I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven

 Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, "Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name."  And He said to them, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.  Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.  Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven."

In that hour Jesus rejoiced in the Spirit and said, "I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to babes.  Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight.  All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him."  Then He turned to His disciples and said privately, "Blessed are the eyes which see the things you see; for I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see what you see, and have not seen it, and to hear what you hear, and have not heard it."

- Luke 10:17-24

Yesterday we read that after beginning His journey toward Jerusalem, the Lord appointed seventy others also, and sent them two by two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was about to go.  Then He said to them, "The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few; therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.  Go your way; behold, I send you out as lambs among wolves.  Carry neither money bag, knapsack, nor sandals; and greet no one along the road.  But whatever house you enter, first say, 'Peace to this house.'  And if a son of peace is there, your peace will rest on it; if not, it will return to you.  And remain in the same house, eating and drinking such things as they give, for the laborer is worthy of his wages.  Do not go from house to house.  Whatever city you enter, and they receive you, eat such things as are set before you.  And heal the sick there, and say to them, 'The kingdom of God has come near to you.'  But whatever city you enter, and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, 'The very dust of your city which clings to us we wipe off against you.  Nevertheless know this, that the kingdom of God has come near you.'  But I say to you that it will be more tolerable in that Day for Sodom than for that city.  Woe to you, Chorazin!  Woe to you, Bethsaida!  For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago, sitting in sackcloth and ashes.  But it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you.  And you, Capernaum, who are exalted to heaven, will be brought down to Hades.  He who hears you hears Me, he who rejects you rejects Me, and he who rejects Me rejects Him who sent Me."  Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, "Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name."

 Then the seventy returned with joy, saying, "Lord, even the demons are subject to us in Your name."  And He said to them, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.  Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.  Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven."  My study bible says that Jesus' statement, I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven, describes an event that took place before the creation of the world.  It notes that five times Satan set his will against God (Isaiah 14:12-15; see also Revelation 12:7-12).  Taken in its entirety, Jesus' statement is a response to report of His power and authority at work through the seventy apostles.  Serpents and scorpions are representations of demons and devils.  Nevertheless, the seventy -- and we -- are to rejoice rather because our names are written in heaven.

In that hour Jesus rejoiced in the Spirit and said, "I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to babes.  Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight.  All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, and who the Father is except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him."  Then He turned to His disciples and said privately, "Blessed are the eyes which see the things you see; for I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see what you see, and have not seen it, and to hear what you hear, and have not heard it."  My study bible says that babes are people of simple faith and open hearts (see 18:15-17).  Jesus rejoices over the outworking of faith through His ministry, the fruits of faith in His disciples, and especially the presence of the Kingdom at work through them to whom God has revealed it.

Many people seek for power and for signs of the presence of the Kingdom at work.  But Jesus tells us that we should rather rejoice in that our names are written in heaven.  This is a powerful call to faith.  The Gospels are filled with signs and wonders of the presence and power of the Kingdom, as is all of Scripture.  But what about in our own lives?  What should we look for?  Perhaps the most important characteristic of Christ's ministry, especially in Luke, is healing.  What does healing mean?  And what does it look like when we are healed?  Quite often, healing is something we know from the inside, but people cannot necessarily tell from the outside, except perhaps those of great spiritual and psychological discernment.  Healing may come in the form of God's love which empowers us to overcome hidden wounds, personal difficulties with addictive behaviors or reliance upon abusive relationships, or destructive patterns of our own habit and thinking.  God's work in us may be to turn us around, to create true repentance from bad or destructive behaviors, to release from forms of selfishness we thought we needed to rely upon for substance in the world.  Our faith may give us the strength to say No to what we need to renounce, and Yes to what we need to embrace.  We simply cannot predict the type of healing God's work in us offers, but these things don't necessarily present themselves to us or to the world as spectacular signs such as those we read about in the Gospels.  And yet, it is the power of Christ against "the enemy" that we don't realize is at work in us to produce such healing results.  This does not mean that we attribute all bad behaviors and choices to the direct work of demons and devils, but it does mean that we recognize that at the root of much selfish and destructive behaviors of all kinds is the "enemy of God," the "evil one."  There is an influence in our world that comes from spiritual origin which the Gospels also testify to, which gives birth to all kinds of ways of thinking and being -- destructive and misleading patterns of thought,  such as, for instance, toxic forms of shame or blame, as the case may be.  Even our own denial of a problem is a kind of lie that may work destructively, and which we need to face.  In the Gospels, the patterns of demons at work in a person are always destructive, and particularly self-destructive.  The patterns and influence of various ways of thinking which are quite commonplace among us can also work within us in the same way, and we should understand these also as forms of evil which harm both individuals and communities.  They form the root of what the tradition of Eastern monasticism calls "logismoi," the things for which we rely on our faith to help us with a constant kind of repentance or "change of mind" so that we are healed.  Spectacular signs and proofs of the presence of God's kingdom need not come in the forms we see in films (such as The Exorcist) or the signs of Christ's miracles.  But our own signs and miracles may happen to help create change in us, to overcome the flaws of our own lives and upbringing, the hardships that may befall us at any time.  There are thousands of thousands of ways in which the Kingdom may be influencing our own lives, even as science may measure and validate the power of love and prayer on health and healing.  Let us consider more deeply the ways in which our faith instructs us through the power of God's love, and in particular the ways in which we heal.  And let us, indeed, rejoice because our names are written in heaven, even when it is only we who know and understand the impact of our faith and the reality of that journey.