C.S. Lewis wrote an introduction to his novel, and if you've ever read it, you need to read it.

He've written too many novels, of course, but the screw tape letters is an amazing little book.

And in effect, in that introduction, he said, there are two extremes. One is believing that the devil does not exist, and the other is excessive

fear of the devil, especially for the believers. Both are equally erroneous. It is not surprising,

therefore, my beloved friends, that the Bible tells us that one of the reasons why Jesus was born in

Bethlehem of Judea, one of the reasons why Jesus came to our earth is to destroy the works

of the devil. I'm going to come to that in a minute. We saw in the last message that Jesus came

from heaven according to the word of God to deliver us from sin and from the power of sin and from the wages of sin.

And today we're going to see another reason why Jesus came from heaven.

And I want you to turn with me, please, to 1 John, as they say in England,

in Australia, 1 John, 1 John 3.8. And what I want to do, I'm going to give you a home-spun

translation, my translation, my paraphrasing, if you like, because it's not really exact translation. You ready?

He who habitually, and without any qualms, sins is of the devil. Because the devil is a sinner

from the beginning. Yet the purpose of why the Son of God

appeared was so that he might destroy the works of the devil. What does it mean when John said

the Son of God came to destroy the works of the devil.

It's works in the plural of the devil.

It means that he came to eviscerate the devil, that he came to disarm the devil,

that he came to remove the fangs from the old serpent,

that he came to knock out the teeth from the roaring lion.

And we will see in the next message how Jesus also came in order to prepare the final church,

the last church, for its final triumph.

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