Nonye had sold lace and ankara at Mile One market in Port Harcourt for eleven years. Her shop was a narrow stall under a zinc roof, with bolts of fabric stacked to the ceiling and a plastic chair at the front where she sat with her calculator and her Bible. Customers came back to her because she knew her cloth and she kept her word. Then, in the space of one season, things changed.
A younger woman took the empty stall next door. She stocked newer designs, priced them a little lower, and greeted every passer-by with a bright smile. Within weeks, some of Nonye’s regular customers were walking straight past her chair. Her sales fell by half. And one morning, as she raised her shutter, she found a small knot of black nylon tied with red thread lying in the gutter just outside her stall.
She did not touch it. She went home and told her prayer group what she had seen, and by evening the matter was settled. Somebody was using a charm to divert her customers. For the next six weeks Nonye attended every night vigil she could find. She anointed her shelves with oil. She posted long prayers in the group at three in the morning against “every market witch assigned to my destiny.” She stopped greeting the woman next door. When customers asked about the new stall, she told them, with a meaningful look, that some people did not get their success by God.
Through all of this, she was exhausted, frightened and very angry. And her shop was opening later and later, because the vigils kept her out until dawn.
It was Mrs Essien who came to see her. Mrs Essien had traded in that market for thirty years and had been a deaconess in Nonye’s church for nearly as long. She sat down on the plastic chair, looked at the oil stains on the fabric, and asked a question Nonye had not expected. “My daughter, you have been resisting the devil for six weeks. Have you also been submitting to God?”
Where James places the word “resist”
James 4:7 is one of the most quoted verses in spiritual warfare teaching. “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” It is printed on stickers and preached at crusades, and rightly so, because it is a wonderful promise. But it is almost always quoted alone, and when we read it in its setting, we discover that James is addressing something quite different from what we might expect.
The chapter opens with a question: “From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?” (James 4:1). James is writing to a church in conflict. Believers are quarrelling. They are envious of one another. They want things they cannot have, and when they pray, they pray with selfish motives. James calls their divided loyalty “the friendship of the world” and says it is “enmity with God” (James 4:4).
In the previous chapter he has described this kind of envy in striking terms: “But if ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not, and lie not against the truth. This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish” (James 3:14-15). Notice the word devilish. In James, the devil’s influence shows itself in envy, selfish ambition and strife among believers. That is the setting of our verse. Here it is in full:
But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.
“But he giveth more grace.” Before James gives a single command, he points to the grace of God. Whatever the believers have done, God’s grace is greater. Then he quotes Proverbs 3:34, in the form found in the Greek Old Testament: “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.”
Look at the shape of what follows. “Submit yourselves therefore to God.” Then, “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” Then, “Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.” Then cleansing of hands and purifying of hearts, mourning over sin, and finally, “Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.”
The command to resist the devil sits in the middle of a passage about humility, repentance and nearness to God. It is surrounded on every side by submission. James does not imagine a believer who resists the devil while remaining proud, envious and divided. Resistance is one movement within a larger turning of the whole heart toward God.
Humility before resistance
The order matters. “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil.” The word therefore connects submission to the quotation just before it. God resists the proud. He gives grace to the humble. So humble yourselves before Him, and in that place of humility, resist the enemy.
There is a serious warning here. A proud believer can spend a great deal of energy fighting the devil while God Himself is opposing his pride. Nonye’s prayers were loud and long, but they had become a way of avoiding the uncomfortable questions about her own heart. Was she envious of a younger woman’s success? Had she spread suspicion about her neighbour without any evidence? Had her business suffered partly because she had grown careless? It is easier to bind a market witch than to confess envy.
The wisdom books saw this long ago:
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud.
Notice the phrase “divide the spoil with the proud.” Pride promises gain. It tells us we deserve more, that our rivals must be stopped, that our position must be defended. Proverbs says it is better to sit low with the humble than to win anything in that spirit. The proud believer is heading for a fall, whatever he is praying against, because the fall comes from within.
Paul gives the same insight in Ephesians. “Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil” (Ephesians 4:26-27). Unresolved anger gives the devil a place, a foothold. The enemy gains ground in a believer’s life most often through the doors that pride, bitterness and unforgiveness leave open. Paul says it again when he urges the Corinthian church to forgive a man who had repented. “To whom ye forgive any thing, I forgive also,” he writes, and he explains why: “Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices” (2 Corinthians 2:10-11). What was the device Paul was worried about? Unforgiveness. A church that refused to restore a repentant brother would hand Satan an advantage. Paul’s way of resisting the devil in that situation was to forgive.
This is why humility comes before resistance. Humility closes the doors through which the enemy works. When a believer submits to God, confesses his sin, forgives those who have wronged him and draws near to the Father, he is already resisting the devil, often more effectively than through any amount of shouting.
PunchlineHumility closes the doors through which the enemy works. When you submit to God and draw near to Him, you are already resisting the devil.
“He will flee from you”
Once that order is in place, the promise is bold and clear. “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” The devil is not stronger than a believer who is submitted to God. He cannot stand his ground against someone who stands in Christ. James does not say he might flee, or that he will flee after a long struggle. He says he will flee.
The word resist means to stand against, to oppose, to refuse to give way. It is a defensive word. It describes a person holding his position under pressure. And the clearest picture of it in Scripture is the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness. After forty days of fasting, the devil came to Him three times. The last temptation went like this:
Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.
Look at how Jesus resisted. He did not argue at length. He did not enter a negotiation. He answered with a clear refusal and a word of Scripture: “Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” The refusal was rooted in worship. Jesus resisted the devil by declaring His total submission to the Father. Submission and resistance were one act.
“Then the devil leaveth him.” The promise of James 4:7 is fulfilled in the experience of Christ. Luke adds that the devil “departed from him for a season” (Luke 4:13). Resistance does not mean the enemy will never return. But each time he comes, he can be resisted in the same way.
This should give you great confidence. You do not need to be a spiritual expert to resist the devil. You do not need special words or a long ritual. A believer who says, “No. I belong to God, and I will obey Him,” and who stands on what God has said, is resisting the devil. Jesus “was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15), and the same Spirit who strengthened Him in the wilderness lives in you.
Temptation does not always come from outside
Before we turn to Peter, we need to hear something else James says, because it guards us against a common mistake. In his first chapter he writes: “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God” (James 1:13). And then: “But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed” (James 1:14).
James locates the source of much temptation within the human heart. He does not deny that the devil tempts, as the wilderness shows. But he refuses to let believers blame someone else for their own desires. That is a healthy corrective. Some Christians attribute every temptation to a demon: a spirit of lust, a spirit of anger, a spirit of laziness. Then they spend their energy trying to cast the spirit out instead of dealing honestly with their own desires and habits.
The New Testament gives us a more balanced picture. The world, the flesh and the devil all play a part. John speaks of “the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life” (1 John 2:16). Paul describes the battle between flesh and Spirit within the believer. And he promises that “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape” (1 Corinthians 10:13).
So when temptation comes, you do not first have to work out whether it is from outside or inside. You respond the same way. You submit to God, you refuse the temptation, you take the way of escape He provides, and you draw near to Him. Grace teaches us “that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world” (Titus 2:12). If you have fallen, you confess it and receive His forgiveness. You do not need to identify a hidden spiritual source before you can obey.
Peter’s setting: churches under pressure
The second great text on resisting the devil comes from Peter, and its setting is different again. Peter writes “to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia” (1 Peter 1:1). These were believers living as a minority in a hostile society. Their neighbours spoke evil of them. Some were slaves with harsh masters. Some had husbands who did not share their faith. All of them faced what Peter calls “the fiery trial which is to try you” (1 Peter 4:12).
At the end of his letter, Peter draws his teaching together:
Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.
Like James, Peter quotes Proverbs 3:34. “God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.” Two apostles, writing to two different situations, both place the same verse right before their instruction to resist the devil. That is not a coincidence. In the mind of the early church, humility before God and resistance against the enemy belonged together.
Peter applies humility first to relationships in the church. The younger are to submit to the elders, and “all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility.” The phrase be clothed suggests tying on an apron, like a servant preparing to work. Peter may have been remembering the night Jesus wrapped a towel around Himself and washed his feet.
Then humility is applied to anxiety. “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.” Humility includes admitting that you cannot carry your burdens alone. The proud person holds on to his worries because he believes everything depends on him. The humble person throws them onto the Lord, because he trusts that God cares for him and will lift him up at the right time.
NuggetThis is important for spiritual warfare. A believer weighed down by anxiety is easy prey. A believer who has cast his cares on God is free to stand.
The roaring lion
Only then does Peter speak of the adversary:
Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.
“Be sober, be vigilant.” Sobriety means clear-headedness, a mind that is not intoxicated or carried away. Vigilance means staying awake and alert. Together they describe a believer who sees things as they really are. He is not careless about the enemy, and he is not hysterical about him either.
“Because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” The image is vivid. A lion roars to frighten, to scatter, to make its prey panic and break away from safety. In the context of Peter’s letter, the roar is persecution and intimidation. The devil’s aim was to frighten these believers into abandoning their faith, or to crush them with despair so that they gave up. The psalmist described his enemies in the same way: “They gaped upon me with their mouths, as a ravening and a roaring lion” (Psalms 22:13).
“Whom resist stedfast in the faith.” How do you resist a roaring lion? By refusing to run. By staying firm in the faith, holding on to Christ, and refusing to be scattered from His people. Earlier in the letter, Peter told them, “be not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled; But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts” (1 Peter 3:14-15). Resistance here means faithfulness under pressure. It means continuing to trust God, to do good, to speak with gentleness and to refuse to deny Christ, however loud the roaring becomes.
“Knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.” This is a remarkable comfort. Peter tells the suffering believers that they have not been singled out. Their brothers and sisters across the world are facing the same things. The devil wants each of us to believe that our trial is unique, that God has abandoned us in particular. Peter answers that lie by reminding us that we belong to a worldwide family, and that the family is standing together.
Peter knew this lion personally. On the night of Jesus’ arrest, the Lord had told him, “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not” (Luke 22:31-32). Peter was sifted. He denied his Lord three times. But his faith did not finally fail, because Jesus had prayed for him. The man who writes “resist stedfast in the faith” is a man who was restored by grace after he had fallen. And he immediately points his readers to the same grace: “But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you” (1 Peter 5:10).
Standing your ground without hunting for attacks
Paul’s instruction in Ephesians 6 matches what James and Peter teach. “Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil” (Ephesians 6:11). The repeated emphasis is on standing: “that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand” (Ephesians 6:13).
None of these passages asks the believer to spend his days trying to identify hidden attacks. James asks us to submit to God and resist the devil when he comes. Peter asks us to be sober and stand firm in faith. Paul asks us to put on the armour and stand. The posture throughout is one of steady faithfulness, not anxious investigation.
I write as someone who believes, with the Pentecostal and charismatic tradition, that demonic oppression is real and that Christ still sets people free. I have seen it. But some teaching on spiritual warfare has pushed believers into a constant state of alarm, in which every delay is a spiritual attack, every illness a curse, every difficult relative a witch and every bad dream a message from the enemy. Believers who live this way often become exhausted, suspicious and fearful. They lose sleep in vigils that never seem to end. They break relationships on the strength of a dream or a rumour. And, like Nonye, they sometimes neglect the very faithfulness that would protect them.
When something troubling happens, ask the ordinary questions first. Is there sin I need to confess? Is there someone I need to forgive? Do I need medical help, financial advice or a practical change? Do I need to work harder, speak more kindly or seek counsel? Then pray, trusting God with whatever you cannot see. If there is genuine spiritual oppression, the same response applies. Submit to God, resist in faith, and seek the help of mature, accountable believers. Deliverance in Jesus’ name never requires payments, beatings, chains, starvation or public humiliation. Any ministry that uses these things is doing harm, and you should leave it and, where necessary, report it.
Spiritual warfare also never permits us to accuse people without evidence. Nonye’s suspicion of her neighbour did real damage to a woman who may have done nothing wrong at all. Scripture forbids false witness and slander. “We wrestle not against flesh and blood” means, among other things, that we must stop treating human beings as the enemy.
What resistance looks like on an ordinary day
So what does resisting the devil look like in practice?
It looks like a young man who feels the pull of pornography late at night, puts his phone in another room, prays a short honest prayer, and calls a trusted friend in the morning. It looks like a businesswoman offered a profitable deal that requires her to falsify documents, who says no and accepts the loss. It looks like a husband who feels the rising heat of anger and leaves the room to pray before he says something cruel. It looks like a student who has been mocked for her faith and chooses to answer gently instead of returning insult for insult. Peter reminds us that when Christ “was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not” (1 Peter 2:23).
It also looks like a believer who wakes at three in the morning with a wave of fear about the future, and instead of spiralling into dread, casts that care on the Lord, quotes a promise, and goes back to sleep. Resistance can be very quiet. Often it consists of a simple refusal and a turning toward God.
None of this requires us to be preoccupied with the devil. In fact, the passages we have studied keep pointing away from him. James surrounds his one sentence about the devil with sentences about God: grace, submission, drawing near, humility. Peter surrounds his warning about the lion with the care of God and the God of all grace. The devil is mentioned. He is resisted. But he is never placed at the centre. God is.
Nonye did not answer Mrs Essien at first. She began to explain about the charm and the prayer group and the drop in sales. The older woman listened, and then said, “Maybe it was a charm. Maybe it was rubbish that blew into your gutter. You do not know, and I do not know. But your answer is the same either way. Humble yourself before God. Stop speaking against that girl. Open your shop on time. And go back to sleeping at night. The devil will flee from a woman who is submitted to God.”
Nonye cried that afternoon, for the first time in weeks. Then she prayed with Mrs Essien, there on the plastic chair, and confessed that she had been envious and afraid.
The following Monday she opened at seven. When the woman next door raised her shutter, Nonye greeted her by name. It was awkward. Within a month it was easier. Within a year, the two women were sending customers to each other when one of them was out of a particular fabric. Nonye’s sales recovered slowly, partly because she was back in her chair every morning and partly, she says, because she stopped scaring customers with stories about witches.
She still prays. She still believes the devil is real and that he must be resisted. But she resists him differently now. “I used to think resisting the devil meant fighting all night,” she told her church group later. “Now I know it starts with bowing my head to God.”
PunchlineSubmit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you.
Teaching Companion
For Reflection
- Why do you think James and Peter both quote “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble” immediately before telling believers to resist the devil?
- Are there doors in your life, such as anger, envy or unforgiveness, that might be giving the enemy a foothold? What would it look like to close them?
- How does Jesus’ answer in Matthew 4:10 show that submission to God and resistance against the devil can be one act?
- In what ways have you been tempted to search for hidden attacks instead of standing steadfast in faith?
- What cares are you carrying today that you need to cast on the Lord?
This Week
This week, read James 4:6-10 each morning and pray it through in order: thank God for His greater grace, submit one specific area of your life to Him, and then ask Him to show you any pride, envy or unforgiveness that needs to be confessed. When temptation or fear comes during the day, respond with three simple steps: say no, speak a relevant verse of Scripture, and turn your attention back to God in prayer. If there is someone you have spoken against or treated with suspicion, go and make it right before the week is over.
A Prayer
Father, thank You that You give more grace. I humble myself before You today. I confess the pride, envy and anger that I have allowed to take root in my heart, and I ask You to forgive me and cleanse me. I submit my life to You. In the name of Jesus, I resist the devil and refuse his lies, his temptations and his intimidation. Help me to stand steadfast in the faith, to cast all my cares on You, and to remember that my brothers and sisters around the world are standing with me. Keep me sober and watchful, but never fearful. Draw near to me as I draw near to You. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Truth received brings freedom. Truth believed establishes the heart.
Scripture quotations are from the King James Version. · Illustrations using first names only are composites unless stated otherwise.