The devil cannot be as stupid as people seem to think he is. It should be undeniable that Satan cannot battle or even defy God. Satan destroys humans to grieve God, because this is something Satan can do without committing a sin himself.
The devil is cast out of Heaven, but as far as the timing of the devil being cast out, the only clues are found in Revelation 12 and Isaiah 27. Both passages suggest that Satan is killed or cast out in the end times.
This means the devil is still in Heaven, evil but not stupid.
The Bible tells us that Jesus is at the Right Hand of God, but surely this has greater significance than Jesus simply sitting beside God. It is also said that the Messiah dwells in the secret place of the Most High. This is because the Right Hand of God is a transcending level of Heaven which has been kept secret even from the inhabitants of Heaven. This explains the Trinity.
God the Father is outside of time. There is also the presence of God moving in time in two different levels of reality. The Spirit of God is in Heaven, while the Word of God is at the Right Hand of God which transcends Heaven.
The Word of God came to the earth and lived as a human.
On the cross, Jesus cried out, “My God why have you abandoned me?”, because God had looked away from the crucifixion. When God looked away, the devil openly cursed God, not knowing that Jesus is the Word of God who transcends Heaven. Even now, Satan is still in Heaven because it has not been revealed that Jesus is a witness against him.
The early church would occasionally use words like “substitute”, but mostly the church believed what is called Christus Victor. This means Christ redeems us by destroying sin, death and the devil.
There was never a satisfactory explanation for Christus Victor, so over a thousand years after Christ, the church would turn to vicarious atonement. Today those who reject vicarious atonement are called heretics, but it is vicarious atonement that is the heresy. Vicarious atonement was developed over a thousand years after Christ to replace what the early church believed.
Christus Victor can now be explained. Christ destroys the devil as a witness, but this had to be kept secret until the time of the end. When this is revealed in Heaven, the devil will be cast out.
Relax, the great and powerful Satan has no regard for the theories of the little microbes on earth. The devil will not take seriously the idea that a little human who died on a cross is greater than him, not until the devil is confronted in Heaven by someone his own size (like Michael).
