Verse: You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.’ But you are brought down to Sheol, to the far reaches of the pit. Isaiah 14:13-15
Besides ourselves, Satan is our worst enemy. He runs the system and influence in this world. He is the one who whispers in the ear of those who “guide” our culture towards darkness. He is the one along with his fallen angels who tempts us and tries to take us off the path of following God. This is what he does and how he functions. But where did he come from? Was he always evil? To better understand his attacks, we must better understand him.
Satan was a creation of God and the most beautiful at that. Ezekiel 28:12 says, “You were the signet of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.” God showed so much love and care in his creation of Lucifer. In verse 14 we see that he was placed in a position of honor, “You were an anointed guardian cherub. I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God; in the midst of the stones of fire you walked.” This was how God treated Lucifer, and he loved him.
The next verse reveals the shift, “You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created, till unrighteousness was found in you.” Lucifer would lead a war against God in the heavens taking one-third of the angels with him. Of course, when you fight against God, you lose. And because of this, he was cast down to earth. But why did Lucifer rebel against God?
The verse above shows us the unrighteousness that was found in him. Lucifer wanted to become God. He wanted to be on the throne. It was pride that led him down this path of sinfulness. He was just like us in the sense that we put ourselves on the thrones of our lives rather than the almighty God. We like Lucifer are tempted to become our own god and serve ourselves rather than him. This was the first sin.
So after this Lucifer became better known as Satan, the adversary. His goal has not waned. He still wants to be on the throne of heaven even though he is the god of this earth (2 Corinthians 4:4). It is not good enough for his pride to be lower than God, as we see in the temptation of Jesus, all he wanted was to have the Christ, king of all, bow to him. That is his goal.
We must understand that this is Satan’s goal if we are to effectively fight him. He wants every man to bow to him instead of God. Every one of God’s images bearers that he can entice to join him in hell and judgment is a win. Because that is one more person that chooses to rebel.
Every temptation you face in this world revolves around the aim of putting something else above God. This is Satan’s aim. He is not God and can only be at one place at a time. Yet, his influence on this current world is everywhere. Fight and resist him, with the Spirit because alone we cannot do it, but with Christ all things are possible!
Written By,
John Cooper Jr.
Godly Grunt 6
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