The Economy of Hell

You may have heard of something call the "Economy of Heaven." The concept comes (as near as I can tell) from an October 1976 talk by Neal A. Maxwell, then of the First Council of the Seventy: "In the economy of heaven, God does not send thunder if a still, small voice is enough, or a prophet if a priest can do the job." In general, God doesn't tend to exercise any more of His power than He deems necessary. Recently I wondered whether this tendency holds true for other other-worldly beings. If there is an economy of heaven, is there also an economy of hell?

You may also have heard of the story of two travelers.The way I remember it, a certain man saw two travelers, and an angel gave the man the ability to see how many devils were tempting each of the travelers. The first traveler had a whole consortium of devils around him, and the man thought he must have been very wicked, but the angel corrected him, telling him that the traveler was so strong at resisting temptation, it took a great number of devils working together to challenge him. The second traveler had only one devil tempting him, and the man thought the second traveler must have been fairly righteous to have only one devil near him, but the angel again corrected him, saying that the traveler was so wicked that only one devil was needed to prod him along.

I can't recall the source of this story, and I can't vouch for its doctrinal accuracy (or lack thereof, as the case may be), but it does stand to reason that anyone with finite resources would want to employ those resources wisely, and the adversary only has a certain number of devils at his command. Satan isn't likely to send dozens on devils after someone who would yield to the temptations of a few. Yet, he also wants to sway as many souls as he can, so he sends as many devils as he has to to tempt as many people as he can. I think it's likely that, just as God gives His toughest challenges to the strongest people, Satan probably does the same.

So if you find that Satan is fighting hard against you, take heart. That probably means he fears your strength and what good you might do with it. And if you find that you're not facing strong temptations, you might want to do some soul-searching. If Satan isn't trying hard to tempt you, it may be because he doesn't think he has to. So, count your devils. If you're not facing much opposition, that may be because Satan thinks he's already winning the fight for your soul, but if you far facing a lot of opposition, that may be because you're winning.