διαβολος (fallen angel?)

[darinhouston]

Darin,

You wrote:

it caused me to have at least some doubts on my view of Satan as a created tempter, not a fallen angel.

Where would we find biblical evidence of the origin of the devil? It seems the biblical focus is on his activity/position/character and little else. I have considered him as an angel gone bad.

I don't actually believe he is a fallen angel or "angel gone bad," but this is a good list of the scriptural proofs some use... Steve's lecture handles all of these.

https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Bi ... tans-Fall/

Ezekiel 28:13-19 - Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. (Read More...)

Isaiah 14:12-15 - How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! (Read More...)

Revelation 12:9 - And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

Luke 10:18 - And he said unto them, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven.

2 Peter 2:4 - For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment;

John 8:44 - Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.

Revelation 20:1-3 - And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. (Read More...)

Matthew 25:41 - Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

Ezekiel 28:14-17 - Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. (Read More...)

1 Peter 5:8-9 - Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: (Read More...)

Genesis 3:14 - And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:

[dizerner]

To BE tempted is not "evil" but to TEMPT someone else is definitely evil!

for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. (Jas. 1:13 NKJ)

We can quibble on the difference between tempt/test but if you're testing folks because you were designed to do that, then you're not evil per-se because you haven't made a choice. If God uses the "adversary" not because he WANTS you to fail but because he WANTS you to pass, then it's not an evil act to test you, it's an act of goodness. To give you a measure and a choice and to cause growth and success.

I highly commend Steve's teaching on this to you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRzaTGV1yhw

Yeah, I could agree with this logic as it stands, if no evil intentions were involved at all.

I don't think the devil ever "tests" in that sense though, he has a genuine desire for people to fail.

A roaring lion seeking to devour is not the same thing as a teacher giving a test.

[darinhouston]

Yeah, I could agree with this logic as it stands, if no evil intentions were involved at all.

I don't think the devil ever "tests" in that sense though, he has a genuine desire for people to fail.

A roaring lion seeking to devour is not the same thing as a teacher giving a test.

But, the question is not what his intentions were but what God's are. Putting aside the devil, God created us. We do evil and have evil intentions. That doesn't make God the creator of Evil.

Also, we're studying the temptation of Christ in our Lent study. God sent Jesus into the desert to be tempted/tested. Do you see a moral difference in creating the tempter to test us vs sending Jesus himself into the desert to test Jesus? (or our own temptations)

[dizerner]

Yeah, I could agree with this logic as it stands, if no evil intentions were involved at all.

I don't think the devil ever "tests" in that sense though, he has a genuine desire for people to fail.

A roaring lion seeking to devour is not the same thing as a teacher giving a test.

But, the question is not what his intentions were but what God's are. Putting aside the devil, God created us. We do evil and have evil intentions. That doesn't make God the creator of Evil.

Also, we're studying the temptation of Christ in our Lent study. God sent Jesus into the desert to be tempted/tested. Do you see a moral difference in creating the tempter to test us vs sending Jesus himself into the desert to test Jesus? (or our own temptations)

Yes, I do see a difference in that.

I will admit some nuance here. Demons can be used for judgment or refinement in certain instances, like Job. Obviously Satan could not possibly have entered the garden if God did not at the bare minimum allow it. I do not think Adam and Eve had previously done anything wrong.

But again Satan is evil. God is not. Their desires and purposes are completely opposite. To confuse those categories and make the devil "God's devil" strikes me as deeply morally wrong. And notice one of the unforgivable sins is attributing Satan's power to the Holy Spirit. This should make us at the least pause and be a bit nervous about the idea.

When I was under some very strange demonic influence I started to have crazy ideas I never thought of before in my whole life. I started to think that maybe God is being so subtle and clever, that the demonic manifestations I were perceiving (and knew were demonic), were in fact what God wanted me to hear, because God was using the devil without him realizing it. This would make me feel justified in accepting whatever the devil says, because after all, it would be what God had secretly manipulated him to say!

Now there is no doubt God can use the devil for certain things. But the lines must be clearly and starkly drawn and fought for dear life. The color gray is the devil's favorite color—not black, not white, but oh how he loves gray. Because gray isn't quite black—and isn't quite white—it is creating a new category that melds Satan and God together in some way.

So God first of all would not create a truly evil creature evil, just to fiddle around with it. That's not his nature. Second of all, a truly evil creature is not something God is going to support in anything it does—even for judgment or testing, it is still against God's fundamental nature, and it has to be more of a plan B than a plan A, because it speaks to intention. God did not desire Satan to rebel, so whatever allowed him access to tempting others, could not be God's direct intention, but his bare permission for some high level reason.

I don't want to be too dogmatic in some ways, but I do want a sharp line between Satan and God as true enemies, because over and over that is what Scripture says. If God creates an enemy, than God is "a kingdom divided against itself," he is playing both sides of the game. And I personally know that one of Satan's "devices" is always to somehow put evil as part of the character and intention of God, even a little.

[darinhouston]

Some good thoughts. A couple of things...

And notice one of the unforgivable sins is attributing Satan's power to the Holy Spirit.

Two things: (1) Where do you get this from? and (2) Did I suggest such a thing?

So God first of all would not create a truly evil creature evil, just to fiddle around with it. That's not his nature.

I agree - I do think he created it for a purpose and restrains and permits it for those purposes. I don't have an answer for why he doesn't restrain it more often, such as your case.

Second of all, a truly evil creature is not something God is going to support in anything it does—even for judgment or testing, it is still against God's fundamental nature, and it has to be more of a plan B than a plan A, because it speaks to intention.

I agree - pertaining to Job, God was restraining the devil until it fit his purposes not to do so. To say it's against his nature and a plan B seems to beg the question - if it was his plan, it was in his nature and we need to re-evaluate what we think about God's nature or how he views temptation. Not to be flip, but perhaps seeing it as "necessary evil."

God did not desire Satan to rebel, so whatever allowed him access to tempting others, could not be God's direct intention, but his bare permission for some high level reason.

I guess I don't see Satan as rebelling, but acting according to the purpose for which he was made.

Have you listened to Steve's lectures on Spiritual Warfare? I highly recommend it.

[mikew]

The clue in Genesis is usually missed. Genesis 3:1 notes that Satan is more cunning the any of the wild animals. or NASB shows "beast of the field." The association with the creatures of the planet/ suggests Satan is also a creature of the planet rather than an angel. His existence begins with the creation of the animals and people. However, he seems to have a non-physical nature and thus is not limited by lifespans of physical creatures. Neither then does he reproduce physically.

God's purpose in creating Satan has not been directly clarified in scripture. However, his purpose appears to be about tempting people toward evil action. As the logical objective, the tempting is not, within the overall scheme of God's design, to promote evil but rather is to attract evildoers and thereby expose them as evildoers. This role appears in Rev 20 in a rather obscure fashion. First, God releases Satan after the thousand years. This release is in accord with God's purpose, not as Satan escaping and causing unrestricted destruction, as movies try to portray the situation. Instead, as seen in Rev 20: 7-10, the devil attracts all evildoers within the nations, who seek to destroy God's work. This results in God's judgment of fire upon those nations and also the casting of Satan into the lake of fire. This then is the final cleansing action of God before entering a new era.

It seems the judgment of Satan is due to over-performance of his job. It is a bit like Isaiah 10's description of the king of Assyria, who thought too highly of his own ability. However, the king's ability was given to him by God as highlighted in Isa 10:15 "Is the axe to boast itself over the one who chops with it? Is the saw to exalt itself over the one who wields it? That would be like a club wielding those who lift it, Or like a rod lifting him who is not wood." (NASB)