EXPELLED FROM HEAVEN
How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations!--Isaiah 14:12
The warfare against God's law commenced in heaven. Satan was determined to bring God to his ideas, his way, to force Him to change the law of His government. This was the cause of the war in heaven. Satan worked upon the sympathies of the angelic host by his deceptive attitude, but he was expelled from heaven, and now he is determined to carry out on this earth the plans instituted in heaven. If he can persuade man to be disloyal to the law of God, he will feel that he is revenged upon God.
He strives to instill into the minds of men his masterly deceptions, thus perverting judgment and justice, and trampling down the law of God. This work--the conflict between truth and error--lies at the foundation of the trial and tribulations which the children of God will experience. This is the "trial of their faith." [1 Peter 1:7.]
By pressing upon the soul the idea that God is displeased with us, Satan tries to torture us into unbelief. But we are to "rejoice in the Lord always." [Philippians 4:4] The Lord Jesus is our only hope....
Although God is so high and holy, and though His glory and majesty fills the heavens, yet He looks with pitying tenderness upon all that tremble at His Word. These are the contrite ones. They may feel that they can scarcely hope in His mercy, yet they are the special objects of His care and love.
When you have a plain, "Thus saith the Lord" for your course of action, He will sustain you. (Letter 24, May 19, 1895)
REFLECTION: Satan, who was once an honored angel in heaven, had been ambitious for the more exalted honors which God had bestowed upon his Son. He became envious of Christ, and represented to the angels who honored him as covering cherub that he had not the honor conferred upon him which his position demanded. He asserted that he should be exalted equal in honor with God. (The Review and Herald, February 24, 1874)
How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations!--Isaiah 14:12
The warfare against God's law commenced in heaven. Satan was determined to bring God to his ideas, his way, to force Him to change the law of His government. This was the cause of the war in heaven. Satan worked upon the sympathies of the angelic host by his deceptive attitude, but he was expelled from heaven, and now he is determined to carry out on this earth the plans instituted in heaven. If he can persuade man to be disloyal to the law of God, he will feel that he is revenged upon God.
He strives to instill into the minds of men his masterly deceptions, thus perverting judgment and justice, and trampling down the law of God. This work--the conflict between truth and error--lies at the foundation of the trial and tribulations which the children of God will experience. This is the "trial of their faith." [1 Peter 1:7.]
By pressing upon the soul the idea that God is displeased with us, Satan tries to torture us into unbelief. But we are to "rejoice in the Lord always." [Philippians 4:4] The Lord Jesus is our only hope....
Although God is so high and holy, and though His glory and majesty fills the heavens, yet He looks with pitying tenderness upon all that tremble at His Word. These are the contrite ones. They may feel that they can scarcely hope in His mercy, yet they are the special objects of His care and love.
When you have a plain, "Thus saith the Lord" for your course of action, He will sustain you. (Letter 24, May 19, 1895)
REFLECTION: Satan, who was once an honored angel in heaven, had been ambitious for the more exalted honors which God had bestowed upon his Son. He became envious of Christ, and represented to the angels who honored him as covering cherub that he had not the honor conferred upon him which his position demanded. He asserted that he should be exalted equal in honor with God. (The Review and Herald, February 24, 1874)
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