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May 11th, 2005
 

"Darth Vader still rules the Dark Side according to a USA Today online survey. The “Star Wars” heavy took first place among a selection of movie villains with 34.7% of the votes. Hannibal Lector from “Silence of the Lambs” drew 25.9%."

While we like our villains dark and sinister the fact is “Mr. Nasty” (as my friend Nigel calls the Devil) is actually seductive, more like the Wilco lyrics in “Hell is Chrome.”

When the devil came
He was not red
He was chrome and he said

Come with me
You must go
So I went
Where everything was clean
So precise and towering

I was welcomed
With open arms
I received so much help in every way
I felt no fear
I felt no fear

The air was crisp
Like sunny late winter days
A springtime yawning high in the haze
And I felt like I belonged
Come with me

Come with me
Come with me
Come with me
Come with me
Come with me
Come with me
Come with me

These lyrics capture the lying, seductive nature of the “diabolical one.” “That old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceives the whole world” finds effectiveness not through straight-out, head on lies, but through half-truths. As novelist Ron Hansen observes, “the devil doesn’t propose temptations that are easy to resist. The devil proposes temptations that seem to be good. And you find yourself going down the wrong path for all kinds of good reasons.”

Satan’s aim is always your destruction, yet the traps laid are concealed; he disguises himself as an “angel of light.” One of his greatest tricks has been to make us believe in his “red-suited harmless image” or an extremely dark and obvious Hollywood one. The truth is Satan exists, is extraordinarily powerful and in the cosmic scheme of things, we serve either God or Satan. He has his emissaries, demons, who threaten us and if invited may occupy or possess us. The majority of the planet is under the control of the dark side and does not know it.

There is good news for those whose allegience is to God. We know that God’s power is greater than Satan’s and the ultimate victory has already been won. Yet make no mistake; we are at war against “principalities and powers” who seek to do us harm, and our souls and the souls of those we love are at risk. So young Christians MUST learn to use the weapons of spiritual warfare as surely as the Jedi mastered the lightsabre.

Lest we live in daily fear, C.S. Lewis offered a good piece of advice, “There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel and excessive and unhealthy interest in them.”

Yours for the pursuit of God in the company of friends, Dick Staub.

PS. And remember, “these are the best of times and the worst of times, but they are the only times we have.” (For Now).

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© 2001 - 2010 Dick Staub, CRS Communications.