The Nature of the Devil

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Well good evening everyone.
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We are continuing our study of the subject of angels and as I have mentioned in weeks previous, I know we've had a few weeks off and I appreciate Brother Andy teaching for me during camp and then of course last week we took and did a dual class with the academy so we didn't, it's been several weeks since we've been in this study together and you will remember that we've been on the study of angels and I said within the study of angels, which we would call angelology, and no I didn't make that up, it just is what it's called in the grand scheme of systematic theology, under the heading of angelology there are two subsections.
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The first is called Satanology and the second is called Demonology and so in our last study we began Satanology, which basically all putting o-l-o-g-y on the end of something means is to mean the study of that thing.
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Biology is the study of life, because bios is the word for life and so on.
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So Satanology is simply the study of Satan.
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Why would we study Satan? Well because he's in the Bible, we want to know what the Bible says about everything that we can know and moreover we want to know this particular subject because we are at war.
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We've been at war ever since Adam and Eve chose to eat of the tree, which was a sin, it was the first sin, it was the great sin and it was what drove a wedge between mankind and God.
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There are some great illustrations that have been used over the years, one of the illustrations is that between man and God there is an impassable gulf and that gulf cannot be jumped over, it cannot be climbed down and walked through and we cannot build a bridge and walk over it.
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The gulf is too far and that gulf is the gulf of sin.
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And the illustration goes on to say when Jesus came he died on the cross and in doing so metaphorically took the wood of the cross and built a bridge for us that we could go back to the relationship with God only by one way, that being the way of the cross.
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So I say all this only to remind us of just how devilish the devil is.
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In doing what he did, in tempting man to evil, he brought man into a condition of enmity with God.
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Sometimes I talk to unbelievers and I'll just listen to them talk about God as if he is their buddy.
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They talk about God as if he is somehow in a good relationship with them and I'm reminded of what the Bible says, we who are not in Christ are outside of Christ and those who are outside of Christ are at war with God.
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And who is the champion of that side? Satan himself.
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He is the first to go to war with God.
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He was the first to establish a coalition against God and he is the one who continues to want to build his side.
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Not for the sake of anything except for his own vain glory.
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That he would not be in hell alone.
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The Bible says hell was created for Satan and his angels.
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Well, Satan was not satisfied with that.
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He wants man, God's crowning achievement, God's crowning creation to be there with him.
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So that's why we study.
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To know our enemy and to know with whom we are at war.
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Last time in our study, if you look at your sheet, we looked at the existence of Satan.
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And what did we say? Satan is mentioned in seven of the Old Testament books and he is mentioned by every New Testament writer.
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So what does that tell us about Satan? The Bible assumes his existence.
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It's not as if we have to wonder, well, what does the Bible think about the devil? In fact, this past week, I'm doing a series on Heaven and Hell begins this week.
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It's called Our Eternal Destiny.
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It's four weeks on the subject of Heaven and Hell.
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And I was looking at books that I could read to help come alongside my Bible study in preparation for this series.
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And I looked up a book by a man and it caught my eye.
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It seemed kind of interesting.
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So I began to read some of the reviews of the book.
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I often do that, especially if I don't know the author.
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I will read the reviews and try to learn as much as I can before I dive into the author's book.
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Learn more about him.
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And one of the things that the reviews said turned me off immediately and meant I didn't have to go any further.
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As one of the reviewers said, this particular author, I don't remember his name, or I would tell you, this particular author does not believe in the devil.
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It said in the review, he believes that the devil is an impersonal force of evil, is the personification of evil, but is not an actual being of rationality or intellect or will, which we're going to talk about later is how we know the devil is a being.
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And so I said, you know what, I don't need to go any further.
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Not that the man wouldn't have anything that he could possibly teach me, but I am limited on my time and so I choose not to engage with a lot of books with people who I know are already denying what the Bible clearly teaches.
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So I chose to move on to another book.
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If you don't believe the devil exists, you've got a problem with the Bible.
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It's just as simple as that.
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You don't have a problem with me.
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You don't really have a problem with this church.
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If you don't believe the devil exists, you have a problem with the Word of God.
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I interpret it different than you.
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Well, we're going to see tonight.
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It's hard to interpret any different than what the text seems to clearly say.
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But for the sake of that, let's move on to the second point because we've looked at the existence of Satan tonight.
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That was what we did last time.
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We're going to look tonight at the personality and names of Satan.
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And this is how I believe and I believe that I can prove, if that is the word to use, that he is a person and not just an impersonal title or name or picture or a metaphor for evil.
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The first is, how do we define it? Let's see if you guys remember this.
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How do we define personality? Personality.
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We did this with the Holy Spirit of God.
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We've done this with angels.
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We said there are three markers which prove, because we said the Holy Spirit.
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Some people don't believe the Holy Spirit is personal.
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They believe the Holy Spirit is a force.
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And what do we say? No, the Bible clearly shows the personality of the Holy Spirit.
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But how? What three ways show? Intellect, emotion, and will.
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Is that what you're saying, Rosanna? Yeah, the first is intellect.
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Intellect, emotion, and will are the three characteristics of personal beings.
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Rocks do not have intellect.
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You ever heard of somebody that was dumb as a box of rocks? Well, that's why you say that.
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Well, maybe you shouldn't say that, because that's mean.
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But you know why you say it? Because rocks don't have any intellect.
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Emotion, you have, say somebody's cold as ice.
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Why? Because ice doesn't have, well, ice is cold, but at the same time, it doesn't have any emotion.
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And that's why you use the metaphoric language.
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There's cold as ice.
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And then will.
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I've talked about this with animals.
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Animals do not function on will.
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Animals function on instinct.
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This is why we don't accuse animals of rape.
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In the human world, if a male overcomes a female against her will and satisfies himself with her, we call that rape, because he has a will and she violated it.
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In the animal kingdom, we don't call it rape.
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Well, maybe you do, but typically and historically, we have not identified what happens in the animal kingdom as rape, because we understand that animals do not function with a will, like humans function with a will.
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We understand the difference.
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This is why I would say animals are certainly, they certainly have some type of intellect.
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They certainly have some emotions.
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Elephants are very emotional creatures.
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I don't know if you've ever looked at the National Geographic.
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When an elephant dies, the other elephants come around and almost have like a funeral for the other elephant who died.
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But they really don't function out of the type of will that we talk about with human will.
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Human will is more than simple instinct.
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Human will is part of how we are in the image of God.
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Our will has been damaged by the fall.
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Our will is no longer free in the sense that we're not simply free to do right because we're so damaged by sin.
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We have a fallen will, but we do have a will.
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Men make decisions and their decisions not always based on instinct, but they're based on intellect and they're based on emotion.
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You ever made an emotional decision that wasn't really based on your intellect? Do you often make decisions based on your emotions rather than your intellect? Yeah, right? So that's what we mean.
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And that's why I stress this threefold concept of personality.
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Because I really think that if you get this, you'll understand why we press the nature of the Holy Spirit, the nature of the angels, and the nature of Satan as personal.
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Yes, ma'am.
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Well, it's getting a little off the subject.
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No, you're fine, but I could chase this rabbit for the next 45 minutes.
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So for the simple answer is that man does have imprinted on his heart the law of God.
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Romans chapter 2 tells us that very clearly.
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That when a man does what he knows to be right because of the law of God, he shows that the law is written in his heart.
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Because God has done that.
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This is why no person can have an excuse when they face the final judgment and say, I didn't know that was wrong.
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Because God has placed within every man the understanding of right and wrong.
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The problem is our fallen nature longs for and yearns for the wrong.
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That's the problem is we don't want what's right.
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We want what's pleasurable.
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And often what's pleasurable is not what's right.
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I think Satan has something to do with that.
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I really do.
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I think Satan is part of the reason why all the good food is bad for me.
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He about choked on his coffee.
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Yeah, it is funny how so many things that are would be considered pleasurable are bad.
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Either they're bad for your body or they're bad for your soul.
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And I think the devil has had his hand in that.
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Men are really good at creating evil.
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In fact, that's what the one of the sins in Romans 1 that talks about when it's going through that list of sins, one of them on the list inventors of evil, coming up with new ways to be bad.
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And Satan is a part of all that.
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He wants to give us new ideas on how to be opposed to the will of God.
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So let's look at three verses to show the intellect, emotion, and will of Satan.
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Uh, if you want to write these down, the first one is in second Corinthians chapter 11 and verse three.
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I'm still kind of getting over a little frog in my throat.
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So forgive me if I, uh, if I don't sound like my usual self, plus I'm getting used to this.
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I feel like I'm driving a semi.
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It really is like I got my hands on the steering wheel of a big, uh, big rig.
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Okay.
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Uh, second Corinthians 11 verse three.
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Uh, the apostle Paul is speaking.
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Um, he's asking the people to bear with him.
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And he talks about how he betrothed, uh, uh, since I betrothed you to one husband to present you as a pure virgin to Christ verse three, but I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.
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Let me ask you a question.
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Does anybody have any other translation other than the ESV? What does your say, sir? When it says cunning, what does the translation say there at second Corinthians? I'll give you a second to get there.
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Does anybody else have, what do you have sister craftiness? That's a great.
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Yeah.
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And what translation is that? That's the new American standard version.
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Okay.
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So the mayor of the new American says craftiness and, um, the ESV says cunning.
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And, uh, what does yours, what is yours brother? Yeah.
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It says subtlety, but I fear least by any means as the serpent through his subtlety.
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Okay.
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Subtlety is the word there.
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Okay.
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Yeah.
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It's a set.
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Yeah.
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And does anybody else have anything else? Simplicity.
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Okay.
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All right.
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So right here, the point I'm trying to make is that this, all of these words are words that would equate to intellect.
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Satan did what he did because he's pretty smart.
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And you say, are you giving Satan a compliment? No, because he's not using his smarts for, for good.
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I could say Adolf Hitler was pretty smart.
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That don't mean he was good.
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I mean, would you agree that somebody who could take over a whole nation and talk the whole nation into doing something so evil has to be devilishly smart.
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Right.
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And so by using the words cunning or craftiness or what have you, those words all indicate the intellect of Satan.
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He is a crafty devil.
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So that is one argument for his intellect.
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Now for his emotions, his emotions, Revelation chapter 12, verse 17.
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And we have quite a few verses.
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If you want to write these down, you can.
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If you want to try to outrun me and get there before I start, that's fine too.
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But I'm going to read it just so that we can move through these.
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Revelation chapter 12, verse 17.
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This uses the metaphor of the dragon for Satan.
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We know that that is Satan that is spoke of in Revelation chapter 12 and the dragon metaphor.
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It says, then the dragon became furious with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring on those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus.
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And he stood on the sand of the sea.
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All right, just stop right there.
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What does it say happened? Uh, that he became furious.
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He became furious.
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What is fury? Anger, but what is it? It's an emotion, right? So we saw in the last passage that the devil is crafty.
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Therefore he has intellect here.
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He becomes furious.
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Therefore he expresses emotion again, another building block of personality, right? If we're trying to build a case that the devil is personal, not just a force, not just a metaphor, not just a, not just a symbol, but he's symbols don't get mad, right? Metaphors don't get angry, but here Satan, who is being spoken of as a metaphoric, uh, uh, dragon still though in his person is angry.
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So he's smart and mad.
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Okay.
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There are two points for his personality.
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Last is second Timothy chapter two, and this one we're going to camp on for a second.
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So if you do want to jump over there, second Timothy two and verse 26, second Timothy chapter two, the sentence is a long sentence in the ESV.
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It actually starts in verse 24.
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So I'm just going to read from verse 24 and the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome, but kind to everyone able to teach patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness.
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God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth.
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Now stop right there.
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If you ever want a verse that shows that God is the one who gives repentance, that repentance doesn't come from us.
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It comes as a gift from God.
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This is one of the verses.
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Verse 25 clearly says God grants repentance, but then in verse 26, it says this, and they may come to their senses.
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This being the one who was formerly an enemy may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil after being captured by him to do his will.
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Captured by him to do his will.
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So right there, we don't have to wonder.
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The text clearly says Satan has a will.
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You ever think about that? Well, we're talking about God's will.
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In fact, a lot of people spend a lot of time, Pastor, what's God's will? This right here, this is the will of God, your sanctification.
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That's what the Bible says.
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This is the will of God, your sanctification, meaning you're being conformed to the image of his son.
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That's what sanctification means in a nutshell.
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God's will for you is that you would be conformed to Christ.
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That's what he predestined you to, having been predestined to be conformed to the image of Christ, Romans chapter 8.
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That's God's will.
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Now that doesn't mean that you always know God's will at every moment, like should I go to the job in Atlanta or should I take the job in Tucson or whatever.
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That's different.
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But God's ultimate will for you is that you be sanctified.
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What's the devil's will? Whatever the opposite of sanctified is.
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If the definition, if I am correct, and the definition of sanctification is that you be conformed to the image of Christ, then the will of Satan is that you be conformed to whatever would oppose Christ's image.
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That's his will for you.
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He would be happy if you would be deceived.
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He would be happy if you would be deviant in your behavior.
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He would be happy if you were depraved in your thinking because all of those things would be opposed to Jesus Christ's image in you.
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And so the devil has will and he wants you to not be like Christ.
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That's simple enough.
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Nothing I'm saying tonight is tremendously profound.
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It's just true.
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So Satan has intellect, emotion, and will, therefore we can say beyond doubt he is a personal being.
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And on top of that, he's always given that very special thing that only persons are given, and that is he is given the personal pronoun.
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So we'll add to this, he is always called he.
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Remember we said that about the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit is never called it.
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The Holy Spirit is never referred to as a thing.
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The Holy Spirit is always referred to as God, as he, as him.
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Right? That's important because the Jehovah Witnesses will seek to convince you that the Holy Spirit is it.
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It's a spiritual force, not a person.
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Well that same argument is being made about the devil.
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He's not personal.
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He is simply a symbol or a force or a metaphor.
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No.
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The Scripture clearly talks about him and he always when it refers to the devil.
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So not only is he given the intellect, emotion, and will treatment that we've given to the rest, he's also given the treatment of the pronoun.
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But on top of that, I'll just keep building my case.
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You understand this is how I teach, right? I build cases.
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This is because I know what the world does.
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The world tries to tear everything we say down.
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And if we're going to base what we believe on the Word of God, you build your case.
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Sunday I'm going to talk about heaven and hell.
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You know what I'm doing the whole time? I've already written my sermon.
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I mean, I've got to go back and edit some, but the whole sermon is just proving that there's only two destinies.
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There is no third, the title of the sermon, no third option.
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I'm just going to spend the whole time, my whole preaching is going to be showing from the Word of God that you are either going to go to heaven or to hell.
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You say, well that's a simple thing.
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Yeah, it's simple, but not everybody believes it.
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I'm not sure everybody in here believes it.
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I'm not certain.
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Because I think sometimes you live like, we live like we don't believe it.
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Your neighbors, the people to your left and to your right, when you go home tonight, the people on either side of your house, they're either going to heaven or hell.
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They are not, there's no third place for the good old boy.
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Sorry, I'm starting to preach on Sunday.
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Let me get back to this.
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My point is I like to build cases.
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And I'm building a case for the personality of the, we proved the devil exists, now let's prove that he's a person.
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And what else can we use to prove that he's a person? He's given names.
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Not a name, but he has given several names in the scriptures.
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He is called Satan.
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That is a Hebrew word, which means adversary or enemy.
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He is called the devil.
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That word means slanderer.
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Now, the third one I have here, I want to take you to this one because in the weeks ahead, I'm going to be looking at this passage a little bit more thoroughly.
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But for tonight, I just want to introduce it to you.
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Go to Isaiah 14.
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Now, if you know anything about Satanology, if you've ever done a study of Satan in the past, you have probably looked at Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28.
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Because both of those passages have been understood by theologians as being references to Satan in a metaphoric sense.
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Because one is talking about the king of Babylon, the other is talking about the king of Tyre.
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But yet the description that is given to both of them is often said to be an apt description for Satan himself.
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Therefore, Isaiah 14, when it is referring to the king of Babylon, in verse 12, it says this, How you are fallen from heaven, O day star, son of the dawn, how you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low.
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Stop right there.
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Later in the study, we'll go back and look at this whole passage.
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But this is the only verse where you will find the name Lucifer.
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And only if you have a King James Bible will you find the name Lucifer.
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What does it say in the New American Standard Bible, Richard? Does it say Lucifer there? That might be the only other one.
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What does it say? Son of the morning? Isaiah 14, 12? No, the beginning of verse 12.
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Star of the morning? Is that okay? Yeah.
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Alright, so we have son of the dawn, star of the morning.
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Mine says day star, which I think is an awkward translation.
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Okay, so the NKJV maintained the same language.
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How many of you have ever heard of a Luciferian? A Luciferian is a person who is a worshiper of the devil.
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Is it related to a Rastafarian? No, that's Rastafarian.
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That's a person who likes the Jamaican stuff, right? That's Rastafarian.
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No, Luciferian is a person who supposedly worships the devil.
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And it's based on the name Lucifer.
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Yes, sir? Can you please expound on old day star? Yes.
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No, no, no, it's fine.
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Here is why I bring this up.
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And I mention this because most of us are familiar with Lucifer by name because we at some point have been indoctrinated into hearing that name.
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And again, if it were not for its use in the King James Bible, I don't think it would ever have become one of the normal names of Satan.
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This particular word in the Hebrew does mean light or star or morning star, some kind of bright light.
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And that's what Lucifer means.
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We have taken that name and applied it to the devil because we believe this passage refers to the devil.
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You understand? My point is this.
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I don't think that in the first century anybody called the devil Lucifer because it wasn't a name that would have been attributed to him like devil or Satan.
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Lucifer is more of a name that we use because of the King James use in this passage.
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It's nowhere else.
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You won't find Lucifer anywhere else other than the New King James and King James use.
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I'm not saying we shouldn't use the name Lucifer.
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My point is simply this.
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The word meaning is simply the bright one or bright star, day star, however you want to translate it.
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And you say, well, some people take great offense to that and they say, but wait a minute, Jesus is the sun of the morning.
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Jesus is the bright and morning star.
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Are we attributing the name of Jesus to the name of the devil? And some people get very offended and they accuse the newer modern translations of applying the name of Jesus to the name of the devil.
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I think that's one, that's conspiratorial and unnecessary.
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But also, what better would the devil want than to be called by the name that would normally be attributed to Christ? He, the Bible says he disguises himself as an angel of light seeking to deceive.
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So I, you know, I have no problem.
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I don't really like day star.
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It just doesn't sound right.
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I think the new American standard sounds a little better.
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I don't have a problem with using the word Lucifer.
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I'm just simply saying that word is not technically a common, or a specific proper name for the devil.
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And therefore, those who call themselves Luciferians, I think they're basing it on a translational issue.
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Yes.
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That's what some people would, yeah, and they base that on this passage because it says, if you take the King James rendering, how you have fallen from heaven, Lucifer, son of the morning.
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And then it goes on to say how you have been cut down.
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You've laid the nations low.
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You said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven and I will be as God, right? So the idea was that was his name as the angel.
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He was the angel Lucifer prior to becoming Satan, the deceiver.
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I think that is possible.
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I don't think it's necessary.
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It's one of those things where we can infer that, but it's not a necessary inference.
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It's not necessary, it's just a description of before he fell.
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Yeah, yes.
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He's definitely the arch enemy.
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Yeah, absolutely.
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Absolutely.
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That's what they're distinguishing here in my King James version is how are thou cut down, son of the morning.
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Yeah.
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How did you fall from grace? What happened to you? Yeah.
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So again, that could very well be.
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Keith, are you aware that there's a network on television that uses the name Daystar? Oh, Daystar? I thought you were going to talk about the television show Lucifer.
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Yeah, I guess, yeah, you're right.
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Yep, yeah.
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And there's a television show called Lucifer.
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Is there a song? It's called Shine Down On Me.
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Interesting.
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Did you have a question, brother? You know, we've talked in the past, you've talked in the past about the Apostle Paul almost saying stuff sarcastically in Scripture.
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I wonder, and you correct me if I'm wrong.
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I mean, could this be a sarcastic view that the writer is using of Satan? I mean, I'm probably wrong.
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I just thought that, you know.
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I'm not sure where I'd have to look at it.
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I would have to talk about it and see.
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I'm not quite sure if I would see it as sarcasm as much as it simply is a description of his attitude.
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The only reason I said that is what's said next, how you are cut down to the ground.
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You know what I'm saying? It was kind of almost like the writer is presenting old Daystar, son of dawn, how you are cut down.
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I know I'm probably wrong.
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I just kind of thought that.
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Like I said, I'd have to think more on that as far as how I would understand it ironically or sarcastically.
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Again, this particular passage, we have to remember, first and foremost, this is talking about the king of Babylon.
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Any application we make beyond that first has to be limited to what the text is referring to in its immediate context, and the immediate context is the king of Babylon.
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I think that the application can be made to Satan, but like I said earlier, I'm very careful about the inferences that I draw, even if historically people have always seen this because I want to say, well, why did they see it? Did they see it because they naturally read it in the text or because the person before them said, hey, look, you know, there's something to be said for finding things only because someone else points them out.
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Would you, if you were not told this was about the devil and it didn't use the word Lucifer and you were not by nature looking for that passage, would you have known that this passage is referring to the devil? Would you infer that from the text? Again, now I'm getting well past what I wanted to talk about tonight as I was going to address this in a later lesson.
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This passage and the passage in Isaiah I believe can be referring to the devil certainly, but I think that that's a secondary application.
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The primary point, the focus is the king of Babylon and the king of Tyre.
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I say that only because we have to be fair to the text.
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You will rarely hear me say that we can just simply come at this and put in what we want.
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I never say that.
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We have to pull out what's there.
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That's what this whole study we've been doing at Sovereign Grace Academy, and so we have to be careful.
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I'm not saying that it's not about the devil.
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I believe it is, but we have to say what is it saying first and pull out what it says, not introduce something it doesn't say.
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So again, that's Lucifer.
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That's that one word, one time use in the text.
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Brother Dale? What person did Ezekiel refer to? Ezekiel 28, which again we're going to look at these next week when we look at the fall of Satan.
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Ezekiel 28 verses 11-19.
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Again, these are lamentations over the king of Tyre.
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Like I said, I wanted to get to those next week to look at the fall of Satan, because I do believe what little bit we know about the fall of Satan comes from these passages, because again, we don't have anything else.
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There is nothing in Genesis 1 and there is nothing in Genesis 2 about the creation or the fall of the devil.
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So the only places we can go to, because we know the devil had fallen by Genesis 3, because he's the one who's tempting Eve to sin.
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And some people believe that's his fall.
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That's when he fell, was when he came and tempted Eve.
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But some event had to precede that.
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He had to have some reason for his tempting of the first woman.
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And so what was his reason? He himself had fallen first.
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But when and how? I think that's where Isaiah and Ezekiel shed light.
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They give us light to the fall.
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But again, we have to be careful and say that is our inference.
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And I think it's a good inference, but we have to be careful with our inferences and not take them further than what they say.
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Not say more than the text says.
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We say what the text says.
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Very quickly, there's a lot more names, but I don't have time to go through each one of them.
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He is called Beelzebul.
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He is called Belial, which means lawless.
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He is called the evil one, the tempter, the prince of this world, the god of this age, the prince of the power of the air, the accuser of the brethren, the angel of light, serpent and dragon.
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That's just some of the names that the devil has given.
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But I do, before we leave tonight, I want to look at the nature of Satan.
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I want to do personalities, names, and nature, because next week I would like to do the fall and the activity of Satan.
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Because before I take my break in August, I want to have been completely done with angels, devils, and demons.
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And that way when I come back, we can talk about something else.
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So if you can give me just a few moments to go through the nature of Satan.
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What is the nature of Satan according to scripture? He is an angelic being.
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We know that because he is referred to as having angels of his own, and he is referred to as himself being a spiritual being, but not being a god.
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How do we know Satan is not a god? Come on, that's an easy one.
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How do we know Satan is not a god? There's only one god, and Satan ain't him.
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So that's it.
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We know there's only one god, and Satan is not god, therefore Satan is not a god.
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Satan is therefore a spirit being.
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The only spirit beings that we are given privy to knowing their type is the angelic type.
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And since Satan is referred to as an angel of light, he's referred to as having his own angels, his guard of angels, band of angels, those who followed after him, we can make the simple assertion that he is an angelic being.
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He is a part of an angelic realm, and he is a high one among them.
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This going back to the Ezekiel 28 passage, which talks about him being a high-ranking angel.
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And he is also an enemy of righteousness, the scripture calls him an enemy of righteousness.
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He is a liar, he is an adversary, he is an accuser, he is even a murderer.
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The Bible says he is a murderer.
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John chapter 8 verse 44, Jesus says he was a murderer.
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How is Satan a murderer? Does he go around like Michael Myers and hide in people's closets and jump out and take their lives with a big kitchen knife? No, the Bible describes Satan as a murderer because he is the murderer of souls.
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He is the one who leads men into sin, which kills the soul.
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Do not fear him who can kill the body, but fear him who can cast body and soul into hell, Jesus said.
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Satan does not cast the soul into hell, but Satan prepares the soul for hell.
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God ultimately is the one who will be the final judge.
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Satan is a limited creature.
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He is not God's equal.
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You ever see this symbol? In Eastern philosophy, that symbol usually is black and white, and it's called the yin yang.
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That symbol is used in dualistic religions and dualistic philosophies, wherein they believe that evil and good, or what they would call yin, which is the negative, and yang, which is the positive, or yang is the female, yang is the male.
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There are all kinds of ways to describe it.
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That is the balance that must exist in the universe.
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You ever seen where they stick the needles in you when you get sick? It's called acupuncture.
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What they are doing, at least what they believe they are doing, is they believe your body has channels of energy that exist.
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The energy flows in from the ground.
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It goes through your body and expels back out into the ground.
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What they believe is these channels of energy can be blocked.
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They take a needle and they use it to open the channel of energy by placing it into a pressure point.
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It allows that energy channel to open up.
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You have channels that are in your body, like this one right here, that goes down your arm.
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That is your lung meridian.
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This energy that's supposed to go down, if you have lung problems, they will do work on your lung meridian and that is supposed to somehow heal your body by bringing it into balance.
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So the idea of dualism is balance.
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How many of you have ever seen Star Wars? Star Wars is all about the force, the good light side of the force, and the bad dark side of the force.
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Remember? That's again balance.
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Let me tell you this.
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In scripture, there is no balance between God and the devil.
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The devil is subject to God.
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Do you want proof? Job chapter 1 verse 12.
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In Job chapter 1 verse 12, And the Lord said to Satan, Behold, all that he has is in your hand, only against him.
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Do not stretch out your hand.
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So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.
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Satan could not touch Job lest God allowed it, and Satan could only touch Job to the point God permitted it.
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God is sovereign even over the devil.
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So there is no balancing dualism in the Bible.
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There is a sovereign God, and did you call him a monkey on a leash? Was that the devil? Ape on a leash.
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So I just brought our lesson full circle, brother, because he mentioned that in his devotion tonight, that Satan is like God's ape on a leash.
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He can only go as far as the leash allows.
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And speaking of that, I want to end with this.
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This will be the last thing I say, and then I'll close with prayer.
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Satan is like an ape.
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He is like an animal.
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Not that he is an animal in the sense that he does not have intellect, emotion, and will as we discussed.
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He certainly has that, but he's in this sense.
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He is always referred to as a carnivorous being.
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He is called the serpent.
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He is called a bird who despoils God's harvest.
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He's called a wolf who tries to destroy God's flock.
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He's a lion who tries to devour God's children, and he's a dragon who tries to destroy God's son.
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He is our carnivorous adversary.
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So does he have intellect, emotion, and will? Yes, but he behaves like an evil animal seeking to desire and devour that which is God's.
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All right.
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Thank you for listening.
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Let's pray.
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Father, thank you for tonight, for the time of study.
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I pray that it's been fruitful and will be used to help us to understand our enemy and therefore be able to stand against his wiles.
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And it's in Christ's name we pray.
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Amen.