Posted on 09/28/2014 2:49:18 PM PDT by NYer
The Devil is real. I saw him. He was on TV with a teleprompter. Okay, maybe it wasn’t, The Devil, but if it wasn’t, he played one on TV.
Satan has the biggest role in Daniel’s 70th week.
He indwells the “Man of Sin” and sets out to thin the herd of those alive at Yeshua’s second coming by tempting them with “the mark of the beast.”
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>> “You make the choice which team you are on. Even if you pick the losers, eventually you will realize your mistake and like the tax collectors and prostitutes you can be redeemed.” <<
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Pipe dream!
Yeshua said that “few” would find his narrow gate.
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That should be:
II Peter 1:19; Revelation 2:28 Morning Star
At least in the RSV
>> “Obviously he gave this position up with his defection.” <<
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Not so!
There is nothing in the scriptures that makes such a statement.
He still has full access to the throne of Yehova, and will until the midpoint in Daniel’s 70th week, at which point he will be cast out of the throne room, and will indwell the “Man of Sin,” beginning Satan’s 3.5 year Tribulation of the Saints.
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The RSV had Day Star
Isaiah 14
12 “How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low!
Read more: http://www.ewtn.com/ewtn/bible/search_bible.asp#ixzz3EezULnNo
1. Yes.
2. God’s not done with the current creation yet. Or extending mercy to his creatures. (The ones capable of receiving it, anyway. I’m pretty sure Satan’s hosed.)
God, being omniscient, knows everything that will ever happen, but His knowledge of our future actions has no influence on those actions.
I believe God ‘allows’ Satan because he loves you. He wants you to love Him. In order for you to love Him you must have free will to chose. If He decreed that you love Him, there would be no love, only compunction. As Screwtape said, God can only woo, never complel. He allows you to chose if you will love Him. I would admonish that you Love the Lord with all of you heart, mind, soul, body, and spirit, because while you were in sin (rebellion against God), He still loved you.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucifer
http://biblehub.com/isaiah/14-12.htm
All versions on one page including cross references.
For something that will give this conversation an interesting spin, checkout Revelation 22:16.
I believe God ‘allows’ Satan because he loves you. He wants you to love Him. In order for you to love Him you must have free will to chose. If He decreed that you love Him, there would be no love, only compunction. As Screwtape said, God can only woo, never complel. He allows you to chose if you will love Him. I would admonish that you Love the Lord with all of you heart, mind, soul, body, and spirit, because while you were in sin (rebellion against God), He still loved you.
The question needs to be expanded on. The Catholic church has, over centuries, composed demonologies filled with information about the devil, but also those he considered his peers, and many of their subordinates.
So focusing on just the devil is like focusing on just Adolf Hitler. While they have evil power in their own right, their greater power comes from their legions.
However, it is unwise to think that their singular focus is mankind, because many of them are indifferent to man. Instead their primary conflict continues to be with God and his angels.
“Pipe dream!
Yeshua said that “few” would find his narrow gate.”
Matthew 7:
6 “Do not give what is holy to dogs; and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them under foot and turn and maul you.
Ask, Search, Knock
7 “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? 10 Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
The Golden Rule
12 “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.
The Narrow Gate
13 “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road is easy[d] that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. 14 For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.
These are all very true statements. However, If you ask, it will be given. Yes, the gate is narrow but when you ask, the guidance is given to go through the gate. The problem is, I cannot give you the secrets as you must go within and find them yourself. Scripture must not be taken out of context. It is a good policy to always read the entire chapter when you look up a scripture.
The more you focus on following our Teacher, the easier it is to find your way through the gate.
I once met an old man who I recognized by his glow that he had been through the gate. We chatted a few moments and he stated that he never went through the Dark-Night of the -Soul that many refer to as the journey to find the narrow gate. I knew he was a truthful man and had no reason to lie to me.
When I read his soul it became obvious. He was a minister who totally lived his life serving God by serving others. He had created an individual identity based upon being a “servant to God” and as such did not have to go through the hell of diminishing self to find the entrance to the gate.
The gate was wide open for him and he just sailed right through. That however, is very rare.
In order to pass through the gate, you must be “whole.” and you can only be whole by finding and removing all obstacles to Love that exist within your soul. If you are not whole, you will be turned back to do more work. On this I speak from personal experience as I had a lot of work to do to clean my house.
“you Love the Lord with all of you heart, mind, soul, body, and spirit,”
Bingo.... that is the first and most important commandment as that is how you find your way through the narrow gate.... with God as your beacon.
Reminds me of the story about the sea catfish in the wet well of the wise old fisherman ... he eats one or two during the long voyages, but it keeps the others moving thus they arrive to shore in better shape.
I rather doubt it. We can't definitively confirm or deny this so the point is moot. However logically Satan has been unmasked with the crucifixion of Christ and any sympathy for his cause has been lost by the rest of creation. Any standing for an audience should have been revoked by this act but that is merely my opinion.
If it was to be our only choice to love and obey God, how could we choose it? Choices have consequences, and the warnings are there.
Choose well my FRiends.
>>> I think you are the one who is mistaken in their “thinking” that God didn’t know what would happen.
Having foreknowledge that Lucifer would rebel, and creating him anyway is NOT creating him to do evil.
God also had the foreknowledge that Adam and Eve would sin, and He still created them. By creating them anyway, He also went forward with His plans to create you.
The question then is why? and more specifically, where does sin actually come from?
Sin certainly does not come from God, because He is perfectly Holy and incapable of evil.
Sin itself is a natural byproduct of imperfection... and by imperfection, I mean “Not God”. While all things are possible with God, God is by definition incapable of self replication... because He always was with no beginning.
Obviously, God’s plan from the beginning was to go forward with creation KNOWING that imperfection would result in sin which would have to be dealt with and separated to end up with a final universe of beings where sin itself was defeated forever.
The only way that imperfect beings can be made perfect is to somehow be “grafted in” to the creator Himself. I’m not suggesting that this involves “being God” or even being “like God’, but rather attached to Him in such a way that we become incorruptible. Such a condition obviously limits one’s “free will” to some extent which itself must be a choice we make ourselves. Such a choice can only come from love... sort of like the commitment which a man and woman makes in marriage. When God instituted the practice of marriage, does it not make sense that He was trying to show us something?
Giving creation a choice to sin or submit invariably means that some will choose the former.
Without the choice in that matter, the love that is required to make the choice FOR God is not possible.
Without those who choose sin (fallen angels), there is no example or life experience to learn from for those who will choose God’s free gift of salvation.
In short, it is my position (right or wrong) that God ALLOWS evil for the benefit of those who will Choose Him.
And that is why God gave His One, True, Church the Sacrament of Confession. Do you take advantage of this Sacrament?
Satan is here to give us a choice. Without him and that choice, we are no different than the Angels.
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