I Saw Satan Fall
The enemies keeping you from God are not all-powerful. They are already defeated.
Today is my Name Day.
In the Orthodox tradition, your Name Day is in many ways more significant than your birthday. Your birthday celebrates the gift of physical life. Your Name Day celebrates the saint whose name you bear and whose life you are called to imitate. Today, the Church commemorates the Holy Apostle Barnabas, and I am humbled and grateful to bear his name.
Today is also the Name Day of His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, whose feast of St. Bartholomew the Apostle we also celebrate today alongside St. Barnabas. Many years to His All-Holiness!
So forgive me if today’s devotional is a little more personal than usual.
“I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.”
St. Barnabas was the leader of the Seventy, that remarkable group of disciples who followed the Lord during His earthly ministry and were sent out ahead of Him to prepare the way. Today’s Gospel captures the moment they returned from that mission, breathless with joy, having discovered something they barely had words for. Even the demons obeyed them. Even the powers that had held humanity captive for so long were forced to yield before the Name of Jesus.
And the Lord’s response tells us everything about what His entire mission was accomplishing.
Today’s Lesson: Luke 10:16-21
The Lord said to his disciples, “He who hears you hears me, and he who rejects you rejects me, and he who rejects me rejects him who sent me.” 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 have given you authority to tread upon serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing shall hurt you. Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you; but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to babes; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.”
“I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.”
The Lord does not say, “I will see Satan fall someday.” He uses the past tense. The defeat is already accomplished in the mind and will of God.
What the Seventy are experiencing in their mission is not the beginning of the victory. It is the manifestation of a victory already won.
What Can We Take From This?
First, the enemies that keep us from God are already defeated, even when they do not act like it.
The demons that the Seventy encountered were not free agents doing as they pleased. They were already defeated powers, forced to yield to the Name of Jesus. The Seventy discovered this not in a theology class but in the field, when they actually went out and did what the Lord sent them to do.
This matters enormously for how we understand our own spiritual struggles.
The “demons” that enslave us to our untamed desires, the enemies that keep us gripped by fear and selfishness, the powers that blind us to the love of God and poison our hearts against the Father by lying to us that He is angry with us or that He hates us, these are defeated enemies. They are not all-powerful. They are not equal and opposite forces to God. They are already fallen, already judged, already stripped of ultimate authority.
They still make noise. They still press. They still deceive when they can. But they are fighting a battle they have already lost. And when we go out in the Name of Jesus, we go out on the winning side.
Next, the Lord’s joy reveals how deeply He desired our freedom.
“In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit.”
I love this detail.
The Lord rejoices. In the Holy Spirit. In that very hour. The return of the Seventy, with their report that the demons have yielded, brings joy to the Lord Himself.
Why? Because this is what He came for.
The whole mission of the Incarnation, the entire purpose of the Lord taking on our flesh and entering our death, was to set us free from exactly what the Seventy were discovering. Those demons that yielded before them represented everything that had kept humanity captive since the Fall. The fear. The shame. The addiction to lesser things. The blindness to the Father’s love. The lie that we are unloved, unwanted, and abandoned.
“I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.” The Lord came to defeat those enemies. And when He saw His disciples experiencing that victory, He rejoiced.
He rejoices over your freedom, too. He rejoices when the lie that He is angry with you loses its grip. He rejoices when the fear that has driven your choices begins to yield before His love. He rejoices when the Name of Jesus does in your life what it did for the Seventy in their mission.
This is personal to me today. The Name I bear is the name of a man who walked with the Lord, who was sent by the Lord, and who spent his entire life helping others discover this same freedom.
Finally, our deepest joy is not in spiritual power but in being known by the Father.
“Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you; but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”
The Seventy are exhilarated. Understandably so. They have just discovered that the power of darkness yields before them. That is an extraordinary experience. And the Lord gently redirects their joy.
Don’t rejoice in the power. Rejoice that you are known. Rejoice that your names are written in heaven.
Rejoice in the relationship, not in the authority that flows from it.
This is the deepest freedom the Lord won for us. Not simply the authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, as remarkable as that is. But the freedom to be known by the Father, to have our names written in His presence, to be restored to the communion that the Fall had broken.
Yesterday, we saw how terrifying the words “I never knew you” are. Today, we see their opposite. Your name is written in heaven. The Father knows you. The Son has won your freedom. The Holy Spirit rejoices in your liberation. That is the ground of our deepest and most unshakable joy.
St. Barnabas the Holy Apostle
On this, my Name Day, I am especially glad to honor St. Barnabas the Apostle, leader of the Seventy, companion of St. Paul, and one of the great pillars of the early Church.
His name means “Son of Encouragement,” and the Scriptures show us why. When the newly converted Paul was mistrusted by the Jerusalem Church, it was Barnabas who vouched for him and brought him into fellowship. When the mission to the Gentiles seemed impossible, it was Barnabas who partnered with Paul and went. When John Mark failed on the first missionary journey, Barnabas refused to give up on him and gave him another chance, an act of mercy that preserved one of the four Evangelists for his great work.
St. Barnabas walked with the Lord among the Seventy. He experienced exactly what today’s Gospel describes, the joy of seeing the enemies of humanity yield before the Name of Jesus. And he spent the rest of his life helping others walk in that same victory. He was eventually martyred in Cyprus, his homeland, sealing his witness with his blood.
I am honored to bear his name. I ask for his prayers, and yours.
Your Response Today
Today, the Feast of the Holy Apostle Barnabas and the beginning of this week’s continued fasting, is a good day to ask yourself what enemies you are still living as if they had power over you.
The fear that the Father is angry with you. The shame that says you are too far gone. The addiction that whispers it is stronger than grace. The loneliness that lies to you that no one truly knows you or loves you.
These are already defeated powers. They yield to the Name of Jesus. Not because you are spiritually impressive, but because your name is written in heaven and the Lord who wrote it is the One before whom Satan fell like lightning.
Pray simply today:
“Lord Jesus Christ, I rejoice not in spiritual power but in this: You know me. My name is written in heaven. Let every defeated enemy know it too.”
Being Orthodox on Purpose means living in the joy of a freedom already won, trusting that the enemies keeping you from God are already defeated, and rejoicing above all that your name is written in heaven!
P.S. To your Lord, O Barnabas, you were a genuine servant; and among the Seventy Apostles, you were the foremost; and with Paul, you shone brightly in your wise preaching, making known unto all men Christ Jesus, the Savior. For this cause, we celebrate your divine memorial with hymns and spiritual songs.
Happy Name Day, Fr. Barnabas! Here is a link where you can help Fr. Barnabas on his Name Day with our Video Project - Click the Button!
Fr. Barnabas Powell is the parish priest at Sts. Raphael, Nicholas, and Irene Greek Orthodox Church in Cumming, GA. He is also the founder of Faith Encouraged Ministries and produces the Faith Encouraged Daily Devotional on Substack. Watch the Faith Encouraged YouTube Channel here - https://www.youtube.com/@FaithEncouragedTV
Many Years to you Father on the occasion of your name’s day.
Xpovia Pola!
You truly are a "Son of Encouragement."
May the Lord continue to bless you, your family, and ministry!