The Only Verse The Devil Ever Quoted

By John Stallings


I read an article recently about something that happened after a forest fire in Yellowstone National Park.

One ranger found an Eagle petrified in ashes perched statuesquely on the ground at the base of a tree. Sickened by what he saw, he knocked the bird over with a stick and three tiny chicks scurried from under their dead mother’s wings. The loving mother, keenly aware of impending disaster, had carried her offspring’s to the base of the tree and had gathered them under her wings, instinctively knowing the toxic smoke would rise. She could have flown to safety but she refused to abandon her babies. When the blaze arrived, the mother had remained steadfast and because of her willingness to die, those under the cover of her wings would live.

This story is analogous to the promise in Psalm 91:4 that- God will …cover us with His feathers and under His wings we’ll be safe.

You probably recognize the following passage as the one Satan quoted to Jesus in the wilderness;

….for it is written, He will give His angels charge over thee; and in their hands shall they bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. --Matt.4:6

Old split-foot was quoting from Psalm 91and verses 11-12 are so powerful he couldn’t resist trying to tempt Jesus with them. Obviously he failed. The fact that he only quoted this portion of scripture isn’t meant to imply that he isn’t well versed in the Word of God.

James 2:19 says; Satan believes and trembles.


I BECAME AWARE OF PSALM 91 AS A BOY.

It was my mother’s favorite chapter and the Psalm has fascinated me for years. Mom would hold her Bible close to her heart, opened to Psalm 91 when she was doing “dangerous” things like flying. I always think of her when I read the Psalm and have grown to love it as she did because of its marvelous promises.

Years ago someone was looking over letters written during World War 11 between people in the United States and their sons, brothers or sweethearts serving overseas. Almost every single letter had references to Psalm 91. Though promises of God’s protection are echoed throughout the pages of the Bible, there is no chapter that better covers His ability and desire to deliver His people than Psalm 91.

STUDY VERY, VERY CAREFULLY THE WORDING OF PSALM 91.

It gives us powerful revelation on how far God the Father can and will go to protect His own, even in the worst terror scenarios imaginable.

In verse 7, the Psalm says, A thousand shall fall at thy side & ten-thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.

It’s hard to imagine circumstances when this Psalm was written where ten-thousand at a time would be killed, but it sounds an awful lot like our day. Isn’t it comforting to know that God has promised to be a shelter or protection from danger, distress and calamity that’s so secure it’s inaccessible to your enemy? When we think of the Tsunamis, earthquakes, killer storms, pandemic, and wars we are seeing today, and the list goes on; it’s evident that we need this kind of holy “bomb shelter.” Even many unbelievers are beginning to ask if this is the end of the world.

Psalm 91 speaks of;

The “A” OF ABIDING IN GOD’S PRESENCE

The presence of God is to be our home address.

It’s important to notice that these Psalm 91 promises aren’t to everyone regardless of their lifestyle. These promises are to those who “dwell (or live) in the shelter (or secret place) of the Most High.”—verse 1. - The call is to live in the secret place-not just to have a time of prayer occasionally. We are admonished to dwell, reside, abide and stay continually in the secret place with God. Verse 9 says we’re in the “secret place” when we “make the Most High our habitation.”

It’s not actually a physical place or even a devotional activity but an attitude and decision of the heart; a direction of the spirit toward God, continually cultivating fellowship, friendship and relationship with Jesus and an inner position of faith. Doesn’t it make your heart yearn for that ever-increasing experience?

This promise is for us to abide, or rest. Not just a cessation of activity but rest for the soul in the midst of activity. It’s much like Jesus’ invitation to “take His yoke and learn from Him.” When God is your dwelling place, “there’s no place like home.”

PEOPLE CRAVE A SENSE OF SECURITY.

Everybody wants to feel more secure. So many things can go wrong in life. People are betrayed as well as grow sick and old. They have disappointment after disappointment in life. Or maybe the doctor orders tests and the report says Cancer, Parkinson’s, Heart disease or Leukemia. Maybe it’s trouble with family and people are feeling bitter, ignored and forgotten. Perhaps they’ve burned out on alcohol or drugs, or they’ve been sexually abused or physically mistreated as a child.

Though we crave security, just how much security is there in this world? Recently a local Orlando pastor, 69 years old was walking out of a Home Depot and two men in their mid-sixties called him over to their car under the pretence of asking for directions. They pointed a gun at him and forced him to take them to his bank and withdraw $2,000. Then they took him to a remote place and dumped him off. He was scared but happy to be alive. Did you notice that the crooks weren’t teenagers, they were older men? What does it say about our times when two pensioners hold up a preacher? I know some pastors who wouldn’t have had as much luck at their ATMs as this man did.

The security or protection industry is one of the fastest growing industries in North America. In homes and offices people are putting bolts on doors, and motion detectors in rooms. Alarms, cameras, and electrified fences are being used to protect persons and property.

Everywhere you go you see the stickers of all kinds on buildings saying they are protected by a certain company. Armored cars are becoming more and more popular around the world. Nuclear arms in the hands of terrorists have become a very real possibility as we now must face up to an enemy that until 9/11 most of us didn’t know we had.

To people everywhere looking for a sense of security the Psalm 91 speaks words of comfort. Comfort is one of the great themes of the Bible. God is our refuge and fortress; He is our shelter. “He will cover you with His feathers, and under His wings will you find refuge.” Ps.91:4- God makes it clear that those who abide in Him will receive His divine protection.

PSALM 91 CALLS US TO BE LIKE CHILDREN.

Most children have no burdens. They don’t go to bed at night worried about things. If they have an ache they don’t start trying to remember at what age grandpa died and what he died of. If they have a leg pain, they don’t spend time worrying if it’s a tumor or blood-clot. No, they simply lay themselves down and drift into peaceful sleep. All is generally safe and secure in their world because they’re in the safe keeping of their parents. When the parents are doing their job right, the children are able to rest secure in the knowledge that someone big and strong is in charge; someone who knows just what to do in any eventuality. As far as children are concerned, parents guard the fort all night long, checking the doors and windows, turning the temperature up or down, keeping intruders and monsters away. Parents are seen as fearless watch-dogs who always guard and protect the sheep. Under God’s wings we can be as safe as little children need and want to be.

PSALM 91 OFFERS US COMPREHENSIVE COVERAGE

Verses 3-6 say, --Surely He will deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with His feathers & under His wings shall thou trust. His truth shall be thy shield & buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day; nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor the destruction that wasteth at noonday.
Someone might ask, “If this Psalm is true, why do bad things happen to Christians? In the Tsunamis, earthquakes and hurricanes we experience, many Christians die.”

That’s true. People even die with some part of Psalm 91 on their lips. Many of the boys who were claiming these verses in wars didn’t come home alive and many who did come home were severely wounded. So what do we have here, and bunch of verses with no teeth? No way!

FOR A MOMENT LET'S LOOK AT SOME THINGS PSALM 91 DOESN'T MEAN.

It doesn’t mean we should go to sleep at night and not lock our doors. It doesn’t mean we should organize a tour and fly over to Afghanistan, with stops in Iraq, Iran & Mogadishu. It doesn’t mean that we can smoke, drink, overeat, drive like Jehu & expect God to be sure nothing bad happens to us.

God puts a divine hedge around every one of His children. If that weren’t so, the devil would kill us as soon as we become Christians. However God allows the hedge to drop sometimes for our own good to test our faith and show Himself alive in our lives. Can you imagine what we’d be like if we were carried on a silk cushion and never had a test or trial? A lack of any kind of struggle would be tantamount to destroying us. As the song says, “If we never had a problem we’d never know that God could solve them.” This is exactly what God did in Job’s life but it was for Job’s ultimate good. Also the protection of God is sometimes removed in order to discipline a disobedient Christian. But again, this is for the good of the wayward saint. - 1. Cor.5:5.

JESUS STRESSED BALANCE IN BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION.

In Matt.4:6 the devil tried to get Jesus to cast Himself down from the highest point of the temple. That’s when the devil quoted from Psalm 91; - He will give His angels charge over you, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.” Of course, being who he was, the devil sought to twist, misinterpret and misapply this verse in the life of Jesus. And Jesus, being who He was didn’t let him get by with it.

What did Jesus do? In verse 7 He said, --On the other hand it is written thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. Jesus is stressing balance where the scriptures are concerned. He says in essence, -- “yes, the Bible says that, but look what else it says.” Jesus is telling us not to act like fools and expect God to come through for us. It’s always good before we take one verse and run with it to say, O.K that’s what the Bible says here, but what other teaching is there on the subject? It’s advisable to read not only the verse before and after the one we’re considering, but also the chapter before and after the one we’re considering. This is “rightly dividing the word of truth,” and not “leaping” from an isolated passage. I believe that if I were bitten by a poisonous snake while on a mission for God like Paul on the island of Melita, (Acts 28:1-5) that God could and would spare me as He did Paul. But if I went out looking for snakes just to put God to the test, I’d have no faith at all that God would be obligated to protect me. In my opinion, that would be tempting God.

Some people are always “jumping off pinnacles” putting God to the test to come through for them. They will say, “The Lord told me to buy this or that” though they don’t have a penny. Then they claim they acted on faith trusting God to provide for them. In reality they’ve jumped off a “financial pinnacle.” If we let someone pressure us to “write a check by faith, in Jesus name,” to give to or invest in this or that, if it isn’t God, when the check bounces, it won’t bounce on Jesus’ account, it’ll bounce on ours.


THEN THERE’S THE “B” OF BELIEVING GOD.

Believing is absolutely vital to our ultimate success. We must be convinced that God will do what He said He’ll do for us no matter how circumstances might appear. The Psalmist doesn’t try to duck reality in Psalm 91. He mentions a full cornucopia of problems like “arrows, pestilence, destruction, lions, snakes, dragons and bird hunters.” These are more or less poetic words describing the dangers we all face. I understand this Psalm to say that God gives the “secret place” Christians 24/7 protection. There is no threat, seen or unseen, anticipated or unexpected which can catch God unaware and unable to protect us. When Insurance companies start to write you a policy they want to know if you’re engaging in practices like skin-diving, sky-diving or motorcycle racing before they insure you. Again, we need to exercise good judgment, but with God no matter how disproportionate the odds, He’s able to protect us and deliver us like He delivered the whole nation of Israel from Pharaoh.

There’s no better proof of this than in Exodus 7-12, when the plagues hit the Egyptians leaving the Israelites who believed God untouched. In every case the Egyptians suffered but not the Israelites.

But the Lord will make a difference between the livestock of Egypt & the livestock of Israel; so that nothing will die of all that belongs to the sons of Israel. And the Lord set a definite time saying; --Tomorrow the Lord will do this thing in the land. So the Lord did this thing on the morrow, & all the livestock of Egypt died; but of the livestock of the sons of Israel, not one died. Exodus. 9:4-6—NASB

Hail destroyed the crops, the cattle and the servants of the unbelieving Egyptians, but the Israelites weren’t harmed. (Exod.9:18-26) The first born of the unbelieving were all killed by the death angel, but those who believed God, applying the blood of a lamb to the doorposts and the lintel of their house, weren’t touched. (Ex.12.)

Another place the saint of God is safe is from the wrath of God. In vrs.7-10 we are told that those “who dwell in the secret place of the Most High” need not fear Gods wrath, which when you think about it is the most awesome danger of all.—You will only look on with your eyes, & see the recompense of the wicked. For you have made the Lord, my refuge, even the Most High your dwelling place. No evil will befall you, nor will any plague come near your tent.The wicked will reap divine wrath, which is their recompense but those who have placed their trust in God will never suffer God’s righteous wrath.

Again, this doesn’t mean that Christians will never suffer, for the preceding Psalm (Psalm 90) talks about the condition of man in this present world. We aren’t told the there isn’t a night terror, just that we don’t have to fear it. If Christians didn’t have to worry about their stocks dropping, or grocery and gas prices, if Christians didn’t have to worry about acts of terrorism; if crooks would drop dead when they pointed a gun at a Christian, our churches would be filled with people who see the church and faith as a cotton candy world, with insurance against the troubles and problems of life. When the verse says that we “won’t dash our foot against a stone,” it doesn’t mean that a saint will never stump their toe. It means that God is interested in the minute matters of our lives. We never want to be so presumptuous that we take a promise of protection and push it to an unscriptural extreme when what God is telling us is that we should live our lives fearlessly, not foolishly.

LUKE 21: 16-19 GIVES US A SURPRISING PROMISE.

Jesus tells His disciples,

--And ye shall be betrayed both by parents, & brethren & kinsfolk, & friends; & some of you shall they cause to be put to death. And ye shall be hated of all men for my names sake. BUT THERE SHALL NOT A HAIR OF YOUR HEADS PERISH.

When we follow Christ we recognize that “If we lose our lives for His sake we’ll find them.” It’s possible that we could “lose our heads for Christ without a hair of our heads being harmed.” No doubt about it, whatever we lose for Christ’s sake, in His time we’ll ultimately be more than adequately compensated.

A Christian friend of ours in Florida was shopping one mid-afternoon in a small strip-mall near her home. As she exited a store and walked out into the parking lot, she had a “senior moment” and forgot where she’d parked her car. (I hate to admit I’ve had a few of these moments.) As she stood pondering about the location of her car she was aware of a genial, smiling grey haired lady walking beside her. My friend turned around and smiled at her and when she did the stranger asked, “Honey, have you forgotten where you parked your car?” Slightly embarrassed she admitted that she had, and the stranger said, “Well I’ll just help you find it.” She persistently stayed right by her side until my friend finally found her car. As she turned around to tell the lady she’d found it and thank her for her concern, the “stranger” was nowhere to be seen; she had vanished.

A few days later she picked up her small town newspaper and read a chilling story of a pregnant young woman who was abducted from a local shopping mall. Two men had taken her to nearby woods and killed her, just to get her car. The funeral for the young woman was perhaps the saddest the little town had ever seen. Since the young lady was expecting her baby soon, they’d taken the little one and laid it on her chest in the coffin.

Our friend was further surprised to read that the abduction had taken place in the same little mall where she’d been shopping. The real shock came when she synchronized the day and time and realized that at the same time the men had been scanning that mall parking lot looking for an easy target- that was the exact moment the “strange lady” appeared to her and walked by her side until she was safe. There’s no question in my mind that was a heavenly visitor who was dispatched to protect that child of God.

BECAUSE YOU LOVE ME

In Psalm 91:14-16, not the Psalmist-- but God is doing the talking. Look at all the “I wills.”

Because he has loved me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him on high, because he has known my name. He will call upon me, and I will answer him’ I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him, and honor him. With long life will I satisfy him, and let him behold my salvation.

We aren’t safe because we “hope so” but because “God says so.” God not only promises His protection from trouble but His presence in danger. Sometimes He will “pluck us from danger” and at other times he will go through it with us. The three young Hebrew boys, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were not alone in Nebuchadnezzar’s furnace.-Daniel 3:25. And Daniel wasn’t alone in the lion’s den.-Daniel 6:22. Our Lord personally appeared to Paul one night as he was imprisoned. --Acts 23:11.

God says “because he loved me, therefore I will deliver him.” Isn’t God good to His kinfolk? God also tells us that we need to call on Him, and petition Him. Those who ask shall receive and to those who knock the door will be opened. Matt.7:7-8. -- If we recognize our peril and ask for God’s protection, we’ll get it.

THEN THERE’S THE “C” OF CONFESSION.

In Psalm 91:2, the Psalmist says, I will say of the Lord, he is my refuge & my fortress; my God, in Him will I trust.

Once we’re abiding in Christ and firmly believing His promises of protection, there’s something else for us to do. We need to open our mouths and express our faith in God’s delivering power. Not only does the Psalm 91 man believe in his heart, he opens his mouth and says of the lord--...He is my refuge & my fortress; My God, in Him will I trust.

When times of stress come, we need to stay in faith and instead of saying, “I’m catching a cold” say things like “I’m catching some healing.” The only way I know to have a believing confession like that is to stay in God’s word and be ready for all eventualities. Sometimes we think that things start going wrong, and then we grumble. The truth is, we grumble first, and then things start going wrong. As we Abide, Believe and Confess the word of God, when trouble comes we’ll be able to hear the voice of God tell us what to do.

For many years I’ve pled the blood of Jesus over my life as well as friends and family for divine protection. When we do this we’re doing in a spiritual sense what the Israelites did in reality when they applied the blood of a spotless lamb on their doorposts. I’ve missed few days doing this in the last half-century. Many Christians don’t get this kind of protection because they don’t “pray it on themselves.” The Bible says in James 4:2—……Yet ye do not have because you do not ask. We may lose this valuable protection simply because we don’t ask; it’s just as simple as that.

Plead the blood of Jesus over your body, your cars, your house and all your loved ones who don’t know how to do it for themselves. Plead the blood over the building you work in. Quote parts of these Psalms of protection to God. I’ve heard people say, “Don’t throw God’s Word up in His face, He knows what He’s said.” Wrong! He won’t take offense at it. He likes it, for He honors His word above His name and it lets Him see you’ve done your homework. Express to God that you have full faith in His Word, you are staking your eternal soul on it and that you will stand on it during any future attack on you and yours. It’s probably the most effective thing you and I can do.

It’s clear to me that God is looking for those who will enter this secret place with Him. Verse 14 says - I will set him on high because he has known mine name. That is describing someone who has entered into a special relationship with Him.

IF WE WILL ESTABLISH A GOOD, CLOSE PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD, HE’LL SET US UP ON HIGH AND OUT OF HARMS WAY.

The last verse of Psalm 91 says, “With long life I will satisfy him…..”

If I’m reading right, God will allow (secret place dwellers) to live a long life, protecting them from a plethora of dangerous evils.

This is a comforting reality because it's possible that all our landscapes changed forever with the events of the last few years.


What shall we then say to all these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? Romans 8:31


Blessings,


John