Publisher's Synopsis
I was shocked to read this statistic in a 2009 national Barna poll of American spiritual beliefs:
The majority of American Christians did not believe that Satan is a real being:
Four out of ten Christians (40%) strongly agreed that Satan "is not a living being but is a symbol of evil." An additional two out of ten Christians (19%) said they "agree somewhat" with that perspective. A minority of Christians indicated that they believe Satan is real: one-quarter (26%) disagreed strongly, and about one-tenth (9%) disagreed somewhat. The remaining 8% were not sure what they believed about the existence of Satan (Barna 2009).
I grew up on the mission field in a cultural context where the spirit world was more real than the physical world. My family's religion is baked in a fundamentalist protestant context, so all this supernatural stuff comes as natural to me as breathing. I know some friends and family who are openly declared atheist, hurt by church people, or frustrated by the disconnect between the ideas they were taught and their life experience. You may be in that camp yourself. If so, this book was written for you. Not just for you, but also for those confused by the many, many, beliefs about the supernatural that have integrated our modern Western Culture through the books, movies, and religious expressions that make up our lovely Western cultural melting pot. I also wrote this for my family and friends. For my children and their children, if they ever have any. It is intended to be a booklet, a sort of quick guide to my understanding as well as an inspiration to dive deeper and become more knowledgeable in the healthy kinds of ways.
The Supernatural exists or it does not. We do not get to choose. We must contend with reality as it actually is, not as we wish it is, as we imagine it is, or as we were taught it is. Only as it actually is. When we face reality as it actually is, instead of how we imagine or wish it to be, we will be more equipped to thrive in our actual universe instead of our imagined one.
Some of us would rather pretend it does not exist than talk seriously about it or learn how it works. There is a beautiful, impactful world that intersects our world in terrific and terrible ways, and it is useful to understand it.
Jesus spoke and taught more about Satan and Demons than any other person in the Bible. He never once, in all his teaching, suggested that Satan was not a real being. Quite the opposite. He called Satan "The Prince of this World" four times on the night he was betrayed. In one of those statements, he says:
"I will not say much more to you, for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold over me, but he comes so that the world may learn that I love the Father and do exactly what my Father has commanded me. 'Come now; let us leave.'" John 14:30-31 NIV
When we pretend Satan and his demon followers don't exist, we give him freedom to move about unnoticed and unchallenged. He loves this freedom and takes full advantage of it.
