Good Like a Medicine

This second Device of Satan as laid out by Brooks makes so much sense to me. It didn’t at one time, but looking back I can see so many ways that Satan has tried in my life to pull me into sin by masking a temptation with something “good.” He couples a sin with some good thing so that we will not flee, deny the sin, and be ever more lured in to his plan. This he did with the very first sin, did he not? How can I then be so blind and stupid sometimes?!

My husband and I have discussed this at length in recent months. One evening while we were talking, he said, “I think it is very possible that the root of so many sins you are talking about stem from discontentment.” That is very true. It seems so minor, but even the slightest bit of “I wish I…” can snowball into an overwhelming sense of discontentment that zaps our joy and leaves us so vulnerable. All of a sudden something else seems better, and our minds set themselves on it for our pleasure. Open goes the door…

Sometimes I look at how far I’ve come in my life and am tempted to despair at how much farther I must still go this side of heaven, walking through thorns and wondering how many times I will again wander away from my Lord, blinded by Satan’s schemes. You know, I am learning, though, more and more how Satan works, and I must stay by the side of my Savior, learning from Him, and sharpening my mind with the Word of God. This can be my daily prayer, then, that God would shield me with the power of His Word. Satan’s temptations may look sweet, but God will give me eyes to see through them as I seek discernment. I also fight by getting so angry at the reality of who Satan is, and how he really doesn’t even care one bit about me — probably doesn’t even know my name. He just wants to pull down the children of God and prey on us.

I think about this, and I imagine some terrible man trying to get my children to eat candy that is poison, just to hurt them. I imagine that he doesn’t even care who they are, and if he does find out their names, it is just to convince them to trust him. I imagine their tender eyes willingly following, and then I imagine them choking. The thought of this makes me so angry, and I think of how Satan deals with believers in the exact fashion. It’s disgusting.

Well, on with the quotes from Brooks:

Device (2) - By painting sin with virtues’ colours. Satan knows that if he should present sin in its own nature and dress, the soul would rather fly from it than yield to it; and therefore he presents it unto us, not in its own proper colours, but painted and gilded over with the name and show of virtue, that we may the more easily be overcome by it, and take the more pleasure in committing of it. Pride, he presents to the soul under the name and notion of neatness and cleanliness, and covetousness (which the apostle condemns for idolatry) to be but good husbandry (”thrift, economy”), and drunkenness to be good fellowship and riotousness under the name and notion of liberality, and wantonness as a trick of youth.

Remedy (1) - Consider, that sin is never a whit the less filthy, vile, and abominable, by its being coloured and painted with virtue’s colours.

Remedy (2) - That the more sin is painted forth under the colour of virtue, the more dangerous it is to the souls of men… The most dangerous vermin is too often to be found under the fairest and sweetest flowers…

Remedy (3) - To look on sin with that eye [with] which within a few hours we shall see it… Sin will be bitterness in the latter end, when it shall appear to the soul in its own filthy nature. The devil deals with men as the panther doth with beasts; he hides his deformed head till his sweet scent hath drawn them into his danger. Till we have sinned, Satan is a parasite; when we have sinned, he is a tyrant… Oh! therefore, look upon sin now as you must look upon it to all eternity, and as God, conscience, and Satan will present it to you another day!

Remedy (4) - Seriously to consider, That even those very sins that Satan paints, and puts new names and colours upon, cost the best blood, the noblest blood, the life-blood, the heart-blood of the Lord Jesus… It was good counsel one gave, ‘Never let go out of your minds the thoughts of a crucified Christ.’ Let these be meat and drink unto you; let them be your sweetness and consolation, your honey and your desire, your reading and your meditation, your life, death, and resurrection.

– Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices (pp. 34-38)