Would you turn with me, please, to the passage we read in the New Testament, 1 Peter 5. As the Lord would enable us, we might consider together verses 8 and 9. 1 Peter 5, verses 8 and 9. Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, is a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour. Whom is this steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world. 1 Peter 5 verses 8 and 9. The holy angels delight to study the wonderful works of God. We read of them in creation, of how they rejoice As they saw God and work, and his creative work, the suggestion may be that they were one of the first creatures to be created. How they must have delighted to see God working in creation. But above all, they take delight in God's mercy on Christ. Peter talks of that. He speaks of how the Old Testament prophets spoke or the coming Redeemer, the coming Savior, and of how the angels desire to look into, to understand the things of the gospel. They marvel and they worship as they see God's goodness to help deserving sinners, providing a Savior in Jesus Christ. For the holy angels, they delight to study the wonderful works of God. However, the devil and his minions are not aligned in the things of God. They are active in study, but their study takes a very different form. They are those who study to seek to thwart the plan and the purpose of God. Their delight is in the destruction of men, and especially the destruction of God's people. And here this Peter sends a word of warning. We remember that he is one who knew by personal experience, the danger of the attacks of the evil one. All God's people do. that he knew he had so openly and so publicly said he had denied his master. And he could never forget what he had done, although he was forgiven. And as he writes to the churches in parts of Asia, as he likes to encourage them, and strengthen them in the midst of persecution and difficulties. He sends a final word of warning, yes, and also encouragement. Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil is a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour, whom resists steadfast in the field. Well, let us consider this exhortation this evening. We notice, first of all, the reality of our spiritual enemy, the reality of our spiritual enemy. He speaks of our adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion walking about seeking who he may devour. He describes the evil one and the powers of darkness two ways. First of all, as an adversary who accuses. An adversary who accuses. Your adversary, the devil. As a roaring lion walketh about. The word adversary doesn't just mean any old opponent. The root of the idea is of an opponent at law. And therefore the thought is of one who is an opponent at law, who is challenging, who is accusing, who is seeking condemnation of us. The devil, described elsewhere in Revelation 12.10 as the accuser of the brethren. One who delights to point the finger and to say they've sinned and they have disobeyed God. And we read of him in Job 1, casting aspersions, suggesting that Job only serves God out of a mercenary spirit, out of what he can get out of God. Does Job serve God for nothing? You've blessed him and he knows that's the way a blessing is to be obedient and that's the only reason he is obedient. And of course, blessing and obedience often are tied together. But the trouble is, there was this suggestion, it's a self-centred type of obedience. It is. accusing. What does he do? He's going around and he's seeking to find evidence or create evidence in order to lay before God, in order to say they have sinned, in order to accuse the brethren that he might say they have sinned. The law says the wages of sin is death. Let the execution of that sentence fall on them. They are worthy of condemnation. malicious school. He seeks to lure us into sin and then point the finger at us and convict us of our sin. Friends, are you trusting in Christ? Are you not thankful that there is one who is described as the advocate of the Father, Jesus Christ the Risen John was writing, and he says, these things I write unto you that he said, no. But if any man said, we have an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sin. He's going to plead to me. His own day is that rock turning away, sat and sacrifice to satisfy divine justice. Aren't you thankful, are you trusting in him to deal with your sin? Remember Zechariah 3, where you have Joshua the high priest appearing in filthiness, and the devil pointing the finger again. And he is cleansed, that is what all God's people have, through Christ. The Antichrist, that's our end. He's described further as a roaring lion walking about, seeking whom he may devour. So he is a prosecutor, we might say, and a lion. A restless lion. You'll notice he walketh about. It reminds you of what we read in Job, where the devil appears amongst the sons of God, the angels, as they're called by that name in the book of Job. And that's what he's doing there. He's been walking to and fro, up and down throughout the world. Walking around, restless. Restless because He is constantly engaged in the activity of opposing God, along with his followers, seeking to oppose God, seeking to oppose the people of God. What's he doing? Well, he has been active and busy studying God's people, trying out different ways of tempting people into sin, saying what will work, studying individuals, taking note of their characteristics, of their strengths and their weaknesses, how he might attack differences of people. There he is, walking to and fro. He has had thousands of years of experience, and he knows how different people are likely to act in different situations. He's not a novice in doing what he's doing. He's walking to and fro as a rolling line. His very restless activity is a reminder of how powerful he is. He's more powerful than you. But remember, he is only a creature. We must never think of him as being anything but a creature. God alone is the almighty. I am the almighty God. Trust me, walk before me, be thou perfect. That's what we're called to do in the strength of God. He's only a creature. He's a crafty creature. We are not ignorant of his devices, How often he disguises himself. We're told he can come even as an angel of light. He can appear and disguise how brave he must be. Well, he's a restless mind. Notice he's also described as a roaring lion. A roaring lion. Now what do you think of when you think of a roaring lion? Perhaps you think of a lion getting ready to pounce on its prey. You hear the roar as it lunges forth in order to grab a hold of its prey. Well, that's not the picture. Lions don't do that. Lions stalk their prey, but they don't roar when they're stalking their prey. Why then is it called a roaring lion? Well, lions will often roar to assert their territory. This is my territory. Keep out. This belongs to us and our little pride. Keep out. It's only for ourselves. What is the claim of the devil? It is that he is the prince of this world, that he is the lawful ruler of the universe and the ruler of this world. and as a right to men and to their loyalty. You're trusting in Christ. You have been delivered from the power of darkness, brought into the kingdom of God's dear son. Or we could put it another way. You have abandoned him. You have rejected his rule and his dominion, and you have made choice of Christ. You have fled to him for salvation, and you are trusting in him. You're an enemy. You're a turncoat as far as he is concerned. And he seeks to reclaim those souls that have abandoned him. He's a roaring lion saying, you should be under my dominion and only mine. He also roared to display the power. And the very display of power But the powerful, loud roar of the lion is enough to make many fearful. And when people are fearful and coward, they are liable to submit. That's what the devil wants. That he can bring you into submission to himself. He's described also in scripture, as like one who is a wounded lion. Christ, we're told, has given them a death toll. On the cross, when Christ was dealing with sin, in Colossians 2.15, we're told that there on the cross, he destroyed principalities and powers, making a show of them openly, triumphing over them in that cross. There, Christ on the cross achieved the victory over the powers of darkness and over the evil one. An evil one is described as being like one that is chained, one that is bound. Out of a wild animal, chained. How it longs to break free. How the devil longs to break free. how he is marred and enraged. Think of a wounded teacher, how it tends to be very sensitive. Perhaps even a domesticated animal, if a stranger approaches it, might be more, might be liable to be dangerous because of its injuries. How much more? Oh, I'm a beast like a lion. He knows his time is short, and he seeks the destruction of all that he can get a hold of. Now, I don't know whether Peter here is directly referring to persecution. He may be. Although persecution tends to be a very unsubtle form of temptation. Tow the line, turn away from that religion, or you will lose money. You might lose your life. Very unsubtle. It may be a reference to that, or it may be that he is just pointing out that the devil, by various subtle forms, seeks to attack and seeks to destroy us. We are to learn from these things. that we might be kept safe. A restless lion, a roaring lion. You'll notice he's also a ravering lion. We see it, we read. He walks about seeking whom he may devour. Ideas is of the beast, swallowing down something, devouring something. What's brought before us is the cruelty and the heartlessness of the beast. I suppose if we were to watch a lion pouncing on a baby giraffe, a zebra, dragging it down, and then using its teeth to start ripping into the flesh of that beast until it dies, We would tend to think how cruel, how heartless, what it would be if this was a moral creature, a human being behaving in that sort of way. The heartlessness, the cruelty of Satan. Here is the one who is envious of Adam, sets out to destroy Adam. ruins Adam and the race. Because he cannot stand Adam being in relationship with God, Adam being loyal to God, Adam being ruler of this world, having dominion over the creatures, serving God. And he just attacks him and seeks to destroy him. That he was a murderer from the beginning, and a liar. How cruel. He envies God's people. There are people who are the children of God, lairs of glory. And he hates that thought. And he seeks to destroy the saints. Well, how many souls have been destroyed by his activity? The God of this world has blinded the hearts of those who believe not, lest he should turn, be converted, There's so much unbelief today, it's rooted in the hardness of man's heart. But you remember also in scripture, the devil is at work to keep men in unbelief. Oh, let us pray. Let us pray for the destruction of the kingdom of Satan and for the advance of the kingdom of grace that ourselves and others may be brought into it and kept in it, and the kingdom of glory might be hastened. How often we must pray then, thy kingdom come. Yes, how we must pray that we might be delivered from evil, kept from temptation, delivered from evil, that the Lord would either keep us from being things or give us the necessary grace to resist temptation. Dear Robin and Marilyn, we can't destroy God's people. We're thankful for them. Because God's people are in the hands of Christ. I give to them eternal life. They shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. God's people are kept by the power of God through faith and the salvation, ready to be revealed In the last day, that doesn't mean to say he can't wound you. Doesn't mean to say that there aren't some with many wounds painted into glory. He can harm your profession. He can cause things that you will regret for the rest of your life. Peter denies his master three times. He hears the cock crowing. And in Mark 14 at verse 72 we read, when he thought that off, he went. And the impression we have is that the story is that every time he heard the cock crowing, he brought back the memory of what he had done. He could never quite get over it. It was a source of grief to him so long as he was in this world. And the devil can do that to you, lead you into a situation where an essential devil can get over it. In this world, it will have lasting damage to your profession, bringing lasting regrets. Remember then, our spiritual enemy. Notice secondly, the readiness required to engage our spiritual enemy. We're in a battle. We have to engage the spiritual enemy. And it is described for us, our readiness is required for that engagement. He says, be sober, be vigilant. Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary, the devil, is a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour. First of all, then, be sober. Now, you're the opposite of intoxication. Be sober. And you think of how someone who is drunk is exposed to prey. You think of a person who is very drunk and in the middle of the city, and who knows how they might be taken advantage of, how easily they could be mugged, or something worse could happen to them. And part of the problem, or a great deal of the problem is they went sober. They didn't realize what was happening. they were exposing themselves to danger. You think of how strong drink affects the reasoning. People who have drunk in a sense of foster reason, they become the beasts. They're not thinking clearly. You think of how many people end up doing things that they afterwards regret. Because the conscience, the alarm bell was muffled through the effects of their intoxication, at least the sin. Sadly, we see much of that today. And that's why scripture warns us, be not drunk with wine, for in his excess, be filled with the spirit. Young people, especially, must be aware of the dangers of strong drink, and avoid it, and especially avoid an excess of it. It leads to problems. He says, be sober. Now, obviously, as he uses this word here, and as it's used in the New Testament, the primary thought is not on that. intoxication that comes through strong drinks, through alcohol. When it says be sober, the idea is of being spiritually restrained or of being clear-headed. In other words, not being spiritually intoxicated so that their spiritual judgment becomes cloudy. In other words, you and I are to be a people who are sober, who are disciplined, who are temperate, who are serious in the way we think and the way we behave. You're constantly aware that the spiritual dimension is there. The spiritual things, and eternal things are the most important things, and we're to keep a spiritual balance in all our thinking. Because if we're not, then we are liable to expose ourselves to temptation. Look at the context. There's warnings here of anxiety. What happens if we're not spiritually minded? If God is not continually in our thoughts and we're not seeing him as the one who is in control of all things, the God of providence, well things happen in our lives and we begin to fret and we lose sight of his sovereign care and of his promise that he cares for us and we fail to cast our cares upon him and we end up becoming overly anxious. Anxiety perhaps leads to open fears. Open fears can lead to sin. If you think of the fact that we need, we all need to live and to work and provide for ourselves, that's a fair enough thing. We might be aware that the love of money is the root of all evil, and we're not seen to be covetous. On the other hand, we may forget our total need of the Lord. And we can end up subtly trusting in uncertain riches rather than the living God who gives us richly all things to enjoy. And we can end up in a situation where we, because we feel the need to provide ourselves, For ourselves, well, we end up doing questionable work. Or there might be temptation to little bits of dishonesty. Rather than a careful, conscientious honesty before God. How easy it is for us to be drawn into sin, aren't we? We've failed to be sober. You think of how at times we may allow the pleasures of this world to just take the better of us. We have not retained that spiritual seriousness that there should be in our lives. We end up wasting so much time over trivial things. We haven't got an eye to the glory of God in all that we do. It may expose us to lust, or we may end up just spiritually cold. We can forget spiritual things. Christ is the precious one. He is the one who gives us lasting joy. We can become just like the world. That's dangerous. How easy it is. Pride to lead us to become self-centered. Pride to lead us to self-reliance. Again, we expose ourselves more and more to the attacks Realize the need to be spiritually tame and serious. And along with that, there's this call to be vigilant, be vigilant, to be watchful. If you were told that an enemy might come and attack, then you would be vigilant. If you were told that you lived in an area where There were a lot of break-ins and there was thieves going out on the prowl. Well, you would make sure your locks were working, your windows were closed and locked, your doors were locked. You would be vigilant because you would know not being vigilant will leave yourself an open place. And in the same way, we are to be vigilant, we're to be watchful. or to have an eye out for the enemy, or to watch out for his traps. One thing we must remember is this, what you think is a strong point, can become a point of weakness. The city of Sardis that the Lord wrote a letter to, the ancient city was an acropolis, it was built on a high hill, with something like 1,500 foot cliffs. It was impregnable, or at least they thought it was. And it meant that they tended not to bother putting guards on duty. And the meats came, and they climbed up these sheer cliffs, and they took the city. What was the lesson? Even the strong fortress needs a defense. Even the bits which seem strongest in the attack were overcome by the enemy. Only one has remained sinless, the Lord Jesus Christ. We must be vigilant in all those in our guard. Let us be aware of spiritual drowsiness. Let us be aware of our own weakness. Let us be aware of trusting to self. Let us be vigilant, looking out for the enemy. Well, thirdly, the resisting of our spiritual enemy. We've seen something of his roaring and of how we must be preparing to resist him, what is required in order to be ready to resist them. Then thirdly, the resisting of an enemy. Who is this steadfast in the people that are telling you, tell me this, Satan will attack you. He won't leave you without problems. Whether it's persecution, or temptation, perhaps especially temptation in the middle of the trials of life, will come and you and I have to resist. How are we to resist? Well, he tells us, who resists steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the one. How are you to resist? By being unyielding. By being unyielding. You have to be steadfast. In other words, you have to stand firm. you're to resist a little, that he might flee from you, James 4, 7. And the idea of standing firm means not just negatively rejecting temptation, but potentially turning around, that we might truly resist that temptation. Does it cause you to fret? troubles of life, cast your cares upon them. And seek grace that you might glorify God. Believe that he will work all things for good. That it shall prove a blessing to you. That God has a plan and purpose of good in it. Whatever losses you may have, He will in some way or other make up because he has promised to do this. Seek to turn those anxieties into reasons to glorify God by laying a hold of the promises of God and the truth of God. Or it may be that you're tempted to be ashamed of Christ. You all seem to be tempted. to be ashamed of Christ. Well, let us turn it round by boldly professing him. By acknowledging that he is ours, and that we love him, and that we serve him, and he means everything to us. We tend to worry about our finances, Remains spirited at times? Well, let us remember, God loves the cheerful giver. Let us be charitable, to do good, and to communicate, that is to give, to share. Forget not, for with such sacrifices, God is well pleased. He that watereth, shall be watered himself. Remember these things. Be a hold of the truth. Be steadfast. Another thing, not only be unyielding, but be confident. Be confident. Who does verse 9? Who is this steadfast in the faith? Does that not suggest the possibility of victory? Did not suggest the possibility that you may overcome. It is not certain that you shall be devoured. Not Christ overcome. Is he not able to enable you to overcome also, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Let us be confident. The Lord. The third thing, be believing. Whom is this steadfast in the faith? Often the devil seeks to get you unbelieving. Oh, how we need to hold fast the form of sound words. To hold fast the truth. And we shall be steadfast As we exercise faith, we shall be steadfast as we use the armor of God. We take up the shield of faith. Remember the truths of God. We fend off the attacks of the evil one with the truths of God and with the sword of the spirit and the truth of God. Trusting in him. were enabled to resist. This is the victory that overcome of the world, even our faith. Let us be believers. Let us rely on the grace of Christ. We know we need his strength. Let us keep up fellowship with him that we might be steadfast in the faith. Let us rely on his intercession. Remember Peter. Seem not desired you all, but I've prayed for me. Well, let us be thankful for the Lord, please, for this people as individuals that they might be kept. Let us rely on him and his grace and his intercession. Let us delight in the redemption of Christ. Remember Joseph, What if his wife tries to seduce him? How does he respond? How can I do such a thing and sin against my God? Can you not say the same for him? How can I do such a thing and sin against my Lord and Master, Jesus Christ, who bought me with his own blood? I belong to him. How then can I do that which dishonours him, displeases him, denies him? Fear me, Lord. Thou might live for thine own. Yes, that is even fear, and even the chastisement of the Father. Faith, resisting in the faith. Living a life consistent with faith, that prepares us for resisting in the Lord. How are we to resist then? by being unyielding, by being confident, by being believing, and finally, by seeking fellowship with the saints. The idea here of steadfast isn't just the idea of being unmoved. The idea is of something being solid. So it's not so much like a tuft of grass that is somehow deep-rooted and managing to survive. Rather the idea is of something more like a bit of rock. You think of the grass, it's blown around with the wind, but it might still stick firm, or as good as rooted well. But it's better if we are more like the rock. Together, in unity there is strength. And you see there's this common enemy. Your brethren that are in the world, they're suffering the same things. They know problems. He's saying, well, as you are together in fellowship, one with another, and remembering the fellowship of the believers, that will help you resist. It shows you the importance of fellowship. One of the difficulties of this time is our lack of fellowship. that is long, that that might be restored, and that is the use of it, when we can more freely meet together. Perhaps in verse nine also there's a hint of a reminder that we are to see that we are at least a common enemy. And that the attacks on God's people are no proof we have no faith. There are common afflictions. They've overcome, we can overcome as well. You see, fellowship encourages us. The lion, we find it tends to isolate its victim. It gets it on its own, then pounces. It finds a young calf on its own, pounces there. So let us remember we are safe as we are together, steadfast in the faith. Oh let us not give in, let us be aware of the enemy, let us be vigilant, let us be ready for attacks and let us resist them in the faith. Oh Lord, we seek thy blessing. We need thy blessing. We face a cruel enemy. We thank you that we have a faithful saviour who is able to help us. He has promised his blessed spirit. Oh Lord, we are shielded in our reward. Keep us and help us to resist the evil one. Stay fast in the faith and I bless you. Forgive our sin for Jesus.