Understanding Satan: Deception, Temptation, and God's Sovereignty

But we've seen also that he is one who is a liar, that he's clever and crafty, and -- but yet at the same time, he's resistible. Now, one of the things that's most often overlooked about the nature of Satan and his activity is his metamorphic character, and when we speak of metamorphosis, we speak of that which changes in its outward appearance -- as the butterfly goes through the metamorphosis of going from a worm into a flying -- beautiful flying creature. [00:00:42]

And what is meant by our describing Satan as metamorphic is his capacity, we say in theology, to manifest himself 'subspecies boni', which means, literally, "under the auspices of the good" -- that so far from being this ludicrous character in the red suit and the horns and the pitchfork that we talked about in the last discussion, he rather has the capacity to manifest himself, the Scripture says, as an angel of light. [00:01:30]

He doesn't come against us bearing fangs, with a hideous visage; but rather he will approach us disguised in beauty, looking attractive. That's part of the allure of his seductive techniques. I think if Satan were to manifest himself in a human person, it would not be some horrible, famous, miserably wicked person like Sadaam Hussein or Osama bin Laden, but rather he will come on the stage of history looking like a Billy Graham (that's no reflection on Billy Graham). [00:02:17]

And his two main functions that he gives to the world are the functions of temptation and accusation; and it's very important for us to understand both of those functions of Satan. The one with which we're most familiar is his function as the tempter. We've already seen how, in paradise, he seduced Adam and Eve by tempting them to sin. We know that his full powers and expertise were unleashed against Jesus in His hellish experience of temptation in the Judean wilderness. [00:03:22]

Jesus is subjected to the assault of Satan in the midst of the Judean wilderness, and if you've ever been to Palestine -- if you've ever been to Israel -- and have gone by the Judean wilderness, it's one of the most desolate places you'll ever see in your life. The only living things in there are a few birds, a couple of rabbits, and scorpions, and some snakes. It's a horrible place. [00:04:44]

And yet there was Jesus, for 40 days in this place of desolation, subjected to the unbridled attack of the adversary, of Satan. And the attack comes to Adam and Eve on a full stomach; it comes to Jesus after 40 days of fasting, when he has the natural, biological pangs of hunger. Also the assault comes against Adam and Eve while they have the mutual strength of human companionship and fellowship. [00:05:04]

And here is Jesus, utterly alone, during His period of 40 days, when the temptation comes. You think, for example, of His own parable of the prodigal son, whose behavior level is one thing when he's in the father's house and with the family, and he doesn't manifest his radical degeneration until he goes into a foreign country where he's anonymous, where nobody knows him, where there's no expectation of a certain level of behavior. [00:05:59]

And so this is his forte: to come to the people of God and try to seduce them to sin. You know, sin itself has so much attraction to us. If we know anything about the things of God, we know that sin can never possibly make anybody happy; and yet we're driven to seek our own happiness. Jonathan Edwards once said that the action of a will, the action of volition, is the mind chooses what seems to be good for us at the moment. [00:07:04]

And see we get confused between happiness and pleasure. Sin brings pleasure, but never happiness. We haven't learned that yet; we won't learn it until we find that our only happiness is in God and in the things of God, when we enter into the heavenly state. In the meantime, we're subject to these seductive advances by Satan, who makes sin look good to us, with the promise of pleasure. [00:07:50]

But everything that Satan does is always under the sovereign authority of God. Satan can't move a finger without the divine permission. Now, Jesus understands that, and He understands the situation in which Job is placed; He understood the situation Adam and Eve faced when they were in the garden; and certainly He never forgot the situation He had in the isolation of the Judean wilderness so that when He taught His disciples to pray, He says, "When you pray, pray like this: 'Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil'." [00:14:36]

One of the difficult things in the Christian life is to discern between the work of the Holy Spirit in convicting us of sin and the work of Satan in accusing us of sin because they may be both pointing at the same transgression; but I've noticed this difference: when the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, as painful as it may be for a moment, there's always something sweet in it because in conviction the Spirit always gives us the promise of forgiveness and restoration. [00:20:09]

I believe that people can be demon-possessed, but I don't think a Christian can be demon -- not a true Christian, not a regenerate person because in that regenerate person resides God the Holy Spirit, and the Scriptures tell us, "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." So no demon can hold us hostage to the power of Satan. They can oppress us, they can harass us, they can tempt us, attack us, do all of those things, but thanks be to God, He who is in us is greater than he who is in the world. [00:23:19]