When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom. . . . Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. (Proverbs 11:2; 16:18)
If you were going to ambush a believer and lure him with some temptation, when would you do it? When do you think he would be most vulnerable, most likely to ignore all that he knows about God and holiness and joy, and to believe — even for one devastating moment — that sin might be more fulfilling and satisfying than all of that? When would you strike?
Satan himself might say (if it’s possible for him to be honest) that we are most vulnerable on the heels of a major victory or deliverance. John Newton noticed this troubling (and illuminating) thread woven through the spiritual giants in Scripture:
I have observed that most of the advantages Satan is recorded to have gained against the Lord’s servants, have been after great and signal deliverances and favours; as in the cases of Noah, Lot, David, and Hezekiah. And I have found it so repeatedly in my own experience. (Letters of John Newton, 175)
