MID-WEEK MANNA FROM PASTOR NAT’S DESK:
January 11, 2023
GOD’S SAVING ENMITY
Part 2
The new principle of enmity (or hatred, antagonism, variance, etc.) between fallen mankind and Satan beginning at Eden (Gen. 3:15), is the first of the divinely-endowed supernatural powers given to man to wage a successful warfare against sin and Satan.
The second one was grace, amazing, empowering grace indeed! “The divine INFLUENCE upon the heart and its manifestation in the life” so that “where sin abound grace MUCH MORE abounds.” (Rom. 5:20).
Sin is of Satan. Grace is from God. In Christ’s current kingdom of grace and righteousness, we cannot serve both God and mammon” or “two masters for we either hate one or love the other” (Matt. 6:24; Luke 16:8-13).
This enmity and grace were not selectively given to certain dispensations or generation nor only to certain select few but to “every nation, kindred, tongue, or people, members of the human family for “God is no respecter of persons” but to fallen mankind!
But it is only when one studies the creation account of the Bible that he will come to understand these saving truths. Evolution is devoid of any such divine powers and hope of eternal salvation in its forlorn and hollow entirety.
Man was created a free moral agent to choose rationally and willingly who to obey and what to believe. And the conscience is at the core of this faculty. Thus choose wisely for your eternal happiness and destiny depends upon it. It is only in this profound, Biblical spiritual sense that you become the “master of your destiny.” Hence, “Choose ye this day whom ye will serve.”
In the great controversy that has been raging on earth since the fall of man in Eden six thousand years ago, no natural enmity exists between EVIL MEN AND FALLEN ANGELS! They are in league. Note the following (all emphasis and words in brackets mine):
GC 505; Te 284: “Satan tempted man to sin, as he had caused angels to rebel [in heaven, Rev. 12:4,7-9] that he might thus secure co-operation in his warfare against Heaven. There was NO dissension between himself and the fallen angels as regards THEIR HATRED [enmity] OF CHRIST; while on all other points there was DISCORD, they were firmly UNITED in opposing the authority of the Ruler of the universe.
“But when Satan heard the declaration that ENMITY should exist between him and the woman, and between his seed and her seed, he KNEW that his efforts to DEPRAVE human nature would be INTERRUPTED [not instantly cut off]; that by some means [fallen, sinful] men would be ENABLED to resist his power
NOTE: Satan immediately “knew” at Eden that Adam and Eve and their “seed” would not be totally helpless against him because of God’s declaration. In these last days he also “knows his time is short.” Prophecy not merely declares but warns us: “WOE to the inhabitants of the EARTH and of the sea [whole creation] for the devil is come down upon you, having GREAT WRATH, because he KNOWETH that he hath but a short time.!” (Rev. 12: 12, KJV). This helps explain the mysterious intensifying “enmity”of all kinds manifesting itself at all levels in our world today!
“Satan’s ENMITY AGAINST THE HUMAN RACE is kindled, because, through Christ, they are the SUBJECTS of God’s love and mercy. He desires to THWART the divine plan for men’s redemption, to cast DISHONOR upon God, by defacing and defiling His handiwork; he would cause GRIEF in heaven, and fill the EARTH with woe and desolation [through the overspreading curse of sin and it’s exceeding sinfulness and malignant nature]. And he points to all these evil as a RESULT OF GOD’S WORK IN CREATING MAN. “ E. G. White, Great Controversy, 1911, Pacific Press Publishing Asso., pp, 505-6.
This is what Satan, “the father of lies and murderer from the beginning,” the master “tempter” and “accuser of the brethren” does for a living before he is finally destroyed at the end of the. true Biblical millenium (which commences at Christ’s glorious second coming). And so does his “seed.” Indeed, “by their fruits you shall know them!”
To be continued next MWM, God willing. Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Bless all, NMF.