Russell A. Cardwell Online

I have not been able to sleep for the past two nights because of this toothache. The whole roof of my mouth hurts, and now it has spread to my throat. Here it is just a few days before the Chrysalis weekend, and I already have more to do than I can manage. This is so typical of Satan’s tricks. Sometimes I just have to laugh at his attacks. It’s as if he doesn’t even bother to try coming up with something new. It’s always the same old stuff over and over again. There’s no subtlety to it at all.

I keep thinking about C. S. Lewis’s depiction of Satan in Perelandra. Contrary to popular conception, he said, Satan is no gentleman. Nor is he the somber tragic figure from Paradise Lost. Satan picks up reason and intelligence like a soldier picks up a weapon. Bayonets or bombs are tools a soldier uses, and are of no interest to him beyond their utilitarian purpose in helping him accomplish his ends. Similarly Satan uses reason and intelligence as part of his arsenal when he needs them, but they are not part of his nature. When you focus on Satan himself, and not on the tools he has picked up, what you see is more like “a monkey or a very nasty child.”

Deep within, Lewis said, there is “nothing but a black puerility, an aimless empty spitefulness content to sate itself with the tiniest cruelties, as love does not disdain the smallest kindness.”

So a part of me looks with scorn on the childishness and monotony of his attacks. And a part of me is thankful that I am not dealing with some grand and subtle design. But another part of me is disgusted and somewhat chilled at the thought that something so petty and childish as giving me a toothache before and important event could be so damned effective.

I’m glad that God knows what I need. He knows my thoughts even as I am thinking them. He knows my feelings better than I know them myself. Anytime I turn my thoughts toward God, no matter what time, night or day, God is already thinking about me. And long ago, he prepared for this day. Satan was defeated once and for all when those nails pierced my Savior’s flesh. Is that awesome or what?

I hate to admit it, but it reminds me of an old Willie Nelson song. Remember “Always on My Mind“? Well, when it comes to God, it really is the truth: You are always on God’s mind.

• God’s Palms