Part 9

Satan always scores a victory when a neighbourhood is shocked by the news of a suicide; the victory is direct and indirect. If the victim is prepared or unprepared, sane or insane, the crime can somehow never be forgiven. A strange demoralizing influence is always felt; a feeling of horror and depression. If the victim is pious, and many, many are the most devout in the church, do they forfeit their salvation by the _felo de se_? Not necessarily. Now we wish to say here, with every word underscored: _no sane, devout person will destroy themselves_. Where, then, is the motive and victory of Satan? Much, every way. The whole church or community will be religiously paralyzed. It is generally believed that no self-murderer can be saved. But behold a sainted mother in Israel found hanging in the barn: we have in mind just such an incident, and remember also the gloom, the depression, the silent whispers, the downcast look on the faces of all who knew her. Satan may know that he has nothing directly to gain, but, indirectly, doubt and discouragement prevail. Anything to get the world to doubt God.

A very devout man, writing of a personal experience, says: "There seemed to be some designing spirit near me for days that constantly whispered in my ear, and sometimes it seemed almost audible, "Go kill thyself; you have disgraced your Redeemer and you are not fit to live." Scores of such testimonies are on record.

Think of the logical traps used by the Designer to incite the deed: if poverty, "My family will be cared for better than I can." If a suffering body, "This will cure me of my pain." If fear of exposure, "That will end it--charity will forgive me then." If hopeless over some sin, "Better die than face the disgrace. It will solve all the problems," says the Tempter. It is often remarked concerning some one: "How cowardly;" but it is not cowardice; it is inability to answer the Devil's logic to commit suicide.

Again, gruesome as it is, and here is more strange evidence in favour of the satanic explanation: It is fearfully contagious. Professor Bailey, of Yale, said that the report of a suicide by any special method will be followed by others in the same manner. Morbid, despondent people hear of it and follow the example. That which should be revolting in the extreme possesses a strange charm. Ingersol toured the country at one time advocating suicide as the best way out of life's difficulties. Many took his advice and a fearful epidemic followed. One young man in a rural community of Illinois committed suicide; three others, all associates, followed in a few weeks. No special motive could be given for either. We are forced to place the blame where it belongs, and sympathize with the victims.

XXXI

DEVIL WORSHIP

"Then he forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation. They provoked him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they him to anger. They sacrificed unto devils, not to God; to gods whom they knew not."--_Deuteronomy xxxii. 15-17._

"But I say the things which the Gentiles sacrificed, they sacrificed to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and the table of devils."--_1 Corinthians x. 20-21._

Satan's consuming passion is thirst for power. He is the "prince of darkness," but also the "god of this world," and this long period of satanic rule is called _night_. God's glorious Sabbath of rest was superseded by the black intervention of toil and suffering. Satan's scheming fight has been for the rulership of this world. He succeeded in winning the entire antediluvian world, which to save the coming generations necessitated the Flood. He began adroitly with the only remaining family; swept the postdiluvian peoples into midnight heathenism. To-day, nearly one billion descendants of Noah worship not God--but _demonian_--demons, just what the Greeks and Romans worshipped in Apostolic times. No less than two hundred and fifty million are devil worshippers by name.

Satan began his fight of opposition by assuming the form or incarnating himself in the body of a snake. Therefore it is not an accident, growing out of mythological tradition, that serpent worship has been the chief religion of many peoples. The Egyptians worshipped Set, which personified all evil--enemy of all good--they called Typhon, a monstrous serpent-like animal. To this god human sacrifices were offered on great religious holidays. It is no accident that the millions who know not the true God nevertheless, some way, learned to worship the Devil, and generally in the form of a serpent. The Egyptians had a serpent-god in Typhon; the Canaanites worshipped a snake in the days of Abraham; the Babylonians worshipped Python, which is a specie of the most deadly reptile on earth, and another name for Typhon. On the monuments and tablets of many dead civilizations the engravings of serpents show their particular customs of devil worship. The American Indians were snake worshippers; in Ohio an altar more than a half mile in length remains in good preservation. This altar is one of the wonders, being a perfect outline of a gigantic snake. We readily see that tribal association and tradition have had nothing to do with the customs of our own aborigines; the same being who inspired the peoples of the Old Orient, millenniums ago, to worship the snake-devil inspired our red men in his primeval forest.

David speaks of demon worship: "Yea they sacrificed their sons and daughters unto _Shadim_." Jereboam built places to worship evil spirits; the ordained priests to serve the altars of "Satyrs," and children were offered. The Molech of the Canaanites was also devil worship; when the Israelites forgot God, they "caused their children to pass through the fire unto Molech," an evil god. The damsel whom Paul delivered possessed the spirit of Python--the snake. The priestesses of the Delphic oracles prophesied by the spirit of Python; this was the dominant religion throughout Greece. The Aztec war god of the Montezumas, where two hundred and fifty thousand human skulls were found in the temple, was a bloody system of devil worship. The Yezidis of Persia, descendants of the early Python worshippers, worship the Devil to-day, and are known as such.

We are not confined to heathenism, ancient or modern, to find the same religion of "divinations." The best authorities of Spiritualism believe that the supernatural, occult demonstrations, as produced in their séances, are from demon agencies. The whole system of mythology grew out of what is to-day the work of mediums. The Old Testament is filled with statements concerning "familiar spirits"; they heard voices, received messages, saw physical disturbances--just as may be witnessed at any spiritual séance. The most reliable of mediums do not deny that evil spirits (damned demons) come to them at times. One fact is noteworthy: when men and women become spiritists, they discard all the essentials of the Christian faith. They are modern types of demon possession. It is no unusual thing during a séance to hear a regular clash of voices: blasphemy, oaths, vulgar, obscene language, terrible threats, etc.

What connection do we find between Devil worship and modern Spiritualism? First, the moral condition among the spiritists is exactly as it was among the ancient priests and priestesses in the temples of Devil worship; they literally worshipped the Devil in their corrupt, degrading practices. Now, among the votaries of Spiritualism, every iniquity, crime, and indecency known among men and women are daily carried on. Such is the testimony of one of their travelling lecturers. One of their noted mediums when under control delivered this message: "Curse the marriage institution; cursed be the relation of husband and wife; cursed be all who sustain the legal marriage." From what source could we expect such a vile deliverance?

Second, their mediums actually pray to Satan. One of their advocates at the opening of a debate with a Christian minister at San Jose, Cal., prayed in the following language: "O Devil, Prince of Demons in the Christian's Hell; oh, thou Monarch of the bottomless pit; thou King of Scorpions, I beseech thee to hear my prayer. Thou seest the terrible straits in which I am placed, matched in debate with a big gun of Christianity. Remember, O Prince of Brimstone, that when thou stretchest forth thine arm the Christian God cannot stand before thee for a moment. Bless thy servant in his labours for thee; fill his mouth with wisdom; enable him to defend thee from the false charges of thy sulphurous Majesty, so that this audience may know and realize that thou art a prayer hearing and a prayer answering devil" (abbreviated). Similar prayers are frequently published in the _Banner of Light_, the organ of this cult; prayers formulated in the same language as prayers offered to the God of heaven.

It cannot be doubted that Pagan religion and modern Spiritualism are Devil worship, shifting under various forms and ceremonies in different ages and places. Rev. B. Clough, missionary in Ceylon, says: "I now state, and I wish it to be heard in every corner of the Christian world, that the devil is regularly, systematically, and ceremoniously worshipped by a large majority of the inhabitants of the Island of Ceylon." We repeat: his consuming passion is to be worshipped.

XXXII

VICTORY THROUGH THE VICTOR

"This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus Christ is the Son of God?"--_1 John v. 4-5._

"Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world."--_1 John iv. 4._

One of the grave dangers of to-day is that Satan is no longer regarded as a Personality. Even among those whose faith is founded on the word of God, the idea of an orthodox devil smacks of superstition and an exploded hoax from the Dark Ages. "Let us hear the love side of the gospel; away with this devil and hell business--it's too dreadful," they declare. His real existence and personality are ridiculed in many pulpits and lecture platforms. When these ideas become common among the people who think, a wide open field remains for him to work unmolested.

We can also go to the other extreme: that is, to think him a greater being than the Son of God. Those who have followed us through these chapter studies will, we fear, come to some such conclusion. Who can be equal for such a mighty Prince? Now this biography was undertaken that we might have a full, life-sized photo of our Enemy. In this we cannot exaggerate the true status of the case; any less conception of Satan than we have portrayed will put us at a serious disadvantage in the life struggle. He is a real foe, and we must meet him in the open, under cover, and invisibly. Let it be written in black-faced caps, and heavily underscored: Satan is all we can find out about him--plus, with emphasis on the plus. We want to keep in mind clearly the Enemy, the battle-ground, and the battle; we can never match swords with him; to ignore him--big, cunning, supernatural, eternally at it--will be the most dangerous folly.

But--there is victory, complete, overwhelming victory for every one who fights; but bear in mind it must be a fighter. There is one Name which never fails to reverberate from the Throne of God to the cavernous pits of darkness; this Name shakes loose the grip, untangles the web of all the allied powers of the Prince of Night. Satan is mighty, Jesus is almighty; he met his Waterloo. Jesus was never defeated. His first defeat was when he was an archangel; he was overthrown and cast out of heaven. Jesus said: "I was present when Satan fell like lightning from heaven." He was also defeated in the wilderness; again in the Garden, and at Calvary. In fact, on every battle-field where he met the Lord Christ the defeat was stunning, humiliating. Now we are in mortal combat with him, and we must not forget--he has been many times defeated. A writer says: "We have the advantage of fighting a defeated foe." Standing alone, we are doomed to utter defeat, capture, ruin; but if our fight is coupled with the Name of Jesus, our triumph is as certain as our defeat will be without Him.

So long as we muster in as munitions of war our intellect, self-sufficiency, egotism, etc., the cohorts will laugh at our delusion. There is but One who can out-general his maneuvres, silence his thunderings, checkmate his diabolical acumen, know his oily, snaky approaches, penetrate his angelic beneficence, understand his insidious schemes: that One knew him from the beginning, and--outranked him in heaven and conquered him on earth.

This question arises: If Satan has been conquered, and Jesus is yet contending with him for world-wide supremacy--why the almost universal triumph of evil? Why is true righteousness at such a discount? Why are the fighters failing and falling all around us? If these questions cannot be answered with a degree of sound reasoning, the whole problem of life, Bible, God, Atonement, Gospel are in a hopeless tangle. A Chinese puzzle does not compare with a riddle of everything worth while, visible and invisible.

Satan undoubtedly controls the machinery of this world. Then wherein is the "victory that overcometh the world"? Let us keep in mind the power, resources, opportunities, organization, and management of Satan; also the blindness and bondage of sin, and--the Free Agency of Man. So long as man remains carnally-minded and free, the Enemy has undisputed right of way; while the heart is carnal, impure, unsanctified, the controlling motive power of man's life "is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." He has in his own bosom a traitor, an alien to the government of God. "To be carnally minded is death," says Paul. The "old leaven must be purged out"; we must "put off the old man (carnal mind) and his deeds, and put on the new man, etc." This putting off is absolutely necessary.

Jesus cannot only defeat Satan, but He can destroy the "works of the devil"--one of which is the alien principle of our nature. "For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the Devil." The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus--the God-Man--is an everlasting Atonement and a propitiation for sin. Sin is the Rubicon of our battle; once we solve, in all its fullness, the problem of sin, we rob Satan of his fulcrum power. He came to Jesus and found nothing: no availability, no sin, no yielding, no fellowship. He was tempted, but _without sin_.

Our victory must be twofold: first, through the merits of the Everlasting Blood Covenant we may be saved from sin unto salvation--reconciliation, forgiveness. Then by the fuller benefits of the Atonement we may "enter into the holiest by the Blood." Only the pure in heart can stand the approaches of Satan by way of our natural appetites. The triumphs of modern surgery are only possible by means of sterilized instruments. Please observe--with all the meaning that can be couched in language: the sinful, unregenerated heart is not only in danger of being overcome, but is already in blind bondage to Satan. The power of sin, both actual and original, must be broken by the pardoning grace of God through faith in the Atoning Blood; and the heart cleansed and empowered by the Baptism of the Holy Ghost.

The second inevitable concomitant of victory is copartnership with Jesus, the Captain of our salvation--"looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith." Diabolus and his minions cannot stand before this Name. His final overthrow was when Jesus cried out on the Cross: "It is finished." Now at the sight of Jesus, the Cross, or the Blood, the phalanx of darkness slinks away. Let us lay hold of eternal life by an unfaltering faith in the Blood that cleanseth, and "The Name high over all: in earth, in heaven, in hell." "And they overcame him through the blood of the Lamb, and the word of their testimony." Amen and Amen.

XXXIII

THE ARREST AND IMPRISONMENT

"For the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time."--_Revelation xii. 12._

"And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him."--_Revelation xx. 1-3._

The fact of a possible victory through the Name of our great Conqueror does not alone satisfy all the items of the indictment. If such were the only background to the picture, great as it is, the human drama is not only a fierce tragedy, but a miserable farce. Thank God, personal victory is not all; there is a rift in the dark satanic cloud which has hung over the world for so many millenniums. Satan is in great wrath, and his power and influence grow steadily stronger; more and more his iron grip fastens about the throat of the world. The Apostasy of which Christ and His Apostles wrote is becoming a reality.

Satan will score one more gigantic victory; then is our "blessed hope of His glorious appearing," when He shall come and catch away His Bride--the Church, both dead and alive; that part of His following who are united to Him and are earnestly yearning for His coming. This event is called by devout scholars "The Rapture." Just where, how, when, or how long, we have only a vague prophetic conjecture. "Where, Lord?" they ask. "And He said unto them, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together."

When the Rapture shall have taken place, Satan will have undisputed dominion; then shall the "Man of Sin" appear, setting himself up as God--to be worshipped. His reign will be the Great Tribulation; all the influences of righteousness will, for the time, be removed--the earth will reek in corruption and bloodshed. It is implied that, so terrible will be this time, divine intervention must necessarily shorten the Tribulation, else no flesh will be left on the earth. The Great Tribulation will be the climax of the Devil's rule on earth. It seems that he will incarnate himself in a Man, giving him supernatural knowledge and power.

However, something spectacular and sensational will soon occur. When the leader of a gang of thugs or desperadoes is arrested, his followers are filled with fear and consternation; then think of the excitement. An Angel officer will break in on the scene--yes, that is exactly what the Book tells us: the High Sheriff of Heaven will suddenly step down from headquarters, and will lay hold--arrest the Old Dragon--Satan--Devil--Serpent (observe all his names are mentioned). Whatever his titles and distinctions of the past have been, they will not save him in that hour. The Apocalyptic Vision is unmistakable.

Some can see in this wonderful language only an allegory: the good influences are to gradually bind the influences of evil, and to expect such an event as the literal arrest of the Devil is a wild, irrational, unscientific, unreasonable dream. Our Lord said, speaking of the time of the end, that the same social conditions as prevailed in the days of Noah were to be repeated: wicked ones waxing worse and worse; scarcely any living in the fear of God. To expect to see a gradual regeneration of society, politics, commerce, and the Church--until evil will be overruled, chained as it were--seems to be a gigantic travesty on language and the teaching of the Bible.

We prefer to stand by the Book rather than human interpretation--fixed up to justify the methods and results of modern religious propaganda. An angel appears--evidently an archangel: one belonging to the rank of which the fallen Prince formerly belonged. This Sheriff of the skies is equipped for his undertaking; Officers carry handcuffs with which to bind prisoners--the angel has a great chain in his hand; he lays hold--arrests the old skulking, hateful, murderous Devil. This angel-officer has also a key, and it is the key which locks the door of the bottomless pit. This door has been wide open; Satan and his emissaries could go and come at pleasure. Just as an officer arrests a desperado and leads him off to prison--so will the archangel arrest the Devil and lock him up in the pit of darkness and despair. What will be done with his millions of cohorts? We can judge only by inference. We want to stay close to the inspired record; of one thing, however, we are confident: the footstool of God will be absolutely cleared of Devil and demons; "that they shall deceive the nations no more."

The prophetic picture of the divine court proceedings is very specific: we have the exact length of the prison sentence--_one thousand years_. When we remember the crimes, unnumbered crimes, the sentence seems to be an example of court leniency. But this is only a "binding over," as it were, to the real trial and judgment yet to come. This will be temporary imprisonment; but oh, it will be such a glad, happy day. The vision of Isaiah, thirty-fifth chapter, will be literally fulfilled. The sceptre so long in the hand of a traitor--usurper--will pass into the hand of the Prince of Peace. Yes, we will strengthen our weak hands and confirm our feeble knees--Satan at last locked up. We shall witness with joy unspeakable and full of glory--"the Restoration of All Things." "And the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." Thank God forever.

XXXIV

THE FINAL CONSUMMATION

"And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever."--_Revelation xx. 10._

After the long term of imprisonment shall have ended, we are told that Satan shall be loosed out of his prison for a season. This is difficult to explain; but we do not presume to question the administration of God's government: "Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?" Satan, like many other confirmed, apostate criminals, immediately on being released, plunges more deeply into crime than before. The long term of imprisonment and punishment hardens and, if possible, more nearly consumes him with wrath.

At once he launches another world-wide campaign of deception, gathering, rallying, mustering, and drilling his forces: those who by an exercise of free choice, notwithstanding the glorious millennium reign, actually fall away and enlist under the black pirate flag once more. He encompasses the whole face of the earth; like a deposed crown prince, he leads an aggressive warfare to regain the honours and influence which he so long enjoyed on the earth.

Now if the binding of Satan is only a figure of the leavening power of righteousness overpowering the evil--what is the _thing_ which shall be unchained and loosened? Such a contention is as unanswerable as it is untenable. We will repeat once more, with each word underscored: _Good or Evil cannot exist except in a Personality_. The same school of theologians who deny the personality of Satan, many of them, see nothing in the Person of Christ except a _Christ spirit_, inherent good, etc.; all of which is unadulterated infidelity. Just another method of "blasting at the Rock of Ages."