Memory Verse: Isaiah 14:14,“I will ascend above the heights of the clouds: I will be like the most High.”
God is excellent, perfect, and impeccable. Therefore, everything that he made was the same as his character. All the heavenly host was like him, even Lucifer. Lucifer was perfect in beauty and anointed. He turned from being a true angelic being of God, to one of self-exaltation and influenced others in the heavenly host to follow him. (Ezekiel 28:14-15)
Where did evil began? To fully understand the answers to this question we must know who God is. He is the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end. He was not created; he is the Creator. When we accept that he is that higher being, we will begin to understand that there are mysteries of God that we will not understand in our flesh. As excellent as our God is, evil began in heaven with one of the most honored angels, Lucifer. He allowed his beauty and high position to rule his heart. This brought forth pride, lies, and deceit. He devised lies that God was a dictator and not a God of love among the heavenly host. He fooled many to believe that they did not have to obey God. He was not immediately cast from heaven. Because God is love, the very spirit of love is powerful. Love includes longsuffering, which means he patiently waited for Lucifer to repent of his ways. When this did not occur, he and his followers were cast from heaven to the earth. His name was changed to Satan, which means adversary. (Isaiah 14:12-14)
Why didn’t God destroy evil? God is love. Love is just, it is fair. He considered the heavenly host that did not give allegiance to Lucifer’s cunningly devices. He considered the other worlds in their glory. God wants us to serve him in love and with the free choice to obey him. Of course, there are consequences when God is denied, just as with Lucifer. If God had destroyed Lucifer and his followers, God’s relationship with the heavenly beings would never had been the same. This would have proved Satan was correct about God, that he was not just. God has allowed evil to run its full course, so that man will see and know who is responsible for all evil. (I John 4:16)
When he was cast to the earth, he continued to be the liar that he is when he spoke through the serpent to the woman, “ye shall not surely die”. “For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be open, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.” (Genesis 3:5)
Satan’s will is to destroy every living soul in sin. He knows that he will never live in the presence of God again. Therefore, he works hard to keep people from the truth about God and his son Jesus. The bible teaches of many ways in which Satan tries to get us to sin. When we read the fall of man in Genesis, we see the same devices are very prevalent in our world today. The nature of man is to find fault with others when we do wrong. In the fall of man, Adam blamed Eve and God. His response to God was “the woman whom thou gavest to be with me”. Eve blamed the serpent who beguiled her. She took no responsibility for her actions. The following will lead to sin:
doubt – makes you question God’s word and his goodness
diversion – makes the wrong decisions seem attractive so that you will want them more than the right things
defeat – makes you feel like a failure so that you don’t even try
delay – makes you put off doing something so that it never gets done (Genesis 3:12-13; Proverbs 28:12-13; II Corinthians 11:3)
We must not be deceived. Remember, Satan is the mastermind behind all sin. The fallen angels, referred to as devils, are at his command. We overcome the forces of evil when we (1) Submit to God. We surrender our lives to God through the life of Jesus. He has all power over evil. (2) Resist the devil. Do not consider any suggestions of temptations. Temptations become sin when we surrender to the thought or deed. Learn to deny or reject temptations immediately. Ask Jesus to help you. He is our only means to escape the wiles of the devil. (James 4:7-8)
In conclusion, Satan has no boundaries to do evil, even to the saints of the Most High. It is his mission to oppress and destroy. Jesus taught that “the thief cometh not but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy”. Time is running to the end. The powers of Satan will be destroyed before the judgment of the wicked. God promised that evil will never be present in heaven nor in the new earth to come, ever again. (John 10:10; Nahum 1:9)
Pastor Tylvia E. Koromah The Path of Righteousness Church in Christ
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