“Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” – James 4:7

One of my favorite hobbies is to feed wild birds. Even when I go on vacation, I make sure someone comes and fills up my birdfeeders so the birds are not forgotten. One year, my husband decided it would be easier and less messy to store our birdfeed in a large, thirty-two-gallon plastic garbage can. We did that, and then left for camp meeting for two weeks. When we returned, there was a large hole in the lid. Then, as I sat in my office, I discovered a well-fed squirrel on top of my garbage can, trying to get into it. The problem was that I had replaced the plastic with a metal lid. Now I had a very angry squirrel! He proceeded to climb up a tree and try to knock the birdfeeder down so he could get to the seed there. My husband, determined that the squirrel was not going to get the birds’ supply, sawed off the branches around the feeder. The squirrel found another feeder on my deck and climbed up to reach into it, so I moved the feeder to a place that was not accessible to squirrels.  

That hungry squirrel was relentless in his efforts because I had something he wanted: birdseed. He was determined to outsmart me. Just when I would think I had the problem taken care of, here he came again with a new attack. I even tried to go halfway with the squirrel—I put out a dish of seed just for him. But he did not want half-measures; he wanted all I had! After much effort on my part to discourage him, he finally went away. Yet, I know that if I put the plastic lid back on the garbage can of birdfeed, or fail to keep the branches trimmed around the feeder, he will be back.  

The squirrel reminded me a lot of Satan. As Christians, we have something Satan wants: our souls. Satan is determined to see us fail. He is determined to have our souls at any cost, and he will not stop until he has taken everything we have. Our focus verse tells us how to overcome him, which is to submit to God and resist the devil. We do this through daily maintenance—reading our Bibles, praying, listening for God’s instructions to us, and obeying His directions. Yet Satan is still waiting for us to get lazy in our alertness. He wants us to become consumed with the cares of this world, and then he will be back to attack again. We can defeat the enemy with God’s help, but we must be vigilant.

It was like a war zone on my deck, and we as Christians are in a spiritual war. Yet our battle is 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” (Ephesians 6:12). We cannot afford to back up. We cannot make compromises with the world, nor allow disappointments, hurts, or “what ifs” to creep in. We need to keep our eyes on Jesus and, like the song says, determine in our hearts: “I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back.”