“What is your only comfort in life and in death? That I am not my own but belong body and soul, in life and in death, to my faithful savior Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood; he has set me free from the tyranny of the devil…”
To whom does a man belong if he doesn’t belong to Jesus? Imagine a man coming to faith in Christ at the age of 25. To whom did he belong to before he belonged to Jesus? Did he belong to himself?
Before our house in Worthington belonged to us, it belonged to another owner. They trashed it and then lost it. The trust which took that house from those delinquent owners spent quite a bit of money restoring it. When we bought that house, the previous owners had no right to it. It no longer belonged to them. It belonged to us.
The man who comes to faith in Jesus had a previous owner just like our house. He belonged to someone before he belonged to Jesus. That owner trashed him. That owner was Satan. Once a man belongs to Jesus, Satan has the same right to him that the previous owners of our house had to our house when we bought it. He has no right.
There are plenty of people who see no point in belonging to Jesus because they don’t see that the alternative is to belong to Satan. Don’t be one of those people. There are plenty of Christians who don’t have much joy in their salvation because they don’t understand the tyranny from which they’ve been saved. Don’t be one of those Christians.
If you belong to Jesus, you don’t belong to Satan. That’s the good news. If you don’t belong to Jesus, you do belong to Satan. That’s the warning. Don’t belong to Satan. Belong to Jesus. That’s the burden of this sermon: Don’t belong to Satan. Belong to Jesus.
We will see this in two points. First: under the tyranny of Satan. Second: set free by belonging to Jesus. First: under the tyranny of Satan. Second: set free by belonging to Jesus.
We humans can grow accustomed to some pretty horrific conditions. You see this in studies of life in Nazi Germany. One such study by Hanna Arendt bears the subtitle The Banality of Evil. Evil had grown banal. Evil had become the norm. People did evil things as if they were normal. People witnessed evil things as if they were normal. Arendt writes about the, “coexistence of normality and bottomless cruelty.”
I start with this because that is the condition of humanity under the tyranny of Satan. If you tell a man that he lives under the tyranny of Satan, he will scoff at what you say because the tyranny of Satan has become normal for him. He lives under, “coexistence of normality and bottomless cruelty.” He no longer sees his situation as miserable. He doesn’t see that he lives under the tyranny of the devil.
Jesus saw it. He called Satan, “the ruler of this world.” Paul saw it. He called Satan, “the god of this age.” You live in this age. You live in this world. Do you take Satan’s tyranny seriously?
Most people don’t because they don’t take Satan seriously. They live under his tyranny as if they had no tyrant. This live under bottomless cruelty and it has become sadly normal for them. They can’t even imagine it being otherwise.
Can you recognize Satan’s tyranny? Here are five marks of this tyranny. First, this tyranny is one of lies. Jesus told the Jews that Satan, “does not hold to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” You see this in the beginning. When humanity first encountered Satan, he told a lie. At the end of the Bible, Revelation tells us that even now Satan deceives the inhabitants of the earth.
If you have ever lived under lies, you know how tyrannical they are. Imagine living under an authority who intentionally deceives you. Imagine a father who deliberately and maliciously lies to his children. Imagine a husband who habitually lies to his wife about matters big and small. Imagine the culture that would develop in that home. Imagine the culture that would develop in a workplace managed by habitual liar.
This world lives under a liar. Satan convinces people that what’s bad for them is good and that what’s good is bad for them. Satan tells impressionable young men that they would be happier as women and impressionable young women that they would be happier as men. Satan tells people that sin satisfies, and that righteousness restricts.
Now, Satan never tells humanity that he is lying. Rather, as Paul puts it, “Satan… masquerades as an angel of light.” How is it that sexual perversion is currently paraded about as virtue and that any warning against such sin is condemned as hate-speech? It is because Satan masquerades as an angel of light. The people he deceives firmly believe they are in the right. The world is deceived, and the people pay an awful cost.
Satan’s tyranny is built on lies. Second, it is aimed at murder. Jesus said, “He was a murderer from the beginning.” The aim of Satan’s first lies was murder. He wanted Adam and Eve to eat from that tree because God had promised that, “on the day you eat of it you will surely die.” The result of these temptations was that death entered the world.
You would never intentionally urge someone to make a disastrous decision. ‘Yes, I think you should leave your family to shack up with that guy you met online. “Yes, I think you would be wise to start using cocaine.” You can’t imagine saying that to someone.
It might be hard for you to imagine such malice but here’s an example right from the news. Michelle Carter was recently convicted on acting with criminal intent in the death of her boyfriend Conrad Roy. She sent him text messages encouraging him to commit suicide. He said that he wanted to kill himself but then he decided not to. She sent him a message saying, “I just don't think you really want this. You just keep pushing it off to another night and say you’ll do it but you never do.” She told him, “I think your parents know you’re in a really bad place. I’m not saying they want you to do it, but I honestly feel like they can accept it.” The day before he killed himself, he expressed hesitation, but she texted him saying, “You're just making it harder on yourself by pushing it off, you just have to do it.”
What’s why he tempted them. That is satanic. She was acting like Satan. Satan wanted Adam and Eve dead. He wanted Jesus dead. Jesus told the Pharisees that they were acting like Satan because they were trying to kill him. He told them, “you are looking for a way to kill me, because you have no room for my word… You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning.” The ruler of this world wants people dead. If you live like the world you had better wake up.
Satan’s tyranny is filled with lies. It is aimed at murder. Third, it is full of blasphemy. We see Satan blaspheming in the Garden. He took the name of the Lord in vain. “Did God really say?” We see the beast blaspheming in Revelation. John writes, “It opened its mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander His name and His dwelling place and those who live in heaven.” From the first book of Scripture to the last we see Satan blaspheming.
Satan takes God’s name in vain to destroy God’s good name. It should come as no surprise that so many people assume that God doesn’t care about them. It should come as no surprise that so many people assume God is petty and vindictive. It should come as no surprise that so many people prefer lies about God to the God revealed in the Bible. Satan is running a smear campaign against God.
If you know God, you know that He isn’t petty and vindictive. He is merciful. He is generous. He is wise. If you know God, you know that the God so many in our culture hate bears no resemblance to the God you know. You should see the work of Satan in all this.
Satan blasphemes God because he wants the worship that belongs to God. Revelation 13:4, “People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?”
Have you ever known someone who can’t seem to bear hearing compliments about anybody else? Some people take anything positive you say about anyone else as an offense against them. Satan is offended by any good word about God. He thinks he is more worthy than God and he hates what we do in this sanctuary. He hates the worship of God because he thinks he deserves it.
It isn’t surprising that those who live under Satan’s tyranny cannot give glory to God. If you can’t give glory to God, if you find God unimpressive or irrelevant to you, recognize that there is something spiritual going on there. If you don’t belong to Jesus, you belong to Satan.
Satan’s tyranny is filled with lies. It is aimed at murder. It is full of blasphemy. Fourth, it is marked by the fear of death. Hebrews 2 tells us that Jesus came to, “break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil—and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death.”
Satan wants people to live in fear until they die. The most potent horror movies aren’t filled with death. They are filled with the fear of death. The Friday the Thirteenthseries didn’t work because people were murdered. It worked because there was so much suspense until people were murdered. Those movies aren’t only about death. They are about the fear of death.
Now people who live under Satan’s tyranny don’t act as if they live in horror movies, but they are afraid of death. Some of them deal with it by avoiding any talk of death. Others deal with it by trying to make some meaning in their lives because they fear death will make their lives meaningless. Satan has successfully made mankind afraid of the one certainty each person will face - death. Constant fear is the hallmark of any tyrannical government and fear of death is a hallmark of Satan’s tyranny. It is so common that people don’t find it strange. That’s a successful tyranny.
First, Satan’s tyranny is filled with lies. Second, Satan’s tyranny is aimed at murder. Third, Satan’s tyranny is full of blasphemy. Fourth, Satan’s tyranny is marked by a fear of death. Fifth and finally, Satan’s tyranny makes people slaves to sin.
This is why Paul told the church, “you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.” Slavery to sin is a mark of the satanic.
Slavery to sin is horrible for any number of reasons, but let’s just focus on the fact that it makes life miserable. God is clear that, “the way of the transgressor is hard.” People who can’t not sin will be miserable. People with a guilty conscience are miserable. People who have no peace with God are miserable. People who are enslaved to what makes them miserable are miserable. “The way of the transgressor is hard.”
Look at the situation with pity. These poor people can’t stop doing what brings them shame. They can’t stop incurring guilt. This is a sad situation. That’s part of why I’m preaching right now. I’m not doing it for a job. I’m doing it because this is one of the means God uses to rescue people from that tyranny.
Do you recognize the tyranny of Satan in this world? Do you see the rampant deceit under which so many people live? Do you see this culture of death for what it is? Do you see how these people misunderstand the Father of Jesus? Do you see how they live in the fear of their impending death? Do you see them not just as fellow sinners but as something more pitiable, as slaves of sin?
What is so sad is that this is all so normal. Men, women, and children God made in His image are accustomed to it. Most don’t even know they need to be set free. If you have been saved from this, you know that it isn’t because of you. You don’t think that you are any better than the people still living under tyranny. You are thankful you’re free.
Or perhaps you aren’t free. Perhaps you’ve heard these marks of tyranny and you’ve recognized your own condition. You didn’t see your situation as dire when you entered this sanctuary this morning, but now you do. You need to be set free and that’s our second point: set free by belonging to Jesus.
It’s not surprising that the first one to hear about the coming Christ was Satan. Moments after all this tyranny which we’ve been studying began, God cursed Satan saying, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”
That was the first prophecy about Jesus. God promised that a man born of a woman would defeat Satan. If you take Satan’s tyranny seriously, the question of whether it can be escaped and if so, how is very relevant. No civilization has been able to do much more than mitigate the worst effects of Satan’s tyranny. That’s why God sent His Son. “The Son of God was revealed for this purpose: to destroy the works of the devil,” writes John. That’s the promise of the Garden. You can’t free yourself. I’ll send someone to do it.
It is no coincidence that records of Jesus’ ministry contain so many exorcisms. Jesus explained these exorcisms saying, “When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe. But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up his plunder.”
Satan is the strong man. Humans are the plunder. Jesus came to overpower him. The Son of God was revealed for this purpose: to destroy the works of the devil. That’s why Jesus said, “if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” In his very first sermon Jesus said, God, “has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free.” Hebrews tells us that Jesus came to break the power of the devil.
The Father saw the pitiable conditions of Satan’s tyranny and He loved us by sending His son. As Paul put it, “because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.” This is why the Catechism says, “He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.”
You are set free by belonging. Remember how the Catechism starts, “I am not my own but belong body and soul, in life and in death, to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.” Belonging to Jesus is part of being set free from the tyranny of the devil.
Jesus doesn’t set you free so that you can belong to yourself instead of the devil. He sets you free so that you can belong to himself instead of the devil. Now belonging to Jesus is nothing like belonging to the devil. He doesn’t lie to you. In fact, it is impossible for him to lie. He doesn’t mean you harm. He has come that you might life and have it to the full. He doesn’t give God a bad name so you find it hard to trust Him. He shows you what God is like. He doesn’t enslave you by fear of death the way the devil does. He died so that you can live. He doesn’t enslave you to sin like the devil. He puts his Spirit in you to put sin to death.
No man who has ever been set free from Satan recoils at the thought of belonging to Jesus. The man who has been set free by Jesus is like the demoniac after his exorcism. The demoniac in the gospels was afflicted by a legion of demons and when Jesus drove them out, the man begged Jesus to let him come along as a disciple. He wanted to belong to Jesus. People who have been set free by Jesus want to belong body and soul in life and in death to their faithful Savior Jesus Christ.
Now Satan won’t tell you that you belong to him if you don’t belong to Jesus. He will talk to you about the freedom of sin. He won’t tell you that you are his. He will do what he did in the garden. He will lie to you and then impose tyranny. Jesus is upfront about the fact that you must belong to him. He tells you to lose your life for his sake. Unlike Satan, he doesn’t hide this business of belonging. He puts it front and center. What’s ironic is that those who want the freedom Satan promises wind up slaves and those who are happy to belong to Jesus wind up free. That’s what Jesus said, “whoever wants to save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
If you have come to Jesus, do live like you’re free? One of the great tragedies of the post-Civil War era was sharecropping. These former slaves were legally free, but due to a whole host of social and economic reasons they continued to work for their former masters as if they were slaves. Many Christians live the same way. Jesus has freed them from Satan’s lies but they continue to believe the lies. They continue to get stuck in unhelpful questions like, ‘am I worthy of God’s love?’ They regularly side with Satan against themselves. They find they can’t trust God as a Father. They believe that Jesus has suffered the death they deserve, but they still fear death as if Jesus’ death did nothing for them. They are no longer slaves to sin, but they often submit to it as if they were.
If this is you, Paul’s words to the Galatians in their situation are applicable in your situation as well, “It is for freedom that Christ has set you free.”
Abolitionists who died fighting for the freedom of those slaves weren’t honored by the sharecropping system. It was for freedom that they set those slaves free. Jesus isn’t honored when the people he died to purchase live like slaves of Satan. It is for freedom that he set us free.
If you are a Christian, you have been set free for freedom. Maybe you grew up in the covenant and you haven’t seen the depth of Satan’s tyranny. You haven’t lived under his deceit. You haven’t seen how malicious Satan can be. You haven’t bought into his blasphemies about God. You’ve never lived as if death were the end of life. You’ve never wondered if you could ever stop sinning. Praise Jesus. Literally, you should praise Jesus that you haven’t experienced that tyranny. You didn’t experience it because you belonged to Jesus.
If that’s you, remember that there is a world full of people made in the image of God who live under the tyranny of the devil daily. The worst part is they don’t even see it as abnormal. They are without hope and without God. They must belong to Jesus or they will stay under the devil. That’s part of why this church exists. We don’t just exist for our own benefit.
If you are here this morning and you don’t belong to Jesus, recognize where you live. You live under tyranny. Recognize that so many of the people around you this morning don’t. They aren’t more worthy than you, but they are different. They aren’t deceived. They don’t live as if they deserve malicious hatred. They know God and they aren’t afraid of Him. They aren’t afraid that death will be the end of them. They aren’t enslaved to the sorts of sins that are enslaving you. They’ve been set free.
You can be set free too. Belong to Jesus. The alternative is belonging to Satan. Satan doesn’t want you to consider this matter. God does. That’s why He sent His Son. That should tell you all you need to know. Amen.