DECEPTION,
SATAN’S

DECEPTION is like the solicitations that so many of us receive from credit card companies. A person from a bank will call your home and say, “I am happy to let you know that you qualify for our new Visa card. We are privileged to tell you that we have raised your limit to twenty-five thousand dollars and it would be our honor to send you your card today. You will be one of our preferred customers.”

That conversation might leave a person feeling pretty good.

“Oh, I’m worth twenty-five thousand dollars!”

“Wow, I’m a preferred customer!”

“I’m somebody!”

Here’s what they won’t bother to tell you. They won’t tell you that if you will simply use the limit, if you will simply spend twenty-five thousand dollars, if you will take advantage of everything they are offering, they will own you for the rest of your life. They don’t tell you that they will tack 18 percent on everything you purchase.

There are people today who are owned by Satan. He may have told you to just take one pill, or just take one smoke, or just take one sniff. What he didn’t say was that after that, he’d own you.

That’s what Satan does. He captures us with a thought, then owns us with a thought.202

[Satan; Debt, Burden of; Temptation]

1 Peter 5:8–9; James 1:14–16