When Jesus came back from the wilderness of temptation, where He had defeated the devil, He went about the country healing all that were possessed with devils. The casting out of devils was one of the most prominent features of His work on earth. "For this purpose the Son of God was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil," (1 John 3:8) and the devil himself. "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death He might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil." (Hebrews 2:14)
The Word of Salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, was confirmed by those that heard Him. Christ said to His disciples, "As my Father has sent me even so send I you." (John 20:21)
Accordingly when He sent them forth to preach "[He] gave them power and authority over all devils." (Luke 9:1)
Without the casting out of devils, their work would have been a failure. If they could not have cast out devils, they could not have done the work of the Lord.
This power necessarily goes with the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the end of the world. Preaching which does not result in the casting out of devils, is not the preaching of the one true Gospel. This will be evident to everyone who remembers that sin is of the devil. "He that commits sin is of the devil." (1 John 3:8)
The devil is the ruler of this present evil world, "the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience." (Ephesians 2:2)
Therefore the freeing of a soul from sin means the casting out of the devil. Paul was sent to the Gentiles, "To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God." (Acts 26:18)
Until a person has Satan cast out of him, he is a child of sin; he ceases to sin only when Satan is driven forth.
All this is made plain in the account of Christ's contest with Satan in the wilderness. He there showed His power over the devil, the same authority that He had ever after; for when He said, "Get you hence Satan," (Matthew 4:10) the devil could stay no longer. But this power was the same power by which He resisted all the devil's temptations to sin. Power, therefore, which Christ gives His followers, even to this day, over all the devils, must show itself in lives unsullied by transgression of the law.
A writer says: "Apart from the keeping power of God, we are never safe till we reach heaven."
True enough; but it ought to be known that the safety of the saints in heaven will be due only to the keeping power of God. That is why God has revealed to us something of the glories of heaven: it is that we may know what power we have to depend on now.
The saved in heaven can never be any safer than are the souls here and now on this earth, who trust implicitly and always in the everlasting God.--Present Truth, February 6, 1902--Original title: Back Page--Timeline: II-3 (The Temptation)--Matthew 4:10.