Part 3 –  ‘Dezinformatsiya’ and ‘And, having done all, to stand’. 

In this study, we complete the first section about the devil as the enemy of our soul.

Summary

‘Dezinformatsiya’ – the Russians coined this word, meaning disinformation, during the cold war when they flooded the world with lies as propaganda. The spiritual war we are in is not one with two armies ranged against each other; it is more like the asymmetric warfare or dirty wars we see now, which use such disinformation. ‘It’s a war between truth and lies.’ The undermining of truth in our post-truth world, beginning in universities decades ago, is now wreaking havoc in the political realm, especially in the US. But the lies we tell ourselves in our heads every day can also wreck our personal lives. The Bible calls this deception, and it is what ensnares us in sin – this is why we need truth to set us free. And experts have shown that human beings are very poor at detecting lies. It all began with the lie behind all lies that is represented for us in Genesis 3 – not to trust in God’s goodness, but to demand autonomy, and then redefine good and evil to suit our own desires, rather than trust God and his truth for what is best for us. The lies current in our secular society are that there is no God, we are our own gods and we should just be ourselves and do what we want. The effects of these lies have been disastrous.

‘And having done all, to stand’ – it’s not enough to know something in our minds. Ideas must get into our hearts and even into our bodies. We are all being formed by and into something. If we are to be formed into the image of Jesus, we need both truth and relationship. The Spirit (God’s relational presence) gets the truth (ideas consistent with reality) deep inside us. That is why isolation and lies are the devil’s strategy. As we see in the story of Eve’s temptation, he isolates us and then lies to us with something that appeals to our disordered desires. Therefore, we need community and relational presence. Contemporary society’s obsession with individualism and autonomy makes isolating us so much easier. Jesus, in Luke 4, shows how to withstand this strategy of the devil. And we see that spiritual practices are at the heart of it – he practices solitude, fasting, prayer, Scripture. Spiritual disciplines are his spiritual warfare, especially quiet prayer and the use of Scripture. He defeats the specific thoughts/lies of the enemy with Scripture that is within him. Our mind can literally rewire our brains by filling them with the truth of Scripture. We should also be careful what we allow into our minds and note that our disordered desires have been normalized in secular society so they seem normal and acceptable. But just as we are careful what we put into our bodies, we should be careful what we let into our minds. And when attacked by lies, like Jesus we just quietly stand against the enemy and speak the truth of Scripture.

For Reflection/Discussion:

  1. Can you think of a time when you believed a lie that ensnared you? How did it happen? What was it like? How did you get out of it?
  2. What are some of the ways in which we can become isolated and why does that make us more susceptible to the enemy’s lies?
  3. How do the practices of prayer and meditating on/memorizing scripture help us to defeat the enemy?

Next:

We will begin to look at the second of the classical enemies of our souls – the flesh. We will see how we can be our own worst enemies.