights and the other coaches high school football on Friday nights. For someone who loves football it is pretty nice getting five days/nights in a row, yes I said five; Thursday junior high, Friday high school, Saturday college football on TV, Sunday NFL on TV, and of course Monday Night NFL football.
I am blessed to have a wife that enjoys football but I think by Sunday afternoon she has had her fill!
Having coached football for 11 years I truly love watching games. I probably watch it differently than the average fan does though. Most people watch the ball or at least the person that has it. I like watching the defense and what they are doing as well as the offensive line. When you really understand the game watching these two aspects really add to the game within the game, coaches making adjustments and changing things they are doing that may not stand out to an average person. Last year they showed a couple games from behind the QB instead of the side. I loved it and wished they would do it more often. It lets you see what the players see.
In my years of coaching I have mainly worked with he offensive side of the ball. My oldest son is a defensive coordinator so I get to hear him talk about the defensive side of the ball a lot and have learned a lot more about it and enjoy studying it. One of the things good defensive coordinators do is try to hide what they are really trying to do. They give a look like they are going to do something and then once the play starts they do something else to try an trick the offense. Talking about this made me think about that is how the devil works as well. He tries, like a defense does, to deceive us. He makes us think what we are doing or getting involved with is one thing when in reality it is something else devised to bring us down.
Just like a good defensive coordinator the Devil studies us. He knows our weaknesses and our strengths and uses that information against us. He does whatever he can to lead us away from what God would have us do. 2 Corinthians 11:14 says And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.
So how do we deal with the craftiness of Satan? We have to know the true light so well that we can spot a counterfeit. I have read when they are training people that work in a bank to identify counterfeit money. They don’t show them the counterfeit they make them experts on the real deal. The people know what the real thing is so well that when they see what isn’t the real thing they know it right away. As Christians we have to know the Father of Light, Jesus so well that we can identify when the devil is using his strategies to deceive us. I pray you spend time getting to know the real deal more and more!