Humble then Resist

James 4:7 NLT
So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

There are many promises in the Bible. And we remember them; at least the second half. In this case we remember that if we resist the devil he has to leave. Right? How many of us remember the sentence before?

As a programmer from a long time ago, I think of this as an "If Then" statement. The first half has to be satisfied, then the second will come to pass. So we cannot expect the devil to flee unless we have first humbled ourselves before God.

Matthew 23:12 tells us that those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. Where Romans 12:3 says not to think we are better than we really are. And to be honest in our evaluation of ourselves, measuring ourselves by the faith God has given us.

In other words, we are to realize we cannot do it on our own. Only God can really fix any situation we find ourselves in. We are but a small pebble on an infinite beach compared to Him. We need to admit that to ourselves and then when we resist the devil he will flee, but not because of who we are. He has to go because of who lives in us.