r and condemnation.

64. If you would withstand these wiles, there can be no other plan or
counsel than this: Fight with God's Word in firm faith against these
suggestions and allurements. Further, keep in mind both your former
misery and your present treasures of grace. Remember how you were
once under God's wrath when, without fear of God and without faith,
you were the devil's own, subject to all his will, and must have
perished had not God, in boundless goodness, forgiven you your sin
and bestowed on you his grace. And now give heed that you may not
lose this treasure, to which end the Holy Spirit has been promised
you. You need not succumb if you remain in faith. Again, if you
experience weakness and suffer want, you are bidden to call upon him,
certain that he will hear you. The promise is: "If ye shall ask
anything of the Father, he will give it you in my name," Jn 16, 23.
Also: "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatsoever
ye will, and it shall be done unto you," Jn 15, 7.

65. Peter would, with his admonitions, make Christians bold and
confident for resisting the temptations of the devil and defending
themselves. He would not have us feel terrified nor despair before
Satan, even though that wicked one press us hard through the
instrumentality of the world and of our own flesh, as well as by his
direct onslaughts. We are not to fear though he seem too strong for
us, and though surrender to his prowess seems inevitable. We are to
have a manly heart and fight valiantly through faith. We must be
assured that, if we remain firm in the faith, we shall have strength
and final victory. The devil shall not defeat us; we shall prove
superior to him.

We have been called of God and made Christians to the end that we
renounce the devil and contend against him, and thus maintain God's
name, Word, and kingdom against him. Christ, our head, has already,
in himself, smitten and destroyed for us the devil and his power. In
addition, he gives us faith and the Holy Spirit, whereby we can
wholly defeat Satan's further wickedness and his attempts to
overthrow us.

66. A Christian should bear all this in mind, I say, and learn to
experience the strength and power of faith. So will he not yield to
temptation and enticement. Nor will he, from love of the devil or the
world, to his own eternal hurt, and for the sake of small temporal
advantage, pleasure, or honor, cast from him God's grace and the Holy
Spirit, and