Where is Satan in the Old Testament?

Note from the Editor: One of the main reasons we as an organization are so concerned about disease is because of the questions it poses about God. If God is who we say he is (i.e., all good and all powerful), why is there so much disease in the world? The answer we like the most points to Satan as the root cause of much disease and suffering. We find this answer to be biblically compelling and logically valid. (See here, here and here.) But what do we do with the numerous scripture passages that attribute suffering to God’s judgment or his mysterious will? (See here and here.) Another related question is, if Satan is behind much of the evil and suffering in the Bible, why is he almost invisible in the Old Testament? Below is an interesting take on the subject from Brad and Dorothee Cole.

Palmyra: Temple of Baal - Stijn Nieuwendijk/Flickr

From Old to New

By Brad and Dorothee Cole

Our brief survey of the Old Testament revealed a deeply rebellious time in which God’s chosen people were only occasionally interested in following the true God and were more often attracted to the cruel gods of the other nations—deities that demanded human (even child) sacrifice, and in which the worship experience involved temple prostitutes, fertility cult worship, extreme cruelty, and snake veneration. In this context, what we see in the Old Testament is God shielding the people from the full revelation of a great Adversary:

The nations surrounding Israel were polytheistic, worshiping many gods. In a polytheistic culture, the good things are attributed to the good gods, bad things to the evil ones. And those evil deities could be so volatile that humans were constantly brewing up incantations and magic rituals to placate them. . . . The great danger for Israel lay in the temptation to worship Satan as another god. So rather than just forbidding magic and incantation, God went a step further and claimed full responsibility for both good and evil. . . . As a result, throughout most of its pages, the Old Testament portrays God as the active agent in all things. God is the one who causes everything. Satan simply drops from sight until the very end of the Old Testament. . . . Indeed, only three passages in the entire Old Testament are explicit in their reference to the “Satan” who was God’s great adversary, and all three passages were either written or canonized toward the end of the Old Testament period (Alden Thompson, Servant God [Loma Linda, CA: Loma Linda University Press]).

Out of mercy, God veiled Satan and met the people where they were. He did not open up to them the potential dangers of worshiping His antagonist, but instead made Himself out to be the only viable divine power who would either bless them if they were faithful or curse and bring ruin to them if they were unfaithful. “If you obey the LORD your God . . . he will make you greater than any other nation on earth. . . . But if you disobey the LORD your God ... all these evil things will happen to you: The LORD will curse your towns and your fields” (Deuteronomy 28:1, 15-16).

Much of the book of Deuteronomy is filled with blessings and curses—all at the hands of God. In most of the Old Testament, God does both, including bringing punishment down to the third and fourth generation for the sins of the parents (Exodus 20). “I create both light and darkness; I bring both blessing and disaster. I, the LORD, do all these things” (Isaiah 45:7).

There is, however, a progressive unfolding of reality throughout the Old Testament. For example, in Ezekiel 18 God makes it very clear that, despite the words in the Ten Commandments, He does not punish the children for the sins of the parents. It isn’t until the New Testament, however, that everything is fully turned on its head. The promise for obedience in the New Testament is not blessing in this life, but rather persecution (Matthew 5). Those who are stoned in the New Testament are not the rule breakers, but rather those who are faithful to God. And, most important for our discussion, the Devil is the roaring lion who destroys in the New Testament, not God.

In the Old Testament, God is usually dealing with immature people just as parents deal with immature children—with rewards for good behavior and punishment for bad. Through Jesus, God calls His people to grow up. With maturity comes a greater understanding of our complex universe and the God who created it all.

This material was excerpted from Brad and Dorothee’s Bible study, Truth, Love and Freedom Bible Study Guide.

Drs. Brad and Dorothee Cole work as neurologists at the Loma Linda VA hospital and teach neuroscience and neurology education at Loma Linda University (LLU).  Brad and Dorothee also edited Servant God, a multi-authored book about God’s character. 

Was Darwin More Concerned About God's Reputation Than We Are?

By Ralph D. Winter

According to Deborah Cadbury’s book entitled The Terrible Lizard which tells us about early dinosaur hunters, the tumble of new bones being dug up right in England soon became a significant factor in a vast and widespread shift away from what came to be called a “bondage to Moses,” that is, bondage to the Bible.

Cornelius Hunter’s book, Darwin’s God: Evolution and the Problem of Evil, demonstrates conclusively that even Darwin, only a little later, was still concerned about the Christian faith in that he was pained until the day he died by the intellectual task of explaining how a good and all-powerful God could have authored the cruelty which he saw so pervasively in nature, and which many of the discoveries of dinosaur bones dramatically highlighted.

Both Hunter and Cadbury show that in the 1820s Biblical perspectives were major factors filtering interpretations of the bones being discovered of earlier life forms. This was true at Oxford University, for example, which was in that era a citadel of defense of the literal text of the Bible, somewhat of a Moody Bible Institute.

Today we have the wonderful and effective work of the Evangelical pioneers in the Intelligent Design (ID) movement, a perspective portrayed magnificently in the Illustra Media video, Unlocking the Mystery of Life. But neither the writings of these pioneer ID people nor this magnificent video reflect any stated concern whatsoever for the perplexing presence of pervasive evil, suffering and cruelty throughout all of nature. Strange, because the lurid presence of evil (“Nature red in tooth and claw”) was a major factor in Darwin’s thinking and the thinking of quite a few other key people who in his day were confused about how the existence of violent forms of life could be congruent with the concept of a benevolent Creator.

Thus, it would appear that some of our present-day creationists are so eager to give God all the credit for all of creation that the virtually unavoidable presence of evil to be seen there has become strangely less important than it was in Darwin’s day and even to Darwin himself. Would it not be very ironic if the man we usually accuse of destroying faith in a Creator God were to turn out to be more interested in preserving the good reputation of that God than are we?

This entry was excerpted from an essay Ralph Winter wrote in the Winter of 2003 entitled, "Where Darwin Scores Higher Than Intelligent Design." The full essay can be read here.

Five (obvious) Questions about Malaria Eradication

By Brian Lowther

There is absolutely no evidence I know of in all the world of any theologically driven interest in combating disease at its origins. I have not found any work of theology, any chapter, any paragraph, nor to my knowledge any sermon urging us—whether in the pew or in professional missions—to go to battle against the many disease pathogens we now know to be eradicable.
~ Ralph D. Winter, December 2001

This quote has inspired much of our effort here in the Roberta Winter Institute. It has also compelled us to search high and low to prove this notion wrong. In recent years a few initiatives addressing malaria have cropped up; some led by Christian groups. Off the top of my head, here are two:

• The United Methodist Church’s participation in the “Nothing But Nets” campaign.
• Compassion International’s Malaria Bite Back Program

The key to both of these initiatives—as with most malaria projects—is bed nets. These two endeavors and their secular counterparts (such as the Roll Back Malaria campaign) should be supported and celebrated. But I can’t get a few rather obvious questions out of my mind.

Malaria patient Yim Pros, 12 from Orumchek village in Western Cambodia, came to Ta Sanh Health Center complaining of high fever, chills, and nauseau. He was diagnosed with a severe case of malaria. Yim's mother laid a damp towel over her son to help bring down his fever while he waited for treatment. Gates Foundation/Flickr

Question 1

Will passing out bed nets—crucial as that activity is—eradicate malaria? Even if every person in the world slept under a bed net, mosquitoes would still thrive, because they feed off of animals, not just human beings, right?

Answer

Well, apparently with the exception of one species of mosquito that causes malaria in Macaques monkeys, the mosquitoes that feed off of animals are of limited public health importance.

Question 2

Okay, but even then, what about when people aren’t sleeping? People aren’t going to wear nets 24-hours a day, are they?

Answer

The Anopheles mosquitoes, the most dangerous ones, prefer to feed at night. So wearing bed nets during the day is not necessary.

Question 3

But, bed nets prevent mosquitoes from biting; they don’t kill the mosquitoes, right? I’m reminded of a story in Dan Fountain’s book, Health, the Bible and the Church, in which he describes a village in Africa that was tormented by lions. To prevent the lion attacks, the villagers erected a fence around the entire village. This was effective, but had they really solved the lion problem? A few days later a woman and two children went outside of the fence. Suddenly a lion attacked and carried off one of her children. The woman ran screaming back to the village, “Why can’t you get rid of the lions?”

Answer

Apparently the nets are treated with insecticide, so they do kill at least some of the mosquitoes that land on them, as long as those mosquitos haven’t developed a resistance to the insecticide.

Question 4

The most simplistic solution to malaria—one that my seven-year-old could have thought up— is to wipe out all the mosquitoes. Mankind has shown a remarkable albeit unfortunate effectiveness in driving other species into extinction. Why can’t we apply that same hunter’s ingenuity to mosquitoes? In the 19th Century, hunters nearly wiped out all of the bison in North America because their hides were so lucrative. Why don’t we make mosquito carcasses lucrative?

While this solution is simplistic, I’m not the first one to think of it. In 1996, Manila had a cholera outbreak that killed seven people and sickened 310 others. Health officials determined that flies and roaches were the culprits. So the city government decided to pay 4¢ for every ten dead flies and 6¢ for every ten dead roaches. Eliminating the insects before they infected people helped to end the epidemic. Could this be done with mosquitoes? A $100,000 grant from Bill Gates would buy a lot of dead mosquitoes.

Answer

Well, apparently this solution isn’t the panacea. When the British invaded India, they tried this same method with cobras. Unfortunately people started to breed cobras and once the British Colonists found out, they nixed the reward. Subsequently, the people released their cobras and they ended up with a bigger cobra problem than when they started.

Also killing off all the mosquitoes on earth is tricky. Many of the most successful efforts at eliminating them have involved the use of toxic chemicals like DDT, which has since been banned in many places because of its side effects.

The real question, however, is not can mosquitoes be eradicated, but should mosquitoes be eradicated? The downside to a world without mosquitoes is that other parts of the ecosystem will suffer. There are plants that rely on mosquitoes for pollination, fish that count them as their sole food source and even caribou depend on being bothered by swarms of mosquitoes in order to prompt their migratory patterns. It's unclear whether the plants and animals that depend on these pests would adapt and survive without them. Ridding the world of mosquitoes might save millions of human lives, but the environment would pay the price in more ways than one.

Question 5

So, what’s the solution?

Answer

The current strategy involves insecticide treated bed nets, draining standing water and spraying insecticides. This lowers the mosquito population enough so that sooner or later the malaria infected mosquitoes disappear from a given area, as happened in North America, Europe and much of the Middle East (though each of these regions had the advantage of DDT).

But unless mosquitoes (or more specifically the P. falciparum Plasmodium) are eradicated from the entire world, malaria could become re-established. As long as we have airplanes, a few cases each year will pop up even where malaria has been eliminated. In the U.S. alone there were almost 1,700 cases in 2010, and 2,000 in 2011, a 40-year high.

Thus we turn to vaccines. Perhaps the only real solution is to make all human beings immune to the disease through vaccinations, as happened with smallpox. Vaccines may be especially important in the face of mosquitoes that are becoming increasingly insecticide-resistant. As of this moment, a completely effective vaccine is not yet available for malaria, although several vaccines are under development. Bill Gates—who funds much of this research—recently said, "I'd be disappointed if within 20 years we're not very close to eradicating this globally."

In the end, it may require a completely new solution that we haven’t even considered. But I’ll leave that one to my seven-year-old.

Brian Lowther is the director of the Roberta Winter Institute. 

Blessed are the Peacemakers

John Bennett/Flickr

By Beth Snodderly, D.Litt. et Phil. 

God wants his children to be known as peacemakers. Jesus is the Prince of Peace.

Greg Boyd wrote in a Sept. 2010 ReKnew blog that, “A number of scholars have argued that the whole point of the book of Revelation is to vindicate God’s sacrificial lamb-like way of overcoming evil. That is, God’s way of defeating evil by being willing to die, rather than conquer with violence, looks like it loses throughout history, but all will see that it triumphs in the end.”

One of these scholars is Sigve Tonstad, author of the book, Saving God’s Reputation. He points out that as a deceiver, “Satan wins support for his cause and programme by something other than what he truly represents. If this is the case, simple demolition of the deceiver will not suffice unless or until his true character has become manifest” (p. 129). If God were to simply demolish the devil, those who have lent their support toward the evil one by believing his lies would then continue to believe the lies about God’s character.

Erich Sauer (The King of the Earth, p. 73), writing after the violence of World War II, explained his view that Satan’s area of power had been granted to him legally before his fall. (“The whole world lies in the power of the evil one,” 1 John 5:19.) Sauer believes it is God’s plan to take back the rulership of the world from Satan in a way that is “legal” and that reflects God’s justice. This meant, according to Sauer, that God would have to take the rulership of the world back without force, through the free choices of human beings who have to decide for themselves which ruler to follow. This was obviously a big risk for God, as Gregory Boyd points out (Satan and the Problem of Evil, p. 86). By creating humans and putting them in charge of the world, God was setting up a counter Kingdom and throwing out a challenge to Satan. The serpent’s insinuation to Eve was Satan’s initially successful response to that challenge. But God struck back with a long-term plan, first mentioned in Genesis 3:15, to defeat the dark prince of this world and restore the world to what it was originally intended to be, under the rule of the Creator-King.

Satan has to wait until humans give him an opportunity to act (Trevor Ling, The Significance of Satan, p. 38). God likewise has chosen to limit himself to acting when intercessors and his obedient people pray, “let your kingdom come; let your will be done” (Matthew 6:10).

Beth Snodderly is the RWI's Theologian in Residence and Chair of the Advisory Board.

Causes of Death in the USA

“The Son of God appeared for this purpose, that He might destroy the works of the devil”—our mission too?

By Ralph D. Winter, originally published on April 25, 2004

View fullsize

Click to enlarge. Row 18 indicates the reported number of deaths in the USA, per year in Column 1, and per day in Column 5. Row 16 sums up the total number of deaths in the USA per year due to the 15 causes listed in rows 1-15. Each row gives the breakdown for each of the different causes of death, Column 1 = annual total, Column 5 = daily total. Column 1 data for 2001, from the National Center for Health Statistics, 2003. Other columns and calculations, RDW, 4/25/04

How few die a natural death!

1. Note that the deaths from the causes listed in rows 1-8, Column 4, account for 75% of all deaths in the USA.
2. Note that the number of deaths in the USA from just homicide (Row 14) is only 7/10 of 1% of all deaths.
3. Note that the number of deaths from heart disease plus cancer (Column 4, Row 2) constitutes more than half (51%) of all deaths.
4. Lines 5, 11 and 14 are non-disease causes. Together they represent 4%, 1/3% and 0.7% of the total. The remaining twelve disease-related causes are still 76.4% of the total deaths. (Should that be true?)
5. If Line 17, “Other Causes,” is mostly disease, then pathogenic or germ-based disease accounts for even more than 76.4% of deaths. Yet 99% of medical/pharmaceutical funds focus on treating disease, not eradicating the pathogenic sources.

Beneath these silent statistics...

Beneath these silent statistics is a raging war of pathogenic disease against human beings. This war prematurely drags down to death in pain and suffering about four out of five people who die in the United States. Subtracting lines 5, 11, and 14, eight out of ten dies an unnatural death. This is not a pretty picture, and not something to look forward to. As someone said, I am not afraid of death, just the process of dying.

But the absolute wonder is that less than one percent of medical funds go to disease sources instead of disease treatments. There are several reasons for this.

1. Until recently many of these diseases were not understood to be the result of infections (pathogens, that is, viruses, bacteria or parasites), but because of “conditions.” Duodenal ulcers also were because of stress and spicy food, etc., not a bacterium (heliobacter pylori). Tuberculosis was assumed to be caused by sleeping in damp places, not by a pathogen. Heart disease has long been described as being caused by conditions like salt or cholesterol in the diet and as a gradual build-up of plaque in the arteries. Now it is clear that half of all who die of heart attacks don’t possess any of the alleged symptoms. Now, heart deaths are attributed to sudden “eruption” of inflammation in arterial walls (due to an infection), which suddenly blocks arteries and thus strains and damages the heart, suddenly. Strong evidence has now been acknowledged to indicate that infections underlie heart disease, cancer, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s, and schizophrenia, for example.
2. A second major reason is that Western theology has a blind spot stemming from the Neo-Platonism of Augustine (in the fourth century AD). Thus, we tend to look for God’s after-the-fact purposes in a tragedy. We don’t often seek to eradicate the causes—unless we think they are conditions like lack of exercise, wrong nutrition, etc. Jonathan Edwards (1740s) was accused of “interfering with Divine Providence” when he sought to employ a vaccine to defend his Indians from smallpox.
3. The simplest factor to explain is that sick people seeking healing (not causal explanations) provide the truly enormous resources of the medical and pharmaceutical industries. Over 99% of all such funds, understandably, focus on treatments not origins of disease. Yet, most government money (NIH, NCI, etc.) is also manipulated or influenced by the medical/pharmaceutical industries, so also with the research grants on which university faculties live. In other words, relatively little concern ends up for disease origins. 

Why Eradication?

Flickr/UNICEF Ethiopia

The eradication of smallpox has been called “one of the greatest accomplishments undertaken and performed for the benefit of mankind anywhere or at any time.” And though it's the only human disease in history that has been eradicated, we are on the verge of seeing both Polio and Guinea Worm wiped from the face of the planet.

The goods news is that with every disease we eradicate we get better at it. With every disease we eradicate more resources and funds are freed up for investment in the eradication of others. Every 26 days the United States saves the total amount it contributed to smallpox eradication because it does not have to vaccinate or treat the disease. The value of eradication is exponential.

This article enumerates the immeasurable benefits of disease eradication, and the reasons the Body of Christ should take up the cause with the zeal of the missionaries and abolitionists of old. Christians have always been at the forefront of furthering the mission of Christ in the world, to destroy the works of the devil. We are entering a new era. Read all about it...