Humor: once there was a poor young couple, and the
husband served as a minister. He
complained to his wife for breaking her promise not to buy a new dress. She
responded, “The devil made me do it. It’s his fault for tempting me.” He
replied, “You could have said, ‘Get behind me Satan!’” She said, “I did, but
then he whispered over my shoulder, ‘it fits you beautifully in the back too.’”
The two men possessed by demons in today’s Gospel
reading from the Fifth Sunday of Matthew (8:28 – 9:1) gives us the opportunity
to talk about the first demon, the devil. Fr. Anthony Coniaris provided many
thoughts about Satan in his sermon “The Truth About the Devil and His Demons”
(This is My Beloved Son: Listen to Him, vol. 1, pp.145-152).
Satan is clever. He knows how to play us, both our
weaknesses and our strengths. The Apostle Paul warned that he masquerades as “an
angel of light” [14 And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an
angel of light. (2Corinthians 11:14)]. Satan was in the beginning the angel of
light. That’s why his name was ‘Lucifer’ which means “bearer of light.”
St. Clement of Alexandria said, “God created an
archangel and the archangel made himself a devil.” Jesus said, 18 And He said to
them, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. (Luke 10:18). [12 "How
you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down
to the ground, You who weakened the nations! (Isaiah 14:12)]
We know more details about Satan/Lucifer’s fall from
the Book of Revelation:
7 And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels
fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, 8 but they did
not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer. 9 So the
great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who
deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast
out with him… 12 Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them! Woe
to the inhabitants of the earth and the sea! For the devil has come down to
you, having great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time."
(Revelation 12:7-9,12)
Now he has become ‘Satan’ because, as the name means,
he “opposes and plots against” God. And his newly chosen darkness must be
disguised so that he may tempt us give in to our weaknesses and pridefully
exalt ourselves in our strengths. The word ‘demon’ comes directly from the
Greek and is a fallen angel, one of Satan’s disciples.
He cannot fight God, so he tries to hurt God by
harming His children. He is the one who “entered Judas” (John 13:27) to bring
about the betrayal and death of Jesus. He is the one who prowls around like a
roaring lion seeking someone to devour.
Thus, he earns his second name, the devil or
‘diabolos’ because he divides us from God and from each other.
Because of Satan’s great ability to disguise himself,
many people do not believe that he even exists. And that becomes one of his
great tricks. The devil is able to
convince us that he does not exist. He is like the opossum, that fierce little
rodent, who, when cornered by its enemies, plays dead.
Malcolm Muggeridge wrote in his book, “Jesus, the Man
Who Lives”: “I have found the devil easier to believe in than God…a diabolical
presence in the world pulling downwards as gravity does instead of pressing
upwards as trees and plants to when they grow and reach resolutely and
beautifully after the light.”
One of the other tricks of Satan is to turn things
upside down. He portrays good as evil and evil as good. This is the
unforgiveable sin against the Holy Spirit (Mt.12:31). Satan is the father of
lies. Think about how sin is portrayed in movies, television shows and other
media. Fornication and adultery are no big deal. Abortion and homosexuality are
upheld as virtuous. But, speaking as a parish priest, perhaps many of you have
also noticed, these sins are terribly hurtful and destructive to people’s
lives, and not to just the one or two people directly involved, but to many
more indirectly. In fact, demons have other names today such as pornography,
addiction, alcoholism, greed, envy, lust, etc.
It is important to know our enemy. The devil always
takes the good things that God has created for us to enjoy and tries to get us
to distort and abuse them. For example, the demon of money is greed. The demon
of sex is lust. The demon of self-respect is pride. Money is not evil but the
love of money is! 10For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for
which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced
themselves through with many sorrows. (1Timothy 6:10). Sex is not sinful but
using others for one’s selfish gratification outside of marriage is. Listen to
what Jesus says about Satan on this matter:
44 You are of your father the devil, and the desires
of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does
not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie,
he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it. (John
8:44)
[Story about
scorpion and turtle.] The nature of the devil is incorrigibly deceitful and
destructive, illogical and irrational. That’s why evil does not make sense.
There is no logic to it and often a sign of devil’s presence is the confusion
he causes. He promises freedom but delivers slavery. He promises life and
delivers death.
Have no doubt though, Satan is for real. Jesus Himself
had to struggle with him during His forty days in the wilderness. He taught us
to pray in the Lord’s Prayer, “deliver us from the evil one” (Mt. 6:13).
8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the
devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. (1Peter 5:8)
The devil has not changed in his ways with us. Master
deceiver that he is, his approach is always with a lie.
4 Then the serpent said to the woman, "You will
not surely die. 5 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." (Genesis 3:4-5)
The devil comes and tells us: “You don’t need God to
tell you what to do. You are not the puppet. You can do things your own way. Be
totally free. Set your own rules. You call the shots.”
“The devil made
me do it.” Once Satan has convinced us to sin, then he moves on to his third
trick of lies, that is to convince us that we did not commit sin. Thus, we
blame others, even Satan himself. However, St. Cyril of Alexandria says, “The
devil is able to suggest, but he has no power to force himself against our
choosing. It is by choice that we sin.” Sin arises within us as the demons take
advantage of our sinfulness. They aggravate it by introducing evil thoughts
into our hearts. This is why Jesus urges us to “watch and pray” that we may not
enter into temptations (Mt.26:41). Evil thoughts do not become sinful thoughts
until we welcome them into our hearts and begin to take pleasure in them,
mulling them over and over.
So how do we resist Satan? Knowing his three tricks is
a start. Remember: 1) he does exist; 2) he is a liar, but 3) he does not have
power over us. There are some other strategies we can employ to counter the
devil.
St. Makarios the Great said, “The most important work
in the spiritual struggle is to enter the heart and there to wage war with
Satan; to hate Satan, and to fight him by opposing thoughts…by fornication in
his thoughts, then there is no profit whatever in keeping his body pure.” 28But
I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already
committed adultery with her in his heart. (Matthew 5:28)
By entering the heart, we can guard its gate to oppose
the logosmoi or thoughts by joining forces with God who dwells also therein.
4 You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in
you is greater than he who is in the world. (1 John 4:4). As Jesus said, 4 Abide
in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it
abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. (John 15:4)
With God’s inner presence, we have the power and the
authority to command Satan to leave us and leave us alone (Mt.16:23; Mark
8:33).
10 Then Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan!
For it is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall
serve.' " 11 Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and
ministered to Him. (Matthew 4:10-11).
St. Gregory Nazianzen says, “If the devil tempts you
to ambition by showing you in an instant and in a single glance all the
kingdoms of the earth, and if he claims that they all belong to him, then do
not believe him for he owns nothing at all.”
But the greatest weapon of all against Satan is
prayer. That’s why he works so hard to distract us from prayer with our daily
chores. That’s why he entices us to skip liturgy with weekly chores,
entertainment, sleep, recreation, family time, etc. Because the devil knows he
has no power against prayer, so he tries to prevent us in the first place.
In conclusion…
Someone said once that in God’s kingdom there is
always an election going on. God votes for you and the devil votes against you.
But you have the deciding vote. Who will you vote for: God or Satan? Truth or
lies? Freedom or slavery? Life or Death? 24"No one can serve two masters;
for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to
the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. (Matthew
6:24). Amen!
By Fr.
Rick's Sermons
Source: http://stgeorgegoc.org/pastors-corner/fr-ricks-sermons/who-is-satan
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