Satan was the first terrorist. Satan knew that Adam was totally dependent upon God for his existence, and that he would perish if he could be turned from his Creator. So he caused Adam to rebel against God and then exploited his natural weakness and mortality to imprison him and his descendants in the chains of sin. Death is part of God’s law, the inescapable consequence of rejecting the Source of life, but Satan co-opted this divine judgment and used it for his own purposes. Satan hijacked the law of God and used it as a weapon against humanity. He leveraged the universal reality of death to stir up compulsive guilt, unbelief, lust and fear, thus bringing mankind under demonic bondage. Satan pointed a gun at man’s head and said, “The only way to save your life is by submitting to me.”
Satan uses human mortality and the threat of death like a whip to drive us into sin. The self preservation instinct is so strong that ordinarily people will steal, kill, lie, horde wealth, oppress the innocent, fight wars of aggression and sell their bodies and souls to evil—all in a vain attempt to save themselves from oblivion.
But Jesus came to “proclaim freedom for the prisoners and . . . to release the oppressed” (Luke 4:18). When the disciples returned from a successful mission of raising the dead, healing the sick and casting out demons, they said, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.” And Jesus exulted, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. I have given you authority . . . to overcome all the power of the enemy” (Luke 10:17-20). The ministry of Jesus demonstrated that the enemy’s realm was crumbling. The kingdom of life was invading the kingdom of death.
On Calvary, Jesus faced Satan in a battle to the death and was victorious. When the powers of evil tried to conquer and rule Jesus, he would not give in to them. Instead of persecution, Jesus could have received accolades from the scribes and Pharisees by submitting to their religious interpretations. He could have appeased the statist system of Pontius Pilate and gained worldly power by agreeing that the world belongs to Caesar. Jesus could have saved himself from dying on the cross--but only by bowing to Satan’s authority. Instead, he took our struggle upon himself. He asserted God’s claim over the earth. He stood up to the powers of this age, rejecting their tyranny, going on the offensive against them until (ironically) he defeated them by letting them killed him.
When Jesus was crucified, it appeared at first that the old realm had triumphed, that God’s attempt to re-establish his reign on earth through his Son had been frustrated, that evil had overcome good. Even the disciples gave way to despair (Luke 24:20,21). But in dying to the powers, Jesus condemned them. His death became a noose around their necks, the decisive maneuver in negating and disarming them. The secret victory of God was openly revealed on Sunday morning. For when Jesus rose from the dead, he was forever carried beyond the reach of those powers, raised to live with God in triumph over them. The risen Son of God defeated death. God had the last word after all. It was in view of this life-long battle, culminating in death and resurrection, that Jesus proclaimed, “All authority [over death and the devil] has been given to me” (Matt. 28:18).
If the world was like a frontier town tyrannized by outlaws, Jesus was the gun-slinging marshal who suddenly appears for a showdown and defeats the bad guys at high noon. He proclaimed, “Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out” (John 12:31). He gave people courage to revolt against the death-dominated status quo: “Take heart! I have overcome the world!” (John 16:33). And he called his disciples to follow him in the liberation movement he had created. After explaining the necessity of his death and resurrection, he urged, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:22). We are called to participate in Christ's victory over death. We belong to the risen Lord who already stands on the other side of the cross. Because we share in his risen life, our victory is certain, our future is absolutely secure.
