SATAN'S DEVICES by Albert Stone

The Seventh-Day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · November 27, 1879

FromThe Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, Vol. 54, No. 22

SATAN'S DEVICES.

By Albert Stone

Satan accomplishes his evil designs mostly by treachery and deceit. His arts are ineffectual to draw away the honest from the truth, unless his purpose is concealed. He therefore seeks to corrupt the truth, and thus lead his victims unsuspectingly into the snare.

It was his influence, exerted long beforehand, that led the Jews to reject Christ. They drank at the fountain of perverted truth carefully prepared by his Satanic majesty. Gradually their perceptions became blunted, so that when Christ sought to correct their false impressions, their hearts were impervious to his clear and pointed testimonies. It was the design of Satan that when Christ came they should occupy just this position; and the way was thus prepared for them to reject and crucify Him whom God sent to save them, and to become henceforward the abettors, not of truth, but of falsehood; not of Christ, but of Satan and his nefarious cause.

It required several centuries for Satan to set this fatal snare, and to spring it upon the Jews, and so to do his work that the nation would even remain ignorant of the facts in the case, though fully declared and explained by a then future revelation from Heaven. Yet such a work he did accomplish more than eighteen centuries in the past, and it has been written upon the page of Inspiration as a warning to all future generations to beware of the snares of the devil.

Beware! The trap may be set with such consummate skill that you may not perceive it. You may be drawn into it by the very means by which you hope to be saved from it. You may be caught in its fatal jaws, and not take in the situation till the day of Judgment.

Those suggestions of Satan by which he seeks to ruin men are always accompanied with pleasing considerations. Thus he said to the woman, “Thou shalt not surely die;” and to Christ, “You have no need to die to redeem the world; just fall down and worship me, and all shall be yours.” Not less false and fatal are the modern and much-cherished views of the world's conversion, a temporal millennium, and a good time coming this side of the resurrection. The fact that these views are popular, and generally received by the churches of the present time, weighs nothing against the fact that they are of modern origin, and are not found in the Bible.

Is it not plain, then, that those who give heed to these doctrines are giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils? How can this be, says the objector, when so many great and good men advocate these views? It was the saying of an eminent divine, “Satan never employs common sinners to do his special work, so long as he can get church-members and ministers to do it.” Should religious teachers awake to the dangers of the time, their theory of a world's conversion and temporal millennium would vanish like the early dew and morning cloud before the rising sun. Instead of a good time coming, they would see an evil time already begun. They would behold the noble structure of Christianity, which can count her martyrs by the million, assailed by new and threatening forms of infidelity, which demand counteracting efforts from its friends,—efforts which they do not seem to be putting forth. They would see an army of invaders entering her very citadel, without a well-set guard to oppose its march, or scarcely a sentinel to give the alarm. They would see the old and established doctrines of the Bible one after another falling to the ground, and giving way to the encroachments of a false philosophy and blind unbelief. May God pity the millions of men and women who, but for the delusions that are woven into popular Christianity, would embrace a better hope.

It is the design of Satan, in order to meet the exigencies of the present time, to lead the old and the young to embrace and profess sentiments of infidelity. And who can say that his success has not been satisfactory to himself? The forms of unbelief and skepticism are greatly multiplied in these last days. The bottomless pit is indeed opened, and the smoke of the pit is as the smoke of a great furnace, and the moral atmosphere is darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit. Every form of false religion that Satan has invented is set in motion, and he cares little which men choose, as each is deceptive, and fatal to the chooser. Perverted Christianity, in some form, is brought to every man's door, and offered without money or price.

We are living in the day of God's preparation. A mighty work is being done in the earth. The trumpet calls to battle. The gathering note is sounding. God is testing the qualifications and strength of his people, as in the days of Gideon, for the mightiest conflict the world ever saw. It is the last conflict. Previous conflicts have decided matters of smaller note, but this is to decide the eternal destiny of individual humanity.

The most potent truths ever proclaimed in the ears of man by the command of God are being met by the most crafty and powerful opposition of Satan. He has, to some extent, called to his aid the pulpit, the press, and all grades of fallen Christianity. These compose the van of the army of opposers; the rear is made up of backsliders, infidels, and scoffers,—“commixture strange,” as Pollok said of a certain character, “of Heaven, and earth, and hell.”

Our Lord, in the 24th of Matthew, predicted that this solemn message of his second coming would develop a class of ministers who would lend the dignity of their office, and cast their influence, against the last closing message of God to man. They are denominated “evil servants,” who meet the teachings of Christ on this subject with a positive denial. They are the leading spirits in setting forth the most damaging heresies ever taught by any class of men, at the same time claiming to be the chosen ambassadors of Christ. But the Saviour does not neglect to set forth their doom, Matt. 24: 50, 51.

This class of opposition to the Bible doctrine of Christ's second coming gives courage and strength to unbelievers and infidels to cast reproach and obloquy upon the most solemn and weighty truths of the word of God. It may prolong the controversy, and perplex some honest minds that have not learned the depth of Satan's devices, and will doubtless cause many to remain ignorant of the will of God and finally perish. Satan will still carry on his nefarious work for a little time. He will deceive some, perhaps many, and will worry whom he cannot devour. Let us not be ignorant of his devices. The truth has been tested by his assaults, and the servants of the Lord may take courage. He has not moved a pin from the frame-work of the plan of salvation, or caused the pillars of creation to tremble. His career will soon be ended. His time is short; his doom is sealed.

The decrees of redeeming grace will destroy both the devil and his works. The fire of God will devour him, and he will be brought to ashes upon the earth in the sight of an assembled universe, and never shall he be any more. Eze. 28: 13-19.

ALBERT STONE.