I'll admit that I have not been entirely comfortable spending a whole week of devotions focussing on the character of Satan. Like so many of us, I often seek to avoid thinking too much about such things. I think it is right for us to focus on the light, not the darkness. Yet, while we can certainly be overly fixated on Satan and his many schemes, surely one such scheme is to have us ignore him completely. The Bible, and the Book of Job particularly, will not let us do this. So, for our final devotion this week we will consider as Christians what we are to make of Satan so that do not remain ignorant his strategies.

Look first at Luke 22:31, where Jesus says to Peter: “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat” (note that “you” here is plural, referring to all of the apostles). Just as the satan asks to sift and test Job, so Satan here asks (the word is stronger, more like “demanded” or “required”) to sift the disciples of Jesus. Now note that Jesus does not go on to say, “But my Father has forbidden Satan from doing this.” Instead, he says, “But I have prayed for you (note now that “you” here is singular), that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:31, 32). It appears as though Satan’s demand is to be granted; the apostles are to be sifted by Satan, to see if their faith is genuine. And their faith will prove genuine, not least because God the Son prays to God the Father for Peter, and then Peter becomes the instrument to strengthen the faith of the others.

Later in his life, Peter writes to suffering Christian believers to explain that their trials are necessary “so that your faith- of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire- may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed” (see 1 Peter 1:6-7). Then, Peter writes “Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour”. And he can be resisted only by faith: “Resist him, standing firm in the faith” (1 Peter 5:8-9).

The apostle Paul calls Christians to “put on the full armour of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes” (Ephesians 6:11-12). So we are being ignorant and naive if we suppose that Satan no longer wants to attack believers or that God the Father has changed his mind about giving Satan permission to launch such attacks. We have an enemy who continues to attack us, as he attacked Job and as he even assaulted the Lord Jesus Christ himself.

But there is one difference. We live after the cross of Christ and therefore after the fulfilment of the story of Job. In the cross of Christ, God has “disarmed the powers and authorities, [making] a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross” (Colossians 2:15). Through his death Jesus will “destroy him who holds the power of death- that is, the devil- and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death” (Hebrews 2:14-15). “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work” (1 John 3:8). The cross changes things.

We learn what the cross changes from a vivid apocalyptic passage in Revelation 12.
And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say:

“Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. Therefore, rejoice you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short.” (Revelation 12:7–12)

As a result of the victory of the cross, the Satan is no longer present in the council of God, as he was in Job 1-2, to accuse believers before the Father. He has been thrown down to earth. He no longer has access to the throne room of Heaven. What does this mean, since he is still dangerous, ranges the earth and sea with great anger, and indeed can only be conquered by those who “did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death” (v. 11)?

The key truth is that he who was “the accuser of our brothers” is no longer able to accuse Christian believers before God (v. 10). Satan continues to accuse us, and we need to learn what to do with his accusation. Indeed, when he accuses us, it is not before God. Satan no longer has that kind of access. Any accusation Satan may make against us has been- with our sin- nailed to the cross. This is the truth of the gospel: there is no longer any condemnation (Romans 8:1), and our consciences have been cleansed by the blood of Christ (Hebrews 9:14).

So as we read the story of Job we think first and primarily of the greater story of Jesus, who walked the way of Job for us, who plumbed the depths of Job’s suffering for us, and who was vindicated for us and our salvation. Satan is still at work in this world and seeking to undermine faith, and he spends what short life is left to him angrily doing that, like a hungry lion on the prowl. We must be realistic about this. In the face of our real struggle against such attacks, we are called to endure (“This calls for patient endurance and faithfulness on the part of the saints” Revelation 13:10). And the glorious news of the gospel is that if we are in Christ, the Satan is no longer able to accuse us before God. He no longer has that access.