The Devil’s Hierarchy of Temptation. Remember to take everything with a Grain of salt, and always think for yourself.
Christianity is becoming more popular over time. Not “Spartan Christianity”. Primarily certain genres of Christianity like the “Health-Wealth Gospel”, which put the primary focus on the individual instead of on God. Or the emotionalism gospel, which again places the focus on oneself and one’s emotions. One problem with these types of gospel is that they all seem to emphasize ease of living and mental ease or peace of mind. That’s not what we are told in the Bible.
Jesus said he would not bring peace but a sword, and that he would bring division and set relatives against each other. He said we would have to take up our cross and follow him. That does not reflect the ease taught in these popular “gospels”.
We should be tempted constantly.
If we are not tempted, we are not valuable.
And these temptations do not give us mental ease or a constant emotional high.
I have an analogy that I think about with regards to how the devil tempts us. The devil has a hit list where he keeps the most valuable Christians. These are top priority targets. People who are the most valuable to God are the targets for the devil.
Think about how Jesus said to Peter that Satan had asked for him, that he might sift him as wheat. We know Peter, he was a high value target so the devil was willing to see to it personally that he was harvested. Satan lost that target. So there are some targets who are so high priority that the devil himself will tempt them. The prime example, of course, is Christ when the devil directly tempts Him in the wilderness. That’s another time that Satan lost.
I think of temptation in three tiers, or levels:
1) Ways the Devil Himself Tempts us (Active)
2) Ways Low rank or high rank Demons tempt us (Active)
3) Ways we tempt ourselves by our own desire (Passive)
Think of these levels as being normally distributed on a bell curve: most people fall in an around the average. That’s all the bell curve means, that most people are around the normal. In this we are going to say that half of the population falls into the first level.
-This simply means 60% of people are tempted by their own desires (Level 3).
-We will say 39.9% are tempted by various demons (Level 2).
-Only 0.1% of all Christians are so valuable that they make up the Devil’s hit list. These are people who are tempted by Satan himself (Level 1).
People can fall into multiple tiers at the same time. They can be tempted by demons in some cases, and then tempted by their own desires in relation to other sins. No one has to be stuck in one level completely.
Before we jump into the details, remember that this is pure speculation, and the way that I personally think of temptation.
3- We will start with the lowest tier. James 1:13-15 tells us that God doesn’t tempt us, but rather we are drawn by our own desires and enticed. Desire gets pregnant and gives birth to sin, which gives birth to death.
Imagine that, we literally tempt ourselves!
The devil loves this because he doesn’t have to waste time tempting us, nor do we waste the time of his demons. We do all the work for him.
When we place ourselves in situations where know that there will be temptation, we are tempting ourselves. When we crave what is wrong, we tempt ourselves.
-We are trying to stop drinking, but we go to a party where we know there will be alcohol. We convince ourselves that we are just there to ‘hang out’.
–We are trying to stay sexually pure, but we hang out alone with our boyfriend/girlfriend.
-We try to stop using profanity, but we hang out with ‘friends’ who have rainbow vocabularies.
These are just examples of how we do the heavy lifting for the devil by amping up the likelihood of our failure. We desire evil, put ourselves in proximity to that evil, then the desire gets pregnant and eventually we dive headfirst into the behavior we were trying to avoid. This is temptation level 3.
This is passive temptation.
2 – Level 2 is where demons tempt us. This is the thesis of Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis. That book is one of the greatest satire works ever written. Screwtape is a high level demon who has many subordinate demons assigned particular targets. The book consists of Screwtape writing letters to one low level demon giving him advice on how to tempt properly.
The demon will give his target all kinds of opportunities to do what is wrong by attacking the weakest points of his nature. He tries to get him to be sexually active. He tries to get him to focus on politics instead of religion. He tries to get him to mistake his lust for love. Screwtape continues to give pointers and strategies, all of which reflect how we ourselves are tempted. Get the book to see how it ends.
Targets who are slightly valuable are targeted by demons who actively try to make them stumble and lose the faith. The demons present them with multiple opportunities for failure, and cater temptations to the weaknesses of their assigned targets. These Christians usually have to be hit in a weak area, or tempted while mentally weak in order for the temptation to be most effective. This is Level 2.
This is active temptation
1 – The top tier is where Satan himself tempts someone. “The Devil has got me!”. We overuse this statement. We attribute every temptation to the devil, as if we are important enough to warrant his full focus. The Bible doesn’t indicate that the Devil is omnipresent, therefore he can’t be multiple places at the same time. If he was omnipresent then why have the demons? Why would you need an army if you can do all the tempting yourself?
The Devil has limited time on earth, and he is not going to waste it on some low level target. The Devil spends his time on the best of the best, like Christ, Peter or Paul for example.
So when we say that the Devil is tempting us, we are probably giving ourselves way too much credit.
Take a good look and the mirror and ask yourself if you are the kind of Christian that would require the full focus of the devil. Odds are that you are not one of the 0.1%
I hear Some Christians brag about not being tempted or the ease of the Christian life.
Really?
You are never tempted?
Anyone who thinks this should consider the fact that they are not worth anything to the kingdom of God. In fact, they are worth so little that neither nor the devil nor his low level demons waste time on this individual. The devil already knows that he already has this person, even if they think they are faithful. These are the “Pew Warmers” who like to clock in and clock out of their Christian walk once a week or so. Those targets do not matter. Do not be a pew warmer.
Also, this Christian is simply a liar attempting to make himself look righteous. These people are also known as modern day Pharisees.
If you find yourself in epic struggle and temptation that does not come from your own desires, you should be glad, you are on the radar of the devil. James tells us to rejoice because of trials and temptations, because the testing of our faith brings forth patience (James 1:2-4). Be glad in temptation. Remember that you are not simply being tempted, you are being given the opportunity to train your patience for the purpose of reaching perfection. If you are not tempted, however, you should consider whether or not you really matter. Make sure you make the Devil’s Hit List.