Notes on the Invisible War #5

Mankind’s Mission
Insights from Genesis 3

In Eden Satan sought to subvert the human race and to set human beings against God. He was partially successful. He succeeded in moving Adam to declare independence from the Creator, but he failed to enlist the human race in his crusade against the Lord.

In our last study we saw something of Satan’s goals, and also a glimpse into our mission here on planet Earth. Satan has a certain amount of control of the planet, as well as a firm grip on human cultures. In reshaping our planet God designed a system marked by stability and regularity, which he declared was “good” (Genesis 1,2). But there are also forces here that promote chaos and cruelty, reflecting Satan’s influence. God’s command to the first pair to “fill the Earth and subdue it” (Genesis 1:28) is far from a license to exploit Earth’s resources. It is rather a commission to battle the tendencies toward chaos that operate in a world impacted by evil. We are to do all we can to preserve and promote the beauty imbedded in our planet as God fashioned it, for the benefit of all creatures (cf. Genesis 1:28, “rule”).

The commission to subdue the tendency of natural evil toward chaos also implies a commission to battle personal evil. As noted in the fourth post in this series, we are told to “overcome evil with good.” Satan is intent on spoiling God’s good works by overcoming good with evil. One of our major roles in the divine plan is to identify evil, and then to challenge and overcome it with good. We are to seek the good of the planet and its wildlife, and so combat what I’m calling natural evil. We are also to “overcome evil with good” in relationships, combating what I’m calling “personal evil.” We bless the persecutor, help those who would harm us, speak kindly of those whose brutal gossip hurts us the most. We seldom realize that overcoming evil with good may be the way that many of us will glorify God the most.

A look back at Genesis 3
Satan succeeded in moving the first pair to eat the forbidden fruit. Adam and Eve sensed their sudden alienation from the Creator, and tried to hide from him. But God entered the garden in search of these creatures fashioned in his own image and likeness. Genesis 3 relates his words to Satan, to Eve, and to Adam after the fall. While there are many lessons we might draw from elements of the story — from the strategy Satan used to corrupt Eve, from the fact that God initiated contact with the sinning pair, or from his act in clothing Adam and Eve with the skins of animals, as far as the conduct of the Invisible War is concerned. the most significant insights are found in what God says to each of the three.

The curse on Satan (Genesis 3). In Scripture a curse is best understood as a prediction of disaster that is supernaturally empowered. The empowerment may come from God, or – as in the case of Balaam’s attempts to curse Israel as recorded in Numbers22 — via a demonic power.

Genesis 3:14-15 is addressed to the serpent which Satan used to channel his temptation of the humans. While the initial curse is placed on the serpent, elements clearly relate to Satan.
God says, “you will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust.” This first curse element is directed against the serpent, although some have argued that “and you will eat dust” is directed against Satan. The serpent is cursed because he permitted Satan to operate through him.

God says, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers.” This curse element seems to impact both the serpent and Satan. Most human beings tend to be repelled by and fear both snakes and Satan. This element of the curse is significant, for Satan’s goal was to thwart God’s purposes by enlisting humanity on his side in the Invisible War. But humankind will remain independent, allowing each individual to choose sides freely. The guilt and fear humans feel that leads them to draw back from the Creator is matched by the enmity they feel for Satan and the evil for which he stands.

Then God says, “he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” In this curse element God reveals his purpose to end the Invisible War with a blow struck by a human being. Satan will
injure the person who dooms him, but Satan and his rebellion are destined to be crushed. Amazingly, a human being, a descendant of the deceived Eve, whom we know today to be Jesus Christ, will end the war and achieve final victory!

From the beginning God has intended to use human beings as his secret weapons in the Invisible War. He is conducting the war through us, weak though we may be. And although his intent was openly proclaimed to Satan at the fall, there is nothing the Evil One can do to avoid his fate or alter the curse pronounced by the Creator.

Consequences for the woman. It’s important not to take God’s words to Eve as a curse. The text does not say or even intimate that God is cursing Eve or her daughters. Rather God is letting Eve know the impact that her choice to eat the forbidden fruit will have on womankind.

God says, “I will greatly increase of pains in childbearing.” While some interpret this to indicate physical pain, it’s best to understand this statement as primarily a reference to psychological pain. Fallen, the first pair’s tendency to sin will be passed on to their children. For Eve that tendency will erupt in the murder of one of her sons by his brother.

God says, “your desire will be for your husband.” A better translation is “your desire will be to please men.” Rather than seeking identity and meaning in relationship with God, women will seek identity and meaning in their relationship with men, a reality we see expressed powerfully in our own culture and society.

God says, “and he will rule over you.” The relationship between men and women will be distorted, so that men take advantage of women’s vulnerabilities. Rather than give women due respect as persons created in God’s image and likeness, men will turn women into objects, demeaning, misusing, and victimizing them.

Consequences for the men. God says, “Cursed is the ground because of you, and through painful toil you will eat of it.” As women will seek meaning and identity in their relationship with men, men will seek identity and meaning in their work. Status will be associated with the effort and energy they expend in their struggle to provide a living for their families.

Also, implicit in the previous statement of consequences for women, is the impact on men who realize that they have, and thus are tempted to misuse, power over women.

Implications for the Invisible War
Most, but not all human beings will insist on retaining their independence. They will fall victim to the consequences which the Lord laid out for Adam and Eve. A few may give their allegiance to Satan, knowingly or unwittingly. Others will respond to God’s invitation to trust him, and give their allegiance to him. It is through these human beings who are welcomed into relationship with God that he will fight the invisible war, until final victory is achieved at the return of Christ.

In this and the preceding post I suggested that one of our major roles in the Invisible War is to commit to overcoming evil with good. Wherever we see the results of evil in nature or culture, it is our calling to seek to restore that which is good.

Genesis 3’s statement of the psychological and interpersonal consequences of the fall focuses our attention on several areas where we are to battle evil. Each of these areas is relational.

First, we are to personally root our sense of identity and meaning in our relationship with God. Christian women cannot continue to seek identity in their relationship with men, and Christian men cannot continue to seek identity in their work. Each must give priority to his or her personal relationship with God.

Second, we are to seek to restore the appropriate relationship between the sexes as co-bearers of the image and likeness of the Creator. Christian men can no longer view and treat women as second class citizens, or as objects rather than as full partners, in the home, the church, and in society.

Third, we are to give priority to raising children who are responsive to God. As sinners by nature, our children will always be a source of pain as well as joy. But nurturing them in a family with two parents is a vital aspect of how we fight on God’s side in the Invisible War.

Application
Each of the areas which are explored in the Genesis 3 statements of relational consequences of the Fall have practical applications. Rather than spell them out here, I prefer to invite you to look at your own life, your family, your work, your church, and your friendships, and ask God to show you where those consequences occur in your own relationships. Where do you need to overcome evil with good? Where are you called to serve in God’s army today, to do your part in his Invisible War?

In the News

Spell Book, Anyone?
When school officials in Buncomb County, NC, arranged for students who wanted them to pick up Bibles donated by the Gideons, Ginger Striveli brought pagan spell books to be distributed in the same way. She didn’t really want to give away the books, but was making a point made by others who practice “minority” religions these days. Instead of trying to directly block the giving away of Bibles, atheists, pagans and others are making the practice of even passive distribution of religious materials uncomfortable for school officials by demanding equal time. It worked in North Carolina. The school board decided that maybe such distributions weren’t such a good idea anyway.

Filtered Wicca?
On January 3 the ACLU filed suit against a Missouri public library. Seems their computers are set to block access to sites about modern Wicca, Native American religions, and Astrology. The librarian states that she is glad to unblock any websites for those doing legitimate research on request. But that the person whose objection to the filtering policy wouldn’t say which web sites she wanted to access. The Child Internet Protection Act requires libraries to block material which may be deemed harmful to minors. Apparently the ACLU deems occult material harmless.

Take care
If you should run into a faerie, you probably should follow some safety rules. Supernatural folk, one writer says, aren’t necessarily friendly. (Surprise!) 1. Don’t give them your name. 2. Have some iron handy. It helps in fighting them off. 3. Mind your manners with strangers. Could be a faerie or deity in disguise, and they tend to be touchy.. 4. But avoid saying “thank you.” It implies indebtedness, and you don’t want to give a faerie that kind of hold on you. And by the way, don’t thank me for these warnings. Thank Tricia Woodbridge, who researches this kind of thing in ancient documents. Better yet, don’t thank her. Maybe she’s a faerie in disguise.

Powers of the Powers #2

Taking Away the Word

In the ancient world people were leery of beings they believed inhabited the spirit world. They believed that gods and demons (identified in the first century by words associated with power, such as authorities, rulers, and principalities, etc.) shaped their destinies. The religious myths of the Greeks and Romans feature many stories of heroes who were aided or victimized by gods or goddess, who favored or persecuted them. The people of that era, whatever part of world they lived in, resorted to magic in an attempt to influence or control these supernatural beings.

In our time, few take the spirit world seriously. Even fewer see its denizens as a threat. Moderns explain events by cause and effect, and assume that whatever happens can be explained naturalistically, or could be if we knew enough about the preceding cause/effect chain. Even most Christians find it hard to take seriously the idea that some links in the cause/effect chain may be due to the actions of angels or demons. For us, “science” has replaced “superstition,” and most in the Western world are much more comfortable with the notion that everything has a rational naturalistic explanation than with the idea that, when things go wrong, evil spirits may be involved.

Perhaps the modern view is to be preferred. After all, a person who blames everything on the activity of evil spirits is unlikely to take responsibility for his choices and their outcomes. Certainly most of the things that happen to us are the result of our own or others’ choices. Cause and effect clearly do operate in our world and in our lives. Yet this does not logically rule out causes sourced in the spirit world. If “powers” do exist, and if those powers are able to act in our world, their actions would become links in that cause/effect chain we feel so comfortable with.

It’s clear from Scripture that the biblical worldview does include a spirit world, and that the principalities and powers mentioned in the New Testament are evil spirits, demons who follow Satan and who are enemies of humankind. We need to understand what they can do, and how to counter their activities. But what are the evil powers able do?

In the last post I invited you think about a verse found in Jesus’ parable of the sower. This is a familiar parable, which includes a hint about one of the abilities of the evil powers ranged against humans. Here’s the verse:

“Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they man not believe and be saved” (Luke 8:13)

In Jesus’ original parable the farmer is scattering seed, which represents God’s Word. The seed falls on different types of ground, representing different attitudes in the hearers, and Jesus comments on the varying responses represented. Ground along the path is hard and rocky, pressed down by the passage of many feet. Seed that falls on this kind of ground can’t be pressed into the soil. It lies on the top, exposed, unable to germinate, and birds come and take it away.

In his explanation of the parable Christ tells us that the birds represent Satan [or his agents], and that they “take away the word from their hearts.” Apparently evil spirits have the ability to remove information or to make it make inaccessible. Contemporary research has identified explicit and implicit memories; memories which an individual can recall and access, and memories of which an individual is unaware and is not able to access. Implicit memories exist, but they simply are not available to the individual to guide his or her actions. The same research has identified brain chemicals associated with the filing of implicit memories.

Is this what Jesus was alluding to when he spoke of demons “taking away the word from their heart?” Is this how evil spirits manipulate humans, through their brain chemicals? Possibly. But however the demons work, some individuals hear the word, but it is unable to produce change because it is quickly “taken away” by evil spirits bent on thwarting God’s purposes in our lives.

While Jesus is speaking specifically of God’s Word, what other things are evil spirits able to “take away” so that we are unaware of them and unable to respond appropriately?

While this last speculation may be thought provoking, it is not something we can easily deal with. But the question of how we can defend ourselves from the efforts of Satan to “take away” the word of God, however the Holy Spirit speaks that word to us, does have an answer. In Jesus’ parable, those who are vulnerable to this kind of attack by evil spirits are characterized as ground “along the path.” This ground is hardened, pressed down, unreceptive. When the Word is heard, the word simply lies there until “taken away.”

What ground along the path represents is an essentially unresponsive attitude. We hear, but have no impulse to respond to what is heard. These are the words which demons “take away,” leaving us unchanged and unfruitful.

What can we do to protect ourselves from evil spirits who are eager to snatch away any words God may speak to us? James 1:22-25 explains:

“Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks in his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.”

If we cultivate a responsive attitude, always eager to put into practice what the Lord says to us, we thwart the efforts of Satan and those evil spirits who are ever eager to take away what we have heard from the Lord.

Next Power Post.
Is the idea that demons can manipulate us through our brain chemicals foolish? There may be more evidence for this in Scripture than we imagine.

Powers of the Powers #1

In the ancient world the gods, goddesses, demons and other supernatural beings thought to inhabit the spirit world were known as “powers.” The New Testament gives some 13 titles to these beings, referring to them as rulers, principalities, authorities, dominions, powers, etc. In fact these supernatural beings are fallen angels, whom we know better as demons.

In the ancient world the powers were thought able to control the lives of individuals. Success or failure, health or sickness, were viewed as being in the hands of the powers who shaped the fates of humans.

It was natural then to attempt to influence the powers, and to do so the people of the ancient world turned to magic. And to empower the magic, people sought the help of “spirit assistants,” or “spirit guides,” themselves among the powers. Thus in the first century the people of the Roman Empire, like those of thousands of years before and after, attempted to use magic for four primary purposes. (1) Protective magic (apotropic magic) was used in an effort to gain protection, particularly against dreaded disease and illness. (2) Aggressive or malevolent magic was used in an effort to harm competitors or enemies. (3) Influential magic was used in an attempt to bend another person to one’s will or desires, as in love magic. And (4) divination magic was used in an attempt to discern the course of the future and to determine the best available choice one might make.

The conviction that a spirit world exists, and that it impacts the life of humans in the material universe, was universal across ancient times and cultures. It was the common belief of the various peoples of biblical times, and the dependence of the nations around ancient Israel on magic is clearly reflected in Old Testament prohibitions on any attempt to contact the spirit world through magic or other means. Thus Deuteronomy 18:10,11 specifies, “Let no one be found among you . . . who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or cast spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead.”

The Bible views the powers of the spirit world as essentially hostile. In the words of the Apostle Paul, the spirit world is inhabited by the “spiritual forces of evil,” and the Christian’s calling is to “struggle against” them (Eph. 6:12).

Christians and the Powers today
The Quotable below makes the point that in his death Christ “disarmed the powers and authorities, … triumphing over them by the cross” (Col. 2:5). No longer do Satan’s demons hold sway, leaving believers helpless. In Christ, we have the resources we need to stand against their evil efforts.

At the same time, the “powers and authorities” remain active, eager to attack us and make our lives unproductive and unhappy. And the more ignorant we are of what Scripture calls the wiles, or strategies, of the devil, the more vulnerable we are to demonic attacks. What we need, and what Scripture provides, is an understanding the nature of demonic attacks, and of the resources God has provided to enable us to stand against them. Despite the evidence of Scripture few believers understand the powers that demons possess or how they exercise them. And few understand how we can defend ourselves against Satan’s strategies.

That’s why I’m launching a new series with this post. The series is called “Powers of the Powers,” and in it we’ll examine what Scripture reveals about demonic attacks on on believers, and what Scripture reveals about how we can defend ourselves.

The verses and passages we’ll look at generally aren’t viewed as providing insight into the abilities and strategies of demons. But then, most commentators and Bible teachers seldom study the Word with spiritual warfare in view. I suspect you’ll be as surprised as I’ve been to discover what demons are doing. And that you’ll be as relieved as I to discover the resources God provides to enable us to combat them.

To think about until the next “Powers of the Powers” post
“Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they man not believe and be saved” (Luke 8:13)

Quotable

Christ’s death and resurrection deprived the evil forces of effective power against himself of the members of his body, the church. Whereas, prior to the cross the powers could maintain a kingdom and hold humanity in slavery, Christ’s work changed that. No longer can these powers exert their compelling influence over people whom Christ as claimed for himself. Christ is able to redeem people from captivity and bring them freedom because he has disarmed the powers.
Clinton E. Arnold
Powers of Darkness

NOTES on the Invisible War #4

Battlefield
As Adam and Eve rest in the grove where the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is found, a stranger cloaked in the identity of a serpent intrudes.

The Enemy
In our last NOTES we explored his nature and origin. He was a member of the angelic hosts created by God prior to God’s creation of the material universe. Described in the older testament as an “anointed cherub,” the stranger was also created in the image and likeness of God.

The phrase “image and likeness” is expressed by two Hebrew words. Together they serve as a technical theological construct. The implications of “image and likeness” has been debated, but it’s way to understand it as an affirmation of full personhood. Just as God is a person, with all the attributes of personhood, so certain of his created beings are also persons, having the ability to think, to feel, to make distinctions, to remember, to plan ahead, to desire, to choose. While the Scripture specifically states that humans have been created with the image and likeness, it’s clear from biblical depictions of angels that they too were created in the image and likeness of God. This is especially clear in regard to Satan and his followers, who although created blameless had, and exercised, freedom to reject God’s love rather than to return it. This freedom of choice, as we’ve seen in earlier NOTES, is critical for determining true personhood.

The stranger, who is now the implacable enemy of God, is about to try to corrupt the humans God has placed in this garden on the planet we call Earth.

The significance of Earth
In one sense Earth is merely a tiny planet circling a dim sun in a minor galaxy of the vast universe. In another sense Earth is the center of the created universe, the battlefield on which the Invisible War between God and Satan, angels and demons, is being fought.

Scripture suggests that Earth has always had an unusual significance. We see it in Ezekiel’s lament over the fallen angel in chapter 28:13, where the God says “you were in Eden, the garden of God.” As one who had been “anointed as a guardian cherub” (28:14), Satan was “on the holy mount of God.” A few wise commentators have drawn the conclusion that Earth was the place from which Satan, as Lucifer the Light Bearer, exercised his commission to serve God as “guardian cherub” (Eze. 28:14). But as we saw in NOTES 3, Satan rebelled against God. In the struggle that followed Satan attempted to displace God (Isa. 14:13) but was “cast down to earth” (Isa 14:12) – that is, denied free access to heaven and had his activities limited to Earth. In the battle the earth was battered into the condition described in Genesis 1:1; it became “formless and empty,” shrouded by a “darkness” that hung “over the surface of the deep.”

Thus in his initial attempt to displace the Creator, Satan and his followers failed miserably. All they succeeded in doing was to bring ruin the seat of his own power, Earth. Still, Earth was his, ruin though it was. Even the New Testament acknowledges that Satan remains the ruler of this world ( ).

The beachhead
It was after this that God acted to restore the ruined Earth, reshaping the planet and filling it with freshly created life. God was not willing to permanently cede any part of his Creation to the rebel. So God restored the place that Satan’s rebellion had left a ruin, replacing chaos with that which was good. And here, on the restored Earth, God planted a Garden. In Eden itself.

How Satan must have raged. For the new Garden of Eden represented a beachhead established by God in Satan’s own territory. That Garden made it clear that God intended to reestablish his authority over Satan’s realm.

Then, in the Garden, God created Adam, in his own image and likeness. Later he provided Adam with Eve, and charged the first couple to be fruitful and multiply. God even told them that were to “fill the earth and subdue it” (Ge.2:28).

The significance of the phrase, “fill and subdue,” has been widely misunderstood. Its meaning has been distorted by those who have failed to realize that the biblical narrative is the account of an invisible war between God and Satan, between good and evil. The phrase has been twisted to justify exploitation of the world’s resources, and to charge Christianity with supporting a rapacious capitalism. In fact, the phrase commissions humankind with subduing a fallen and Satan dominated earth’s tendency toward chaos. To fill and subdue the earth is to ever restore and to maintain the beauty God created on a planet ruined by Satan, a planet that ever tends toward destruction and decay.

Not only was the reshaping of the planet a demonstration of the Creator’s superiority to the rebel angel, the planting of Eden and the introduction of human beings was a direct challenge to Satan and his followers. Eden was the establishment of a beachhead in Satan’s territory; evidence that God intended to carry on active warfare against the rebel angels. And the creation of Adam and Eve was a warning that God intends to prevail through the agency of human beings, with the final triumph won through a descendant of Eve.

Satan’s response
Genesis chapter 3 describes Satan’s response to God’s initiative. The Creator’s plan to win the war clearly involved these two mortal creatures in some unknown way. Satan might not be powerful enough to confront the Creator directly. But Satan might be able to subvert these new players in the grand drama. Satan had won millions of angels to his side. Why shouldn’t he be able to turn these two from their allegiance to the Creator?

And so Satan joined Adam and Eve that day in Eden, and though he must have hated them intensely, he calmly set out to turn their hearts away from the God who loved them.

Then and Now
Satan was partly successful. He did woo Adam and Eve from their allegiance to God. But in contrast to the fallen angels, humankind remains redeemable. Adam’s fall corrupted our nature but fell short of infusing an implacable hatred of God. Unconverted humans are antagonistic to the Creator and spiritually dead, yet God continues to pursue us. And those of us who turn to him are become the agents through which he fights his invisible war here on earth.

As in ages past, Earth remains the battlefield on which the Invisible War between God and Satan, good and evil, is being fought. And every believer has a role to play in that struggle, though few understand their role or even imagine that the war is being fought fiercely all around them.

In future posts we’ll examine our role in the war more closely. But here I want to offer one simple concept that applies to every believer. In an earlier post I explored the implications of God’s repeated statements in Genesis 1 and 2 that elements of his refashioning of the ruined Earth were “good.” There I noted that we can understand “evil” as the virulent, active antithesis of “good.” Just as God rejected the chaos of the ruined earth and sought to replace it with stability, harmony, and beauty, so God’s people are charged with “subduing” the evil that Satan works in this world. In the words of Romans 12:21, we are told, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

Where are you and I to “overcome evil with good”? The specifics will differ for each of us. But wherever we see evil, we are to look for opportunities to do good. Wherever we see pain, we are to look for opportunities to heal. Wherever we see hatred, we are to look for opportunities to love.

We cannot imagine how great deeds we do and how much our efforts contribute to God’s victory when we simply seek to “overcome evil with good.”

Have a supernatural new year?

New media additions for 2012 make it clear that our culture’s fascination with the occult and the supernatural is growing. The new flick “The Devil Inside” is being heavily promoted on the tube, with the promo stating, “A woman in Italy becomes involved in a series of unauthorized exorcisms.” In the process all sorts of folks are possessed by the devil, and the viewer gets a good scare.

It’s sort of like the edifying prime time TV program “Grimm,” although that show mixes in a little humor as two crime fighters “see” the characters from Grimm’s fairy tales in the perpetrators of contemporary crimes.

A little less violent, but also relying on the supernatural, is the new prime time show Fox show, The Finder, featuring a veteran whose brain injury in the service triggered an ability to find anything—or anyone—who is lost.

These and other new additions join some 60 shows based on the supernatural already on TV: shows like Ghost Whisperer, The Twilight Zone, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Moonlight, Most Haunted, Ghost Hunters, Dark Shadows, Supernatural, Angel, and many others.

As the number of shows continues to grow distorted views of the supernatural infiltrate our culture. And fascination with the occult captures the imagination of many, especially youth and young adults.

We can expect this fascination to keep on growing, distorting views of God and shaping beliefs that are totally out of harmony with Scripture.

The Case if the Frustrated Witch

In one of the books on deliverance in my library the pastor-author tells a story of a frustrated witch. It seems the church has been active in setting the demonized free, and members of a local coven decided to put a curse on the pastor. But nothing bad happened. One of the witches in the coven, after she was converted to Jesus, told the pastor how she had come to church in pretense, and while he was praying for her even tried to rub the curse on him with her hand. “I could just feel it fall off,” she told him.

Curses are something most of us aren’t used to dealing with. But ill wishes and hostility can be empowered by evil spirits and have an impact on the experience of the individual who is cursed. One element in deliverance ministry may very well breaking any curses that lead to failures in the victim’s life. Still, a good question that might have been asked by the frustrated witch who sensed that her curses simply would not stick to the man her coven was attempting to harm is, Why didn’t the curse work?

Balaam, the false prophet whose story is told in chapters 22-24 of the Book of Numbers, had a similar experience. He was hired by the Midianites to put a curse on the Israelites, whom the Midianites feared might attack them on their journey to Canaan. Eager to earn the vast sum he’d been promised, Balaam showed up and went to work. He sacrificed animals on high places overlooking the Israelite camp, and called on his deities to empower the curses he intended to hurl at Israel. But when he began to speak, he found that all he could utter were blessings. Time after time the frustrated Balaam tried to curse Israel, but each time all he could do was bless. To the growing frustration of his employer, King Balak. Balaam was forced to report, “I have received a command to bless; he has blessed, and I cannot change it” (23:20).

Still, Balaam wanted the money he’d been promised. So Balaam advised Balak to try to get the Lord to turn on his people. The king followed Balaam’s advice, and set up a camp filled with young and attractive women near the Israelite camp. When the women succeeded in seducing a number of Israelite men they induced them to worship the Midianite gods. Balaam and King Balak thought that surely this would move God to withdraw his blessing, and to curse his people himself.

Balaam and Balak were right – and wrong. The guilty Israelites were punished and a plague struck the outskirts of the camp. But the plague was halted. And the Israelites then attacked and defeated the Midianites. In the war Balaam, who had returned home with untold riches, was killed.

Looking back on this incident Deuteronomy 23:5 reminds the Israelites that Midian “hired Balaam son of Beor from Pethor in Aram Naharaim to pronounce a curse on you. However, the Lord your God would not listen to Balaam but turned the curse into a blessing for you, because the Lord your God loves you.”

What does this Old Testament incident have to do with the story of the frustrated witch? It simply reminds us that God loves us, and intends to bless us. It also reminds us that while God protects his people, he also commanded Israel’s leaders to “put to death those of your men who have joined in worshipping the Baal [god] of Peor” (25:5). The individuals who sinned were not protected under God’s commitment to bless the nation.

Proverbs 26:2 puts it this way. “Like a fluttering sparrow or a darting swallow, an undeserved curse does not come to rest.”

As Christians you and I are a people blessed by God, who loves us deeply. We can live confident that no curse can touch us – as long as that curse is undeserved. Let’s not follow the path of those Israelites who turned aside from God and suffered the consequences. Live a godly and committed life, and no undeserved curse will come to rest on you.

Notes on the Invisible War

Evil enters the Universe

Answers to the “Why” Questions
In the second NOTES I explored some of the “why´ questions people ask about God’s motives. Each answer wa based on God’s revealed intent to create an eternal community of beings made in his image; a community within which they would fully experience and return his love. As to why God chose to create beings who later rebelled, the answer is found in the fact that love is something that cannot be coerced. The creatures God created in his image had to have the freedom to choose love . . . or to reject it. As to why God permitted evil in his universe, the answer is intrinsically linked to issue of love. Those who reject God and his love also reject all that is truly good, and that is the root of evil. It is also the source of an ongoing invisible warfare between good and evil that has a dramatic impact on all of our lives.

In this post I want to think about the nature of evil and the source of evil in the wider universe. In the next post we’ll look at how evil gained its grip on our world and on the human race..

Introducing evil
In the second NOTES on the Invisible War I commented:

Humans were not the first living beings created to bear the image/likeness of the Creator. Angels, like God and like us, are persons . . . distinct individuals with emotions, rationality, and volition. While there are many significant differences between angels and humans, we do share personhood with each other and with our Creator. Like God we think, we understand, we can appreciate beauty, we have the capacity to extend and receive love, we are able to make distinctions between good and evil, and we make choices. These and the complementary attributes we share with each other and with God are what make angels and humans persons, capable of being members of communities that can receive and return the love of God, and can express that love to one another.

Angels, then, like humans, had the freedom to choose or to reject God’s love. And it was an angel who made the initial choice to reject God’s love who introduced evil into the universe.

Who, and How?
Remember that everything God created was good, without a taint of evil. Yet sentient beings were created with the freedom to choose to respond to God’s love, or choose to reject it. Two Old Testament passages, long recognized as descriptions of the being we know as Satan, describe the pivotal event when the initial choice to reject God’s love was made.

Ezekiel 28 describes a “guardian cherub” (one of an order of powerful angels) who was created perfect. The description is found within an extended passage addressed to the “ruler of Tyre” (28:1). The passage shifts focus from the human ruler to the guardian cherub at 28:12, a shift marked by instructions to the prophet Ezekiel to speak to the “king of Tyre” rather than the ”ruler of Tyre.” Relevant phrases from 28:12-15 give us a clear picture of the being addressed.

“You were the model of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. . . . You were anointed as a guardian cherub, for so I ordained you. . . . You were blameless in all your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you.”

Ezekiel is speaking to a powerful angel, created a “model of perfection,” who was “blameless in all your ways” until a certain point when “wickedness was found in you.” The biblical introduction of this angel answers the questions of who introduced evil [“wickedness”] into the universe, and clearly absolves God of that responsibility. God created the guardian cherub perfect, and he originally lived blamelessly until “wickedness was found in you.”

This same being is further described in an Isaiah passage in which he is addressed as a “King of Babylon.” Again the passage makes it clear that the human ruler of Babylon is not in view. The relevant passage reads,

“How you have fallen from heaven, O morning star, son of the dawn. You have been cast down to earth, you who once laid low the nations. You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven, I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit enthroned on the mount of the assembly, on the utmost heights of the sacred mountain. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds, I will make myself like the most high” (Isaiah 28:12-15).

This passage describes the “wickedness” that was found in this one time citizen of heaven. Rather than honor God as God, the angel addressed in Isaiah “said in your heart” that he would replace God as the central figure in the universe. His “I wills” represent the choice against God that fixed his character and initiated the Invisible War.

Again Scripture indicates that this being, whom we know as Satan, corrupted other angels. Many made the same choice to reject God that Satan had. Satan thus became the leader of “his” [own band of fallen] angels” (cf Matt 25:41); angels whose character was so warped they became the demons we read of in the Gospels and in other Old and New Testament literature.

Note that the passage says nothing of what Satan did, but focuses on what Satan “said in his heart.” The entire orientation of this once blameless “anointed cherub” shifted from God to himself. His concern was no longer to love and serve the God of love, but rather his concern was for what “I will.”

What makes evil evil?
Genesis 1 and 2 constantly describe the planet God is shaping as “good.” Study those references to “good” in these chapters, and we gain insight into God’s nature. God chose to fashion a world in that is marked by consistency, regularity and stability. Day follows night, season follows season. Thus God shaped the world which would provide a sense of security for his creatures. God filled the world with living creatures, and called life “good.” He fashioned human beings with the capacity for intimacy and mutual love, commenting that it was “not good” for Adam to be alone. God shaped a world in which humans would have meaningful work to do, and so share in God’s own creativity. And God made humans responsible for the care of his creation, providing them with a basis for a sense of their own significance. Again and again God looked a what he had done and “saw that it was good.”

In his actions and the repeated statements of his pleasure in that which he called “good,” God revealed himself. We understand what he values, and in creation’s mirror we glimpse his nature and the ideal for human beings =made in his image and likeness.

In rejecting God Satan and his angels rejected repudiated everything that God is and everything that God calls good — and chose the opposite. Rather than stability, Satan chose chaos. Rather than intimacy, Satan choase strife, hostility, and alienation. Rather than beauty, Satan chose the ugly and depraved. Rather than personal responsibility Satan chose excuses, lies and blaming. Satan’s choice put him at war not only with God but also with all that God stands for.

One of the major struggles in the Invisible War between God and Satan is the struggle on God’s side to promote what is good, and on Satan’s side to promote what is evil. Even though what is evil always corrupts sentient beings and leads to their misery and pain, Satan is committed to doing and to encouraging evil.

Evil’s impact
The Bible never equivocates about good and evil. We see the contrast in multiplied passages in the Old and the New Testaments. A familiar passage in Galatians contrasts evil and good as each finds expression in human beings.

The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of range, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law (Galatians 5:19-33).

God never created any creature originally evil. God created angels and man blameless. But evil entered the universe when an “anointed cherub” chose to repudiate the God of love and to place himself rather than the Creator in center of his universe.

The result of that choice has been an unending Invisible War between the forces of God and Satan. The issue in that war is not only to whom will those originally created in God’s will image give their allegiance – to God or to them selves – but whether we humans who choose God will be doers of evil or doers of good.

Satan and the angels who followed him to become demons have made their choice, and their character is eternally fixed. They have become evil, they are committed to evil, and they will fight God to the end. But, as we’ll see in the NOTES, we humans have continuing freedom of choice. And even those who have rejected God may change their minds. Even those who are doing evil may change and begin to do good.

Have a Blessed Christmas

This is the final demondope for 2011. God willing, we’ll resume publication in January of 2012. Thanks to all of you for sharing with me this exploration of spiritual warfare from a biblical perspective.