The Devil’s Plan, Part Two: Stay Faithful to Truth and One Another
Small excuses can gradually pull us from the life we want with God. Keep belief, obedience, fellowship, and a willing response together.
#379 — The Devil's Plan (Pt. 2) - 4 final methods of Satan to keep hearts from the goodness of God.
Jun 16, 2025
Play the original Excel Still More episode here without leaving the article.
Notice the small excuses
We rarely drift from God by announcing that's what we plan to do. More often, we repeat a small excuse until it sounds reasonable. 'Later' and 'I don't need those people' can slowly become the way we live. Each thought may seem small enough to tolerate. Together they can weaken the habits that keep us attentive to God. The practical challenge is to recognize the drift and answer it before it becomes our normal way of living.
The Devil's Plan is a way of examining choices Scripture warns about. We aren't claiming to know Satan's private thoughts. We're asking where obedience, truth, fellowship, and timely action are being pulled apart in our own lives. They focus on recognizable choices: separating spirituality from obedience, using hypocrisy as a reason to abandon fellowship, becoming comfortable with sin, and delaying a needed response. We need belief, truth, relationships, and action working together. We need more than awareness of danger. We need a clear picture of the faithfulness worth protecting.
Keep spiritual life connected with obedience
When someone says they are spiritual but not religious, ask what they mean before deciding how to answer. Empty performance deserves correction. A sincere heart still needs the instruction Jesus gives us. Scripture plainly opposes going through motions with an unwilling heart. Yet it does not offer a relationship with God that deliberately avoids his instruction. James 1:22–27 connects hearing and doing, self-control in speech, care for the vulnerable, and remaining unstained by the world. The heart and the conduct are meant to agree.
We should ask the question about ourselves, too. Have prayer, warm feelings, or gratitude become reasons not to face a command we've been avoiding? Sincerity should make us more willing to listen to His word. Hebrews 10:23–25 connects holding our hope with encouraging one another and assembling together. Faith is personal without being self-contained. Our relationships with believers give love and encouragement concrete places to operate. The answer to empty routine is a sincere heart within faithful practice, rather than replacing revealed instruction with a private standard of what feels spiritual enough.
Tell the difference between hiding and struggling
First John 1:5–10 confronts walking in darkness and also rejects claims of sinlessness. That helps us distinguish a person hiding wrong from one confessing a struggle and asking for help. We must not protect deliberate deception simply because a person appears religious. We also must not call every imperfect believer a hypocrite. Someone confessing a wrong, seeking help, and trying to change is showing a different posture from someone intentionally hiding wrongdoing while presenting an image of righteousness. We can take sin seriously and still offer help to the person trying to leave it.
Hypocrisy causes real harm, and people hurt by it deserve more than dismissal. Address the wrong and seek trustworthy help. But another person's failure does not make Jesus less worthy of being followed. Do not dismiss that pain as merely an excuse. At the same time, another person’s wrongdoing does not make Jesus unfaithful or remove our own responsibility to follow him. Look for believers who take truth, repentance, and accountability seriously. A congregation consists of people who need the Savior, but that fact should produce humility and correction rather than permission to conceal sin. Honest struggle needs support; deliberate deception needs to be exposed and stopped.
See people honestly rather than through a label
When someone hurts us, it's easy to make their worst choice the whole description of who they are. We usually want more understanding for ourselves. Fairness requires us to examine that difference. This unequal treatment does not help us judge fairly. A lie is still wrong, and a betrayal may require a significant change in trust. Yet the wrong should be identified accurately rather than used to decide that every person associated with the offender is equally guilty or beyond any possibility of repentance.
Romans 12:17–21 calls us away from revenge and toward good. Boundaries and accountability can remain necessary. We can address an actual wrong without turning every person connected to it into another target for our anger. It doesn't require forgetting facts, placing yourself in danger, or restoring trust without evidence of change. It does require resisting the wish to repay injury with deliberate injury. Apply the same care to broad judgments about churches or groups. Address actual conduct and seek a willing response. A sweeping label may feel satisfying while preventing the more difficult work of distinguishing what happened, who is responsible, and what truth and love now require.
Don't let familiarity decide what is right
Isaiah 5:20 warns against calling evil good. Seeing something often can make it feel ordinary without changing what it is. We need to ask what repeated messages are teaching us to excuse or enjoy. Repeated entertainment, conversation, or approval may make a behavior feel normal without making it right. Christians should not assume that a familiar pattern has become harmless simply because it no longer shocks them. The standard is the Lord’s teaching, not the number of times a culture has presented the same thing attractively.
Look at particular habits instead of making a broad accusation about culture. What are you watching, laughing at, repeating, or learning to admire? The question is how those choices are shaping your own response to Scripture. Are greed, cruelty, sexual immorality, or dishonesty being presented as worthy of imitation? Not every depiction of wrongdoing is an endorsement, and discernment should be more careful than a blanket judgment about a medium. Still, if a pattern repeatedly encourages you to enjoy what Scripture condemns, recognize the concern. Romans 6:15–23 reminds us that freedom under grace does not make sin a rightful master. Genuine freedom equips us to serve righteousness rather than giving every desire a place to rule.
Respond while the opportunity is here
Sometimes we already know the right response and simply keep postponing it. Acts 2:37–41 shows convicted hearers responding through repentance and baptism. They allow the message to lead to action. Conviction matters because the Savior they have heard about deserves their willing response. Their conviction became action. The account encourages seriousness about receiving the Lord’s instruction rather than treating recognition alone as a sufficient response.
James 4:13–17 reminds us that tomorrow isn't promised. Study and counsel may still be needed. But if you already know what faithfulness asks, don't keep giving delay a more respectable name. Study, counsel, and careful planning can be necessary. The question is whether those activities are genuinely helping you respond or merely giving delay a respectable name. If the needed step is already clear, identify what can be done today. Make the call, seek the conversation, remove access to the habit, or ask for help obeying the gospel. A willing response makes use of the opportunity actually in your hands.
Show a life worth choosing
Young people need a clear picture of what we want them to choose. They need more than warnings. Let them see truthful repentance, self-control, dependable love, and a life in which following Jesus is worth the effort. Adults strengthen that picture when their own conduct agrees with their instruction. A parent who speaks about fellowship while avoiding people, or about self-control while surrendering to every irritation, makes the lesson harder to receive. Example gives the words a setting in which they can be understood.
Hebrews 3:12–14 calls for daily encouragement against sin's deceitfulness. Start by staying close enough to help. Keep the word clear, admit where you need correction, and give honest questions a patient hearing. Keep Scripture central, admit where correction is needed, and make room for conversations in which a younger person can ask honest questions. Treat the Lord’s commands as a source of faithful direction rather than as rules you mention only during conflict. We don't need to fear a hidden tactic behind every hard day. We need confidence in Christ and a willingness to follow His truth. That combination gives people a stronger reason to remain faithful than accusation or alarm alone.
Take the idea with you.
- 01What excuse has started to sound normal to you?
- 02Who needs patient support rather than a sweeping label?
- 03What right step can you take today?
Prefer listening?
The original episode player is available near the top of this article, so you can listen without leaving the page.
