What does the Bible say about evil and the Devil? So many things. For instance, the well-known story from the Book of Charlie Daniels, “The Devil went down to Georgia. He was looking for a soul to steal. He was in a bind ’cause he was way behind, and he was willing to make a deal.” Just kidding that is not in the Bible. But, we do learn from that song that the Devil is a really good fiddle player, just not the best. Which I think is probably true. But, like I said, not in the Bible. There are many things that people think about the Devil that are not in the Bible.
Some of us might think that the Devil makes his first appearance in the Bible in the Garden of Eden by taking the form of a serpent who tempted Eve and Adam to eat the fruit. But, the Book of Genesis never says that the serpent in that story is the Devil. We read that into it, but it is not in the text. The serpent is just a serpent. A talking serpent, but just a serpent.
Looking at the whole text of the Bible, Satan is a very complicated figure primarily because the concept of Satan was evolving over time in the cultures in which the books of the Bible were being written. The earliest references to Satan in the Hebrew text are references to him as an angel or even a servant of God who had a very particular purpose which was to accuse or test people. In fact, the Hebrew word “satan” literally means “the accuser.” In the Book of Job Satan is a member of God’s heavenly council of angels and Satan wants to test Job to see if he will be faithful in hard times as well as good times. In the story, Satan asks God’s permission to do horrible things to Job and God grants that permission. In other words, in early Hebrew thinking, Satan was not the Prince of Darkness or the personification of evil or the enemy of God that we might think of today.
There are some references that might refer to Satan falling from heaven or being a fallen angel, which is a popular idea, but these are pretty obscure verses and in no way central to the Bible as a whole.
It does seem that in the several hundred years between the writing of the Old and New Testaments the idea of Satan developed rapidly from this heavenly accuser working with God to an enemy of God. So when the New Testament begins Satan is a very different character than he was in the Old Testament.
The most important story where we learn about this New Testament souped-up satanic figure is in the story of the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness. One gospel just references this story and two tell the story in detail. This story of Jesus being tempted by Satan in the wilderness is probably the most important biblical material we have about Satan and how he fits into our own Christian faith, except maybe the Book of Revelation which I will talk about later and also next Sunday.
So the temptation in the wilderness. First of all, we are told that Jesus is led to this experience by God. Matthew 4:1 says “Then the Spirit led Jesus up into the wilderness so that the devil might tempt him.” So even here in this New Testament iteration of the Devil, we have echoes of Old Testament theology that the work of the devil is somehow part of God’s plan. God uses Satan by leading Jesus into this confrontation.
I’ll tell what really confuses me about this point. Whenever we pray the Lord’s Prayer we say “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” Yet, here in Matthew Jesus is being led by God into temptation. So if God led Jesus into temptation, does God also lead us into temptation? And if leading us into temptation is a thing that God does with a larger plan and purpose in mind, why does Jesus tell us to ask God not to do it? Is temptation like a testing that ultimately helps us grow or is temptation an evil to be avoided at all costs? Honestly, I don’t know. I wish I could give you a more helpful answer to that question, but it continues to perplex me.
What this story does say very clearly is that Jesus overcame the temptations. He defeats the devil. He does not give in to temptation. He resists. He passes the text. The Devil tries three times. He wants Jesus to use his power to make food appear magically, but Jesus refuses to use his power for selfish reasons. The Devil wants him to try to kill himself to prove that God would not allow the Son of God to die that way. Jesus refuses to test God in that way. The Devil wants Jesus to bow down and worship him in exchange for power over all the kingdoms of the world – a power which Jesus would certainly have used to make the world better, but Jesus refuses to bow down and worship anyone but God. \
Basically, the Devil offers Jesus a bunch of what seem like short cuts toward good ends and Jesus stays true to his faith in God and refuses the Devil’s easy answers. Maybe that is the most important thing we can know about the Devil. The Devil tempts us with short cuts and easy answers, but God has a larger purpose for us that involves daily, faithful, selfless, sometimes hard, sacrificial choices. God has a larger purpose and plan and there are no short cuts or easy ways to get there.
There are many more times Satan or the Devil is mentioned in the Bible, but these are rarely more than a passing comment. One of my favorite quick mentions is from 2 Corinthians 11:14 where Paul says, “Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light”. In other words, there are times when something seems to be good and right but it is evil and wrong and we are being deceived. In America today we have a large number of people who can look at pictures of immigrant children who have been taken from their parents and locked in overcrowded cages and see this as good, righteous, and just. How is that possible? Because sometimes Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.
Or perhaps an example closer to home and more convicting for some of us, we can all get in conflicts with family members; spouses, children, parents, siblings and we sure that we are right and good, we have done nothing wrong and the other person is just being evil. Has anyone ever felt that way? But, in reality, any objective observer would look at the situation and tell us that we are wrong. That works the other way too, by the way. We can beat ourselves up for things in a relationship that are not our fault at all. How does this all happen? Because evil can disguise itself as good. Because Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.
Which brings us to the part of the question for the sermon today, “What is evil?” I’ve mostly talked about Satan so far, but the question of the day asks, “What does the Bible say about evil and the devil?”
Well, unfortunately, I can’t give you a straightforward definition of evil or even a biblical definition of it. We can say some general things like, “Evil is disobeying God’s Will.” but what does that mean? The Old Testament prophets and Jesus spend a lot of time condemning powerful people who prey upon the powerless. We could say that evil is harming people, especially people who are less powerful than us. The Book of Revelation makes this assumption. We will talk about it more next week but behind all the fantastic imagery in that book, it is a story about God confronting and defeating powerful and violent forces in the world, forces which have victimized the powerless, forces that are clearly evil.
So, those are some big pictures ideas about what is evil, but then in the Bible, we also have the Apostle Paul who gets a lot deeper into the cultural and ethical weeds of what is good and what is evil. However, I think because, because he gets so deep into the details, sometimes he gets it wrong. When he names homosexuality as evil in Romans 1, he gets it wrong. When he fails to condemn slavery as evil he gets it wrong. When he tells women to be silent in church and treat their husbands as their head the way Christ is the head of the church. He gets it wrong again. It seems when Paul starts to name individual people or behaviors as wrong or evil; when he gets specific, he can miss the mark, and in so doing we could say he condemns or harms innocent people over which he has power. Isn’t the definition of evil I just offered. It turns out the devil really is in the details.
The other place evil is mentioned is Genesis. Interesting that evil comes up so prominently at the beginning and the end of the Bible. But, in the creation story of Genesis evil is mentioned in a very specific context. It is mentioned in the context of the human ability to discern what is evil. The story of Adam and Evil and the forbidden fruit. That fruit God which forbade them to eat was from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Eating that fruit gave them the ability to discern the difference between the two. The price of eating it was expulsion for paradise. I’ve got to say I think it was the worst deal in history. Not only did they lose paradise but this knowledge of good and evil: It’s either the worst superpower ever or we are just terrible at using it. We get this wrong all the time. Adam and Eve got it wrong right of the bat. They immediately decided their bodies were shameful or evil. God didn’t teach them that. God didn’t want them to cover their bodies. So basically the first decision about what was good or evil using this new power to discern, was their evaluation of their bodies and they got it wrong. Humanity hasn’t really done any better sense. We are really bad at this. We think evil is good and good is evil. Our own selfishness, biases, and prejudices are always coloring our discernment of what is right and wrong, good and bad.
On the one hand, there are things that clearly evil in this world. On the other hand, just 200 years ago some things we thought were evil we now see as good and some things we thought were good we know see as evil.
So let me just close this little survey of evil and the Devil, by circling back to the Devil. Because there is one more thing that needs to be said in any Christian reflection on evil and the Devil. And this is kind of old school theology. It is biblical though I can’t point to a specific verse, the whole narrative the Bible is clear. The fact is this: The Devil has already been defeated. God has already defeated the Devil. These present times and this present darkness in which we live are the last battles in a war that has already been won by God through the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. The Devil hasn’t given up but his fate is sealed. I told you it was old school. But, it’s important. When we face temptation or trials or troubles, we know that these too shall pass. The ultimate defeat of evil is important when we see terrible stories in the news because we can know that God has a larger purpose and plan. Our purpose might be to fight with all our might for the good as we understand it, but every awful news story we see is probably not a defining moment in God’s purpose for the world. It’s important that God has already defeated the Devil because, we can know that no matter how dark it gets in our lives or in the world, the light will still shine and ultimately the light will cast out the darkness.
To put it simply, through faith, we know that God wins. Love wins. We see it thousands of years ago in Israel’s liberation from slavery in Egypt. We see this in the resurrection of Christ. We see it throughout history when communities organize around love with discipline and faith. We see it in Revelation in the visions of a new Jerusalem where every tear is wiped away. Love wins. If we are on the side of love, we are on the winning side.
That old saying, “The Devil made me do it” is a lie. The Devil cannot make you do anything. The devil has no power unless you give it to him. The Devil has already been defeated. When we are on the side of love and equality, when we are on the side of kindness and gentleness, when we have hope and vision for a better future for all living things, we know we are on the good side, the right side, the winning side. We may not see the victory now, but soon we will. We may not overcome the forces of evil today, but tomorrow we will. We may fall on our faces in this moment, but we will rise again. The light will always cast out the darkness. Love wins. Amen.
Govans Presbyterian Church 