The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. -- John 10:10
Have you seen the Discovery Channel TV documentary River Monsters hosted by extreme angler Jeremy Wade? If you haven’t, try watching it; it’s very fascinating. However, real life is the exact opposite of it. Instead of being the river monster, we all are the unsuspecting fishes swimming in the big river of life. The real river monster is the extreme angler, and his name is Satan. He is a very experienced and skillful angler with a bag full of tricks on how to snag souls.
The first thing to remember about the River Monster is that he wants to stay undetected while attacking his prey because it’s easier to catch a soul this way; this way he is pretty clever. He litters the river of life with countless fishing lines, and stays behind the bushes camouflaged.
How does Satan catch souls? This is a very interesting question. To try to answer this, I will draw from more than 35 years of experience as a sinner and insights from the booklet, One on One, by Steve Murrell.
Satan usually uses three basic steps depending on the spiritual strength of his prey.
- Grab the attention of his target
- Deceive his target by telling lies and half-truths
- Tempt his target to commit sin
As Christian way stay out of trouble by focusing on the Lord and following His teachings and ways. But Satan is a clever attacker. He flashes a DISTRACTION to grab the attention of the hapless target. It could be anything and these generally fall under three main categories – wealth, fame and pleasure.
Once Satan grabs the full attention of his target, he DECEIVES his target by telling lies and half-truth. The main motive is to divert the focus of the person from God to himself or herself. Satan would chant, “Is it true that you will go to hell? It can’t be bad if it feels so good, right? Forget God. Forget the needs of others. Focus on yourself and your needs. Nobody cares about you so you have to look after your own interest. Who needs them anyway? You’re self sufficient. You are your own man. ” Lies! Jesus said, “Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from God.” Now that’s the plain truth!
When a person becomes full of himself or herself and forgets God and doesn’t care about other people, he is ripe for the final blow – TEMPTATION to sin. A person who ignores God and doesn't follow his ways is no match to the evil River Monster. That poor soul will be shackled and trapped to a dark deep pit of sin where short-lived pleasure, emptiness, misery, pain, and torment abound.
Satan does not come with good intention. He hates men and women. But is there hope to the captured? And is there a way to avoid being snag by the River Monster?
