- Eric Hoffer (1902 - 1983)
It was through a crafty serpent, that all of creation was hijacked. You can read it in one chapter - Genesis 3, and the rest is history. Portions of the Bible (mostly Old Testament) is a course and consequences account of a group of people whom God made a covenant with, who overall struggled to have much willingness to trust and surrender to God. The New Testament, in short is how God redeems it all, through one man who had perfect love and trust in God. It includes (but isn't limited to) several eye witness descriptions/testimonies of the course and consequences of one man's life -Jesus. (There's tons of wisdom and treasure in that book - I highly recommend it being read in its entirety, more than once.)
It wasn't by big might and brute power that the serpent was able to outwit Eve. She could have beaten him up if she wanted to. I'd imagine Adam would've surely came to her side and helped if she ran to him in terror due to this crafty serpent. But, by nature, the serpent was crafty. And by nature, Eve was trusting. The crafty serpent knew he needed to hijack God's beloved creation with their cooperation. If Eve was frightened and felt threatened by the serpent, all bets were off. He needed their trust. What the serpent feared and was threatened by most was Adam and Eve's complete trust and dependency on God.
I often get scared when I think of Satan. I imagine he's lurking behind or in front of me to beat me down without any forewarning. This isn't a Biblical account of Satan and how he primarily works in the details, according to Genesis 3 at least.
Satan, as depicted as a crafty serpent, was friendly and he came to Eve by amicably selling her a lie. He was a crafty salesman. What did he have to gain by selling his lies? -Taking down God through His beloved creation. Satan was jealous of God and wanted all the worship for himself, (little did he know it would all backfire on a wooden cross, sorry for not giving a spoiler alert). Satan got her to believe she could trust him and his words, that he was for her, more than God was and that God was jealous of her and therefore withholding good from her. He did this by getting her to believe there was a secret inside scoop on God, that he had and she didn't. He's a great actor, on his script he was to play the role of a whistle blower on God, for the benefit of Eve. She bit the bait. She didn't run away from it, it appeared safe to her, so she bit it, literally. The bait was taken by simply believing a seductive lie.
A deception of corruption that simply rearranged a few paradigms around:
- God was secretively corrupt and could not be fully trusted
- Satan was on Eve's side and could be trusted over God, after all - he was divulging God's secret corruption to Eve. Satan felt safe to Eve through deceiving her into feeling like she was a victim of God, and he was rescuing her from God
- as a result Eve was lacking or not good enough as God created her, and she had the solution in front of her, it required her to disobey God by first mistrusting Him
Satan projected his corrupt nature onto God, and he sold that projection as if it was the truth to Eve. And the rest is history.
"Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour." - 1 Peter 5:8
"...in order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes." - 2 Corinthians 2:11
Satan had to get them to be fearful of trusting God - that is what he fears most - our trusting God.
Being aware of Satan's schemes and his strategy:
Doing whatever it takes to get me to believe a lie about God, which will therefore cause me to see a false picture of myself - since I am created in the image of God.
The battle is in how I really see God. Not in how I tell you what doctrine I subscribe to. It's revealed through choices I make. I look at my choices, the course and consequences of my life as a fact-finding process. Not a shaming fault-finding one. The facts will present themselves and if I'm not offended by them, I get to see how I really see God, through my course and consequences of life, not the verbal or written sentences I say I believe in.
Armed with these facts, the enemy's schemes to hijack my life are now exposed. They include how I've interpreted the events in my life through seeing God a certain way, and those specific consequences or results of how I've seen God. That is what ultimately steers my life...how I see God. Do I find Him fully trustworthy or not? My course and consequences, or a searching and fearless moral inventory is a huge step towards my freedom. It helps me uncover the enemy's schemes in my life - his lies, and exposes the results of trusting them going unchallenged and unmoved, one day, year, or decade at a time.
I won't have arrived fully after a thorough course and consequences inventory has been done once and shared with a trusted Ruth. It's just the beginning. One day at a time, I can now start to see, and even better; believe the beautiful secret in life that Satan has withheld from me: the truth about God and myself.
"God is love." - 1 John 4:16
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." - John 3:16
My beliefs are revealed through my choices [deeds], not in my words alone, but through my actions.
"...faith by itself, if it's not accompanied by action, is dead... -James 2:17
"But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds [actions] Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that - and shudder." - James 2:18
I'm now much more open to learning a new way of doing life...a new strategy for living...that is what the Path offers...
