We are not only human beings, we are also spiritual beings. When we accept Jesus into our heart the spiritual part of us is awakened. You’ve heard the phrase “good side and bad side,” or “the Spirit and the flesh,” or seen a picture of a character with an angel above one shoulder and a devil above the other one. Those are great metaphors to use to describe what is going on in us. The human part of us is the bad, the flesh, and the devil (his influence) and our Spirit is the good, the spirit, and the angel (God’s influence). Before Jesus we only had our human part that was influenced by the devil. But once we receive Jesus our Spirit is awakened, and we then also have the influence of Jesus by His Holy Spirit that is within our Spirit.

Everyone always has their human side that directs their mind, emotions, desires, and actions from birth. You have the thought to do something wrong or bad and you act upon it it without a second thought. So you learn to function that way. For the most part you do what you want, when you want, and how you want to do it. When the Holy Spirit comes inside of you it starts to direct you to do things differently. It begins to try to guide you to do things better and in ways that are good for you and everyone else involved. But you still have the human side of you trying to tell you what to do too. And because you have become accustomed to hearing your human side it sounds much louder and more demanding than your spirit. It may be very hard to sense the Spirit at first but the more that you listen for and to it the louder and stronger it will become. As the Spirit gets louder the flesh will get quieter.

Now although the flesh may get quieter it will always be a part of us and there will be times that it will throw a fit. There will be times that it screams at you, “I want what I want and I want it now!!” We have to constantly be aware that we do have an enemy that absolutely hates the fact that it no longer has complete and total influence on us. And he is going to put up a fight with giving up that control. He will try all different kind of schemes to get his way. Any way that deception can be caused he will try. That is why we have to constantly be aware that we are a two part being and that we always have a choice as to which side we are going to allow to influence and direct our path (deuteronomy 30:19).

Because God wants us to follow His ways but wants us to do so willingly the Spirit will direct us but not demandingly or forcefully. It will more than likely be a still small voice (1 kings 19:11-13) that speaks to you. The devil on the other hand will try to force us to follow his influence but will do so in very clever ways to where we wouldn’t realize that it is him that is trying to influence us. He will even twist the truth and make it seem as if we are doing what is right and Godly when in fact we are not. That is another reason what we have to stay on high alert when it comes to his tricks and schemes and exactly who it is that we are being influenced by. We have to stay prayed up at all times that God will give us the discernment to know the difference between the two influences and the grace to always choose to follow the Spirit.

SOME OF THE WAYS THAT SATAN TRIES TO DECEIVE US

1. You want to start or stop something and every time you try to start making the change something happens or gets in the way. The enemy is using reasoning to deceive you and putting those things into place to get you to “have a reason” to not make the change at that time. But in reality you don’t have to let anything get in the way of you making a change.
2. You have a temptation to do something that use to be a bad habit for you but you haven’t done it in a very long time. You have the thought, “I can do it this one time and it won’t hurt nothing because I have control over it now.” If you do it that one time then you are opening the door for the enemy to work and it will become a bad habit again.
3. You know that you are on a tight budget and can’t spend any extra money. You see a great sale on something that you have been wanting for a vey long time. You start to think about how you can pay half of a bill this week and catch up on it next week and you could not get this or that essential item that you need and you can put off paying on a debt until next month. All these will still cause financial hardship if you buy the thing that you want right now.
4. You made a commitment to yourself that you are going to start going to the gym after work get workout and get in better shape. You only have a certain amount of time before you have to be home so you have had to plan your time accordingly. Then you boss ask for you to stay late, your child ask if they can stay after school and you pick them up, your elderly parent ask that you pick up their medicine and bring it to them. All of these sound like good reasons as to why you can’t go to the gym but you have to choose to honor the commitment that you made to yourself.

These are just a couple of ways that the enemy tries to work in us to keep us from doing the things that we are being by the Spirit to do because they are good and bring about better life to us. If he can’t influence us through our thoughts or emotions he will work through someone else to try to interfere with what we are trying to accomplish. And he is so sneaky and clever that if we do not stay aware of and focused on what we are being lead by the spirit to do he will find a way to keep us from being successful at it. He can try to influence our flesh/human nature but our Spirit is so much stronger. And the more that we listen for and follow the Spirit the stronger that will get and the less influence that our flesh/human part/the enemy will have over us.