A good steward is recognized for his strong desire to please his master. For this reason, he does not expend the majority of his time and energy toward pleasing other stewards. He recognizes his first responsibility as accountability toward his master. So long as he pleases his master, all other issues will adequately fall into their rightful place. So it is with the steward of God. It is not that he lacks any desire to please others, but this desire pales in comparison to his desire to please the Lord. Simply put, he does not allow others to conflict with his primary responsibility of pleasing his Master. Unfortunately, this issue has become one of the most significant hindrances facing modern Christianity—the inordinate desire men have to please one another rather than the One that matters most.
The Devil was created perfect in every aspect (Ezekiel 28:15) with complete capacity to do right. Yet, he was also created with a free will to choose whether to do right or to do wrong. Sometime in the distant past, he chose to abide “not in the truth.” This conscious decision to depart from the truth caused him to become the “father” of lies. In one form or another, every lie traces back to the work of the Devil. As the enemy of God, Satan wants to deceive God’s creation into believing a lie so that rejecting the truth and remaining condemned in darkness (2 Corinthians 4:4) seems like the natural thing to do. Satan incorporates every deceptive means at his disposal. One of his main tactics is to convince people that there are many ways to heaven (good works, baptism, church membership, etc.) and many ways to know the truth (feelings, science, circumstances, etc.). Yet, the Bible emphatically proves that God is truth and His word is truth and only through God and His word are we assured of learning and knowing truth.
