Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
When evil confronts you, don’t cower! Don’t run and hide. Don’t retreat in fear. Face it fearlessly and conquer it. Resist its claims to power and prove God to be the only power. The evil will then flee from you.
Per James instruction above, it’s important to understand that the “devil” is never another person. It’s the evil that is being manifested.
For instance, if another person is acting selfishly, selfishness is the evil to be addressed. If they are full of hate, hate is the evil to disarm. If they are acting ignorantly, their ignorance needs to be corrected with understanding.
For success, separate the person from the evil; address the evil, and save the person!
Don’t put up with evil. Heal it.
Thank you so much Evan: this is so important to remember with personal and world challenges. When we Resist Insist Persist we will Rest In Peace. God’s blessings to you and your family and all the Spirit View family.
Here are a couple of my acronyms
DEVIL – powerless nothingness
D elivering
E very
V ile
I nsidious
L ie
GOOD – reality expressed in
G od’s
O mnipotent
O mnipresent
D elights
Evil is not the opposite of good and it is definitely not on a continumm between itself and good. Good has no relationship with evil and needs not to be definite in part or in whole by it. Good is itself virtue and the substance of faith. Evil or Error vanishes once it is realized for what it is not. Although Good need not evil or error to be realized it not the same with error or evil. Evil needs the goood to pull off its falsity so in many ways evil is dependent upon the good, but not the other way around. Evil vanishes in the face of realization for it no longer has the illusion of power.
Have been thinking about what you have written, Josef and the
thought came as an example of what you have given – between
light and darkness. The light obliterates the darkness and proves
it’s nothingness. But darkness can not destroy light. It needs only
to have light shone on it, like all the little mortal monsters that try
to creep into our thoughts that Seem devilish, but are conquered
by the Truth.
Thank you, Angel.
Thank you, Josef for supporting the fact of what I was
trying to bring out in my acronyms- that the devil,
or evil, is nothing, and is just a load of lies, which we
need to be alert to and cast out as nothing.
The only goodness there is, is expressed by God in
man as His reflection – and is the only power and reality of our being. I am treasuring “the”babe of
Christian healing,” Now is a lovely season to express more of the love, innocence, and unselfish giving of our
spiritual treasures and share them with all mankind.
Love this!!! Sometimes hard to do, to separate the lie from the person, but with practice, it gets easier.
I also want to greatly thank whoever shared (I’m thinking it might have been J) that article/interview with George Millar the other day, Out From Mind, Not Up To Mind. It is incredible! I really needed that explanation of the absolute vs the relative. It’s sensational and a complete treatment.
Thanks to everyone!❣️
Hi Patty! You’re very welcome, and I’m so glad you found the article helpful. It’s a favorite article for me and so powerful. xo
Thank you Evan. What you wrote inspired me to read Mrs. Eddy’s reply to the question “Is There A Personal Devil?”It begins on page 22 in No and Yes . Especially on page 23, line 20 to line 2 on next page, she addresses man’s physical personality as possessing good or evil, and her statement on page 24 line 25 through line 3 on page 25. The good news is “There never was a moment in which evil was real!
Impersonalize evil—what does that mean? By Russell Luerssen. From the August 1999 issue of The Christian Science Journal:
https://journal.christianscience.com/shared/view/16froi4lf2c?s=copylink
To J:Appreciate the Russell Luerssen article. What an antidote on how to handle the suggestions of evil.
Lovely way to start the day … Thank you all.
These presentments to our thoughts are mere offers to contract.
Every single one is illusory, just an illusion.
To these SUGGESTIONS I swiftly respond, No thanks. Not interested. You are not real, God is the only reality.
Do not try to ‘reason’ with an illusion. It could suck some life outta you, well that said, I realise it is God’s life for which I have been appointed steward.
Thank you Evan and all who gather here.
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Straight to the point Evan!! I wish the whole world could read this post and everyone else’s comments. So so relevant to us all in this time, but at any time there can seem to be a “ devil” in our lives… and sometimes it can be a recurring fear or thought about our or someone else’s health that seems to plague our thoughts.
Right now it’s vital for us not to personalise evil because that can send us down a negative track . MBE says “ Evil is neither person , place or thing” and that its only power is to destroy itself . Thanks everyone for your insightful strong comments too
This morning I had to force myself to listen to this week’s Bible lesson. I am amazed at the level of resistance I have had to settling down to study this week. I think it is the world’s chaos that is toying with me and my consciousness. But none of that has power. As soon as I settled down to listen to the lesson read on JSH I felt myself getting grounded again in the fact that everything is about loving each other. This passage stood out to me with deep compassion: “to set at liberty them that are bruised”. The amount of “bruising” that so many experience is difficult, to say the least. When I read that passage this morning I felt the purpose and great depth of Christ Jesus appearing on earth. I felt divine Love blanketing the earth and everything and everyone in Love. And that is the light that appears in specific and individual ways to tenderly meet the needs of each one of us. The distraction of “getting ready”for Christmas in all the material ways is gone and a settled peace is on me. So grateful for this lesson and for breaking through the resistance to experience a little more of the Christ. Love to Evan and the SV community.
Thanks Peg, I can relate to what you were saying about the resistance to settling down to study CS. Many times I’ve seen that form of material mind’s lies trying to keep me from immersing myself in Truth. Error tries to continue to appear real and relevant and it seems to know that as we study, focus on, think about and understand God and our relationship to Him, error will be seen through as unreal and will have no choice but to “flee from us.”
Ah Truth, eh?
If we let error creep in, it’ll try to rob you of the benefits of Truth.
Great story of perseverance and persistence, thank you, God.