03_05 What’s Really Going On?

Document #03_05, What’s Really Going On? is another step back document. It looks at the BIG picture, and brings real understanding of the character of our God, and the cosmic importance of what is going on here on earth!

What’s Really Going On That Our Planet is Involved In?

Is the planet we are on caught in a Cosmic Conflict that all the universe is watching?

You see a plane behaving erratically, making senseless turns, coming in over a runway as if to land, then taking to the sky again, and you say, “What’s wrong with the pilot?”
But would you blame the pilot if you knew that a crazed and desperate hijacker was holding a gun at the pilot’s head and threatening the life of every passenger aboard?
Could there be a reason for the chaotic behavior of this planet – a reason we ought to understand before we blame the Pilot?
Is it possible that this planet has been hijacked and that the hijacker – within limits set by the Creator – is calling the shots?

We can depend on our planet as far as the laws of physics are concerned. We travel the heavens in a precision orbit around the sun. Astronauts can count on this earth’s being right where it was supposed to be when they wanted to come back to earth!
Astronauts returning from the moon saw this earth as a beautiful blue sphere – washed with clouds and seas and seemingly brilliantly clean.
From that distance – if you didn’t know – you could never guess the trouble it is in!

The minds of men race ahead of their understanding. Scientists split atoms they cannot even see. But the hearts of men remain unchanged. They make fiery bolts of terror that twist and melt and incinerate an entire city in one short moment. Violence in the heart becomes violence in the streets and in the skies. We stagger along, unable to understand:

WHY? WHY? WHY?

We gasp at the wreckage of a tornado and the broken bodies scattered about. We walk through a hospital corridor and see the faces of the hopeless and helpless. We shed tears over departed loved ones and know that they are no longer with us.

It takes a strong heart not to cry out,

“Is this any way to run a world?
Or is there anybody running it?”

Many a person stands in the darkness, looking up at the starry sky, asking, “If there is a God, why doesn’t He do something? Why doesn’t He put a stop to this nightmare? Is He unconcerned? Doesn’t He care?”

We find it easy to blame God for the world’s heartbreak. But are we misplacing the blame?
God does care! God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son to save us from the evil of this world! “For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved.” John 3: 16, 17.

So we turn to the Bible for the answer as we seek to know the Reason Why.

1. Where did the trouble originate?
Revelation 12, verse 7:
Answer: “There was war in heaven.”

2. Who were the contestants in the original conflict?
Rev.12:7:
Answer: “Michael and His angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels.” Most Bible scholars identify Michael as Christ and Satan as the Dragon.

3. By what other names is the dragon known?
Rev.12:9:
Answer: “That old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world.”

4. What was Satan’s original name before he instigated war against God and
Jesus?
Isaiah 14:12:
Answer: “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning!”

5. What did Lucifer say in his heart?
Isaiah 14:13, 14:
Answer: “For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds: I will be like the Most High.”
So it was lust for power over the beings of the universe – he actually wanted the throne of Jesus for himself!

6. Where, in heaven, was Lucifer?
Ezekiel 28:13 and 14:
Answer: “Thou hast been in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth [in the throne room of God, above the “mercy seat” over the Ten Commandment Law of the Universe] and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God: thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.”

7. Did God create a devil? What did God say to Lucifer?
Ezekiel 28:15:
Answer: “Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.”
So God didn’t create a devil at all. He made Lucifer – a perfect, brilliant, shining angel, in one of the highest positions of service to the throne of God. But Lucifer made a devil out of himself. God, by creating all of His subjects with free will, had taken a tremendous risk. Someone, sometime, might choose evil. Lucifer did! But what triggered this response? Did Lucifer just suddenly decide to lust for power? Or was it a gradual thing?

8. What did God point out to Lucifer as the cause of his change?
Ezekiel 28:17:
Answer: “Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty. Thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness.”
Pride was the source of his lust for power. He wanted the position of Jesus, the Son of God, and believed he should have it!

9. Evidently Satan didn’t win the war. What happened to him?
Rev.12:9:
Answer: “And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.”

10. How did Satan react to his removal from heaven?
Rev.12:12:
Answer: “Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and of the sea! For the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time.”

So the theatre of the conflict moved to earth. Our planet became the new battlefield!

War originated not on this earth, but in heaven. It began with pride in the heart of Lucifer – heaven’s highest angel! But God did not immediately destroy him, as well as one third of the angelic host who were deceived into following him. The created beings of the rest of the universe would have misunderstood such an action. God could not adequately explain the deadly nature of evil, its fearful results, to a universe that had never witnessed its effects. They must see it demonstrated in order to understand it. So God had to permit the dreadful experiment, which involves the unfallen beings of
the entire universe as well as the entire human race on earth.

Did God have any other options? Yes, He could have re-programmed his subjects to function like robots, with keyed-in specific responses. But He wanted, and always will want, a people who can love Him and who choose His Kingdom over that of Satan. And so, God counted the cost and took the great risk.

Has God stood by and taken no action against the cast-out one? No. Even as Jesus created our world, the God-head knew Satan would deceive human-kind on earth into evil. Calvary lay hidden in the Plans of the God-head. Jesus knew full well the devastation sin would bring to His creation. He also fully comprehended the inevitable sentence – death – that must be placed upon all who join Satan in his war against the Kingdom of God.
Therefore, God laid plans to pay that death penalty for all who would reach out and accept it. Only the Creator of a fallen world could pay that penalty for every one of His created beings. Jesus, bearing the cross of our salvation, struggled up the hill to Calvary that we might be redeemed to eternal life!
Satan and all of his followers were now doomed. Satan was revealed to be a murderer from the beginning. Yet he refuses to give up his earthbound captives. He wants to destroy them all – now in spite against Jesus and God the Father!

Soon there will be a final confrontation. The hijacker (the usurper prince) will be overpowered and destroyed at last. And not a soul in all of the universe will misunderstand!

A MOMENT OF MEDITATION

Heavenly Father, thank You for a new understanding of what is going on. Please forgive me for blaming You for this world’s trouble and woe. Thank You for letting me know that You do care about us and that Jesus gained the ultimate victory over Satan at the cross of Calvary. Now help me to love You and trust You to finish off the reign of evil on this planet and bring in the Kingdom of my Lord and Saviour Jesus! Even so,
Come, Lord Jesus!
Amen.

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