Doctrines of Demons, The Screwtape Letters — Part 3

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Doctrines of Demons, from C. S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters – Part 3

The following points are from notes I took while reading C. S. Lewis’ book, The Screwtape Letters. The book is a compilation of thirty-one letters from a demon named Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood. In it Screwtape gives instructions to his nephew on how to seduce and take down certain humans, mostly new Christians. I think it is an excellent manual on the doctrine of demons (but of course, it is according to one human’s perspective, C. S. Lewis; hence, we can’t be sure it is perfectly accurate).  The following points are ways the demons will draw a person over to the evil path.

  • They (the demons) make it their business to get us away from the eternal present and into the past or the future; both of which will cause us anxiety.
  • (p. 72) They say that if a human can’t be cured of church going, send him to other churches more lacking in faith and that are more party churches. The more lukewarm he is the better.
  • On gluttony. They desire that the belly dominate the whole life of the human.
  • In gluttony, they say that excess of food is less powerful than wanting (lusting after) certain tastes of food. They say that this is a good preparation for attacks on chastity.
  • They feed us the lie that “being in love” is the only ground for marriage and if lost the marriage will no longer be binding.
  • They will try to persuade a Christian to marry someone who will be difficult.
  • They may try to persuade a single human that chastity is unhealthy; and they will try to use unchastity to land a desirable marriage.
  • (p. 93) They will try to direct men to more desirable (sexual) woman.
  • They will prepare the human for sexual temptation by darkening his intellect (fill it with deceptions).
  • They will fill the human with ideas that “my time is my own.” And when anyone invades his time he is angered.
  • They fill men’s beliefs with false ideas that they “own” their bodies.
  • (p. 101) They are revulsed at the pleasures that God gives His own, especially young couples in love.
  • (p. 107) They want believers to treat Jesus only as a great man, but not someone who is divine. This will destroy their devotional life.
  • (p. 110) They will continue to haunt a good person until they find a chink in their armor—to create in them pride or bitterness or lust.
  • (p. 115) They want a Christian to be of a mind of “Christian and.” That is, to add something to their faith, like psychology, or faith healing, or vegetarianism, etc.
  • Instead of asking the question: “Is it righteous, or is it prudent?” they would rather we ask, “Is it in accordance with the general movement of our time?” As a result, they have a better chance to bend our thoughts to what they want for us.

Doctrines of Demons, from the Screwtape Letters — Part 2

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Doctrines of Demons, from C. S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters – Part 2

The following points are from notes I took while reading C. S. Lewis’ book, The Screwtape Letters. The book is a compilation of thirty-one letters from a demon named Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood. In it Screwtape gives instructions to his nephew on how to seduce and take down certain humans, mostly new Christians. I think it is an excellent manual on the doctrine of demons (but of course, it is according to one human’s perspective, C. S. Lewis; hence, we can’t be sure it is perfectly accurate).  The following points are ways the demons will draw a person over to the evil path.

  • (p 36) They know that it is during the low periods (more than the high periods) that we will grow.
  • They know that our prayers offered up in a state of dryness are those that most please God.
  • They realize that we learn to walk in the Lord when God takes His hands off us—and He is pleased even when we stumble. (But He will not let us be cast down, Ps 34:24).
  • (p 40) They know that the low periods in humans provide an excellent opportunity for sexual temptation.
  • They realize that humans are stronger when they read more (keep knowledge flowing).
  • (p 49) They say consisting scoffers are progressing toward Satan. They are glad when we do this.
  • As for humor, they encourage virtue as funny and ridiculous.
  • (p 53) They will introduce a change of direction in the young believer—but they do not want him to suspect where he is headed—downhill!
  • They will encourage him to dislike any religious duties and prayers.
  • They know that pleasure temptations cut off real happiness.
  • They seek to have him waste his time doing menial things for long periods of time: TV watching, etc. They want him to avoid healthy and outgoing activities.
  • They want him not to do what he likes to do.
  • They want to steal away a person’s best years.
  • They know that the best thing they can do is separate the human from the enemy (God).
  • (p 57) They recognize when humans repent and are renewed, and they are discouraged by it.
  • They know that there are times when they can’t get through—due to the fact that God is directly present with them.
  • (p 58) They count it a defeat when the human reads books they enjoy and does things they enjoy, like nature walks, etc.
  • They count it a defeat when the human abandons his self-will.
  • They will try to eradicate from a person his personal hobbies—all things he enjoys, because they will be a source of innocence and humility and self-forgetfulness. They will endeavor to force upon them more “important things”, more “righteous things,” things that if not accomplished will be a great source of guilt and an entrance for sin.
  • They are in favor of getting the human to not apply things that they read—to keep it out of his will. They are in favor of keeping them from developing habits.
  • (p 62) They hate it when we stop thinking of our virtues—thinking of how good we are becoming. They want us to think of how humble we are, how wise we are, so that we become proud. They love to see us become proud.
  • They want us to endlessly think upon ourselves.
  • They know that God wants us to think of all humans as glorious and excellent, so they try to remove this truth from us. But they may try to get us to think too much of ourselves and putting ourselves above others.
  • They want us to continually think of our sins—how bad we are, instead of thinking of the Saviors love and forgiveness.
  • (p. 67) They want us to be tortured by fears.
  • They know that God wants us to live in eternity or in the present. For in our meditation with God in the present, time touches eternity and God brings us in union with Him.

Doctrines of Demons, from The Screwtape Letters

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Doctrines of Demons, from C. S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters

The following points are from notes I took while reading C. S. Lewis’ book, The Screwtape Letters. The book is a compilation of thirty-one letters from a demon named Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood. In it Screwtape gives instructions to his nephew on how to seduce and take down certain humans, mostly new Christians. I think it is an excellent manual on the doctrine of demons (but of course, it is according to one human’s perspective, C. S. Lewis; hence, we can’t be sure it is perfectly accurate).  The following points, in three parts, are ways the demons will draw a person over to the evil path.

  • They (the demons) want us to stay clear of arguments (or debates) because they will awaken reason; they prefer jargon.
  • They prefer we read about and speak of experiences over teaching—that is, the demons will try to draw a person into stories rather than sound teaching in order to convince a person to go the wrong way.
  • They prefer casual talking over science.
  • (p 11) They want to keep our mind hazy, not to have a clear mind, esp. for the new converts.
  • They want to keep us disappointed in ourselves.
  • They want us to depend on our emotions, so we will be easier to tempt.
  • They want us to be wondering what other people in our church are like, and what they do secretly.
  • They want us to think of ourselves as very religious and humble, better than most.
  • They will try to produce in people mutual annoyances.
  • (p 16) They want us to pray not about bodily pain but over sins—so to remind us of our sins.
  • They work on things that irritate—tone of voice, twitches, things that the other dislikes.
  • (p 20) They want to keep us from serious prayer.
  • They would rather we pray our childhood, parrot-like prayers.
  • They would rather we not pray directly to God but to our soul to have a “spirit of love.”
  • Instead of true prayer, they would rather we try to produce in ourselves certain desired feelings—that we try to feel forgiven.
  • Instead of praying to God in heaven, they would rather we pray to a picture of Christ or to a cross.
  • (p 24) The goal for them is to secure the soul of humans to the devil.
  • Their business is to undermine faith and to prevent the formation of virtues.
  • Their refreshment is to produce any fear and suffering, but in the end it must also bring their soul to the devil.
  • They may reason that it is better (for the dark side) for humans to die in costly nursing homes that to die in wars.
  • (p 28) They want us to be filled with uncertainty and contradictory pictures of the future.
  • They want our prayers to be drawn away from the Father and unto ourselves.
  • They want our mind to go toward itself and to insults, or to a woman’s body (to lust).
  • (p 32) Their policy for now is to conceal themselves.
  • They say that they are helped when they are perceived as comic figures.
  • They want religious meetings, pamphlets, movements, causes, to matter more for us than our prayers.

Improve Your Prayer Time

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For some of us, or perhaps most of us, our place of prayer doesn’t seem so appealing. In fact, we don’t seem drawn to prayer at all. Most of the time, we would rather sit in front of the TV, or play a game, or eat food, anything but pray. But we really shouldn’t be surprised at this, if we haven’t had many experiences with God, and if we haven’t worked on making our prayer times better. To have quality prayer times we really need to work at it!

Here are three things we can work at that will enhance our prayer times:

1. Give thanks. When we give thanks to God we are surrendering ourselves to Him in acknowledgement that He is Lord and God, and that He has made us and has made all things (Ps. 100). Likewise, thanksgiving is simply our recognition and gratefulness for all the things that God has done for us and has given us.

Effective prayer—that is, prayer in the Spirit—is always prayer with thanksgiving. As R. A. Torrey has said, “Thanksgiving is one of the inevitable results of being filled with the Holy Spirit.”

I have found that when I am down and in need of God’s touch, when I go to God in prayer, one of the first things God does for me is to make me thankful. He gives me desires to please Him and to sing songs of thanksgiving. Why? Because He knows that thankfulness is required for true prayer (Phil. 4:6), and He wants me to pray. Thus, the Holy Spirit helps me to pray by making me thankful.

Now if you want to work on your attitude of thanksgiving you must also work on bringing the Holy Spirit more into your life.   The two go together. I would say, pray every day to be filled with the Holy Spirit; but also try every moment to be thankful. And you will soon begin to experience more of the beauty of the inner room.

2. Meditate on the Word. Meditating on the Word makes us more aware of God’s presence and tunes us into His thoughts. Says Pierson, “To meditate on God’s words introduces us to the secret chambers of God’s thoughts, and imparts insight into God’s character.”

The more we meditate on the Word the more we see the beauty of Jesus: how wonderful He is, how desirable, how sweet. In Psalms 119:103 David declared, “How sweet are Your words to my taste, sweeter that honey to my mouth!” Again in Psalms 119:14 David said, “I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies, as much as in all riches.” In Jeremiah 15:16 (a favorite of mine) Jeremiah says, “Your words were found, and I ate them, and Your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart.”

By our meditation, all our surroundings become beautiful; and we find ourselves incessantly smiling—even in difficult times. Accordingly, by our constant meditation, our inner room of prayer becomes broadened and more beautiful. Everywhere we go we seem to be always full of His peace and joy—because, you see, we are always dwelling with Him in that beautiful inner room.

 3. Practice prayer. The beauty of the inner room is most experienced by those who take the time to get to know God by consistent, purposeful prayer. To those He surrounds by His presence, and is with them throughout the day wherever they go. And generally, His presence is fuller and sweeter during those times when the Word is also meditated on.

Also, according to Charles Finney, when a Christian obediently struggles and agonizes in prayer over a lost soul or over any burden God puts on him to pray over, he will find in God, after the burden is lifted, “the sweetest and most heavenly affections…” Hence, God rewards the obedient heart by the blessings of His own sweet presence (Heb. 11:6; Jn. 14:21, 23).

I have found that when prayer is practiced outside, during a walk or while sitting in a favorite spot, the rewards of prayer seem greater. In my next blog I will give you four benefits of such prayer.