Satan Accuses, God Warns

Is there a difference between an accusation and a warning?  A warning may include an accusation when given to someone who is sinning.  But there are a couple of differences between God's warnings and Satan's accusations.

We are approaching Atonement.  One of the things Atonement represents is the putting away of Satan.  We are coming to the season when we can expect to hear and read messages about Satan and his wrong way of life.  We can expect to be reminded that Satan is the accuser of the brethren, and we need those messages.  We should not fall into the way of Satan of having an accusing attitude towards our brethren.  

But God gives warnings, and sometimes those warnings contain accusations.  Not only does God warn but He commands us to deliver warnings to those who need them (Proverbs 24:11-12, Ezekiel 3:17-21, Ezekiel 33:1-9, 1 Corinthians 4:14, Colossians 1:28, 1 Thessalonians 5:14).

How do we warn in a right way without becoming an accuser like Satan?

Let's look at a couple of examples of Satan's accusations in the Bible.

The first is in Genesis in the account of the forbidden fruit.  You all know the story.  When Eve told Satan that God had forbidden Adam and Eve from eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, Satan accused God of two things: lying ("you shall not surely die") and having a bad motivation ("God knows that in the day you eat of it ... you will be like God ..." (Genesis 3:1-5).

The second example is in the book of Job.  Satan accuses Job of only obeying God for selfish advantage (Job 1:8-11, Job 2:3-5).

In both cases, Satan is accusing for the purpose of condemning or embarrassing or harming the person he accuses, and in both cases Satan communicates, not with the person he is accusing, but with someone else.  He wants to hurt someone's reputation in the eyes of someone else.  He is not confronting the person he accuses directly.

Satan is not accusing to persuade someone to repent for their own good.  In the case of Job, Satan did not confront Job face-to-face and say, "Job you are only obeying God for selfish advantage. You need to repent and draw closer to God in humility, not self-righteousness."  No, Satan talked to God about Job behind Job's back, so to speak.  He had no intention of trying to help Job.  He was trying to belittle Job in God's eyes, or he was trying to defend his own selfish way of life to God, saying, look, even Job is selfish and self-centered.

But when God warns, He speaks to the wicked directly, and he gives the warning to help them repent (2 Peter 3:9).  That warning may include an accusation of wrong doing, but it is delivered to the person who needs it, and the warning is motivated by love.

Jesus Himself accused the Pharisees, but those accusations were part of warnings that were given in love (Matthew 15:7-9, Matthew 23:13-39, Mark 7:5-13, Luke 11:39-52).  Some of those accusations were pretty strong and harsh, but the motive was still love.  Christ delivered warnings containing accusations in some of the messages to the seven churches in Revelation (Revelation chapters 2 and 3).  Regarding the Pharisees, some of Christ's accusations were in the presence of the disciples, not the Pharisees, but those were warnings to the disciples not to follow the Pharisees, and the motive was still love, in this case, love for the disciples (Matthew 16:6-12, Mark 16:15-21, Mark 12:38-40, Luke 12:1-2, Luke 20:46-47).

That is the difference.  It is not wrong to accuse someone if it is part of a warning given to the one or ones who need the warning for their own long-term good.  That is motivated by love, and it is what God does.  But we should not accuse people behind their backs in an effort to hurt the ones we are accusing.

And it is certainly not wrong to discuss patterns of wrong doing without accusing any individual.  For example, it is not wrong to discuss the pattern of neglecting God in prayer, Bible study, and fasting in an effort to encourage people to draw close to God, talking about the harm of neglecting these things and the benefits of doing them.

We have to warn the world.  It is really God who warns the world, we just deliver His warning like a mail carrier delivers the mail.  In some cases, we may give warnings to the brethren when needed.

But always our motive should be love.  We should do it to help others in the long term.