“Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry. And the tempter came and said to Him, ‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.’ But He answered and said, ‘It is written, “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.”’” (Matthew 4:1-4 NASB1995)
Yesterday the Lord led me to write a meme on the subject of “Internet
Trolls.” And as I read this passage of Scripture this morning, that is what
immediately came to mind. For these internet trolls work like messengers of
Satan, working to try to trick us into some kind of response that would not be
of God, that would not be God’s will and purpose for our lives. For they
instigate (incite, goad, provoke) a particular negative response, hoping to
trip us up, just like the Pharisees did to Jesus, which is how Satan works.
But we have to not take the bait. And with internet trolls,
the best thing we can do is to ignore them, and to not take the bait, and to
not get into useless and meaningless debates with them, which are meant to tear
us down, to distract us, to get us upset, and to tempt us to sin against God. So
we need to pray for spiritual discernment so that we don’t let Satan get us to
the point of frustration or anger or fear. We need to discern if a response is
legitimate or if it is intended to stir us up emotionally to commit sin.
So, if a responder comes at me, “all guns blaring,”
attacking me personally, when this “person” does not know me, making up stuff
about me that is not true, accusing me falsely of what I did not do or say, I
need to stop and pray, and seek the counsel of God as to whether or not I
should give any response at all, and if so, what that biblical response should
be, spoken in love, and never in hate. For when Satan came at Jesus, to tempt
him, Jesus always responded with “It is written..” (in the Scriptures).
But if we quote Scripture to some of these internet trolls,
they may just attack us, or they may also quote Scriptures, but out of context,
and twisted to their advantage, or which have nothing at all to do with the
topic of the writing to which they are responding. For their objective is to
confuse, to distract, to upset, to attack, to contend with, to disrupt, to
anger, and to create chaos and discord, to disrupt meaningful conversations,
and to try to incite emotional distress and fear or anger in their intended
target.
If an internet site on which we post has moderators, and a
way to report a responder who is obviously being vicious, and who is trying to
incite fear or a response so that they can continue in their attacks, and/or because
what the responder is doing clearly goes against the site’s rules of decency
and respect for other humans, then it is good if we can report such individuals
to the moderators, and if we have moderators who will take action, and if they
will not permit such vicious and personal attacks, one person to another.
And this is not saying that we all have to agree with
everyone on everything in order to “make peace.” But if we disagree, we should
do so respectfully, calmly, trusting the Lord to give us the right words to
say, which will be beneficial to others who are watching, reading, or listening
in on the conversations. We, as Christians, should not allow ourselves to get
into heated debates or arguments which produce nothing good, and we should not
lower ourselves to name calling and to personally attacking others.
Now, Jesus did speak the truth in love, at times, to his
opponents, so this is certainly not saying that we cannot speak truth in
response to lies, but it should be the truth, and not a heated and emotional
response just because someone disagreed with us on any given subject. But we
also need to learn when to just walk away from a discussion, because it is
going nowhere good. I see so many heated discussions among Christians that can
go back and forth indefinitely, but that end up producing nothing of value to
anyone.
Satan’s goal is to get us to fail. And he will attack us in
our weaknesses, for sure, on days when we are more emotional or tired or already
distressed over a particular situation. He will go at us at our weakest points
in order to try to bring us down and to get us to fail. So we need the wisdom
of God in these situations spoken of here, so that we don’t get caught in the
devil’s traps and end up ruining our testimonies for Jesus Christ. And we need
the wisdom of God as to when to just walk away and to not get engaged.
So we need to test
the spirits: [Matthew 7:15-23; Matthew 24:11-14; John 10:1-15; Romans 16:17-19;
2 Corinthians 11:3,13-15; Ephesians 4:11-16; Philippians 3:2; 2 Peter 2:1-22; 1
Thessalonians 5:19-22; 1 Timothy 1:3-7; 1 Timothy 6:3-10; 2 Timothy 3:1-9; 1
John 4:1-6; Jude 1:1-25]
Oh, to Be Like Thee, Blessed Redeemer
Lyrics by Thomas O. Chisholm, 1897
Music by W. J. Kirkpatrick, 1897
Oh,
to be like Thee! blessèd Redeemer,
This
is my constant longing and prayer;
Gladly
I’ll forfeit all of earth’s treasures,
Jesus,
Thy perfect likeness to wear.
Oh,
to be like Thee! full of compassion,
Loving,
forgiving, tender and kind,
Helping
the helpless, cheering the fainting,
Seeking
the wandering sinner to find.
O
to be like Thee! lowly in spirit,
Holy
and harmless, patient and brave;
Meekly
enduring cruel reproaches,
Willing
to suffer others to save.
O
to be like Thee! while I am pleading,
Pour
out Thy Spirit, fill with Thy love;
Make
me a temple meet for Thy dwelling,
Fit
me for life and Heaven above.
Oh,
to be like Thee! Oh, to be like Thee,
Blessèd
Redeemer, pure as Thou art;
Come
in Thy sweetness, come in Thy fullness;
Stamp
Thine own image deep on my heart.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrYhiK2nQBg
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The Devil’s Schemes
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