Getting Job-ed
You believe that God is one. Good! Even the demons believe- and shudder. Senseless person! Are you willing to learn that faith without works is useless? James 2:19-20 CSB
This may sound offensive to you, but Satan really does have more knowledge about God and who He is than you do. No doubt, he understands scripture better than we do and has had a front-row presence to God that we have not had the privilege of yet. So, if Satan and his demons know more about God than we could ever know during our lives on earth, what makes us any better than Satan?
What the heart of the issue is…
The heart of the issue is what we love and desire. Satan and his demons believe all the right stuff. It’s possible that the ‘best Christian’ could still be lost while just knowing the right stuff about God- because this scripture says we’re no different than Satan then. The issue is love: do we love God? Do we desire Him?
Check out Romans 1: 18, 21, 24-25, 28 CSB
For God’s wrath is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth… For though they knew God, they did not glorify him as God or show gratitude… Therefore God delivered them over in the desires of their hearts to sexual impurity, so that their bodies were degraded among themselves. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served what has been created instead of the Creator, who is praised forever. Amen… And because they did not think it worthwhile to acknowledge God, God delivered them over to a corrupt mind so that they do what is not right.
Notice the theme here: suppressing truth, not glorifying God, desires of their hearts, exchanging the truth of God for a lie, worshipped something other than God, God delivers them over to their corrupt minds. What’s this have to do with the difference between our faith and Satan?
Satan hates God, His supremacy, and His Sovereignty. Submission to God and kneeling to God is the last thing Satan ever wants. He hates God’s lordship over everything. So, although Satan knows all of the right stuff about God, he hates God. Rather than that knowledge turning him to love God more deeply, it’s repulsive and offensive to him.
What’s this mean for us?
Chapter 2 in the Book of James is a great chapter because James begins to marry the two concepts of faith not just being about book-knowledge about God and shifting us to what true saving faith looks like. James is not at odds with Paul in Ephesians 2:8 in that we are “saved by grace through faith, and this is not from yourselves, it is God’s gift…” but rather he is saying that true faith is a faith that changes a person from the inside out- causing a change in the way we live outwardly and work for God. Our faith and love for God and who He is is what changes us outwardly (primary commandments, see Matthew 22:36-40). Satan has more book-knowledge about God than any of us will ever have, but Satan does not love God or cherish Him. Our faith in God is about desiring God, not just knowing things about Him.
-Austin
