“Are you looking for Mr. Nash? Oh, they are sending him back to the homeless shelter,” she smugly said. Without responding, I stared at her intently for a minute hiding the hurt in my chest as the guilt of the situation weighed heavily on my shoulders. “She will not see me cry,” I remember thinking. “She will NOT see me cry.”
So, what does evil look like?
For me that day, it looked like fake blue eyes. All I knew about her was her name displayed on her name tag, that she worked at the hospital, and that those pretty blue eyes weren’t real. What stood out to me during my stay was the eyes of the people I crossed paths with. A lot of them, patients especially, had bright blue eyes. Dare I say, exotic eyes. It was like taking a dip in the Mediterranean Sea when I looked at them. But her eyes they just didn’t look right. “Is that your natural eye color,” I asked her one day. She stiffly replied that they were contacts. I told her that they were pretty anyway.
Every encounter I had with this lady was met with malicious intent on her part. But the last encounter, that one was the “straw that broke the camel’s back.” I didn’t know that my friend, Mr. Nash, was homeless. And I certainly didn’t intend on my act of goodwill sending him back to a shelter. She wasn’t even one of our caretakers, but she went out of her way to stick her nose in the middle of our affairs. She went out of her way to hurt me. Which she did, but only for a few minutes because my Almighty God had a way to redeem the situation with a heartwarming gesture through a glass wall.
She stole my cookies! Technically it wasn’t stealing, but she made me give them back to my mom. These weren’t just any cookies. They were large kitchen sink cookies, the kind with everything in them, from the gourmet grocery store. Your guests were allowed to bring you food during your visitation, but you had to consume it during the short visit. I was stuffed from dinner and my caretaker said to just slide them under my shirt. Then out of nowhere, “ole blue eyes” rounds the corner and says “un-uh, you can’t take those with you.”
Then standing in line at the nurse’s station one day, she comes up and snaps her fingers at me and said “give me that!” I didn’t even know what she was referring to. “The ponytail holder,” she snapped. Grudgingly, I slid the holder out of my hair and placed it in her hand. It was my last piece of contraband given to me by another patient. I had to resort to tying my thin, fine hair up with a three inch rag. Okay, so maybe she was just a rule enforcer – doing her job. I’ll give her that. But the manner in which she interacted with me and the way she smiled as she told me that my friend was going back to the homeless shelter was all done with evil intent. Luckily for me, my time with her was temporary.
Now don’t think that I am saying that everyone who does hurtful things to you is evil. We’ve all embraced evil tendencies with the slip of a tongue or an ungodly thought. Lies have been told, tempers lost, and sins have been made. We are all sinners; imperfect souls with a gracious savior.
But what is this thing called ‘Spiritual Warfare’ that everyone seems to talk and write about? Why does the elderly lady at church say “that’s the devil testing you?” I particularly love, “you must be doing something right, because the devil is attacking you hard.” Let me get this right. If I carry on living a God-breathed life doing Good in His name – submitting to His Will, Satan and his servants will come my way?
Yeah, pretty much. Doing all things with love, obeying God, being a disciple and following His commandments will be met with opposition. There is no way around it. Jesus was met with opposition when he walked this Earth all the way to the cross. His disciples faced trials every step of the way. Why wouldn’t we have to dance with the devil as well? We are called to “Fight the Good Fight” (1 Timothy 6:12), with the emphasis on ‘fight’.
As if we don’t already have enough to deal with in our busy lives, we also have to thwart off attacks from Lucifer and his minions.
So, just what does Satan and his third of the stars look like?
The Bible doesn’t really describe the physical appearance of the devil after his fall except for the serpent in the garden and the red dragon in Revelation. Eve ruined the whole talking snake experience for most of us and I don’t know about you, but I’m not hugging any red dragon. According to Wikipedia, Satan is described as an entity that seduces humans into sin or falsehood. I was confused by the use of the word ‘entity’ and when I read the definition for the word ‘entity’ that really cleared things up, NOT!
The definition is pretty ambiguous – it has a lot of conflicting meanings. It actually uses the term “or not.” However, entity is a perfect description. Evil is confusing and smart. He could come at you in physical form or supernaturally. Evil can come in any size or package he devises.
‘Seduces’ is also perfect in this definition. That sexy word –exactly describes his way of achieving his purpose. He seduces us with sins. He makes them look good, sexy, appealing, satisfying – the things our flesh craves. And more often than not it works. We fall into his trap and if we are not careful to fight back with our faith, we can get bound in a web of deception.
Why can’t he just walk around in that tight red unitard, with sharp horns, eyes of fire, and carrying a pitchfork? If you saw him walking down the street, you’d either make a bee-line in the opposite direction or get your pepper spray ready and maybe a fire extinguisher. Wouldn’t that be great? Easy? If-only.
Instead he comes cloaked in temptation, dressed to the nine’s, perfect smile, and spewing charming words. She looks like everything you have ever desired. He makes you feel really good about yourself – at first. She may hide behind the words of the gospel. He may teach the gospel. He is smart, very smart. She comes bearing promises of riches, power, beauty and other earthly pleasures. They bring gifts. That pill will take all of your pain away. They feed your addiction with one more glass. She serves up wants, but makes sure they come with sides of envy and greed to keep you wanting. He will get in your mind and run circles with lies.
Every article I have read is very careful not to assume that the devil and the other demons (also called Fallen Angels) will take on human form, because the Bible does not explicitly say that. Common sense tells me that the Anti-Christ, a world leader, is not going to get the vote looking like Puff the Magic Dragon. Paul describes the False Prophets as men masquerading in light and most Theologians believe that Satan took on human form when he went to the desert with Jesus.
That serial child molester on the news, the well-dressed clean cut man; well he looks like evil to me. His actions certainly do. And that Grandma who put a baby in the oven – there is no other description but evil. Or the CEO of the non-profit who pilfered donations on luxury vacations, cars and houses. The list goes on. The problem is they don’t look like the deceiving type until the deception has been caught.
So how do we make sure we are not deceived?
These Boots
This song... Eric Church, These Boots
"And these boots have danced with the devil and nearly lost that battle
To a wild-eyed Irish Rose
I've worn out more souls than I can recount
Done more stupid things than most would dare to
I've kicked myself more times than not
For the roads they led me down..."
Good Book -- Great Story!
Read the story of Megan Boudreaux and Respire Haiti. This story is evident of how God can use one ordinary person with an obedient, loving heart to do extraordinary things for His Kingdom. Of course, she has been met with opposition along the way -- starting with building a school on the enemy's property, Voodoo Mountain.
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