I suspect that we don’t do much serious thinking as to why our lives are the way they are.  Questions may cross our minds from time to time, but we don’t seem to wonder as to what might be behind it all.  It’s as though many of us have forgotten that life is all about cause and effect.

Nothing that happens to us just happens.  Everything has a cause.  I believe you could even go so far as to say that everything that happens to us is not only caused by something, but what happens will itself cause something else to happen.  Something makes something else happen; and when it happens, how we react to it makes something else happen.  The Bible says it plainly and simply in Galatians 6:7:  “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.”  Another text reminds us that life is a process:  “The earth beareth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear (Mark 4:28).

I am convinced that, while we are going through a lot of difficulty these days and are desperately trying to get out of the troubles we find ourselves in, we are doing little thinking about what is getting us into the trouble in the first place.  And even if we do think about it, we are inclined to presume that it is the fault of someone else.

It is said that life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we react to it.  I really believe this is true.  I will say right here at the beginning that I believe our lives are to a large extent what we make them; and so I have entitled this sermon, “Deliver us from Evil.”

I happen to live in Florida.  Living in the Sunshine State has a lot of advantages.  I don’t need to tell you how nice it is to have Thanksgiving dinner in the back yard.  Here in Florida, believe it or not, we plant our flower and vegetable gardens in the fall and winter.  Spring comes in February and March, and then things are absolutely beautiful for several months.

That is the good news.  Do you want to hear the bad news?  Beginning the first of June things really begin to heat up.  Not only does the temperature rise, but the humidity comes in.  And it stays hot and humid into the month of October.  Another downside is that from June until November is hurricane season.  Since Hurricane Andrew, those of us who live in Florida have never been the same.  It was one horrific storm.  I am not saying that you shouldn’t come to live in Florida, but you should know that living anywhere has its trade‑offs.

A friend of mine who lives not far from us bought a home a year or two ago.  It is a nice place and, like so many homes in Florida, has a swimming pool in the back yard.  My friend and his wife were all excited about the house, inasmuch as they had never owned a home before.

Well, one day he called me up and told me that he noticed there was some rotting wood around one of the outside windows.  He checked it out and discovered that he had been invaded by termites.  He ripped out all the infected wood and applied a poison; then he replaced the trim.  I don’t think a month passed until he called me again to say that he had found another infestation of termites, this time in the trim around the garage door.  This damage was more extensive.  But the worse was yet to come.

When he told his neighbors what he had discovered, the owner across the street told him that he himself had suffered more than $20 thousand dollar’s worth of damage to his home.  Not only that, but another neighbor just up from my friend’s house on the same side of the street also had to make major repairs because of termite damage.

I don’t want to bore you with this story, but I think you will soon see that what I am talking about has to do with a lot of things that may be happening to us.  Anyway, we discovered that my friend’s entire community has houses that are stuccoed on the outside.  You might wonder how, if the houses are stuccoed, the termites get in.  The answer:  The houses are not stuccoed over cement block but over a wood frame.

And here comes the clincher.  The stucco runs clear down into the ground.  This means that the termites find a small air pocket and begin to thread their way in under the stucco.  After about a foot or so they arrive at the wood; and--Voila!--there is dinner!

I don’t know if you are aware of it or not but the most common termites make their homes in the ground.  Termites must have moisture in order to survive.  This means that they don’t march out in the open, where they would find conditions too dry.  They travel only as fast as they can construct mud tunnels.  This has its advantages for the home owner, because it means that, if we can build the house above the ground on a foundation of blocks and don’t run the stucco into the ground, we can see when the termites begin to build their mud tunnels up the cinder block.

By now you might be thinking, That does it, Florida is out for me.  Really, I am not telling you this to discourage you from moving to Florida.  This sermon is not about where we choose to live, as you will discover shortly, but how we choose to live.  You see, life is a lot like termites.  Things, even big important things, don’t tend to happen all at once.  And even when something big happens, there are lots of factors that lead up to it.  This is what the Bible means when it says that whatever we sow we are going to reap.  And, sadly, not only will we reap what we sow, but what we do will always affect the life of someone else.  You know the old saying that no man, or woman for that matter, is an island.

No one “falls” into sin.  For that matter, no one “falls” into righteousness either.  Life is not so much about big things as it is about all the little things.  We talk about the importance of a big decision.  But really, a big decision is always the result of a lot of little ones.  I remember when I was in church school we used to play a game called, “Mother, May I?”  The object is to see who could get from Point A to Point B the fastest—with the permission of Mother.  The leader [Mother] would tell a player that he could take, say, five baby steps.  Before taking the steps, the player was required to ask, “Mother, may I?”  If the player was too anxious to move forward and forgot to ask that question, he or she had to go back to the starting point.

Life is about little steps.  I am glad it is that way.  To get to a good place--or a bad place—a person has to take lots of steps.  This is good because it means that, if you find yourself talking steps in the wrong direction, there is generally time to back out.  Though we live life one step at a time, we must never forget that every step we take is leading us somewhere.

When we pray, “Deliver us from evil,” we ought to do some serious thinking to discover whether or not we are running, walking, or crawling in the right direction.  The point is, we will end up where we are heading.

I was in office worship one day and the one leading out asked if there were any prayer requests.  One of the members of the staff mentioned that they had recently heard that some of their near relatives were about to go on a vacation and had said openly that they hoped their children could meet someone while they were on the trip and have an affair.  With tears in their eyes, the staff member expressed how disappointed they were, inasmuch as these relatives were, in their words, “practicing Christians.”  I wonder how it could be said that people who think that way are practicing Christians?  Professed Christians, maybe, but not practicing Christians.  David was not a practicing Christian when he committed adultery with Bathsheba.

It has always seemed strange to me that whenever we talk about David’s sin we are often quick to point out that he was a man after God’s own heart.  Friend, David was no more a man after God’s own heart when he committed adultery with Bathsheba and then murdered her husband than the couple who hope their children will have an affair are practicing Christians.

We do ourselves and God a disfavor, and even become misleading, when we don’t tell the rest of the story when we speak about David.  Though later he was surely repentant and God forgave him, the Lord did not halt the law of cause and effect.  Even though David repented from that time on, the quality of the rest of his life was downhill all the way.  We need to remind ourselves of this so that we don’t continue to make the same mistakes.  Although God is gracious, merciful, long-suffering, and forgiving, this does not rule out the great law that whatever we sow we will reap and that there is a reason why we are were we are today.

We pray “Deliver us from evil,” and so we should.  But as we pray we should be asking God for wisdom to avoid evil.  I don’t want to sound disrespectful, but it seems as though many of us are clueless as to what evil is; and if we do know what it is, we don’t seem to understand how to keep out of it.  I am allergic to poison ivy.  The reason I’m not troubled with it anymore is that I have learned what it looks like and so I stay away from it.

I was talking with a person who was just terminating their second marriage.  I remember that, while their marriage was still in place, the person would say how sad it was that their spouse was not a Christian and how they wished they could be united spiritually.  By and by the marriage was over and the person resumed dating again.  Guess what type of person they began dating?  I just don’t understand.

On a trip to Germany to fill some speaking appointments, my wife and I spent a week at a lay retreat which was held out in the countryside.  This brought back many pleasant memories for me.  When I was a pre-teen, my folks rented a house for us in the country, and I have never forgotten the sights, sounds, and smells of country life.

While there at the retreat, my wife and I would sometimes take a walk in the countryside.  The farm next to the retreat center kept horses in a pasture with an electric fence.  I am sure you have seen an electric fence.  It may look like a regular white twine fence but, of course, it had wire imbedded in it that was electrified.  Interesting how those strands of thin wire kept those large and powerful horses in the pasture!  Once the horses discovered that the line shocked them, they stayed away from the fence.  Too bad we humans are not as smart as horses.  So many times we, as it were, take hold of the wire and then pray, “Lord, deliver us from evil.”

If you don’t mind, I would like to tell you more about what it is like to live in Florida.  Every month my wife reminds me to throw insecticide granules around the edge of the foundation of the house.  This creates a mine field, as it were, for bugs to have to cross in order to get into our house.  This barrier seems to be effective for several months, because three or four times a year Betty will tell me that she is starting to see bugs around again.

I could go on and on, but this sermon is not supposed to be a handyman’s special.  It is much more serious than that.  Nevertheless, we do a lot of things to keep our houses in good repair.  We have them insured, repaired, and all the rest.  But I am afraid many of us are not nearly as careful with our homes.  Our homes are not so much about buildings as they are about families.  Yet our families are influenced by the environment of our houses.  In a moment you will see what I am talking about.

One day some years ago, one of the secretaries in the office asked me to return a phone call.  A man had called the office asking if there was anyone at the office who knew about demon possession.  When I first heard what he was asking, I figured he was probably planning to give a program on demon possession at his church and wanted someone to do help him with it.

I took his number and returned his call.  Much to my surprise, I discovered that he was not planning a program at church; rather, his fifteen-year-old daughter was hanging around with skin heads and devil worshipers.  Somehow one of them began putting curses on the others, and so far two of the young people had committed suicide.  The man begged me to come and have special prayer for his daughter, because he had heard that she now had a curse on her.  This was a serious matter.  People had died.  So I telephoned a number of my friends around the country and asked them to pray for me as I prepared to go and visit the family.

When I arrived at the house, the young girl was not there.  But that was just as well, because I figured that I needed to get acquainted with her father first.  He invited me into the family room.  We sat down and began to talk together.  I felt that before we did anything else I needed to know where this dad was coming from spiritually.  I expressed to him that I didn’t see how we could pray that God would deliver his daughter from the evil influences that surrounded her unless he as husband and father was exercising his God-appointed task of being the spiritual leader in the home.

When we previously talked on the phone, he had mentioned something about his daughter’s room.  So after we had talked for a while, I asked if I could see her room.  As we walked down the hall we passed the room of his ten-year-old son.  On the walls of the boy’s room were several Rambo-type posters.  I saw them out of the corner of my eye but didn’t say anything.  It was becoming evident that there was a problem with the environment of this home.

In a few more steps we were at his daughter’s room, and we walked in the door.  It was different, to say the least.  The trim in the room was painted black and the walls were painted a weird color.  On the walls were posters of wicked rock bands; in the middle of one wall was a poster of a goat’s head, which is a sign of the devil.  On the shelves were numerous books on the occult.  I took it all in; then we left the room.

You might not agree, but I believe that parents are responsible for what goes on or doesn’t go on between the four walls of the house.  Further, I believe that our children’s rooms don’t belong to them but are, if you please, loaned to them for the duration.  This means that the child is not free to create an environment in his or her room that is not compatible with the environment of the rest of the house.  Though we should be respectful of our children, I do not believe that what goes on in the child’s room is off limits to the parents.

Back in the family room, I frankly told the man that I didn’t think it would do any good to pray for his daughter until he had done something about the room.  I cited the case of Gideon, who, before he could deliver Israel from its enemies, had to destroy the idols of his father.  I told him I believed that before his daughter could be helped he must overthrow and cleanse the room.  The poor girl didn’t have a chance to escape the devil’s clutches the way things were.  She hung around with her occult friends all day, and when she came home to her room it was simply more of the same.  Do you see what I mean?

Before I left that night, we prayed together, but it was not so much a prayer for his daughter as it was for him to recognize his duty as husband and father to be responsible for the spiritual atmosphere of the home.  I am glad to say that he made a re-commitment to the Lord that night.

He called me some days later.  He told me that he decided he would cleanse the room.  I had warned him in advance that his daughter would not take well to it and might even attack him physically and run away from home.  As it turned out, she did both.  At first she just watched as he painted out the black trim.  But when he started taking down the posters, she flew into a rage.  She got her things together and left home.  Thank God she wasn’t gone long.  She returned after a few hours.  He told me they sat down on the porch together and talked until two in the morning.

I saw this man a few months later, and he told me that from that moment on things began to look up.  The father had taken his rightful role as spiritual leader and protector of the family.  Now the girl had a safe place to come home to.

Good housekeepers go to great lengths to keep the house clean, and those who are into home decorating do marvelous things with furniture and accessories.  But sometimes a house that is beautiful with furniture and accessories can be a place where the spiritual atmosphere is absolutely toxic.

Some time ago I received a phone call from a person who attended some meetings I conducted.  This sister told me about her friend who was a private-duty nurse.  The nurse cared for a young boy who was born with what amounts to childhood Lou Gehrig’s Disease.  The child was helpless and needed to be cared for twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

The child communicated with its parents by pointing to letters on an alphabet board.  The nurse told my friend that a few weeks earlier the child had told his parents that he was being harassed by something called Karma.  He said that Karma would talk to him and tell him what to do.  Some days the child would cry all day, and when the parents would ask him why, he would say it was because of Karma.  The child’s condition began to deteriorate.

One day the nurse told the mother about her church and suggested that maybe she needed to have special prayer for the child.  Thus, my friend called me.  I told her that she should make contact with the mother and try to find out more about what was going on.  This she did.  My friend asked if we ought not go to the house and have a special deliverance prayer for the child.  I told her I would but that I would like to meet the parents first.

My friend arranged to have the mother come to my house so that we could get acquainted. The child’s mother was a very nice person.  She was not a church-going person but was gracious and kind.  But she was becoming desperate and wanted to do whatever it took to bring relief to the problem at home.  As in the case of the young girl whose friends were into witchcraft, I felt that it would not be timely to simply go and pray for the child until we first understood where the parents were in all of this.

After a frank discussion, we had prayer and agreed that on a certain day we would go and have prayer for the child.  I told the mother that it was important that she talk with her husband and that they both understand that, whatever they expected the Lord would do for the child, they must be willing that He do for them, also.

When we arrived at the house, we knocked on the door.  I was glad to find that the husband was home.  They welcomed us, and we sat down and began to talk.  Now, I suppose we could have gone directly to the child’s room and begun to pray, “In the name of Jesus we command the evil spirits to depart.”  That was an option, but it might well have lead to some even worse complications as far as the child was concerned.

Instead, we talked a while with the parents about spiritual things.  We discovered that understandably they were under heavy stress.  They both worked, and the man worked in a dangerous part of town.  Apparently, we would learn later, the couple was not getting along, and the atmosphere in the home was deteriorating.  We shared with them that, if the child were to be healed from his spiritual distress, the home would have to be sanitized, as it were.  That is, the parents themselves would need to make a commitment to the Lord.  If the child were to be delivered from evil, then the parents must make a way for the Lord to do it.

And so before we went in to see the child, we knelt down and committed the parents to the Lord.  After that I asked to go in and see the child.  There he lay, totally dependant on life support systems.  He acknowledged us and even smiled as we greeted him.

I will say here that the child was enrolled in special education.  A teacher would come several times a week and help the child to learn as much as he could.  In the bedroom was a television set and a bookcase full of videos, most of which were cartoons.  The nurse explained to us that Karma seemed to have the most influence with the child when he watched certain cartoons.

We don’t happen to have a television in our home, but I have been told something of the cartoons that are being watched by children these days.  It occurs to me that, although we say cartoons are for children, the subject matter of these cartoons are not created by the innocent minds of children but by minds which are mature and experienced in the ways of evil.

What we call cartoons may be anything but childish.  Cartoons today can be full of violence, implied sensuality, and spiritism.  There are cartoons that are full of murder and mayhem.  Many of the cartoon characters are more closely related to the appearance of demons than to people supposedly made in the image of God.

And so to occupy this child’s time, he was being exposed day after day to cartoons that were full of spiritualism.  It was no wonder that Karma was beginning to make his life even more miserable!

It became evident that this child could not be relieved from oppression until the environment contributing to it had been cleaned up.  Why set out rat poison if we have not plugged up the holes through which they are coming in?  Why pray, “Deliver us from evil” if in fact we are bringing it home from the video store?  My friends, do you hear what I am saying?

There is probably no single influence that is doing more damage to our homes as is the influence of television.  While we pray, “Deliver us from evil,” we might be needlessly exposing ourselves to nearly every kind of evil there is.  Satellite television now literally provides something for everybody.  We are not thinking clearly.  If we pray “Deliver us from evil,” this must not only be a cry for protection by the Almighty but must also represent a commitment on our part that we will not unnecessarily expose ourselves to sin in any form.

Jesus prayed that God would, for the time being, not take us out of the world, but that He would keep us from the evil.  While we are in this world, as sons and daughters of God, we are not to be of this world.  I am sorry to say that in many instances we are trying to have it both ways and as a result are paying the consequences.

We seem to have forgotten that whatever we sow we reap.  We seem to have forgotten that by beholding we become changed.  In plain language that means that we become like the stuff we look at.  When I talk to children I sometimes take with me a mirror and a sponge.  I explain to them that, like it or not, every human being is like a mirror and a sponge--a mirror in that we reflect what we see and a sponge in that we soak it up.

How can we be pure in heart if we are watching unmarried couples simulate sex acts on television or on video?  How can we pray that the Lord will help us be kind and patience, gentle, and all the rest, if we are watching the fits of rage and hate that is expressed on the screens?

For years our church prohibited us from going to the theater.  Then television brought the theater into our homes.  Rather than taking a stand in regard to television, the common position has been to throw in the towel as far as going to the theater is concerned.  There is even a movement in some church organizations to take the office staff out to a dinner theater for one occasion or another.

We continue to mouth the words, “Deliver us from evil,” while we are in effect sticking our heads into the mouth of the dragon, the enemy of our souls.  You and I may not be able to control what goes on in our neighbor’s house, but we are definitely responsible for what goes on in ours.  We may complain about the kinds of television programming being produced, but we have no justification before our holy God as to why we watch what is being produced.

Because we have become careless in this way, it is no wonder that in many cases our homes are not places where the angels love to dwell but are just the opposite.  We have created an environment where there is bitterness, dissension, impurity, and all the rest.  And to make matters worse, these are homes of so-called practicing Christians who are dutifully praying, “Deliver us from evil.”

There is no doubt that there are many weird things going on in the church these days.  But these weird things are only the sum of the weird things that are going on in our homes.  There will be no transformation in our church until there are transformations in our homes.  And there will be no transformation in our homes until there are transformations in the lives of the members of the family, particularly those upon whose shoulders God has placed the responsibility not only to pay the rent but to keep the children free of the evil influences of the world.

We must not forget that the last message to the world before the coming of Jesus has to do with the home.  Malachi 4:5-6 states, “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: and He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the children to the fathers less I come and smite the earth with a curse.”

For some reason we have forgotten, or at least have ceased to recognize, that life is about cause and effect.  We say that God is in control, and indeed He is.  But I say respectfully that He may not be in control of your home.  I am not trying to get personal.  The Holy Spirit is for that.  But I pray that the Holy Spirit will get very personal with each of us.  God is committed to deliver us from evil, but He cannot do this without our own commitment to Him and to living a holy life.

Our homes are to be lights in this dark world of sin.  We lock our doors and windows and then let electronic influences come in that may not be a threat to our goods which can be replaced but to our very soul salvation.  Jesus said not to fear him that can kill the body but fear him that can kill both body and soul in hell.  Unless there are fundamental changes in our lives, many of us will be lost when the testing time comes.  And what shall it profit a man though he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?

You might think, If all you say is true, then I give up.  It is too late for me and my family.”  No, now is the day of salvation, now is our salvation nearer than when we first believed.  We have the blessed promise that stronger is He that is in us than he that is in the world.  We also have the promise that He will keep us from falling, and that there is no temptation taken us but that He will make a way of escape.

I hope that in your homes you will sit down as a family and prayerful agree together that by God’s grace you will mean it when you pray, “Deliver us from evil,” and that together you will take the steps necessary to seal up the holes where the devil is getting in. You will not be sorry, either in this life or in the life to come.