We come now to the question of the Work of the Devil, or How the Devil Manifests Himself, and What He Does.
1. In the first place we are taught that _the Devil tempts men to sin_. We have a most striking illustration of this in his temptation of our Lord. We have in the Bible three accounts of this temptation. We will look at Matthew's account. Matt. 4:1-9: +"Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. (2) And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he afterward hungered. (3) And the tempter came and said unto him, If thou art the son of God, command that these stones become bread. (4) But he answered and said, It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. (5) Then the devil taketh him into the Holy City; and he set him on the pinnacle of the temple. (6) And saith unto Him, If thou art the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, he shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and, on their hands they shall bear thee up, lest haply thou dash thy foot against a stone. (7) Jesus said unto him, Again it is written, thou shalt not make trial of the Lord thy God. (8) Again, the devil taketh him unto an exceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; (9) And He said unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me."+ Of course we have not time this morning to go into the whole question of our Lord's temptation, but this much is certainly plain, that the Devil is represented as the tempter, tempting our Lord. _If there is no personal Devil, as so many would have us believe_, or _if he is not the tempter, there would be absolutely no reason for bringing him into this account_. As the Devil tempted our Lord, so he tempts us to-day. And it is to be noticed that he does not tempt us merely to gross animal lusts and vile sins, but with subtle spiritual temptations, and above all he tempts us to doubt God's Word. It was with this form of temptation that he first assaulted our Lord. God had just said to the Lord Jesus at His baptism, +"Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased"+ (Luke 3:22), and Satan came insinuating doubt of God's Word by beginning his temptation with these words: +"If thou art the Son of God,"+ and again further down in the temptation, he repeats the doubt, saying to the Lord Jesus again: +"If thou art the Son of God."+ In just the same way Satan began his assault upon Eve in the Garden of Eden, by insinuating a doubt of God's Word and of God's goodness. He began by saying: +"Yea, hath God said. . . .?"+ (Gen. 3:2), and further on when Eve stated exactly what God had said, the Devil flatly contradicted and said: +"Ye shall not surely die"+ (literally, Dying, _thou shalt not_ die) when God had said: +"Thou shalt surely die"+ (_Dying, thou shalt_ die). This is Satan's favourite method of attack to-day. He gets us to doubt God's Word. Satan's most effective mode of work is by leading men into doubt and into error on fundamental points. The saloons and the gambling hells and the brothels are not the chief spheres of Satan's activities, but the schools and colleges and theological seminaries where he is inducing men and women, and callow youths and maidens, to doubt the truth of God's Word, and to reject the fundamental truths of God's word and accept Satan's errors in their place. Satan knows well; that, if he can get men to doubting God's Word, it is easy to lead them into the vilest sins. False doctrine has been a more prolific source of the vilest sins than even the saloons.