From the Daily Lectionary for Wednesday in the Twentieth Week after Pentecost
Luke 10:17-24
The seventy returned with joy, saying, “Lord, in your name even the demons submit to us!” He said to them, “I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning. See, I have given you authority to tread on snakes and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing will hurt you. Nevertheless, do not rejoice at this, that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”
At that same hour Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.”
Then turning to the disciples, Jesus said to them privately, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it.”
We don’t talk about Satan that much in Episcopal circles. It would sound too much like the Pentecostals. But Jesus does. Much of our presumptions of Satan come from medieval depictions: a grotesque representation of predatory evil roaming the world; the master of hell, ruler of demons. Dante speaks of Satan as synonymous with Lucifer, which ironically means, “the light bearer.” John Milton, centuries later, uses the name and figure as an archetype of humankind’s fall from grace. Lucifer is the one who declares, “I will not serve!” it is Milton, not scripture, that names the serpent in the Garden of Eden Satan.
In Hebrew scripture Satan is the “accuser,” a representation of conscience, who calls out the iniquities of the people of Israel. One remembers the figure of Satan in the Book of Job. He is a member of God’s heavenly court, and as such, strikes a bargain with God to test the faith of Job, the most righteous of God’s people. By the time of New Testament literature, the figure of Satan has evolved. After the brutal occupation of Israel by the Assyrian despot Antiochus Epiphanes in the second century B.C.E., Satan comes to represent imperial power and its hegemony and violence. The Apocalyptic literature of the age further depicts Satan as the cosmic force of evil, that, according to prophecy, will be vanquished by God and God’s armies of good and justice.
Here in Luke, the seventy apostles have returned from their ministry and are rejoicing in their success. They seem surprised by it. They have followed through with the practice of Jesus’ teaching. They have fed the poor; they have welcomed the outcast; they have shared their wealth; they have forgiven debts. Jesus’ response is perhaps startling to us: “I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning.” He is attributing cosmic significance to the ministry of the seventy. Clearly this is an allusion to the empire, the oppressive system under which Israel suffers. It is a harkening to Mary’s song in the prologue: “He has pulled down princes from their thrones, and raised high the abused.” Mary’s prophecy is emerging in real time; the revolution of love has begun.
The bottom line is this: We, the proverbial seventy, have been given authority over the evils of our world. Our acts of love will subvert corrupted power and the shame and abuse it engenders. We don’t leave the world in the hands of fate; we are the hands of fate, anointed, literally, to bear God’s love and justice to a world besieged by an unjust, self-interested system that is, shall we say, Satanic.
The process of ministry teems with both failure and success, but it bends towards justice. We have seen what the power of the seventy can do… the civil rights movement is but one example, a moment when Satan fell like a flash of lightning. Perhaps persistence is the word for the day in which we live. Ours is the daily grind… Its cosmic significance belongs to God.
A Prayer for Christians in their Vocation (BCP p. 256)
Everlasting God, by whose Spirit the whole body of your faithful people is governed and sanctified: Receive our prayers for all members of your holy Church, that in their vocation and ministry they may truly and devoutly serve you with gladness and singleness of heart; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
