2 Voices, 2 Choices
-B. Thomas Clark

Remember when you were a kid and you got up early on Saturday mornings to watch cartoons and eat all of the marshmellows out of the Lucky Charms? Some of you probably still watch more cartoons than you'd admit, but if you're like most teens, you haven't seen what Saturday morning looks like in quite a while.

Anyway, back to the cartoons. Do you remember how, from time to time, your favorite cartoon characters would have a battle going on over their shoulders between an angel and a devil? The devil would always appear first and try to get your animated friend to do something that he was already tempted to do. Then the angel would appear and warn him of the consequences he might face. This angel tried everything to keep the cartoon character from doing something that would put him in danger. Most of the time the devil would win and the cartoon character would have to face the consequences the angel had warned him about.

It may be a bit far-fetched, but we all have this struggle sometimes between what others tell us to do, and what our conscience says we probably shouldn't do. We may not have little angels and devils looking over our shoulders, but we've all been there.

There's even an event mentioned in the Bible where Jesus has to decide whether or not to listen to the voice of Satan or the Word of His Father. Now, just picture this for a second. There's Jesus, wandering around in the wilderness all by himself, when out of nowhere this little three-inch devil appears over his left shoulder and starts trying to make him do all these things, that Jesus could have done, but that He knew would be an abuse of His power.

We fight those battles with temptation too. It may not be directly from Satan, but we can definitly hear the voice of the father of lies in the pressure we get from some of our friends. What did Jesus do when He was tempted? How did He get out of this tricky situation?

When Jesus was tempted there is no mention of an angel telling him not to listen to the devil. In fact, the angels don't come until after Jesus has resisted temptation. Jesus was able to beat the devil all by himself. He didn't need an angel. He didn't need His friends. He was able to avoid temptation without the help of any outside source. He didn't write an advice columnist or call a radio host. How did He do it?

The first thing we have to realize is that there are two voices and two choices. The first voice is Satan's. His voice is hard to detect because he never makes his presence known. He uses others to do his dirty work. Did Satan appear directly to Eve in the garden? No. He spoke through an animal. A snake. See, that's the nature of the devil. He's always slithering around starting trouble, but he always does it indirectly. He uses crowds of people to do his bidding. He influences the crowd with the hopes of influencing the entire world.

And then there's Jesus. He stands on a mountain watching all this going on. He sees the people being led astray and at just the right time, He comes down off the mountain armed with the Word of God, and reminds people what God has to say about the issue and what the consequences are of following Satan. That's the other voice... The voice of God.

Once you have heard these voices, you have a choice to make. You can choose to listen to the one behind the fall of man, who is the father of hatred, deception, and lies… Or you can choose the one who created man, who is the maker of love, the author of salvation, and the embodiment of Truth. Making that choice is never easy. It's hard to tell which voice is which. It is hard to choose between your desires and what God desires for you. It's not easy to make a choice between your friends, and your Savior.

But Jesus understands the truth that we are at times unable to see… He understands that there are consequences for all of our actions and He can see the consequences long before he ever has to think about facing them. We can do this too. We don't have to listen to the devil. We can choose to go against the crowd. Jesus didn't listen. He knew from the very beginning that Satan was full of it. We know that too, in our hearts if nowhere else, we know that. We can do exactly what He did. All it takes is thinking about the consequences while we are being pressured. We have to learn to look at the ramblings of the crowd from Heaven's perspective.

Satan will never tell you the consequences of your actions. All he's going to do is offer you a flaming hot plate of sin and encourage you to eat it without questioning his culinary skills; and let me tell you this, you're going to get heartburn. Satan will say "Go ahead, eat that apple, smoke that joint, bottoms up, lie to your parents, cheat on your girlfriend, get revenge…" But he will never fill you in on the consequences.

Now, if we were to see those words from Heaven's perspective, we could see the consequences. Really, what Satan is saying through the voice of the crowd is this; "Go against God, get trapped in addiction, ruin your family life, get pregnant, lose all you've worked for, break two hearts and end up alone, destroy all the trust anyone ever had for you." From Heaven's perspective we can clearly see that the devil does not have our best interests in mind.

Satan uses the crowd to push his agenda. The voice of the crowd is also his. Knowing that, it is important that we consider the consequences when the pressure is on. You don't have to buckle under peer pressure. Your classmates might do it. Your best friend might do it. Members of your family may even do it, but you don't have to as long as you can seek out God's voice above the voice of the crowd.

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