Blessed are the Peacemakers . . .

PRINCE OF PEACE AND PRINCE OF DEMONS
(and the call to arms)

Jesus seemed to realize that he had come into this world to assault the stronghold of Satan. He was destined from eternity to play the chief role in the divine encounter. His constant behavior was that of one who had been called to arms, and he did not mistake either the character or the power of his adversary. He had come to introduce the kingdom of God, but he was aware that this meant war with him who is called the prince of devils. “If it is through the finger of God that I cast out devils,” he said to his disciples, “then know that the kingdom of God has overtaken you” (Lk. 11:20).

Satan initiated the conflict in seeking to destroy the people chosen of God to give the Messiah to the world. The Old Testament is the story of that crucible, showing how God time and again frustrated Satan’s effort to nip in the bud “the plan of the ages.” Once the Messiah was born, Satan made the attack more personal in his attempts to kill him. Then came the temptations in the wilderness, which were real and traumatic, and when these were over “the devil left him, to return at the appointed time.” The demonic world had its strategy, and it was not about to leave Jesus alone. Satan would return at the appointed time.

We cannot be sure of the meaning of Mt. 11:12, but it may well refer to the demonic effort to maintain control of this world and to thwart the purposes of God’s kingdom: “Since John the Baptist came, up to the present time, the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence and the violent are taking it by storm. The “violators” may be the underlings of Satan, who, since the temptation, have been nipping at Jesus’ heels at every turn in an effort to neutralize his work.

Satan was as real to Jesus as Rommel, “the dessert fox,” was to Gen. Patton. He talked with him as he did any other person, not only during the temptations, but now and again during his ministry. It was only when Jesus rebuked him with a “Be off, Satan” that the old deceiver left him for a time. At the very time that Jesus spoke of giving the kingdom to his disciples, he spoke directly to the beloved fisherman with these terse words: “Simon, Simon! Satan, you must know, has got his wish to sift you all like wheat” (Lk. 21:31). The Greek verb suggests that Satan “demanded” to put Peter and the other apostles to the test, somewhat as he had in the case of Job. He had to get permission to subject God’s faithful to such a brutal ordeal as he brought upon the apostles. While Jesus allowed Satan to do his thing, he assured Peter that he was praying for him.

Jesus used the metaphor “sift like wheat,” not Satan, for Jesus knew that as wheat has to be sifted so the apostles had to be tested. To Satan the apostles were not like wheat to be sifted but as straw to be burned. His intention was not to test but to destroy. It is evident that Satan had his strategy, which included encounters with Jesus himself wherein he would make his demands in the ongoing struggle. I want Peter!, he demands of Jesus. The Messiah allows it, but not without soliciting help from the Father, praying for Peter to be strong. And he speaks to Peter in the tenderest of terms and calling him by his more intimate name, and imploringly, Simon, Simon! They were at war with the powers of this world.

In the combat with Satan the Master realized that his adversary sometimes was present and speaking through those closest to him. When he was predicting his death in Jerusalem and Peter sought to dissuade him, Jesus addresses not Peter but his adversary: “Get behind me, Satan!” But Satan at this time must have been a fallen adversary, but one who would not give up. When the Seventy returned to Jesus, joyful that the demons were subject to them, Jesus explained why this was: “I watched Satan fall like lightning from heaven” (Lk. 10:18). We cannot be sure when this was, but it may have been when Satan was defeated by the Son of God in the wilderness. Even he, the exalted prince of demons, could not cause the Christ to sin. So he fell from his lofty, presumptuous position that he had exalted to heaven itself. Jesus, witnessing the defeat, likened the sudden fall to a flash of lightning. He certainly is not saying that he saw Satan fall out of heaven. He is saying that he witnessed his defeat, at his own hands.

But like a caged animal that is still alive and dangerous, Satan is at work, and he has designs upon all the faithful just as he did upon the Messiah and his disciples. The war goes on. It began in a special way when evil forces arrested Jesus in Gethsemane. “This is your hour; this is the reign of darkness,” he said to them (Lk. 22:53), as if to grant that Satan was having his moment of victory. The Prince of Peace would be murdered by the Prince of Demons. The Son of God himself would die like any other man and be buried in the earth. It was surely the darkest day in all of human history. Jesus was dead and Satan was victorious.

But the Prince of Peace was also the Lord of Glory (1 Cor. 2:8) and there was no way for deity to remain in the grave. God raised him up to sit at his own right hand, and when Paul addressed pagans in Athens he argued that the resurrection was proof enough that Jesus was the appropriate one to judge all men (Acts 17:31). And in Col. 2:15 he contends that Jesus’ death and resurrection “got rid of the Sovereignties and the Powers, and paraded them in public, behind him in his triumphal procession.” It is a beautiful metaphor. The shameful tree became the victor’s triumphal chariot, before which his enemies are driven in ignominious defeat.

The Jews believed that the angels had brought the Law down out of heaven, “ministered by angels” as Gal. 3:19 puts it. The demons, who were among the sovereignties and powers, were honored as lawgivers and thus worshipped, as Col. 2:18 indicates. Since the people were obligated to the Law to keep it, there was that “record of the debt” that they could not pay, which loomed before them as a mountain of bankruptcy. It is this, the debt the people owed because of the Law and not the Law itself, that Jesus nailed to the cross. It was like parading the enemy in public when he lost his legalistic control over the people. Grace not only triumphed over the legalism of the Law, but over all legalism of all law.

The soul and heart of man is thus the battleground. This is shown in Jesus’ concern for those possessed of evil spirits. Such spirits were aware of his presence and fearfully acknowledged his deity when he approached them: “They (two demoniacs) stood there shouting, ‘What do you want with us, Son of God? Have you come to torture us before the time?’” (Mt. 8:29). How did they know who he was? They belonged to the spirit world and thus had supernatural insight and/or they had been with him in heaven, before their own fall, and knew very well who the Lord of Glory was. They made the soul of man their place of battle and this sealed their doom. Had they chosen to possess beasts Jesus would not have been so concerned, and on one occasion, at the demons own request, lest they have nothing to possess, he drove them into swine. It is where demons should be, if anywhere!

The Prince of Peace has thus gained the victory over the Prince of Demons. If God is thus on our side, who can be against us?, the apostle asks in Rom 8:31. Not even Satan. “For I am certain of this: neither death nor life, no angel, no prince, nothing that exists, nothing still to come, not any power, or height or depth, nor any created thing, can ever come between us and the love of God made visible in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Those words are shot through with references to the spirit world. Paul was aware of the warfare and realized that he had been summoned to the conflict. He was certain that while the victory was not yet complete there was no power, in this world or in the spirit world, that could separate him from God’s love. Since Jesus stands at God’s right hand, pleading for us, we have the victory in spite of all that Satan might do. It is the magnificent assurance.

The Prince of Peace is thus our peace because of his victory over the Prince of Demons. But the victory is not complete until the last day when the soul of man can no longer be the battleground and when Satan is forever destroyed. In the meantime we are at war. We are called to arms. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal and the fight we fight is the fight of faith. We are summoned to wage peace.

But it is no less a war, and we are called to be soldiers, duly equipped with the sword of the Spirit, the shield of faith, and the breastplate of righteousness. Only with these can we put out the burning arrows of the evil one.

If indeed we are at war with “the spiritual army of evil in the heavens” (Eph. 6:12), then we must have a strategy and a plan of assault. If we are conquerors for him, then we must storm the strongholds of Satan that are all about us. It is important to remember that the enemy is doing his evil work in our homes, churches, and schools, as well as those places where we expect to find him.—the Editor.