We have all heard the saying "The devil made me do it." When someone does something wrong or someone will make the observation that an evil person has the devil inside them.
I think that there is a preconceived notion of what the devil actually does.
Movies and television has shaped our views to the way they make their characters behave on the big screen. This in turn makes us believe that that character must be that way in the actual world. In the case of the devil, most of us have not read the bible and believe whatever the media will tell us.
The devil, for instance, does not tell anyone to do anything and if we were to put him in a type of job scenario, we would say that he is like the warden at a prison. He is there to punish those of us that have committed grievous sins. He is not there to turn people into murderous monsters so he can steal their souls.
This would be like saying that the warden of a prison influences other people to turn into criminals so that he can have more funding for his prison.
I really dislike the excuse that you are somehow not responsible for your own actions. Maybe you will claim that you heard voices telling you what to do. Those voices caused you to kill someone, steal, rape or commit whatever crime that you can conceive. You tell people that the devil made you do it.
Using the devil as an excuse to start up a cult that has to sacrifice live animals in order to please the god they worship is utterly ridiculous when you don't understand that the god you're worshipping will be condemning those same people for sacrificing animals in the quest for power.
Take responsibility for your own actions, don't use god or the devil as an excuse for anything. God will not save you, he gave you the ability to save yourself. If anyone is upset with this article, in my defense, I'd like to say the devil made me do it.
Scott Goerz
