This series is the follow-up to the previous series which dealt with God’s COMMAND to resist and overcome Satan’s temptations to sin, which is necessary for entrance into the Kingdom of God where paradise awaits.

Resisting and overcoming Satan is dependent on the salvation seeker’s will and its interaction with God’s will.  If the interaction is positive, success (holiness) will be the result.  If the interaction is negative, failure (sin) will result.  The first type of relationship will result in eternal life; the second will result in eternal death.  Man makes the call.  It all comes down to whose will he chooses to fulfill–his own will or the will of God.  God raised up a particular man to explain the will-choosing process to serious Truth seekers in His (God’s) gospel.  This man received his gospel directly from Jesus Christ, then became the most prolific writer of New Testament Truth.

In the 9th chapter of the Book of Acts we find Saul of Tarsus lying in the road gazing at the blinding light in front of him, asking him the ultimate question: “Lord, what would you have me do?” (vs 6).  Over time the Lord would inform him as to exactly what He would have him do–He would have him to die.  Saul would learn that he must die to self (ignore his own will) so that he could live to God (obey His will).  The Almighty issues the same command to any and all who wish to spend eternity with Him.  A great gulf separates God’s will from man’s will.  The one who would come to be known as the Apostle Paul would learn many valuable lessons over the coming years, the lesson of the wills was by far the most important.  Without it, he would not have had the success he enjoyed.  From that moment on the road to Damascus until his dying day Paul would have to fight 1) to overcome his own will and 2) to embrace God’s will.  As he waited for his head to be lopped off, he was still fighting the will war.  All he had to do was deny Christ and he would have been spared the blade.  But that was not what Paul was about.  Not only did Paul fight the will war and come out victorious, he was tasked with teaching all other Truth seekers how to win their individual will wars by resisting and overcoming Satan’s attacks–“fiery darts” of temptation–and gaining the “victory” over him.  Until there is victory over one’s will there can be no victory over Satan.  All efforts to resist and overcome him will end in failure.  Sin (Satan) will rule and reign over the self-willed believer.  Our will must be broken.  Jesus referred to this Truth in Matthew 5:3,5 where He declares as BLESSED those who are poor in spirit and meek for they will inherit the Kingdom of God (“heaven”) that Christ will establish on earth.

This is why billions of people who profess God also profess that they must sin.  And they are telling the truth.  They have not mastered their own wills, but allowed “the god of this world” (Satan) (2 Cor. 4:) to deceive them into believing that they are serving the Biblical God while doing what they want to do–sin.   Jesus said to Satan that he (Satan) did not “… savor (desire) the things of God, but the THINGS OF MAN” (Mat. 16:23).  SATAN WANTS MAN TO HAVE HIS WAY AND DO WHAT HE WANTS TO DO.   Man wants to sin and does all he can do to open the way for churchman to sin.  To do this he uses his false prophets to twist God’s Words in order for churchman to have the right to do what he wants–to sin.  SATAN CAN’T MAKE US SIN.  SIN IS A CHOICE.   Read the series by that name.  Use “Choice” as your key word.    By keeping church people Biblically ignorant they do not know the Truth.  Anyone who speaks the Truth is condemned as a reprobate.  The devil’s false prophets earn their pay.  Over three billion “Christians” on earth prove it.  In the Matthew 16 sequence Jesus spoke directly to Satan who was controlling Peter’s will as well as his tongue.  Only a truly converted man having God’s Holy Spirit can resist, overcome and gain the victory over Satan’s manipulations.  Peter was yet in his sins at this point in his life.  Jesus proved this in Luke 22:31,32 when He (Jesus) told the disciple that He had prayed for him, that He had prayed that “… WHEN YOU ARE CONVERTED (YOU WILL) HELP YOUR BRETHREN (to be converted).”  The disciples, though they had preached the gospel, healed the sick and cast out demons, had far to go and a war to fight before they could qualify to join Jesus in God’s family.  THEY HAD TO SUBJUGATE THEIR WILLS TO THE WILL OF GOD IN ORDER TO BE SAVED UPON CHRIST’S RETURN.  But first, there was a war to be fought and a victory to win.

As a man, Jesus of Nazareth had to fight the will war exactly as does every other man.  Recall that prior to going to the cross He prayed according to His human will: “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me.”  His human will was to live and not suffer.   Nevertheless, He prayed: “… not as I will but as you will” (Mat. 26:39).  Like any other man, His will did not include being beaten and crucified.  And like you and I would do, He asked if there was any other way to accomplish the task God had assigned Him.  HE DID NOT WILL TO DRINK OF THE CUP OF SUFFERING AND DEATH. Subjugating His will to the will of the Father, He did exactly that.  Only by doing so could He become the Savior of mankind.

Compare His attitude to that of Adam and Eve.  They knew God’s will.  Even quoted it to the Serpent.  They, as would their descendants, had their own human wills which were the opposite of God’s will.  God’s will was strict, allowing no consideration of their wills.  The Serpent, however, offered a “better way,” one that brought their wills into play.  The war was on.  We know how it ended, and why.  With extremely rare exception (less than 1% of mankind), their descendants have followed in their spiritual footsteps.  Jesus said that only a “few” salvation seekers would ignore their own wills and embrace God’s totally opposite will.  That act takes a level of HUMILITY only a minutely few people possess.  These are God’s “remnant” (little flock), His “saints” (holy ones), His “peculiar nation” who, in spite of the social consequences, choose to obey Him.   Read Persecution.  Sinners saved by grace (Catholics and Protestants) not only PROUDLY proclaim their right to sin, but assure the world that God arranged for their sins to be ignored by Him because sinning is a natural–unavoidable–aspect of the “Christian life.”  I have personally heard uber-religious people say this.  One was an ordained minister and the other was a seminary student.  This church doctrine asserts that, because parishioners have been “saved” and “born again,” the wages of their sins will not be death (Rom. 6:23), but rather eternal life (Gen. 3:3,4).  At this point I will repeat a little ditty that could be the mantra of professing Christendom: “Sin and grin, my friend, for in the end, you still win.  Pie in the sky, sin ’till you die, for in the sweet by and by, you’ll still get to fly.”  Convenient, but wrong–deadly wrong according to God’s Word.  Paul offers a word of warning to professing Christendom: “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb. 10:31).