The devil made him do it

Posted by Jesus on April 20, 2007

Well here’s a fun little article courtesy of your friends over at Fox News. Did the Devil, it asks, make Cho Seung-Hui kill all of those poor students at Virginia Tech on Monday? Yeah, seriously. It’s a real article from a real news outlet asking for real whether or not possession by the Prince of Darkness could have caused this horrible and unthinkable tragedy. Apparently the author of the article, one Lauren Green, is not a regular reader here. If she were she would know the Devil’s role in this already. Just to be sure, though, let’s take a look at the whole mess again.

From the article:

Was Cho Seung-Hui schizophrenic…psychotic…manic-depressive? Or were the shooting deaths of 32 people, including Cho himself, at Virginia Tech University part of the ongoing struggle between God and Satan…good against evil…lightness and darkness?

Could Cho have been possessed by the Devil? Could that explain the massacre at Virginia Tech?

Dr. Richard Roberts, president of Oral Roberts University, shouts an unequivocal Yes!

Based on what Ive seen in the news,” Roberts said in an interview, “theres no doubt that this act was Satanic in origin.”

Well, there you have it. A doctor shouts an “unequivocal yes” and Fox News jumps right in the middle of it. No need for discussion, no consideration as to my own take on the matter - heck, I wasn’t even consulted in preparation for this article. I guess in the end it’s just the fact that this was such a tragic and horrendous crime that makes you all want to paint the horrible, evil Satan into it. Who among you thinks that God is responsible though? How many believers look at what happened at Virginia Tech and wonder how or why Dad did that to thirty-two students?

More from the article:

He [Roberts] said that the evil thoughts in Satanic oppression can be fairly innocuous, or they can be harmful. And the oppression can be in the form of fear, depression or discouragement, he said, because Satan comes to kill, steal and destroy.

Roberts says well never know whether Cho was “possessed” or “oppressed,” because the killer has died. But he did leave a note blasting everyone around him, calling them rich kids, and deceitful charlatans, and then blaming them, saying you made me do this.

Roberts describes Cho’s writings as just words, and says words are one of Satan’s tools to bring about Mans destruction.

So let’s see if we understand this. The Devil can give people feelings which might or might not be harmful, right? How is that any different from, say, taxes? You don’t see a bunch of people running around blaming taxes for possessing this murderer, and I get millions of prayers a year from people whining about feeling discouraged by your tax code. In fact, more people complain to me every year about taxes than they do about satanic possessions. In terms of statistics, it’s far more likely that Cho was possessed by the IRS than by the Devil. Let’s see Fox report on that though…

But you know, words really are one of Satan’s tools, and they are used to bring about all sorts of really ugly things. Words are also one of Dad’s tools, which in His case are used to bring about light and plants and Earth and people and everything you know around you. Words themselves have no power though, rather it is the meaning in the words which gives them meaning. I have a hard time believing that we should just overlook Cho’s statement because they’re “just words.” Even if the Devil did make him do it, which he most certainly did not, the words left behind might be of some importance. Think about it - if you were a guy who spent your life studying and discussing possessions by the devil and his minions, and then someone who you believe was actually possessed for a time left a note describing his feelings and the cause for his actions while possessed, would that note not be great evidence to use in your continuing study of the field of satanic possession? Is calling the note “just words” based on the notion that the Devil made him write them any different from ignoring earthquake data just because the ground has since stopped shaking?

Even more from the article:

But the scenario of demonic possession fits neatly in the Christian paradigm. It says the whole of human existence is predicated on the narrative of mans fall from Grace in the Garden of Eden, after Satan’s temptation of Adam and Eve, and that wherever there is good, there is Satan trying to destroy it.

The battle of good vs. evil in all of us is not a simple choice between two forks in a road, but a cosmic war being waged over our souls.

And here we really get to the meat of the issue. I talked about this on Monday, but decided to keep it short and succinct given the weight of the tragedy unfolding. In your world there does exist good and evil, but it is not such a simple thing as saying that Dad only does good and Satan only does evil. To be sure, Satan does slink around and do everythign in his limited power to confuse people and spread deceit, but only because Dad lets him. In fact, Satan doesn’t do anything at all which hasn’t been written and predetermined by Dad. So while it’s somewhat safe to say of Cho “the devil made him do it,” a more apt phrase would be “God planned for this to happen when He created the universe, and Satan got involved with Cho at the execution stage and helped him pull it off according to God’s plan.” I know, it’s not the explanation you or anyone else probably wants to hear, but it’s a critical distinction.

Satan cannot really work alone, he hasn’t the power necessary to alter events which Dad has put into place. Everything perpetrated by the Prince of Lies is in actuality part of Dad’s plan, which I suppose to some might make him appear evil. The problem is that good and evil are constructs put in place to help you humans understand something which is honestly too complex for your little minds to grasp. In Heaven there are no such distinctions, there is only Dad’s Will. No matter what happens, Dad made it so. Doesn’t matter when, how, to what extend, how many dead, how many saved, who did it, or anything else. If Dad says it’s gonna happen it’s gonna happen, and it just is. No judgment, no good, no evil, it just is. Because we knew humans would have a tough time of this we created good an evil and taught you the basic rules of them both, and further introduced you to someone you would be allowed to get mad at when crazy or unexplainable things happen - Satan. He is the scapegoat for Dad’s wrath, a phantom bad guy to blame when humans can’t grasp the enormity of Dad’s message, and lately an excuse to ignore the lessons being handed down unto you.

Let’s be clear on one thing. Dad had all prior knowledge and all power to stop what happened at Virginia Tech. To believe otherwise is to deny Dad’s very existence. Satan, however, cannot possibly have even the power needed to influence the flight path of a mosquito unless Dad has already preapproved from the dawn of time the modification to the aforementioned flight plan. Satan is just an actor in the play that Dad wrote. He is the character who carries out the functions Dad deems necessary on earth when no angel can be called upon to complete the task. He is the jester who pushes a person to the brink of insanity and causes them to kill. He is the menace which invades your children in public schools, especially those which teach birth control and acceptance of homosexual lifestyles, and causes them to talk back and misbehave. He is the thing which goes bump in the night. He is not, however, the reason Cho killed those students on Monday. Dad had his own reasons for needing that done. Satan was just the messenger.

So as we move along I’d like to urge you all to quit blaming so much on Satan. He really is a bad dude, and he really and truly does want to cause you harm, but all of this belief that he does things which Dad wouldn’t agree with just belittles Dad’s complete and utter omnipotence. He only has as much power as Dad lets him have, and anything else you assign to him is just bunk that you make up. It distracts you from God and focuses too much of your attention on a tool and not on the Master. Lift your eyes, accept the fact that God had a reason for Virginia Tech, and let’s all move forward as a nation and try to figure out what God was trying to say.

Share and Enjoy: