din: a loud, unpleasant and prolonged noise
You can't permanently make the devil be quiet. He will keep on roaring until the mighty angel literally shuts him up in the bottomless pit (Revelation 20:1-3). ''But,'' you may counter, ''the angel made the lions stop roaring at Daniel. Why won't God send an angel to make the devil stop roaring at me?''.
He is not the only one who can roar. You too can roar with your faith. You can roar through prayer. You can follow Jesus' example and roar by quoting select scriptures that apply to your situation. Perhaps it would be better to describe it as God roaring through you. Grace can bring peace and quiet even in the midst of the lions' den.
Daniel turns the lions' den into a veritable prayer room. Beneath the ear-splitting roars of the hungry beasts can be heard the weak voice of the elderly man of God. He calls out to the living God Who created these animals encircling him.
How can this not be so? Daniel remained devoted to prayer in the face of the king's anti-prayer law. He didn't allow the threat of being thrown to the lions stop him from praying as he had always done. So why would he forego prayer now that he is staring into the ferocious faces of those very lions? If ever he needed the power of prayer, it is now.
I believe we can get a sense of what he may have prayed in that pit by piecing together certain scriptures into one powerful prayer...
''My soul is among lions. Save me from the lion's mouth. Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth. Break out the great teeth of the young lions, O LORD. How long, O Lord, will you look on and do nothing? Rescue me from their fierce attacks. Protect my life from these lions!'' (see Psalms 57:4; 22:21; 58:6; 35:17)
At some point the beastly roars cease. Silence pervades the pit. If you listen with your spiritual ears, you will hear the holy sound of divine intervention. God has sent His angel. Daniel longs to meet his Maker when at last his earthly journey comes to an end. But it won't be this day.
Job 4:10
10 The roaring of the lion, and the voice of the fierce lion, and the teeth of the young lions, are broken.
The angel could have easily slaughtered or even vaporized the lions. All options are on the table for he has been sent from Heaven. Samson took out a lion that dared to roar against him (Judges 14:5-6). The young David killed a lion that took a lamb from his flock (1 Samuel 17:34-36). And one of his ''mighty men'' - a man named Benaiah - once slew a lion in a pit on a snowy day (2 Samuel 23:20; 1 Chronicles 11:22). If these men were able to each kill a lion, imagine what the mighty angel sent to the lions' den could do!
Instead, God commissions His angel to help Daniel by shutting the lions' mouths. For one thing, this brings quiet to the situation. A closed mouth makes considerably less noise - be it man or beast. The roar is neutralized. The roar is silenced. There is no more din in the den. There is a spiritual truth here calling out for our attention. The New Testament likens the devil to a roaring lion.
1 Peter 5:8
8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour...
The devil makes a lot of noise. This ''uproar'' from our spiritual adversary takes various forms. He roars at us through circumstances and problems. He roars at us through other people. He roars through the commotion of strife and discord in our broken relationships. He roars through the news media. He roars through the bad news and negative reports coming at us from a variety of sources. He will even use our own thoughts to roar at us. There is no louder, more nerve-racking noise than mental noise. All can be quiet on the outside, but your mind can be roaring with all sorts of negative thoughts.
The solution is to amplify the positive roar of Grace in your life. Think about a guitar amplifier. You plug an electric guitar into it and what happens? As the name suggests, it amplifies the music. The guitar produces a louder sound. Another familiar example of amplification is the hearing aid. This simple device has tiny amplifiers inside which enhance the volume of sounds, thus enabling its wearers to hear better.
Similarly, there are spiritual amplifiers which can help you overcome the devil's roar. There are ways to ''turn up'' faith in your daily life. As a result, you will amplify your experience of Grace because faith is our access to the grace of God.
Turn up the positive roar of Grace in your life.
You can't permanently make the devil be quiet. He will keep on roaring until the mighty angel literally shuts him up in the bottomless pit (Revelation 20:1-3). ''But,'' you may counter, ''the angel made the lions stop roaring at Daniel. Why won't God send an angel to make the devil stop roaring at me?''.
Unlike those lions, the devil is not a physical entity. Demons are not physical beings. Evil is a spiritual force at work in our world. Spiritual problems demand spiritual solutions.
God will not send an angel to do what He has already told us to do. He has already told us to ''resist the devil'' (James 4:7). Right after comparing the devil to a roaring lion, Peter instructs us to resist him with our faith (1 Peter 5:9).
God didn't send an angel to shut the devil up when he tempted His beloved Son in the wilderness. Instead, the devil only stopped roaring when Jesus resisted him by quoting specific scriptures (Matthew 4:1-11). Angels came and ministered to Him after the spiritual battle was over, but they didn't silence the devil even for God in the flesh. Likewise, it's up to us to take spiritual action when the devil roars at us or our loved ones.
Rather than yelling at the Devil to shut up, a more effective strategy is to turn up the volume of Grace.
The more you focus on the Word of Grace, the less affected you will be by the lion's Roar.
He is not the only one who can roar. You too can roar with your faith. You can roar through prayer. You can follow Jesus' example and roar by quoting select scriptures that apply to your situation. Perhaps it would be better to describe it as God roaring through you. Grace can bring peace and quiet even in the midst of the lions' den.
(This post is excerpted from my book GRACE IN A MAZE: How to Make it Through)
