NASHVILLE (BP) — This weekly Bible study appears in Baptist Press in a partnership with LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention. Through its Leadership and Adult Publishing team, LifeWay publishes Sunday School curricula and additional resources for all age groups.
This week’s Bible study is adapted from the MasterWork curriculum.
Bible Passages: 2 Corinthians 10:3-6; Ephesians 6:16
Discussion Questions:
— What are the fiery darts of the devil? To which are you most susceptible?
— How can one seemingly random thought go from being a toehold, to a foothold, to a stronghold for the devil?
— How might an accountability partner help you deflect flaming arrows the devil sends to your mind?
Food for thought:
Every believer knows the experience of confronting the fiery darts or flaming arrows of our enemy, the evil one. While we might not always perceive that wicked dragon as the one who has hurled the missiles that come at us, we have of a certainty felt their sharpened tips and been burned by their destructive heat. What relevancy then does Charles Stanley’s session, “Extinguishing Fiery Darts,” hold for us!
Stanley begins by helping us recognize and understand these fiery darts. “In the spiritual,” Stanley said, “flaming arrows refer to the bombardment of the mind with thoughts, impressions and impulses that are contrary to God’s purposes.”
The devil draws back his deadly bow and skillfully targets an arrow of ungodly thought at the bullseye of a believer’s heart. That wily serpent knows each of us all too well to waste his efforts on generic mass mailings. No, he selects his ammo with care, knowing which arrow will have the greatest chance of destructive success with each person’s heart.
While the thoughts he flings into our minds are not sin in and of themselves, each has been personally selected for me and for you to most provocatively tempt us to savor the thought, to entertain and nurture it so that we follow its deceptive path into sin. At that point we have given our spiritual foe a toehold into our lives.
If we continue to allow the poison of those misdirected thoughts to strengthen and spread, we surrender more and more of ourselves to him. Next there’s a foothold and if left unchecked eventually a stronghold, so that Satan has deeply rooted himself in our minds. But with God’s help, we can bring our thoughts into submission to Christ.
We cannot protect ourselves from the fiery arrows on our own. Clothed with Jesus Christ, we can extinguish those flames before they catch hold and engulf our minds and lives. But we must realize the danger ingrained within the burning barb from the time it enters our minds and thoughts and move quickly to extinguish it with the Living Water.
MasterWork
MasterWork is an ongoing Bible study curriculum based on works from a variety of renowned authors and offers pertinent, practical messages that adults will find uplifting and enriching. The list of authors and their books to be studied in upcoming months can be found at www.lifeway.com/masterwork.
Other ongoing Bible study options for all ages offered by LifeWay can be found at LifeWay.com/SundaySchool or ordered at LifeWay Christian Stores.
