Satan’s Playbook: Attack God’s Goodness

T.J. Gentry, Ph.D., D.Min. | October 6, 2024

Shifting Tactics, Same Strategy

Every believer can and should know about Satan’s schemes—his strategy—and that strategy is as old as the fall of our first parents in the Garden of Eden. As Paul said, “we are not ignorant of his schemes” (2 Cor. 2:11b CSB). Though Satan’s tactics shift when applying his strategy from generation to generation, from the beginning we see a consistent and discernible approach: attack God’s Word, God’s goodness, God’s image, and God’s Redeemer.

In the first article in this series, we looked at Genesis 3:1-3, and saw how Satan attacks God’s Word by questioning its reliability and authority. Now, we’re ready to look at what I consider Satan’s most wicked scheme, his indirect attack on God’s goodness by implying that God’s commands are obstacles to true happiness and freedom.

Satan knows that if he cannot draw us into believing his lies about the reliability and authority of God’s Word directly, then he must confuse and mislead us about God’s goodness. If Satan succeeds in this way, he achieves a two-for-one win, as doubts about God’s goodness inevitably either lead to or flow from doubts about the reliability and authority of God’s Word.

Is God Good?

How does Satan do this? In a manner that is wickedly simple, he seeks to raise suspicion about God’s goodness in claiming to know what is best for us, while also leading us to think that disobedience is better than obedience. Those who follow Satan along this path are, like Satan, using their God-given gift of freedom to choose rebellion and self-exaltation, thereby bringing about self-destruction and separation from God.[1]

Returning to the record of Satan’s conversation with Eve in Genesis 3, we see that after he contradicts God’s warning of death upon eating the fruit of Eden’s forbidden tree, Satan turns his attack on God’s goodness. “In fact,” Satan says, “God knows that when you eat it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (3:5). Satan denies death and promises divinity.

What is Satan’s play here? Why say these things? Satan wants Eve to believe that God’s command is motivated by divine insecurity and a selfish desire to keep humanity at His feet and never at His side. Surely a good God would never do such a tyrannical thing as make a rule limiting freedom. God must be threatened by His image bearers. They should not—must not—gain the power of knowledge, lest they determine to be gods rather than serve God. Satan wants Adam and Eve to listen to him, not God; to serve his ends, not God’s.

Here’s the sinister irony of these words from Satan: they were true in what they promised without telling the rest of the truth about the consequences to follow. After their fall into sin is revealed and God’s judgments are declared, God said that “the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3:22). However, God’s statement is not a celebration of the proper use of human freedom but a lament over its rebellious misuse. Listening to Satan immediately brought spiritual death and set in motion the spread of physical death to all creation.

Through his use of twisted logic and perverse emotional appeal, Satan magnifies a desire for what God forbids while masking the destructive outcome of disobedience. He does all of this with one goal in mind – Satan does not want us to realize that the Word of God reveals the goodness of God and that the goodness of God is revealed in His reliable and authoritative Word. Satan knows that if we question God’s essential goodness, then we are more susceptible to disregard His Word.

Such was Satan’s strategy with Adam and Eve in Genesis 3:5, as he moved from his direct attack on God’s Word to a more subtle attack on God’s goodness.

Screwtape Speaks Again

As with the first article in our series, I ask you again to consider an imagined conversation between C. S. Lewis’s Screwtape and Wormwood. Doing so can aid our understanding of Satan’s strategy of attacking God’s goodness.[2]

My dear Wormwood,

Your last report shows promise. Indeed, you are wise to continually attack the Enemy’s odious though enduring Word. Direct frontal attacks will work in this regard with many we seek to capture for our Father Below, especially if doubt grows to unbelief and the Enemy’s authoritative and reliable Word is relegated to insignificance in your patient’s mind.

However, there is an advanced strategy that I think you are ready to employ, and you will never be more like our Dark Lord than when you use this strategy. My dear nephew, closely attend to what I am about to tell you: attack the reality of our Enemy’s goodness. Though we know all about that twisted combination of goodness and (Dare I say it?) sovereignty that marks our Enemy’s nauseating love, such truth is difficult for His disgusting image bearers to grasp, especially in their early days of following Him. Seize the moment and do all you can now to mislead your patient regarding that nasty gift of freedom he possesses. Do your best to confuse his true freedom with his innate impulse for autonomy.

Though your patient may be very clear about the commands our Enemy gives, your opportunity comes by suggesting that our Enemy’s commands are selfish and limiting. Once your patient seriously entertains such thoughts, he’s not far from questioning the undeniable goodness of our Enemy. He doesn’t yet know what we know all too well, that the Enemy’s goodness is revealed in His Word, and His Word rests upon His goodness.

You must lay the trap carefully, however. Half-truths are your best words, as you must never let slip that the consequences of rebelling are not freedom but bondage. We know that freedom is not autonomy, but your patient doesn’t. Not yet. Do all you can to see that that never happens. If it does, your patient will see that his so-called God really is good…and that won’t be good for you or any in our dark realm.

Your affectionate uncle,

Screwtape

About the Author

Dr. Thomas J. Gentry (aka., TJ Gentry) serves as the pastor of First Christian Church of West Frankfort, Illinois, the Assistant Vice President of Publishing and Communications, and the Assistant Editor of Bellator Christi Ministries. He formerly served as the Executive Editor of MoralApologetics.com. Dr. Gentry is a world-class scholar holding 5 doctorate degrees and 6 masters degrees. Additionally, he is a prolific writer as he has published 7 books including Pulpit Apologist, Absent from the Body, Present with the Lord, and You Shall Be My Witnesses: Reflections on Sharing the Gospel. Be on the lookout for two additional books that he will soon publish. In addition to his impressive resume, Dr. Gentry proudly served his country as an officer in the United States Army and serves as a martial arts instructor.

Notes

[1] See Isa. 14:12-15 and Ezek. 28:11-19 for descriptions generally accepted as describing the circumstances of Satan’s fall. For more on this topic, listen to Dr. Brian Chilton’s Bellator Christi Podcast Season 8, Episode 5: Satan, Demons, Influence, and Fall, available at https://bellatorchristi.com/2024/10/03/s8e5-satan-demons-influence-and-fall/.

[2] For those unfamiliar with Lewis’s classic work on spiritual warfare, The Screwtape Letters, Screwtape is a senior demon given charge of his nephew Wormwood, a junior demon. Wormwood’s task is to corrupt a Christian, and Screwtape offers his counsel along the way.