The Devil, Hocus-Pocus, and How not to Judge Others

I have often resisted the idea that there is a devil out there as it seems like so much strange hocus-pocus, evoking absurd medieval images of men in red suits brandishing pitch forks. My faith tells me that I need to take evil and the darker powers seriously, as a definite and identifiable force of destruction and hell, but my 21^st century mind has found it all too foreign or ‘other-worldly’, and sounding like a fairy-tale nightmare. So, I have often prayed about this question asking that I might understand the devil and evil in terms I can make better sense of, and in so doing, shake off all this historical cultural baggage and silliness.

Then I found myself pondering about, what seemed like a completely different topic, namely the instruction from Christ not to judge others. For example, in Luke 6:37 Christ states: “Do not judge and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned.” I was wondering what this command from Christ means exactly, and how we should view others as a result, particularly those who commit very bad acts – but others too, many of whom I would count as good friends. Regarding the latter group, I was thinking of those who – with some measure of success – search for what is valuable in life but do not, by any stretch of their imagination, believe in God or Christ.

However, as I was pondering my mind wandered back to the devil and who he is, and then it suddenly occurred to me that these two trains of thought were not unrelated. To stop myself judging others, whether good or bad, I must stop assuming that evil is something which is rooted in us. Evil, and so all that is against the God of love, joy and liberation, is ultimately rooted outside of who we are – and so outside of whatever we have done and whatever we believe. Consequently, as the devil has indeed been so often depicted, evil should appear foreign and strange to us – and, dare I say it, other-worldly. Consequently, our struggle is not against people here on earth, but is ultimately against another much stranger and darker place – a place which bears down on us, but is not part of us. As Paul said to the Ephesians 6:12:

“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”

As I pondered and prayed about this scripture further, the devil then started to make a little more sense to me, as I put him in his place, and then refused to judge my fellow flesh and blood!

For details of my book, Nine Steps to Well-Being: A Spiritual Guide for Disconnected Christians and Other Questioning Journeyers go to my blog’s home page http://disconnectedchristians.blogspot.co.uk/ or to the publishers website ‘Whispering Tree Original Books’ where the first three chapters can be accessed FREE! http://www.whisperingtreeoriginalbooks.com/?page_id=40