“There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist or a magician with the same delight.” ~The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
Every year around Halloween season, I inevitably get in a discussion with a brother or sister in Christ about whether or not Christians should celebrate Halloween. This post isn’t about that ;-). However, during this Halloween season, I would like to present a few interesting things I learned about “Satan” and his demons recently and what our role is in regard to them as Christ-followers.
[Fair warning: this will be an attempt to compress 21 pages from Grudem’s Systematic Theology and several hours of study into a “digestible” blog post. I will focus primarily on my conclusions/new things I learned rather than explain from beginning to end]
1. “Satan” doesn’t (technically) have a name.
Many of you, if asked the question, ‘what is the devil’s name?’ might say something like “Satan” or “Lucifer”. However, both of these names are transliterations (such as “bautizo” meaning “to immerse” being transliterated into “baptize” in English) of words with actual meaning rather than a name like “Bob” or “Dan” (sorry Bobs and Dans). In Isaiah 14:12-15, a passage commonly understood to be referring to both “Satan” and the king of Tyre, he is referred to as “O Day Star, son of Dawn”. The KJV transliterates this as “Lucifer” from the Latin which means “bearer of light” which is where we get one of the most commonly known names. The second, “Satan”, comes from a root verb meaning “to be or act as an adversary, resist, oppose”. As far as I can tell, the first time that this word occurs in the Old Testament in reference to the Satan/Adversary is in 1 Chronicles 21:1 and is the same word that is used of him of the divine council in Job 1:6-12. It would seem that, by Jesus’ time, this Hebrew word had essentially become known as his “name” and the writers of the NT seem to transliterate this into the Greek word Σατάν (Satan). I believe that these two names speak to two of his primary roles, one as an adversary who opposes the redemptive purposes of God in the world and the other as an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:13-15) who deceives people into serving him rather than the one true God.
2. When idols are worshipped, demons are present.
I’ve often wondered to myself, “Where did all these “unclean spirits” come from that Jesus was casting out in his day? I see no mention of them in the Old Testament and there are certainly no cases of them being cast out by the prophets and such.” Well, wonder no longer! In Psalm 106:36-37 and Deut 32:16-17, we see clear references to the worship of these pagan gods as worship not of lifeless idols but of demons! “They served their idols, which became a snare to them. They sacrificed their sons and daughters to demons.” (Ps 106:36-27)
“They provoked his jealousy with different gods; they enraged him with detestable practices. They sacrificed to demons, not God, to gods they had not known, new gods that had just arrived, which your fathers did not fear.” (Deut. 32:16-17) This is also reiterated in the New Testament in 1 Corinthians 10:20: “No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons.” This makes sense when we consider the enemy’s dual mission to deceive (into worshipping false idols for example) and destroy mentioned in John 8 and John 10:10 respectively. This brings me to my next point.
3. Where demons are influencing a person, destruction and deceit follow close behind.
When it comes to the question of tattoos, Leviticus 19:28 often comes up in conversation. And without getting into a massive rabbit trail, this was written primarily in reference to the idolatrous practices involving self-harm in worshipping false deities (i.e. demons). We see this in Elijah’s encounter with the false prophets of Baal. This is related to the enemy’s dual strategy to deceive and destroy while despite the fact that the Israelites were supposed to be a people set apart from the idolatrous practices of those around them (Deut 14:1-2).
“You are of your father the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he speaks from his own nature, because he is a liar and the father of lies.” John 8:44
“A thief [the devil] comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance.” John 10:10
The Scriptures show that the enemy and his fallen angels have a mission in order to deceive either so that they can incite you to self-destroy or destroy another person (as in the case with child sacrifice to the god Molech). You see this again with the demoniac in Mark 5:5
“Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains, he was always crying out and cutting himself with stones.” I’m not entirely sure why this was (if someone would like to Google it and comment, please be my guest O:-) ) but it does meet up with the Old Testament warnings against the cutting/self-harm involved in idolatry.
Another one of the primary goals of the enemy is to destroy people in hell. We can see this in the following passage:
“In their case, the god of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” (2 Cor 4:4)
The “god of this age” also known as “Satan” or, “the adversary” wants to blind people to the knowledge of the truth so that they will be condemned.
4. Demon “possession” isn’t a Biblical category but their influence is very real.
Did you know that there is no NT word that means demon “possessed”? The Scriptures consistently refer to people under demonic influence as either “demonized” (Gk. daimonizomai) or as people that “have a demon” (Matt. 11:18; Luke 7:33; 8:27; John 7:20; 8:48, 49, 52; 10:20) but there is no language to suggest that a demon actually “possesses” someone. This is an unfortunate translation and carries over into the English connotations not in the Greek. People can come under varying degrees of spiritual attack but to say that they are “demon possessed” is misleading. Wayne Grudem writes, “Since the term demon possessed is misleading one to use in all cases, especially when referring to Christians, I would prefer to avoid it altogether. It seems better to simply recognize that there can be varying degrees of demonic attack or influence on people, even on Christians, and to leave it at that.”
5. The adversary and his angels (demons) cannot read your mind or hear your thoughts.
After many of us has experienced spiritual attack through their whispering lies, it is easy to believe that they can somehow “get in your head” and might be reading our minds in order to tempt us and lie to us but this is not the case. The Scriptures make clear that God alone searches the hearts and knows our thoughts. (Matt 9:4; 12:25; Mark 2:8; Gen. 6:5; Psalm 139:2) Therefore, when need not be concerned that they have such strength over us in this regard but to speak aloud rebukes and the truths of Scripture to counter their activity.
In conclusion, remember 1 John 4:4’s encouragement, “You are from God, little children, and you have conquered them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.” We know that we who have believed in Jesus have his Spirit (Romans 8:15-16; Gal 4:6) and needn’t fear the wiles of the enemy but take up the sword of the Spirit (the Word of Truth) and victoriously defend ourselves and others from his attacks!
