Alien Nation: The Offense and Defense
1 Peter 2:9-12

You ARE going to be shot at. Just don’t provide the ammo!

The great preacher from Dallas, Texas, Tony Evans, described it like this:
“Remember the old cowboys and Indians shows, and how the cowboys would circle their wagons when the attack came and from the inside of that circle they would shoot at the Indians with their muzzle-loaders? The Indians would ride full speed around the circled wagons shooting the cowboys with their arrows. Then you would see one of them light an arrow on fire and release it. But do you remember where it was aimed? Not to kill a cowboy but to light a covered wagon on fire. In reaction then, the cowboys would drop their guns and go to put out the fire. THEN the Indian would shoot…between the shoulders in the back!”

Our Adversary the Devil has two patented strategies. Division and Distraction. He works to divide the Fellowship of the Body so that it fights its own rather than mount assaults in his territory. If that doesn’t work, then he creates a distraction so that lesser concerns receive unmerited extra attention.

“Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation”—1 Peter 2:11-12

You ARE going to be shot at. Just don’t provide the ammo!

See you Sunday, Church!
Pastor Tom