"So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him" (Rev. 12:9).

Satan originated sin and rebellion against God the Father in the beginning and was cast out of heaven along with one third of the heavenly host (Rev. 12:9).  Satan first came to Adam in the garden of Eden to deceive Adam and Eve.  Adam was created by God the Father to have a personal son-to-Father relationship with Him.  Through the deception of Satan, Adam also chose Satan's deceptive and lying word of sin and disobedience against God the Father.  Adam bit off more than he thought he was getting in that deal, no pun intended.  Adam's choice to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was truly sin and disobedience against God the Father and His word. Adam's choice, with this major deception, was actually choosing to make Satan his god.  When Adam made his choice, he received a disobedient spirit and nature from Satan that was born into him.  In all practical aspects, Adam had chosen a life and a nature of disobedience and sin through that one important decision.  Through Adam's original sin, this spirit of disobedience and sin nature was passed on to all men (Rom. 5:12; Eph. 2:1-3).  This was certainly a costly decision from deception.

One of the major gifts needed in the Body of Christ is discernment.  We get discernment through the teaching and revelation of the Holy Spirit (I Cor. 2:15).  A key spiritual gift is the discerning of spirits (I Cor. 12:10).  That is what that gift is used for, a discerning between the Spirit of God and the spirit of Satan.  It is a discerning between the Spirit of Christ and the spirit of antichrist.  Satan's lies and deception works heavily with religion and religious people.  Jesus told the Pharisees that they were "of their father the devil" (John 8:44).  Why did Jesus say that to them?  The truth was that they had taken on the sin nature and spirit of disobedience from their natural birth that was passed on to all men of the Adamic race of people.  That lying spirit and deceptive nature was so strong in operating in them, that they could not see that Jesus was the Son of God.  The religious Pharisees thought that Jesus had a demon and was a liar (John 8:48). The deception of the devil can keep us locked out of genuine truth and reality in the Spirit.  We must have His discernment in the Spirit through the mind of Christ within us (I Cor. 2:16).