The Devils Logic [Part 1 of 2]
Think for a second what it would be like if Satan were to tell the truth when he tempted people? Could you picture what that would look like? Imagine if Satan tried to tempt us honestly; it might go something like this:
SATAN: You should cheat on your wife with that good-looking girl in the office.
PERSON: I don’t think so. It’s wrong, and it would hurt my wife.
SATAN: Fair enough; you make a good point. But look, I’ve run a cost-benefit analysis for you. Here’s what I’ve come up with:
Benefits:
- A few moments of physical (if perhaps awkward) pleasure.
Costs:
- Disobedience to God.
- Erode your communion with God.
- Ruin, or possibly even end, your marriage.
- Humiliate your wife.
- Mess up your kids’ lives.
- Public humiliation and exposure.
- Might cost you your job.
- Might mess up your coworker’s life.
- Diseases?
- Unwanted pregnancy?
- Dishonor and disgrace on your church.
- Wreck your witness to others.
PERSON: Yeah, wow. Umm . . . no, thanks.
The Devils Logic [Part 2 of 2]
If I were making a list of benefits like the one Mike McKinley imagines, only this time using the devil’s actual logic, it might look more like this:
- Experience the excitement of new romance.
- Get the kind of satisfaction my wife isn’t willing to give or interested in giving anymore.
- Find someone who listens to me and actually understands.
- Relieve this stress and boredom.
- Feel attractive and desired.
- Feel loved.
Those are the lines we follow when we ponder affairs. We give an inch at a time, compromise after compromise, not in the explicit interest of disobeying God and dishonoring our marriage vows, but in the interest of fulfillment, beauty, and enlightenment. Sin makes an emotional kind of sense to us that defies biblical reason, and the devil is more than happy to help us with that too. After all, God forgives anything, right?