Ministries
Resources
Octavius Winslow, 1856 (edited for
today's reader by Larry E. Wilson, 2010)
Bible Verse
"For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places" (Eph. 6:12).
Devotional
What is it that Satan desires to assault? It is the work of God in the soul.
He does not raise a weapon against his own kingdom. It is his aim and his policy to keep all there undisturbed and peaceful.
But he brings his artillery to bear against the work of the Holy Spirit in the renewed heart. Not a part of this work escapes him. Every grace comes in for its share of malignant attack—but especially the grace of faith.
When, for example, a repentant and believing soul approaches Christ with lowliness and hesitancy, and with the tremulous hand of faith attempts to touch the border of his garment, or with a tearful eye looks up to his cross, then Satan assaults faith in the form of suggestive doubts about Christ's power and willingness to save. "Is Jesus able to save me? Does he have power to rescue my soul from hell? Can he blot out my transgressions? Can he redeem my life from destruction? Will he receive a sinner as vile, as unworthy, as poor as me? Does he have enough compassion, enough love, enough mercy to meet my case?" In this way Satan assails the earliest and the feeblest exercises of faith in the soul.
Does this address itself to you? Satan's great purpose is to keep you from Jesus. He will hold up to your view a false picture of Jesus' character, from which everything loving, winning, inviting, and attractive is excluded. He will suggest wrong views of Jesus' work, in which everything gloomy, contracted, and repulsive is foisted upon your mind. He will assail the atonement, questioning the compassion, and limiting the grace of Christ. He does all this to persuade you that there is no room for you in the heart which bled on Calvary. He does all this to convince you that upon that work which received the Father's seal there is not enough breadth for you to stand. All his endeavors are directed, and all his assaults are shaped, with a view to keep your soul back from Christ. It is in this way that he seeks to vent his wrath upon the Savior, and his malignity upon you.
Nor does he less assail the more mature faith of the believer. Not infrequently the sharpest attacks and the fiercest onsets are made—and made successfully—upon the strongest believers. Seizing upon powerful corruptions, taking advantage of dark providences (and sometimes of bright ones), and never allowing to escape his notice any position of influence, any usefulness, gift, or grace that could give force and success to his exploit, he is perpetually on the alert to sift and winnow God's precious wheat.
His implacable hatred of God, the deep revenge he cherishes against Jesus, his malignant opposition to the Holy Spirit, arm him for any dark design and work implicating the holiness and happiness of the believer.
Therefore we find that the histories of the most eminent saints of God, as written by the faithful pen of the Holy Spirit, are histories of the severest temptations of faith. In most of them, there was a temporary triumph of the enemy—the giant oak bent before the storm.
And even in instances where there was no defeat of faith, still there was the sharp trial of faith. The case of Joseph, and that of his illustrious antitype, the Lord Jesus, present examples of this. Fearful was the assault upon the faith of both, sharp the conflict through which both passed, yet both left the battlefield victorious. But still faith was no less really or severely sifted.
Rise, my soul, to watch and pray,
from thy sleep awaken;
be not by the evil day
unawares o'ertaken.
For the foe,
well we know,
oft his harvest reapeth
while the Christian sleepeth.
Watch against the devil's snares
lest asleep he find thee;
for indeed no pains he spares
to deceive and blind thee.
Satan's prey
oft are they
who secure are sleeping
and no watch are keeping.
Watch! Let not the wicked world
with its pow'r defeat thee.
Watch lest with her pomp unfurled
she betray and cheat thee.
Watch and see
lest there be
faithless friends to charm thee,
who but seek to harm thee.
Watch against thyself, my soul,
lest with grace thou trifle;
let not self thy thoughts control
nor God's mercy stifle.
Pride and sin
lurk within
all thy hopes to scatter;
heed not when they flatter.
But while watching, also pray
to the Lord unceasing.
He will free thee, be thy stay,
strength and faith increasing.
O Lord, bless
in distress
and let nothing swerve me
from the will to serve thee.
Therefore let us watch and pray,
knowing he will hear us
as we see from day to day
dangers ever near us,
and the end
doth impend—
our redemption neareth
when our Lord appeareth.
(Johann B. Freystein, 1697; tr. By Catherine Winkworth, 1863; alt.)
Be sure to read the Preface by Octavius Winslow and A Note from the Editor by Larry E. Wilson.
Larry Wilson is an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In addition to having served as the General Secretary of the Committee on Christian Education of the OPC (2000–2004) and having written a number of articles and booklets (such as God's Words for Worship and Why Does the OPC Baptize Infants) for New Horizons and elsewhere, he has pastored OPC churches in Minnesota, Indiana, and Ohio. We are grateful to him for his editing of Morning Thoughts, the OPC Daily Devotional for 2025.
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