Reading the Bible in Context, part 5 - Patterns

One the most important ways you can tell what a passage means is to compare it to similar passages. Otherwise, we might reach the wrong conclusion about what we may be reading. In this post, we will look at a passage from John’s Gospel that is frequently quoted, but not without controversy. It is John 10:10.

The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill and to destroy. I have come that they may have Life, and that they may have it more abundantly.

When the first part of this verse is quoted, the assertion is made that the “thief” is Satan. However, there are many, especially among Christian academics, who say that the “thief” here is not Satan, but the Jewish leadership in Jesus’ day. After all, Jesus had just gotten through saying that “All who came before Me are thieves and robbers.” Jesus then asserts that a thief comes to steal, etc. There is certainly logic to this. Yet many still see the “thief” as Satan. Who is right?

Here is where studying patterns in other scriptures becomes very helpful. We will look at the OT prophets to see what we find. Isaiah had prophesied that during the Babylonian Captivity, a ruler named Cyrus would deliver the Jews from captivity. (Isaiah 45:1) While the prophet Daniel was in Babylon, the Persian king, Cyrus, overthrew the Babylonians and eventually ended the captivity.

When the captivity did not end right away, Daniel prayed and interceded to get an answer from God about the seeming delay of the return of the Jews to their homeland. While Daniel fasted and prayed, an angel came to Daniel. He informed Daniel that God had sent him with the answer when Daniel prayed, but “the prince of the Kingdom of Persia” withstood the angel for 21 days. (Daniel 10:13) No man, no king can resist an angel because angels are spirits. Who, then, is this “prince”? It is clearly an evil spirit. It is revealed to be the ‘power behind the throne’, so to speak. In other words, behind the human ruler of Persia, there was an evil spirit who actually ruled that kingdom.

So, there is a dual kingdom – a natural and a spiritual existing side-by-side. Daniel saw that this pagan kingdom was actually ruled by an evil spirit and not men. This idea is confirmed in other scriptures as well.


Ezekiel 38


“Son of man, say to the prince of Tyre, ‘Thus says the Lord God:

“Because your heart is lifted^] up,
And you say, ‘I am a god,
I sit in the seat of gods,
In the midst of the seas,’
Yet you are a man, and not a god,
Though you set your heart as the heart of a god …
You shall die the death of the uncircumcised
By the hand of aliens;
For I have spoken,” says the Lord God.’ ”

Notice that above it says that this prince of Tyre is a man who exalted himself and therefore will be judged. Below we have the “king” of Tyre who is not a man, but is Satan himself. He was the true ruler of Tyre.

 Moreover, the word of the Lord came to me, saying, “Son of man, take up a lamentation for the king of Tyre, and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord God:

“You were the seal of perfection,
Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.

 You were in Eden, the garden of God;
Every precious stone was your covering:
The sardius, topaz, and diamond,
Beryl, onyx, and jasper,
Sapphire, turquoise, and emerald with gold.
The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes
Was prepared for you on the day you were created.

You were the anointed cherub who covers;
I established you;
You were on the holy mountain of God;
You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones.
You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created,
Till iniquity was found in you.

By the abundance of your trading
You became filled with violence within,
And you sinned;
Therefore I cast you as a profane thing
Out of the mountain of God;
And I destroyed you, O covering cherub,
From the midst of the fiery stones.

Your heart was ^[b]lifted up because of your beauty;
You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor;
I cast you to the ground,
I laid you before kings,
That they might gaze at you.

You defiled your sanctuaries
By the multitude of your iniquities,
By the iniquity of your trading;
Therefore I brought fire from your midst;

It devoured you.

This king of Tyre is definitely Satan. He was in the garden of Eden. It was he who tempted Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. Much later, he ruled over Tyre. (Tyre is north of Israel so it seems that Satan wanted to be close by Israel to keep an eye on it.)

So, we see a simple truth here. Behind evil human rulers and kingdoms, there are Satan and his evil spirits motivating and manipulating them. God has pulled back the veil of the flesh to reveal the unseen realm where angels and demons exist. They have real influence in our world. 

Getting back to John 10:10, we can see the same pattern of evil human rulers (the Jewish leadership of Jesus’ day) and the devil, who is motivating and manipulating those rulers. So, having established a pattern of evil human ruler with evil spirits behind them, it makes sense that the “thief” is, in fact, Satan. Even though Jesus had just called those who came before Him “thieves and robbers”, He indicates who our true enemy is, the devil.

This theme continues throughout the New Testament. Paul almost always called evil spirits some kind of name that indicates that they wish to rule over men. He taught us that we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against “rulers and authorities”, indicating that demons and not men are our problem. So, the devil and his demons not only want to put us into bondage to sin, but they seek to rule over us and oppress us. We must learn to resist the devil and keep him from stealing, killing and destroying us.

“The Son of God was manifested to destroy the works of the devil.” 1 John 4