Why Satan keeps screwing up
Friday, April 16th, 2010The first sin that was ever committed, and every sin since, all sprang from pride.
“How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.’ But you are brought down to Sheol, to the far reaches of the pit.”
That is what “Lucifer”, the “Day Star”, said in his arrogance. It was said also of Nebuchadnezzar, for he was fueled by pride similar to Lucifer’s.
Satan’s fall was not merely about getting worship due to God. It was about status. “I will set my throne on high.” “I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.” Satan’s pride deceived him into thinking that God was like him.
This is the lie that Satan has sold to hundreds of thousands of people through the ages. The Mormon heresy that Elohim was once a human who ascended to Godhood….Hinduism, which teaches that humans can achieve oneness with the Brahmin by repeated purification and reincarnation….Buddhism, which pretends that we can achieve divinity in meditation….all of these false religions preach that we can attain to Godhood.
It’s preposterous, of course. But it’s the lie that people tell themselves. “I can be like God.” When people create an idol of God with their minds—a God who won’t judge them for their sins—they are pretending that they can be greater than God.
Anyone who is foolish enough to believe that he can become greater than God is foolish enough to believe that he can bring God down to his level. This was the fallacy that Satan fell prey to when he tried to tempt Jesus.
It wasn’t just about worship. He was trying to get God to sin. He wanted to prove to the universe that God was no better than the angels. He had believed that from the beginning, and in the incarnation of Christ he saw his chance to prove it.
Of course, this only factored into God’s divine plan. Jesus proved Himself completely unsusceptible to temptation. The devil’s mind was again proven false. And because of this, it can be said (as Paul said): “For we do not have a High Priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.”
Here’s a question. If Jesus wasn’t God, and all Satan needed to “win” was for Jesus to sin once, why didn’t Satan simply say, “let me worship you”? It’s a lot simpler to receive worship than it is to give worship. And if Jesus wasn’t God, then receiving worship would have been a sin.
We who know God laugh at how preposterous it would be to imagine Jesus worshipping the devil. But unless Jesus was God, then He would have been sinning if He had allowed the devil to worship Him.
David
Working in a fast-paces restaurant half the week and living at a secular university invites a good deal of foul language. At times, it’s rubbed off on me. I’ve had to watch my language at times; now and then I let expletives slip under my breath. It’s one of many things I’ve been convicted about, and one of many things God is working on in my life.


