Where does darkness, the silent void that is filled with sticky black wickedness and pungent green evil, come from? Why do monsters lurk in the shadows? How did terror begin to own the night? And since it is October, the month of haunting, I think this is a perfect subject to explore.

Pastoring a large church for over 30 years, I have witnessed my fair share of monstrous actions perpetrated by some very evil people. And yes, some people are just plain evil, the book of Proverbs attests to it. I have counseled stone-cold murderers and Peeping-Tom’s, surly drunks and domestic abusers, thieves, werewolf wannabes, and criminals with baseball bats who smashed up truck windows at a new car lot. I have even been asked to visit creepy houses to cast out oppressive spirits that go bump in the night. Seeing such mysterious darkness firsthand has always caused me to wonder — where does this evil come from and how does it work?

WHERE EVIL BEGAN

The Holy Scriptures tell us that “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” As the only infinite and eternal being, God was, and is, by default, master over all. And out of his benevolent love, he created a world teeming with marvelous creatures, both visible and invisible. And all that he made he called good. Some of these creatures were simple single-cell amoebas, while others were grand in beauty and scale. One of the most magnificent of them all was an archangel named Lucifer, the “shining-one” or “light bearer”.

Lucifer was originally meant to serve in the direct presence of God, to do his Lord’s bidding and worship his majesty: 

You were in Eden,
the garden of God;
every precious stone adorned you:
carnelian, chrysolite and emerald,
topaz, onyx and jasper,
lapis lazuli, turquoise and beryl.
Your settings and mountings were made of gold;
on the day you were created they were prepared.
You were anointed as a guardian cherub,
for so I ordained you.
You were on the holy mount of God;
you walked among the fiery stones. (Ezekiel 28:13-14)

But something happened, Lucifer got a glimpse of his own beauty and fell in love with himself. Narcissism began here in its putrid self-obsessed form:

You were blameless in your ways
from the day you were created
till wickedness was found in you.
Your heart became proud
on account of your beauty,
and you corrupted your wisdom
because of your splendor.
So I threw you to the earth; (Ezekiel 28:15,17)

The punishment for pride was banishment from heaven and the presence of the Holy God. Being thrown down to earth embittered Lucifer’s heart and twisted his mind. He was furious, and from that moment on he was hell-bent on leading a rebellion against God, he wanted complete dominion over all. Listen to the fury of his envy:

You said in your heart,
“I will ascend to the heavens;
I will raise my throne
above the stars of God;
I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly,
on the utmost heights of Mount Zaphon.
I will ascend above the tops of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.” (Isaiah 14:13-14)

Hatred hardened like a black quartz stone in the fallen angel’s heart. A red-toothed, sharp-clawed, roaring lion arose, looking to devour. Envy became him, hence the name Satan — the adversary. This is where evil began. 

A TWISTED ANGEL

Isaiah declares that all of Lucifer’s “pomp, has been brought down to the grave.” Still armed with his natural beauty and brilliance, Satan has become the most menacing celestial force ever to sneak around in the dark.  Jude 1:9 says, “​​But even the archangel Michael, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, did not himself dare to condemn him.” But the power of the Devil was no match for the omnipotent God; so instead of directly assaulting the unassailable, he set his sights on attacking more vulnerable prey: The apple of God’s eye — weak humanity. 

Once he arrived on earth, it took him no time to strike. Like the coiled snake that he was, he slithered into the Garden using clever and tasty lies to entrap Adam and Eve in his spell. By getting the naive couple to sin, Satan stole the title deed to Eden giving him mastery over the whole earth. 1 John 5:19 is very clear, “We know that we are children of God and that the world around us is under the control of the evil one.” And now that he has control, he does not want to let it go.

SATAN LOVES CONTROL

The Prince of Darkness lives and roams to and fro throughout the earth, enormous power he wields, and he surely knows how to use it. That is why Ephesians 6:11-12 says: “Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”  Satan is scheming with his demonic legions to stay sitting on earth’s throne. And to keep his power he must control the hearts and minds of man.

And by control, I am talking about how Satan strongarms people to accept his stolen authority and stay in submission to his rule. 

He has two main strategies to keep control: One is by applying external pressure on the “people who are dead in their sins.” These blind stooges naturally, “follow the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air” (Ephesians 2:2).  And the other method of control is by tapping into the internal desires of humanity where Satan feeds into the natural brokenness of people who are “deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. Living in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another” (Titus 3:3).

In both of the strategies for gaining control, Satan uses fear to compel behavior. “Top-down” external control uses the fear of punishment to keep people submissive to his rule. As Hebrews 2:14-15 says, “Since the children have flesh and blood, Jesus shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil — and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” The Devil’s method to keep people in line, obedient and dumb, is very simple, he threatens them. “Do what I say or else!” And the more arbitrary the rules the more control he maintains. 

A perfect example of how external control takes place is found in the book Invitation to a Beheading by Vladimir Nabokov. It is the story of a man awaiting his execution, but he is never told when it will occur. As one commentary of this book says, “The principle characteristic of this world is its arbitrariness. The prisoner is never allowed to know what is true and what is not because the goal is to keep him in a constant state of confusion. It is not the actual physical pain and torture of a totalitarian regime that rules him, but the nightmarish quality of living in an atmosphere of perpetual dread.” Dread is Satan’s playground!

So to ramp up the dread, Satan continually lies and stokes the fires of fear through threat, exaggeration, and terror. His goal is to always keep people guessing — never letting them be sure of the ground they are standing on. The more he can scare you the more you will submit. That is why horror works. It is exaggerated fear, and the more threatening and mysterious the monster hiding under the bed, the bigger the boogie man crouching behind the door, the more dread is produced, and dread makes people submissive. Hollywood gets this and Satan milks it: Show a little girl on the screen with a spinning head vomiting out expletives in a low demonic tone and you have people running in fear dreading the dark unknown. Satan loves having you imagine the worst because it gives him more control.

When it comes to his strategy of internal control, Satan uses something much more subtle but just as deadly — it is the fear of missing out (aka FOMO), and what a powerful tool. If you can convince people that God’s laws are oppressive and that being a self-controlled noble human being made in the image of God is boring, you will have no problem getting the average person to bite into the forbidden apple. “Did God really say?” Evil is at its deadliest when it looks the most appealing. The Devil’s delicious false promises are packaged in such wonderful shapes and sizes: Turkish Delight offered by a White Queen. Sweet candy and lollypops are sold in the streets by a smiling carnival clown to entrap children in their mobile cages. And the advertising maxim that never grows old, “Sex sells!”, because it does. When evil wears a suit and tie while promising the world, it does this in order to manipulate the world. Silly people take the bait because they foolishly believe that if they deny their passions they will be missing the pleasure others seem to enjoy.

It’s all about control!

USING DARKNESS TO HIDE EVIL

Strategic fear is meant to enslave: Fear of punishment makes passive slaves who are willing to do as they are told to avoid pain; and fear of missing out makes for aggressive slaves, hungry fools who act instantly on impulses that are never satisfied. Satan uses these fears as a master puppeteer would pull the strings on a wooden marionette. Fear says ‘dance’, so we gladly pirouette.

But Satan has something he fears as well — it is the light. Light exposes his evil plans, it makes his tactics clear. Light shows him as the fraud that he actually is — a washed-up angel wearing torn robes of corrupted glory. If people saw him for who he is no one would want to buy his lies. So that is why he hides in the darkness. John is clear on this, “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.” 

Darkness is his domain and lies are his currency. That is why he thrives in the night. Colossians 1:13 even calls his realm “The Dominion of Darkness.” And those who are slaves to fear dwell with him. Paul explains our slavery in Ephesians 4 like this, “So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.” Those who live in the dark have hearts like Satan, hard as stone, forged in fear.

Paul continues his warning, “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible—and everything that is illuminated becomes a light.”

ESCAPING THE DARKNESS

So where does darkness come from? The conclusion is simple: from a petulant fallen angel who wants to hurt Almighty God out of spite. And to get back at him he uses you, controls you through fear, keeps you scared through his exaggerated threats of unseen shadow monsters lurking in the darkness of the night. The bigger the imagined monster, the thicker the dread. The thicker the dread, the more malleable you are.

So how do you fight it? How do you not let the darkness overwhelm you? Scripture gives us two simple commands:

1. Step Into the Light: “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you.” (James 4:7-8)
2. Turn to Truth: “The Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.” (2 Timothy 2:24-25)

Halloween is fun. Vampires, ghosts, goblins, and ghouls bring shivers up the spine. But remember, most of it is fabricated lies whispered by an evil angel who is scared of the light. The Bible tells us one day we will see Satan for what he truly is — a fake:

Instead, you will be brought down to the place of the dead,
down to its lowest depths.
Everyone there will stare at you and ask,
‘Can this be the one who shook the earth
and made the kingdoms of the world tremble?
Is this the one who destroyed the world
and made it into a wasteland?
Is this the king who demolished the world’s greatest cities
and had no mercy on his prisoners?’ (Isaiah 14:15-17)

So, stop letting him control you, and come to the true King, “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins!”