The Mercy of God: A Winning Force against the Devil/the Yetzer Hara

John 11: Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. ² (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) ³ So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”,⁴ When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.” ⁵ Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. ⁶ So when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was two more days, ⁷ and then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.”

John 11:⁴¹ so they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. ⁴² I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”⁴³ When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” ⁴⁴ The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

In Hebrew scriptural understanding there is a concept known as Yetzer Hara. The Yetzer Hara is a spiritual concept that states that when HasHem-God Almighty.

The Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob created humanity, he created humanity in the same way but with each individual created he distinctive roles, assignments, dreams, goals, visions, and aspirations.

Each individual within the field of humanity was created with distinctively unique features that set him apart above rest.

And with this in mind everyone created and formed by God as a living breathing entity unto God Almighty was created and formed to achieve specific assignments, dreams, goals, visions, and aspirations that are pre-designed to fulfill the plan of God upon the earth.

 Because the devil is the principle sworn enemy of humanity, he sets out to attack every unique individual in the human field, in a unique distinctive manner, which the Hebrew sages describe as the Yetzer Hara.

The Yetzer Hara is the evil inclination that sets itself in motion as a distinctively unique attack against your life and your life’s vision, dreams, aspirations, and health.

The attack by the Yetzer Hara is the attack of the devil himself against your life so intense and intent at tearing apart and ravaging your entire being in the nick of time.

The Yetzer Hara or the devil’s attack against your life goes way back from the very time of your conception way back from the very time of your conception in your mother’s womb.

Right from the time your mother conceived you in her womb, the Yetzer Hara has been attacking your life to destroy and if it can’t destroy your life in the nick of time then it will work to alter your course set before you even before time, history, and eternity by the God the Almighty.

But the reason why the Yetzer Hara or the attack of the devil against your life has not wiped you out yet is embedded in the fact that God’s hand of mercy has been on your life and it’s still on your life ever since time immemorial.

From the very time of your conception in your mother’s womb the hand of God’s mercy has been on you, that why the Yetzer Hara or the attack of the devil against your life has not wiped you out.

Your mother did not experience a miscarriage because the mercy of God was on your life immediately after your mother conceived you.

Your mother did not abort you out of her womb when she heard every reason to do so because the hand of God’s mercy is on your life.

And when the hand of God’s mercy is on your life no amount of Yetzer Hara/ attack of the devil against your life can defeat you and stop you from accomplishing all that the God will have you to accomplish.

In Jewish traditional understanding and recollection, the Yetzer always intensifies its attack against humanity when the individual is just a few years away, a few months away, a few weeks away, a few days away, and a few hours away.

A few minutes away, a few seconds away, a few moments away from meeting and encountering with the mercy of God, the mercy of God which arises on with great urgency, awareness, and intensity on the days of Yom Kippur, and Rosh Hannah- the high days in Jewish/ Hebrew culture.
Yom Kippur is the day of repentance, and atonement, when an entire nation comes back to God in repentance to be cleansed of and by God consequently.

On the other hand, Rosh Hannah is the occasion of celebration, celebrating the forgiveness of God and the mercy of God, as well as the beginning of a new season and a new chapter in the glory of God.

Picturesquely, as the hand of God’s mercy approaches and nears your life so does the Yetzer Hara/ the attack of the devil against your life become all the more intense against your life.

And sometimes it seems as if the Yetzer Hara is faster in reaching out to you than the mercy of God but however this can be real because the Lord God understands that whether or not the Yetzer proves itself prominent in your life, once the mercy of God comes in your life the Yetzer Hara/ the attack of the devil against your life and your dreams, your purpose, and destiny will have no option but to vacate your premises.

 If the Yetzer Hara doesn’t leave your premises at the arrival of the mercy of God in your life, then they will have to be a war-a fight between the mercy of God on your life and the Yetzer Hara \ the attack of the devil against your life.

And at the end of the war the attack of the devil against your life will be defeated and kicked out of your life.

 In the gospel of John 11, we come across a man by the names of Lazarus; he was a good friend of Jesus who suddenly becomes ill and surprisingly died before Jesus would come to him.
  
Interestingly however, before he died Jesus was sent news of his illness but instead of going to Bethany to attend to his beloved friend, and much probably stop the Yetzer/ the attack against his friend’s life.

Jesus opted to stay where he was for two days and after those two days; he told his disciples that it was time for them to go to Judea-a place where he was apparently not loved.

The distance between Judea and Bethany is 3kms but yet still Jesus decided to stay in Judea without going to immediately attend to his friend Lazarus for two more days.

However after the two days, he arrived in Bethany, four days after Lazarus had died and buried, but none the less he went to the tomb and ordered the removal of the stone covering the cave, he prayed to God who listens to prayers, and after he called out in a loud voice, Lazarus come out,
”He came out, his hands and feet wrapped in grave clothes, and with a cloth round his face, untie him, Jesus told them, “and let him go”.

Metaphorically, Jesus is the mercy of God and the illness that had killed Lazarus is the Yetzer.

Ironically however upon receiving the news of Lazarus’ deadly illness, Jesus doesn’t rush because sometimes the mercy of God doesn’t rush because it understands that the more the Yetzer Hara torments your life, the more glory of God will be made manifest in your life upon the arrival of the mercy of God in your life.

In John 11:4, Jesus said, the final result of the illness will not be the death of Lazarus, this has happened in order to bring glory to God and it will be the means by which the son of God will receive Glory.

At this junction, God will have me to tell you that the result of the attack of the devil against your life, dreams, goals, vision, assignment, purpose, destiny, business, children, education, family, health, and finances will not be the death and the end of your life, and all its premises but rather it will be the means by which the son of God with whom you have believed and trusted as much followed above rest to receive glory.

 Jesus will receive the glory out of this attack against your life when his mercy arrives in your life.

And the evidence that the mercy of God is in the vicinity and that it has intensified its acceleration, and momentum in the event of getting to you with immediate effect is in the fact that the devil’s attack against your life has been so intense lately.

But the mercy has arrived and there goes the Yetzer Hara/ the attack of the evil one out of your life.

Glory is to God Almighty.