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Satan, the ‘Prince of the Air’ — What Does That Mean? · Pastor John Piper's answers

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  Welcome back to the podcast. As we begin this June together Pastor John.
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  Today in our Bible reading, we arrive at Ephesians two, verses one to
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  ten. It's an incredibly important text and one that you've mentioned in your works
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  over fourteen hundred times over the decades. It is a mega text in your
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  legacy. I would call it one that you could talk about for hours and
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  hours on end. But it includes a curious little line that you rarely ever
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  talk about, especially compared to the other glorious points that Paul makes here in
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  this text. And I'm thinking about that singular title that he gives to the
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  devil, that the devil is the prince of the power of the air in
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  verse two. All sorts of interpretations have been suggested for this over the decades.
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  Historically, back in the nineteen twenties and thirties, as gospel programming was
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  first introduced to broadcast radio for the first time, one critique said that any
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  attempt to preach over the air ways was doomed to fail because such a ministry
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  quote operates in the very realm in which Satan is supreme. Is he not
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  the prince of the power of the air? End? Quote, so there's
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  like a cosmological dimension to his reign. That argument is basically dead today,
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  but questions still remain. Apja listeners want to know what that means that Satan
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  is the power of the air. One of our listeners, named Emon,
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  wants to know if this implies that Satan is omnipresent or all seeing. Other
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  listeners want to know how Satan influences the air and how it is that his
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  reign as the prince of the power of the air leads him to coerce disobedience
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  from sinners. As Paul implies here in the broader context of Ephesians two versus
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  one two three, what kind of power Pastor John is Paul ascribing to the
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  devil in this verse? Well, first, let me suggest a principle of
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  interpretation that I think is really important, especially for a certain mindset that is
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  constantly fascinated with marginal, uncertain things in the Bible instead of being thrilled with
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  central, sure, glorious things in the Bible. So the principle is,
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  don't let speculations about what you don't know control or dominate the things that are
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  clear in the Bible that you do know. That's the principle. We know
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  many clear true things about Satan and his work in the world that are stated
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  plainly in the Bible, and it would not be wise to start speculating what
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  we are unsure of, namely the meaning of air in the Prince of the
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  Power of the Air, in a way that would contradict or dominate those clear
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  true things. Scholars and commentators, including me, are not generally confident or
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  certain about why Satan is called the Prince of the power of the Air and
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  Ephesians two too. There are pointers. I won't stop here. I have
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  something to say. There are pointers that we're not left in the dark about
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  what this probably signifies. But it would be unwise to put too much emphasis
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  on what I'm about to say, because even though it's important, it's in
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  the Bible, it's not nearly as important as other clear things I think,
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  even in these verses and elsewhere in the New Testament. So that's the first
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  thing a principle. The second thing we need to do, just by way
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  of preparation, is to clear away some confusion. To say that Satan is
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  the Prince of the power of the Air does not mean we should stop living
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  and breathing and speaking and looking through the air. Air is what exists between
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  the page of the Bible and your eye. Air is what exists between the
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  preacher's mouth and your ear. To say that we shouldn't broadcast the truth through
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  airwaves would also mean you shouldn't preach into the air or look at the Bible
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  through the air. That's nonsense. There's a battle to be fought with the
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  prints of the air, but you don't fight it by stopping hearing through the
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  air or seeing through the air, or moving through the air. Okay,
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  let's just get that out of the way, really clear. To claim that
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  you shouldn't do radio or Wi Fi or something like that is to overprove what
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  you're trying to do, because it's going to cancel out all preaching and all
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  Bible reading which happened through the air. And we can add this, the
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  fact that Satan has some measure of authority in the air does not imply that
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  he is omnipresent or omniscient. We are not told in the Bible the extent
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  of Satan's knowledge or how a non spatial reality like a spirit, which he's
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  called in this very verse, the spirit that is dominating the sons of disobedience.
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  We're not told how a non spatial with no up, down or sideways
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  reality positions himself in the world. But he's not God. He does not
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  share God's omniscience and omnipresence. But we do know that he has many unclean
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  spirits demons at his disposal, and they are deployed all over the world in
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  the air. The air is where his flaming arrow fly, according to Ephesians
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  six sixteen. So here's what Paul said. Let's get the text in front
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  of us. You were dead in the trespasses, in your trespasses and sins
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  in which you once walked, following the age sometimes translated the course the age
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  of this world, following the Prince of the power of the air, the
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  spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. So here are
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  some pointers that collectively bring some clarity I think to this term Prince of the
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  power of the air. Number one. The air is simply what Paul and
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  people in his time called the space above the earth. And they had no
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  scientific awareness of how high the air went. As far as they knew,
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  it just went on and on. So human life takes place in the lower
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  part of this air, where it meets the earth. That's where we live.
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  That's point number one. It's just a general statement about the sphere of
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  our life. Number two. In Matthew six twenty six, Jesus says,
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  consider the birds of the air. Now. The reason that's significant is because
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  the word translated air is heaven translated heaven. Almost everywhere. The term heaven
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  in the New Testament was very broad in its usage, referring to layers that
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  are above the earth, sometimes called the sky. Nearmi nine to six refers
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  to heaven and the heaven of heavens where the stars are, and Psalm one
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  four refers to the highest heaven, and second Corinthians twelve to two Paul refers
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  to the third heaven. And since Jesus uses the word heaven interchangeably with air
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  where the birds fly, we can think of various layers of air or heaven.
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  There are these heavens. In fact, the word heaven is regularly used
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  in the plural. I think probably because it's thought of in terms of these
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  various layers. This is probably why Paul revers so often, like in Chapter
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  six to Heavens, where the battle with Satan happens, he says. So
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  that's number two. Number three, The term prince of the power. Just
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  take those two words, prince of the power, ruler of authority. Our
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  conta tastes extra see us is exactly the same as those two terms four verses
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  earlier in one twenty one of Ephesians, where it says God raised Christ and
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  seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places the heavens, far above
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  above all rule and authority. Now that's the phrase that describes the devil,
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  rule and authority, far above all rule and all authority, far above the
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  devil, far above the prince of the power, the ruler of the authority
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  of the air. So Satan, though he has a measure of rule and
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  authority in the air or the heavens, is not God. He is vastly
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  under God. Christ is vastly superior to over has authority over him. So
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  Satan's rule in the power of the air or in the lower air of the
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  heavens is not supreme. He's decisively defeated. Classians two fifteen. God disarmed
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  the rulers and authorities, it says, And that's exactly the same phrase as
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  the prince of the power eph Hees ins two to two. The prince of
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  the power of the Air is the rulers of the authority of the Air,
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  and that has been decisively disarmed at the cross, So he's mortally wounded.
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  A decisive battle has been fought, and we in Christ have a victory over
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  him. And when it comes to a feesi in six twelve, where it
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  says we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against rulers against authorities.
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  Same phrase as Beckon two to two in the Heavenly Places, when it
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  says that those heavenly places are evidently layers of heavens, the layers of the
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  air above the earth, but below the highest heaven, where Christ sits supreme
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  governing all things. And we have the victory over this one with whom we
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  are contending in the air. Number four. Paul calls Satan the god of
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  this world in two Timothy four to four. I think God of this world
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  and ruler of the authority of the Air are virtually interchangeable terms, with the
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  world being the sphere in which we live and the air being the sphere in
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  which we live refer to the same thing. So here are my four implications
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  I draw from Paul's calling Satan the Prince of the power of the air.
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  Number one. Satan is a spirit who is invisible like air, not like
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  flesh and blood. According to chapter six, verse twelve, number two,
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  there's no place to go while we breathe air where the flaming arrows of Satan
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  will not fly through the air at us chapter six, verse sixteen three.
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  Any place we go where there's air, heaven, sky space, we will
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  need to wear the armor of God and do battle with the word of God
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  and the shield of faith. And fourth, Christ is exalted as king to
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  the highest heaven above all rule and authority. The Prince of the power of
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  the Air is not sovereign. He is on a leash. So one John
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  five eighteen says the whole world lies in the power of the devil, but
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  those who are born of God he cannot touch, he cannot destroy. We
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  should believe that we should take up the armor of God and live with that
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  kind of boldness. Yes, live with that kind of boldness, and don't
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  let speculations about what you don't know control or dominate the things that are clear
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  in the Bible that you do know. As a very good Bible reading principle.
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  Thank you, Pester John. Satan is a great enemy of ours,
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  but he's not our greatest enemy. Satan is not our greatest enemy. And
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  for that you can see the APGA book on pages three p. Forty three
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  to three forty four. Got to keep the devil talk in perspective, and
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  I go into who that enemy is, and pages three p. Forty three,
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  three forty four of the APJ book you can see a summary of that.
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  Well. Several decades ago, preaching was defined as an act that was
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  meant to disturb the comfortable and to comfort the disturbed. Maybe you've heard of
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  preaching described that way. Disturbing the comfortable remains one of the great challenges faced
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  by the preacher and the evangelists and all of us who seek to share the
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  Gospel in the prosperous West today. How do we do it? How do
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  we disturb the comfortable? That's next. I'm Tony Rank. We'll see you
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  on Thursday.