James 4:7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
Carl Armerding wrote a funny story in Moody Monthly, about his experience at the zoo. “As I stood there,” he said, “an attendant entered the cage through a door on the opposite side. He had nothing in his hands but a broom. Carefully closing the door, he proceeded to sweep the floor of the cage.”
He observed that the worker had no weapon to ward off an attack by the beast. In fact, when he got to the corner of the cage where the wildcat was lying, he poked the animal with the broom. The wildcat hissed at him and then lay down in another corner of the enclosure.
Armerding remarked to the attendant, “You certainly are a brave man.” “No, I ain’t brave,” he replied as he continued to sweep. “Well, then, that cat must be tame.” “No,” came the reply, “he ain’t tame.” “If you aren’t brave and the wildcat isn’t tame, then I can’t understand why he doesn’t attack you.” Armerding said the man chuckled, then replied with an air of confidence, “Mister, he’s old — and he ain’t got no teeth.”
Such is the devil in our lives when we realize that God is for us! We should be like the attendant. He knew that cat couldn’t hurt a fly. Satan will make a big ruckus, fussing and growling all he wants but we need to keep our eyes focused on our Lord.
Are you being growled at today? The enemy would love nothing more than to make us feel powerless against him — but “he ain’t got no teeth” next to our Lord! Let’s turn to God and put our trust in Him. If God is for us, who can be against us?!
Copyright 1999-2026 Worthy Devotions. This devotional was originally published on Worthy Devotions and was reproduced with permission.
How to display the above article within the Worthy Suite WordPress Plugin.
[worthy_plugins_devotion_single_body]Our true value was expressed at the cross of Messiah, where God valued us according to the redemptive work of His only Son. In the light of our identity in Christ our value is inestimable. We are worthy in Him. Much of our spiritual battle, however, is about maintaining and expressing our true identity and worth, day by day.
Recently, Israel announced it was expanding the Pool of Siloam, which they estimated was about an acre and a half in size. The Pool of Siloam is where Jesus sent the blind man to wash [John 9:6-7] and where he regained his sight. Some scholars believe this was where the first 3,000 souls were baptized upon hearing the gospel in Acts 2. [Acts 2:41]
As we enter a New Year, remember the one constant true for everyone, rich or poor, male or female: each of us is given 8,760 hours in a Gregorian calendar year. That is, 1,440 minutes a day, or 525,600 minutes a year. Sounds like a lot, yet have you noticed how time flies these days?
Persecution and serious trials were regular fare for the early followers of Messiah. Apostle Paul who was stoned and left for dead [Acts 14:19] was not exaggerating when he affirmed, "Through much tribulation we must enter the kingdom of God."
Throughout the history of the modern state of Israel, there have been accounts of angelic interventions protecting Israeli soldiers in the midst of intense warfare. One instance recounted by an Israeli military historian after the 1973 Yom Kippur war, describes an Israeli soldier in the Sinai taking captive an entire Egyptian column and leading them to where the Israeli troops were. The Egyptian commander was asked why he and his men gave themselves up to the lone Israeli soldier. He responded with surprise, ”One soldier? There were thousands of them.”
Our life, the life of faith, is pervaded by paradox. Life faces us with apparently irreconcilable conditions and realities that we struggle to understand and integrate, sometimes throughout an entire lifetime. The Lord himself exemplifies this reality in his dual identity as the expressed image of God and a fully human male who suffered the worst consequences of sin...without deserving them. We live daily within the paradox of God's perfect holiness and our fundamental human imperfection, constantly needing to accept His grace as we strive toward His perfection.
During 1941 the United States and Japan were in negotiations to resolve their difference as the rest of the world was at war. The special delegation of Japanese ambassadors, ostensibly sent on this “peace” mission, arrived shortly before the massive surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in which 2,403 Americans were killed, 1143 were wounded, eighteen ships were sunk or grounded, and 300 planes destroyed or damaged. President Franklin Roosevelt called it a “date which will live in infamy.”