Board index ‹ Satan

[4-runner]

Hi christians! What is the range of your beliefs regarding the nature of Satan? Anyone believe Satan is embodied walking the earth? Symbolic/ metaphorical? Somewhere in between? What is the source and rationale for your beliefs, and how does it impact your daily living? Thanks- you guys rule

[jimwalton]

He is a real spirit being. We don't know where he came from or how he got to be the way he is, except that he was created good and somewhere along the way turned against God. We don't know what sort of spirit being he is.

He's not embodied, walking the Earth, but he does operate on the Earth as a tempter and deceiver. He is alive and dangerous.

He is real, not symbolic or metaphorical.

> What is the source and rationale for your beliefs

The Bible.

> how does it impact your daily living?

Not much. Satan can only be at one place at any given time. He is not omniscient, either. Certainly we always have to be alert to temptation or deceit.

[Dark Lion]

Well said.

[Righteous One]

> We [know that] he was created good and somewhere along the way turned against God.

How do you know that?

[jimwalton]

In the Genesis 1 account, everything that God made was pronounced good. And, knowing God, it is contrary to His nature to create anything bad or evil. I infer this from James 1.17 and Romans 8.28, as well as from Genesis 1. That would assert that Satan was created good and somehow and in some way turned against God, similar to what we read in Jude (1).6 how some angels abandoned their positions and their proper dwelling.