Quotes about Satan-Identified

1

The devil is not impersonal like stones or bureaucracies; he is a non-person. The Devil has become all that God is not; he is not beyond personality – he is without it. His purpose in creation is not to destroy God; he knows that he cannot do that. He wants to draw us into the vortex of non-personhood that he has become, and the nothingness of non-being that he is becoming. Satan, in short, aims to take as many of us with him as he can (Nigel Wright).

2

Who is this serpent? The fullest answer is given in Revelation 12:9: “The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world – he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.” So the serpent in the garden is the devil (which means slanderer), and Satan (which means accuser), and the deceiver of the whole world. Jesus calls him “the evil one” (Matthew 13:19) and “the ruler of this world” (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11). The Pharisees call him “;Beelzebul, the prince of demons” (Matthew 12:24). Paul calls him “the god of this age” (2 Corinthians 4:4) and “the prince of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2).

3

Satan has three titles given in the Scriptures, setting forth his malignity against the church of God; a dragon, to note his malice; a serpent, to note his subtlety; and a lion, to note his strength.

4

Sometime after the creation of the angels, Satan chose to rebel. We get a hint from other Bible passages in the Old Testament (e.g. Eze. 28:11-19; Isa. 14:12-15) that Satan’s pride drove him to try to exceed the greatness of God. When he and a third of the angels attempted to overthrow the Almighty, all of them were thrown out of heaven. Lucifer, one of the greatest and most beautiful of all the angels would be now known as the devil and the rest of the angels that rebelled would be known as demons. Their ambition, since they can no longer war directly with God, is an all-out attack on God’s people through their crafty, calculated and diabolical schemes. The warnings are all over the Bible. “Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Pet. 5:8). Though powerful and ruthless, we must remember that Satan is under God’s sovereign authority and will one day be cast in the “lake of fire” (Revelation 20:10). So through it all, the deceiver was even able to deceive himself!

5

Satan is an angel. All angels were created (Col. 1:16; Jn. 1:1-3). Therefore, Satan was created. He is, therefore, God’s Devil. Satan is not the equal and opposite power of God (contra dualism). He is not eternal. His power is not infinite. He does not possess divine attributes. In sum, he is no match for God! If anything, Satan is the equal(?) and opposite power of the archangel Michael.

6

The devil is a better theologian than any of us and is a devil still.

Recommended Books

The Screwtape Letters

C.S. Lewis

Paradise Lost

John Milton