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The Lord Jesus placed heavy emphasis on the
deceitful nature of the devil. In a confrontation with the Pharisees, He
declared that their inability to recognize the truth was due to the fact
that they were allied with the devil.
You belong to your father, the devil, and you want
to carry out your father's desire. He was a murderer from the beginning,
not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he
speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies (John
8:44, NIV).
Dr. William Hendriksen made this comment:
The devil, then, is the very wellspring of lies, the
creator of falsehoods . . . . When he lies, he is the original. When he
does not lie (Acts 16:16,17), he quotes or even plagiarizes; but even
then he gives the borrowed words a false setting in order to create an
illusion. He ever strives to lie and to deceive, and this he does in
order to murder (The Gospel of John, Baker, p.61).
It is the devil's very nature to lie because he
began his career in an act of self-delusion. "You have said in your
heart: . . . I will exalt my throne above the stars of God . . . I will
be like the Most High" (Is. 14:13,14).
By deluding himself into believing that he could
claim a position of equality with the Most High, Satan fell from his
position of high honor. He became the "father of lies,"
depending on a web of self-deceit and illusion to maintain his fantasy of
equality with God.
By claiming equality with God, the devil is forced
to lie to himself about every aspect of reality. His rebellion has locked
him into an irrational posture in which he desperately denies the
evidence of his own hopelessness and meaninglessness.
The devil's position is the same as that of an
extremely self-centered person who clings to an unrealistic view of
himself. For example, a self-centered person who thinks he is a great
singer will not accept any criticism that implies the contrary. Rather than
admitting the possibility that he might be wrong in his estimate of
himself, he will associate only with people who encourage him in his
self-delusion. He may continue to believe that he is a wonderful singer
even if he can find no one else who agrees.
The psychological term for such irrational
willfulness is narcissism, and we are all aware of people who to a
greater or lesser degree exhibit this tendency. Such people eventually
accept reality (however painful it may be) or they defy it by either withdrawing
into their own inner world or attempting to reconstruct reality so that
it fits their false ideas. (Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin took the
second approach.) The devil is the ultimate narcissist. He is powerful
and willful enough to attempt to restructure all of God's created reality
in order to keep his false sense of self-importance.
Satan does not deceive others in the manner of one
who knows the truth and merely seeks to mislead. Satan lies because his
own intelligence has been darkened by his perverted will. He is the
"father of lies" because he has deluded himself and willfully
persists in his self-delusion.
The Elements of Satan's Lie.
The basic elements of Satan's lie are recorded in
Genesis 3:1-8. His words seem to have been chosen carefully to cause Eve
to question God's trustworthiness: "Has God indeed said, 'You shall
not eat of every tree of the Garden'?" He wanted Eve to perceive God
from his own diabolic perspective, questioning God's motives and
intentions. He wanted her to fear that God's plans for her would violate
her individuality and run contrary to her deepest needs and desires.
The devil next denied the truth of God's warning. He
said, "You will not surely die." Having planted doubt in Eve's
mind concerning God's goodness, he wanted her to believe that no
consequences would result from her disobedience.
He continued: "For God knows that in the day
you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing
good and evil" (v.5). These words were a direct attack on God's
goodness and an appeal to Eve's pride. Satan portrayed the Lord as
denying Adam and Eve the one thing that would bring them ultimate
fulfillment--equality with God. These perverse words came straight from
the devil's heart, reflecting his own view of God.
When Adam and Eve acted in accordance with the lie,
they became the helpless pawns of Satan's rebellion. His lie remains
unchanged today.
The Results of Believing Satan's Lie.
The story of the fall shows us that when people
believe Satan's lie that God cannot be fully trusted, they fall into the
fear of self-exposure. After Adam and Eve had eaten from the forbidden
tree, they became conscious of their nakedness, made a feeble attempt to
cover their shame with fig leaves, and tried to hide from God (Gen.
3:7-10).
Christian psychologist Larry Crabb says that the
primary motivation for all of our social behavior is a fear that if
others really knew us as we are, they would reject us in disgust.
This fear of exposure is rooted in our sense of the ugliness of our
fallen natures as they have been perverted and corrupted by sin. Satan
delights in inflaming this fear until we, like the Pharisees, transform
ourselves into "whitewashed tombs" (Matt 23:27) of self-deceit
and self-righteousness.
M. Scott Peck has observed that the central defect
of evil people lies not in the fact that they sin but in the fact
"that they refuse to acknowledge [their sin]" (People of the
Lie, p.69). He also points out that evil people are the people of the
lie, "deceiving others as they also build layer upon layer of
self-deception" (p.66).
This fear of self-exposure drives people into
relativism, mysticism, and legalism. Often they find themselves
confronted with intense experiences and "counterfeit gods" so
compelling that they become convinced that they are on the right track.
When this happens, they fall helplessly into the clutches of that
self-deluded serpent who is masquerading as the source of truth.
So, we know that in this fallen world, Satan will
try to make us think that sin is not sin by causing us to fall into relativism,
mysticism and legalism – all of which drive us farther away from the
truth. True, we are all
sinners but no matter how you twist it – sin is sin.
The Bible is very specific about how to recognize
and defend ourselves from falling into Satan’s deception. The first thing we can do is to
stay constantly connected to God’s word and in that we will find that we
need not worry about measuring up to the standards of men but are to make
every effort to measure up to the standards that God has set for His
children. Secondly, we must
remember that we serve a God that will never reject us and will never
leave us (Heb 13:5). This is the source of our hope and our faith. God never lies and never
changes!
Through constant immersion in God’s word, we will be
equipped to counter any lie that Satan can invent. What a gift God has
given us! His word, a life
manual that has all of the answers to all of the questions that we may
have! Not only has He provided a manual but He has also mercifully
provided us with His Son, Jesus - a way that, one day, we can, even in
our fallen nature, stand before a righteous God in total forgiveness!
Curtis
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