For many a Christian,
the devil is that nebulous malevolence
The polar, if inferior opposite,
of God and good.

Who once was of consequence,
in the courts of eternity,
But was expelled into time, for a time.
For attempting usurpation
Of the order of heaven
and of the God of creation.

And that He now exists, full of wickedness,
forever opposed, to the purposes of God,
and to the agents of those purposes.

Yet much remains unknown

About the present daily impact,
the ongoing earthly outworking,
of these concepts and precepts,
of clear and present evil 

The believing western mind,
reason above all,
defaults skeptic, or agnostic at best,
regarding this idea, of immaterial evil,
collateral to everyday life.

Relegating the thought,
to the realm of myth,
the preoccupation of the backward,
raw material maybe,
for the imagination of her story-tellers.

For many a non-western believer,
never far removed, from the personal stories,
affirmative of the essence,
of contemporaneous spiritual wickedness,
there is the understanding, or at least the acceptance;
That, well,  ‘things happen.’

That there is a spiritual realm; vivid and ambient,
on the other side of a rather porous boundary;
humans transact with other-worldly entities,
who can, in-turn meddle, in human affairs.

Yet that spiritual realm 

a foggy construct for many,
even for those who accept its reality.

Populated by indeterminate actors,
whose powers are subject, of much conjecture,
governed by rules, unclear at best.

What is the geography of this other-world?
The physics of this spatial-spiritual world?
Is it responsive to gravity, for instance?

or to any other material constraints?

And what can ill-intended immaterial forces do;
To humanity in the material realm?
And are all vulnerable to the machinations of darkness?
Or are they exempted
Who are pledged to the rider on the white horse,
eyes are like blazing fire?

Many questions for sure.
And should we even try,
to answer all or any?
Or simply rest in the understanding
That the secret things belong,
to the LORD our God,
Yet those things revealed,
are for us and for our children.