The Warfare of the Soul Part 3

[9] 1 Cor. xv, 55. Compare Hosea xiii, 14.

[10] Heb. xii, 23.

[11] Moberly, _The Administration of the Holy Spirit_, p. 25.

[12] "For Thou, even Thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men."--1 Kings viii, 39.

"After all, with all his vast knowledge and experience, he is but a creature. He cannot know you from within; he is not omniscient, not omnipresent. He can only _guess_ at your motives,--the secret spring of your actions."--Webb, _The Presence and Office of the Holy Spirit_, pp. 78-79.

[13] Job i and ii.

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CHAPTER III

THE TEMPTER: HIS CHARACTERISTICS AND METHODS

I. _Satan, the Deceiver_

The foremost characteristic of Satan is that which marks him as a Deceiver. It was by deceit that he brought death into the world and all our woe. Our first mother was "beguiled through his subtilty,"[1]

and "being deceived, was in the transgression."[2] Our Lord declares him to be the father of lies,[3] and the constant apostolic warning is against his falsehood and deceit. He secures the active allegiance of men by "blinding the minds of them which believe not";[4] he is able to lead astray G.o.d's people by being "transformed into an angel of light,"[5] and through his wiles and lying wonders he seeks "to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect."[6] So we are taught to watch and pray "lest the devil find room to deceive, who never sleeps, but goes about seeking whom he may devour."[7]

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Nevertheless there is great consolation in the fact that his chief weapon is deceit. By using it he bears his testimony that, though we be far gone from righteousness, yet, should we be permitted to see clearly, truth rather than error would appeal to us.

No man chooses evil for evil's sake.[8] Before he makes such a choice he is deceived into thinking either that the thing is good, or that under the particular circ.u.mstances it is right for him to make what, under other conditions, would be a sinful choice. Thus, much of the sin we commit comes from making ourselves an exception to rules which we ourselves acknowledge, and it has been said that such action is of the very essence of immorality.

One of Satan's favourite deceptions is practised upon us in regard to himself. It has been well said that Satan's master-stroke in these latter times is his policy of persuading men that he himself has no existence. If an army disbelieves in the existence of an enemy, no guard will be kept, and it will be easily surprised and overcome.[9]

{30} So we may be sure that those who deny the personality of Satan will sooner or later be his captives. Knowing this he operates as hiddenly as possible.

How different is his plan of warfare from what it was two thousand years ago. Men believed in him then, and he fought them in the open.

Now they question his existence, and he goes softly lest they should discover their error through his too manifest activity. In our Lord's time, for example, demoniacal manifestation was common; it is rarely heard of now. Satan does not care to be too much in evidence. He encourages us to think lightly of him that we may all the more surely fall into his snares.

Here we see the evidence of his absolute devotion to his cause. Wiser in his generation than the children of light,[10] he is willing to be effaced if thereby the glory of the kingdom of h.e.l.l can be enhanced.

We often mar what we do for G.o.d by conspicuously claiming the credit; he asks for no credit if only the result redounds to his power.

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II. _The Fact of his Personality_

The question of the personality of Satan is one that we must briefly consider here. Do we believe in a personal devil? The answer to this question will show what is our att.i.tude towards the spiritual conflict.

We may go further, and say that it will show whether, in the last a.n.a.lysis, we believe there is any spiritual conflict.[11]

In these days when man is made the measure of all things, both divine and devilish, we often hear it said that every soul is its own tempter, that what revelation calls temptation is but the working out of a so-called "evil principle" that resides by nature in every human spirit.[12]

Of course, there is a partial truth in this, for {32} when we yield ourselves to Satan's power by consenting to sin, we then become his servants, and just as one man often acts as Satan's agent in tempting another, so, too, we can act as his agent in tempting ourselves. But it is none the less his personal work though carried out through another.

To deny the personality of Satan involves one in all manner of denials of Scripture and Church teaching. Revelation declares that G.o.d made our first parents and p.r.o.nounced them "very good."[13] Whence then arose the inherent "principle of evil" that wrought their temptation?

Did G.o.d create in them and p.r.o.nounce "very good" that which a.s.serted itself so desperately against His will, or did it come from a personally directed intelligence outside of them?

Again, in the second Adam, if He is indeed the G.o.d-man, the Incarnate Jehovah, whence came His temptation? If it came from some principle within Him, then just in so far as His temptation was greater than ours must the evil principle dwelling in Him have been greater; and when we consider the extent of His temptation we must then conclude that His human nature had more inherent evil in it than that of any other who has ever braved the perils of the spiritual conflict.

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Again, the verdict of the Christian experience of all ages has been that the more nearly men attain to the likeness of Christ, the more they are tempted. Does then the increase of the Christ-character give added virulence and strength to the evil that is within?

These ill.u.s.trations of temptation show that those who reject the personality of Satan and of his evil angels, and subst.i.tute for it the idea of temptation arising from an evil principle within, are involving themselves in conclusions which strike at the very fundamentals of divine revelation concerning G.o.d and His relations to man.

III. _His Experience and Wisdom_

One of Satan's most powerful means of warfare lies in his experience in dealing with the souls of men. We dare not presume to think that we can oppose or overreach him with any gift of discernment that we have of ourselves. His experience in this warfare has been age-long. Ours has covered but a few brief years. His devotion to his cause has been unflagging, and so, by his strenuous attention to the business in hand, he has acquired vast stores of knowledge as to methods of temptation.

Our knowledge of attack and resistance is a poor and beggarly thing, because when G.o.d would place us in the school {34} of temptation that we might learn this military science, we are wanting in devotion to our cause and miss the numberless opportunities that are offered.

Furthermore, Satan has dealt with millions of souls of the same type as ours, dealt with them and mastered them. It were the height of folly for us to imagine that there might be any thing in our nature, or in our aim and purpose, that he has not met and studied in characters far stronger than ours. Taken apart from G.o.d, there is nothing in us that can for a moment baffle so powerful and experienced a foe. We can present no new front to him. Only the infinite strength and variety of G.o.d's grace can supply that which will surely baffle and defeat him.

As we study the history of his dealings with the souls of men we see not only that he is faithful to his own abominable ideals and aims, and so acquires great knowledge of the methods which avail against us, but that he is faithful and methodical in using the experience he has gained.

He makes the most of what he has. If he discovers that a certain mode of temptation is effective against men, he wastes neither time nor force in wandering afield after new things. He works one method thoroughly, getting out of it {35} all possible dishonour to G.o.d, before seeking new ways and means. He never scatters his force, but is ever intensifying and concentrating it, daily seeking to perfect more and more his method of warfare.

Let us see how careful he is to utilize his own tremendous experiences.

Take the first recorded temptation that he brought against man. What was his course of reasoning in devising it? "I fell through the desire to be like G.o.d," he reflects. "This same temptation will ensnare this new handiwork of G.o.d whom He has made in His own image and likeness."

It was to him unthinkable that any intelligent being should not have that aspiration, and he approaches our first mother, promising as the reward of sin, "Ye shall be as G.o.ds."[14] His confidence was not disappointed. The lure attracted, man fell, and sin and death entered the world.

We note that he again falls back upon his experience in tempting the second Adam. He hears the Father's voice declare, "Thou art My Beloved Son,"[15] and immediately he proceeds to test Him. Mark the substance of his insolent a.s.sault. "If thou art the Son of G.o.d, prove it, vindicate your claim. I challenge it. Turn {36} these stones into bread, and by this miracle show me that you are like G.o.d."[16]

This he believed would be the supreme test. His own fall had come through his ambition; the fall of the human race had its beginning in the same proud aspiration; and surely, he argued, it would prove effective against this new opponent of his power as prince of this world. We know what was the issue of the attempt. No sin could enter the heart of the Sinless One, and yet He allowed Himself to be thus tempted that we might find in His example a means of offsetting the advantage our enemy has in his vast experience with men and their frailties.

IV. _The Methods of his Might_

Not in a single chapter, nor yet in many chapters, would it be possible for us to discuss all the forms of the might with which Satan wars against the servants of G.o.d. We must hasten on to the consideration of some of those that he most commonly employs.

(1) His activity. He never sleeps; he never rests on his arms. What seem to be pauses in the battle are only intervals he is employing to study us more carefully, and to plot some more {37} subtle and ingenious method of attack. Even in moments of defeat he is alert to recover even the smallest advantage. How often when we have just won from him some hard-fought battle, and are pausing, as it were, for breath, our vigilance relaxed ever so little, does he discharge a Parthian shot of pride in our victory, or of impatience which, if it does not wound us grievously, at least mars the perfection of the victory we had secured by G.o.d's grace.

(2) His aggression. We are, perhaps, in many instances, ready to use the opportunities that present themselves to labour for G.o.d's glory, but how salutary a lesson have we to learn from him who, in the interests of eternal unrighteousness, does not wait for opportunity, but labours unceasingly to _create_ occasions for the dishonour of our G.o.d. He goes up and down the world "seeking whom he may devour,"[17]

letting nothing slip that can forward his infernal designs.

In furthering the glory of G.o.d and the work of the kingdom we count ourselves to have done well if we have been fairly faithful to the opportunities that come. We hear much, among even the best of spiritual teachers, of seizing opportunities of grace, but little is said of _making_ such opportunities, of watching and labouring, keen {38} and alert to turn to good account and to G.o.d's glory every circ.u.mstance, whether or not it seem in itself to bear the hall-mark of heaven-sent opportunity.

How much more zealous is Satan in the evil cause! He not only uses every opportunity that comes, but he counts himself to have done little unless he has forced occasions for wounding the divine Majesty and enslaving souls made in the image of G.o.d.

(3) His persistency. Though it is within the power of the soul, by a stout and persistent defence, to discourage Satan in regard to certain particular temptations, yet in regard to temptation in general he is never discouraged. However many times we may inflict defeat upon him, however mighty in battle the soul of saint or sinner may wax, he never resigns the hope that he may yet secure dominion in the heart in which G.o.d now reigns.