Stand
“And He said to them, I saw Satan
falling like a lightning [flash] from heaven” (Luke 10:18, Amplified Bible).
We studied in other lessons
that we are SITTING in
heavenly places with Christ NOW! “And raised us up together, and made us SIT together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus”
(Ephesians 2:6).
We also
studied that this is a past tense sitting, in other words, we are already there. Of course, we look at our mortal bodies and the suffering we
are now enduring, and we say, “How can this be?” Remember that this is our legal position in Christ; it is
real, but it is spiritual. This is
where faith comes in. The Word says it, the Devil tries to steal it because we
cannot see it with our eyes nor hear it with our ears, so we must WALK and
STAND until SITTING becomes an experience in our lives.
Well, in the same way, Satan
is SITTING somewhere.
Remember, Satan was a created
being, created as an angel to be a servant of God and man. Instead he rebelled
and he made man his servant. Adam,
the first creation obeyed his own reasoning (Tree of Knowledge of Good and
Evil), instead of God (Tree of Life) and thus became, by default, a servant of
Satan. This was the First Adam.
But there
came the Last Adam.
1 Corinthians 15:45 says, “And so it is written, ‘The first man Adam became a
living being.’ The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.” Jesus was born of the Word of God, not
of the sperm of fallen man. He did
have the nature of the First Creation, the First Adam, but without the taint of
sin. He then lived the sinless
life, overcoming all temptation to become as the First Adam.
At the
Cross of Calvary, Jesus
took into Himself the entire First Race of Adam as its representative. That is why He died as a criminal. 2
Corinthians 5:21 says, “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness
of God in Him.” Satan’s last
potential servant did not serve him!
Jesus bore (took into Himself) all of the First Adam’s race and died and
went to Hell with it.
Our problem is that we are
trapped in TIME. God is in ETERNITY and we can join Him there!
We can, through the eyes of the
Holy Spirit and the Word of God, look into things in the age to come and enjoy
them now and here. If we can get a
view of how this thing ends, and then to know that in God’s eyes and mind it
has already ended, we can then enter into the true ministry to which we have
been called. We are called to take
the “Sword of Truth” and cut off Satan’s head with it. Look at this Scripture.
Ephesians 3:8-11 says, “To me, who am
less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should
preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all
see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages
has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ; to the
intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church
to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which He
accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
What is the truth?
Obviously, God did not annihilate
Satan at the Cross, but the Bible says that He defeated him there., Jesus spoiled
principalities and powers at the cross. Colossians 2:15 says, “Having disarmed
principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over
them in it.” How did this defeat
take place?
The
defeat was just this:
when Jesus was resurrected, He was made a New Creation. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore, if
anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold,
all things have become new.” This
New Creation is a new race of beings that never existed before. The word ‘new’ in the Greek language does not mean renewed, but
means something that never existed before [NEW: of a new kind, unprecedented,
novel, uncommon, unheard of].
This new
race of beings, of
which Jesus is the firstborn, is no longer subject to Satan or the law of sin
and death. Even if we do sin, all
we do is run to Jesus and He removes it.
Satan does not have a chance with us. We are going to be his judge.
We are
free from Death and Sin! Romans 6:3-10 says, “Or do you not know that as many of us as were
baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were
buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from
the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of
life. For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly
we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our
old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with,
that we should no longer be slaves of sin. For he who has died has been freed from
sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,
knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death
no longer has dominion over Him. For the
death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He
lives to God.”
When did this defeat of Satan
happen?
Remember when we ask the question
“when” we are talking about time, and God is before and after time; He is
always NOW.
We could say
that Satan was defeated at the Cross, which took place about 2,000 years ago.
There is a truth in that, but not the entire truth.
Revelation
13:8 (KJV) says, “And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose
names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the
foundation of the world.”
According
to Revelation 13:8 Jesus was crucified before He formed the earth. Remember, to One Who is not limited by time, cause and
effect can be reversed.
Isaiah 65:24 (KJV)
says, “And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and
while they are yet speaking, I will hear.”
So in
reality, Satan was defeated before he was created! You
were redeemed before you sinned.
This
does not seem fair, but God is just. Remember Jude
6 indicates that demons are being kept in darkness, which is the opposite of
light. They do not have the
advantage of being over and above time like God (and us). They are trapped in time.
Jude 6 says,
“And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode,
He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of a
great day.”
Satan has had
a mark on him since he was created, it must have been somewhere on him that his
eyes could not see; the mark said, “Crucified before Created”.
1 Corinthians
2:7-9 says, “But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom
which God ordained before the ages for our glory, which none of the rulers of
this age knew; for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written,
‘Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man, the
things which God has prepared for those who love Him.’”
When the world
is getting you down, raise your voice with these verses:
Galatians 2:20
(KJV) says, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but
Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the
faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.”
Galatians 6:14
says, “But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”
O Death where is your sting?
Death is a General in the
army of Satan. Death comes to take people to Hell when
they die. He escorts them into
eternal misery. But for the
believer in Jesus Christ, Death has no dominion. He cannot come to escort a believer anywhere. When a believer begins to die,
something happens. Death is
standing there waiting, but just then an angel dispatched by Jesus shows up and
escorts us into the presence of God.
Just like Stephen when he was stoned never tasted death, so we will not.
Hebrews 2:9
says, “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the
suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God,
might taste death for everyone.”
Hebrews 2:14
says, “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself
likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had
the power of death, that is, the devil.”
Death
has been annulled. 2
Timothy 1:10b (Amplified Bible) says, “…Christ Jesus, Who annulled death and made it of no effect and
brought life and immortality (immunity from eternal death) to light through the
Gospel.
1 Timothy 6:16
(Amplified Bible) says, “Who alone has immortality [in the sense of exemption
from every kind of death] and lives in unapproachable light, Whom no man has
ever seen or can see. Unto Him be
honor and everlasting power and dominion. Amen (so be it).”
Satan’s destination
Revelation 20:9-10 says, “They went up on the breadth of the earth and surrounded
the camp of the saints and the beloved city. And fire came down from God out of
heaven and devoured them. The devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake
of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are. And they will
be tormented day and night forever and ever.”
We get even!
Revelation 3:9 (KJV) says,
“Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews,
and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before
thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee.”