WHO IS LUCIFER
WHO IS LUCIFER?
This name is not heard much these days. But I want you all to know that this creature still exists. He originally was an angel that lived with God in heaven. We have absolutely no clue as to the number of angels who lived there. But he was high up in the hierarchy of the angelic host. He was extremely beautiful and became jealous of God’s supreme authority, and orchestrated a coup to replace God, on His throne. The bible is not definitive as to when Lucifer, who is also known as Satan, fell from heaven, but according to biblical scholars, he had a large following in heaven of a third of the heavenly angelic host. It was clearly before God created the universes that we are all aware of today, because he came to the Garden of Eden in the form of a serpent, to tempt Eve into taking a bite of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
So that is the commonly held history of the former life of this creature. God and two thirds of His angels all fought against Lucifer and his followers, and won the battle, resulting in Lucifer and those angels who he had conned to join his coup to be thrown out of heaven to an exceedingly nasty place called hell. The bible only once refers to him as Lucifer. Every other time, he is called Satan. We are warned that he loves to disguise himself, masquerading as an angel of light.
So, we can all imagine how Satan and his hordes of demons feel about God. It is not hard to believe that he is extremely vitriolic toward God and filled with vengeance. When one studies the bible, one sees how Satan has used men and woman over the centuries to fight against everything that God purposed for the human race. He began that, of course, in the Garden of Eden, lying to Eve about God’s warning that she would die the very day she ate of that fruit. Then, of course, we all know the rest of that story. She took a bite and gave the fruit to Adam, who followed suit. Adam & Eve were created ‘in the image of God,’ as triune beings. They had a body, a soul, and a spirit. It was through the spirit that they were able to communicate and enjoy a relationship with God, who is a Spirit Being. The bible tells us that God created everything for His pleasure. Rev. 4:11 So, it is obvious that God wanted to enjoy a close, meaningful relationship with mankind. He used to walk in the garden with them, in the cool of the day. Gen. 3:8 That is why Adam and Eve were given spirits. That was the most important part of their created being, because it enabled them to relate to God. Their ‘life,’ as God ordained it from the very beginning, was centered on a relationship with their Creator. There is zero pleasure for either party, if there is no meaningful relationship. So, in God’s perspective, Adam and Eve ‘died’ the moment they disobeyed Him and had their spirits taken from them.
The bible shares the history of mankind for several thousand years, through the Old Testament, and it describes how Satan messed up much of God’s plans for His chosen people, the Israelites. God gave those folks Ten Commandments, which, if obeyed, would bring them blessings, but if disobeyed, curses. It often describes in gruesome detail how those curses were orchestrated. God calls Himself, several times through the bible, ‘a God of Justice.’ Is. 30:18 is one example. His justice is never forsaken by His love or compassion. And His love and compassion are never forsaken by His justice. They all work together, in perfect harmony. In the Old Testament the word ‘love’ has been translated from a Hebrew word ahab, which can mean ‘covenant of loyalty.’ It is very easy to see how this picture of ‘love’ was present in many instances throughout the Old Testament. In such cases there was no display of emotion, but rather an act on God’s part which benefited His people. We live in a society which only sees ‘love’ as either a beautiful emotion toward some other person, animal, or even an object, or a sexual act between two people. But when we come to the New Testament, which was originally written in Greek, we find a similar truth. The Greek word from which the New Testament offers us ‘love,’ is agape. That is also a non-emotional love. It is an active love, just like a covenant of loyalty was in the Old Testament. Agape actually means ‘making a choice to choose for the highest good of the other, with no regard for the personal cost of doing so.’ That is most obviously displayed in God sending His Son to go through all that He went through in order to make it possible for Gentiles to be God’s chosen people, as well as Jews. The same can be said of God’s justice, being enacted in sync with His ‘agape love.’ David gave us a not so beautiful picture of God in Psalm five:
For you are not a God who is pleased with wickedness; with you, evil people are not welcome.
The arrogant cannot stand in your presence. You hate all who do wrong;
you destroy those who tell lies. The bloodthirsty and deceitful you, LORD, detest. Ps. 5:4-6
That, of course, does not in any way negate His ‘agape’ love toward us. What it actually does is make us vividly aware of how sin negates any hope of there ever being any relationship between God and mankind. Paul told us the same truth in his letter to the Church at Colosse:
Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. Col. 3:5-6
Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. Col. 1:21.
America is a great example of how Satan does all he can to disrupt God’s plans. We all know that the founders of this great nation were faithful Christians who prayed much about the manner in which to carry out this greatest experiment in history regarding the governance of a people. John Adams said that the constitution was written for a moral and/or religious people, and no good for any other. For a number of years this worked well, and America became the envy of the world. Alex de Tocqueville, a historian and political philosopher in France, was sent by his government to find out how America could possibly have raced ahead of all other countries in almost every aspect of societal living: economical innovation, industrial and commercial enterprise, transport, science, and infrastructure. After checking out most places that he thought would give him the answer his government wanted, and still without an answer, somebody suggested he ought to check out the churches. After attending several churches, he was convinced he had the answer. At the time, the Holiness Movement was sweeping across the nation, and he was heard to say that the pulpits were ‘aflame with righteousness.’ On his return to his home country, he told them: “America is great because Americans are good, and if Americans ever cease being good, America would cease to be great.” I don’t need to ask you why America is not great today, do I?
As time went by, and the nation was torn apart by a violent civil war, those who believed that Christianity demanded holiness, had been conscripted to fight in this war. They faced an enormous challenge and test of their faith. They were commanded to kill people dressed in different colored uniforms. If they were Christians, who knew that such a thing would break the relationship they had with their God, they had to choose either to kill quickly, or be killed by the other colored uniform. I can well imagine many of them chose, in the spur of the moment, earthy life over spiritual life. According to scripture, that ended their status as God’s children. The writer to the Hebrews assured us that we do NOT get a second chance at salvation.
It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace. Heb. 6:4-6
After the civil war, there were many pastors who wanted to grow their flocks as fast as they could, and Satan jumped in with a scheme by which he could draw millions of gullible sinners to hell. He created what I call the ‘Jesus Freaking’ cult. All one had to do to ‘be saved,’ was to believe in, trust, have faith in, come to, or accept Jesus as Lord and Savior. A prayer was compiled where all one had to do was speak or think the above words, and admit that he/she was a sinner, and ask Jesus to forgive his/her sins. No mention of holiness, purity, blamelessness, uprightness, obedience, or knowledge or fear of God, which are all repeatedly demanded throughout the bible. This caught on real fast, and today, is still the favored gospel of most churches. But very sadly, as time went on, Americans started to cease being good, as Satan enticed these pew-warmers and pulpit-bashers to disobey the biblical instructions to be holy as God is holy, to repent [stop sinning] and to get to know God personally, and live a life that pleased God in every way. In fact, we are commanded to live the life that Jesus lived.
We know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands.
Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person.
But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in Him must live as Jesus lived. 1 Jn. 2:3-6
Obviously, that means we do not sin. Obviously, that means we obey everything God or Jesus commanded us to do. Obviously, that means we only do what God tells us to do. In fact, Jesus assured us that we could not be His disciples if we did not obey all that He commanded us. Matt. 28:19-20 You will find that Jesus commanded us to be perfect as God is perfect. Matt. 5:48. Be afraid of God. Matt. 10:28. Stop sinning. Matt. 5:8, 27-30, Jn. 8:34 Give up everything we own. Lk. 14:33. He assured us that it’s not those who call Him Lord who get to heaven, but those who do God’s will. Matt.7:21 Those are just a few that I know without reading the gospels again. I would strongly urge you to read the gospels to see what He commanded you to do. Actually, what I really want to encourage you to do is to start at Genesis one, and carefully and passionately search for God with all your heart. The bible is God’s autobiography. You will NEVER get to heaven if you don’t know God well. Paul made this very clear in his second letter to the Thessalonians, chapter one, verses 8-9.
He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. [Paul’s gospel, which included: come back to your senses as you ought, and stop sinning 1 Cor. 15:34]
It took me about two years to search for God until He revealed Himself to me. Most of that time I was crying out to Him for freedom from a filthy sexual addiction I could not master. I really despised myself for being such a pervert, and I passionately and desperately desired victory. I had fought that filth for decades, shedding many tears as I begged God to set me free, without success. After many months of searching for the truth that would set me free, it suddenly dawned on me [God spoke to me?] that my efforts were totally self-centered. I was more interested in feeling good about myself than I was in getting to know God. I began at Genesis again, and searched for God with all my heart, with the intention of knowing God well enough to know what His will for my life was. As I got to know God, I also learned to fear him in a positive way; just as Jesus commanded us. I was so blown away with who God is that I desperately desired to experience true and meaningful love for Him. All the years of being involved in church leadership, telling others that they must love God, knowing that I did not love Him, simply because I was a sexual pervert, which obviously did NOT please Him, made me feel such a rotten hypocrite. Now that I knew Him, and understood how sin separated me from Him, I had a totally new perspective of sin. When I sinned again, I was so incredibly shattered, disgusted, ashamed, and grieved that I had displeased God. Of course, I begged His forgiveness again. I did not realize that I had repented until the next time I was tempted to sin, and I remembered how rotten I felt the last time, that I just refused to give into the temptation. I then realized that God had set me free, simply because of my passionate desire to love and please Him. The saints of old displayed their repentance by stripping, putting on sackcloth, sitting on dung heaps, throwing dung dust and ashes over themselves for days without eating or drinking. Under the New Covenant, we do not have dung heaps, so James tells us what repentance is like in his letter.
Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. Js. 4:7-10
That made perfect sense to me, the next time I read it. It is a very emotional event, only ever experienced once in anyone’s life time. Of course, it is absolutely essential for salvation, as recorded over and over throughout God’s word. The new Satanic, ‘Jesus Freaking’ cult assures us that repentance is just confessing one’s sins over and over again as we continue to sin. I have heard that taught from pulpits so many times, and it sickened me to the core of my being. I guess it was never actually taught as vividly as I have suggested, but the meaning was there behind the words. They frequently encourage us to ‘keep repenting.’
I do not presume that everybody will experience the exact same things as I did. But I can absolutely assure you that you will never repent if you never get to know God personally, and learn to fear Him.
Moses said to the people, do not be afraid: God has come to test you so that the fear of God will be with you to stop you from sinning. Ex. 20:20
The fear of the LORD leads to life; then one rests content, untouched by trouble. Prov. 19:23
Whoever fears the LORD has a secure fortress, and for their children it will be a refuge. The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, turning a person from sin. Prov. 14:26-27
Who, then, are those who fear the LORD? He will instruct them in the ways they should choose. They will spend their days in prosperity, and their descendants will inherit the land.
The LORD confides in those who fear him; he makes his covenant known to them. Ps. 25:12-14
There are hundreds of other verses that tell us that fearing God is absolutely necessary for salvation. You will find them as you search for God with all your heart. You may think, “Those are all in the Old Testament before Jesus came, Colin.” “Nor so fast,” say’s Colin.
Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right. Acts 10:34-35
Depending on how many hours you spend in your employment or business, it will take you many months to do a systematic study of the bible, as you search for God. I was working a 40+ hour week when I did my search, but I got up at five am, and spent at least two hours in the word. After dinner, I spent at least three hours studying more. I watched very little TV and did not socialize during the week. I attended church for two services each Sunday, and a cell group one week night. You will need to sacrifice some time-consuming activities if you are going to be serious about your search for God. It has to be the highest thing on your bucket list. You must get a respected concordance to help you understand the original meaning of words like ‘believe,’ because Satan’s religion wants you to think it means a mental assent. One other thing that made it easier for me was that our children had all grown up and had left home. Do not neglect essential time spent with children, if you have them with you at home.
I spent two decades in America researching ‘American Christianity,’ between 1992 and 2011. I was greatly disturbed and shocked at the state of the church across America. They all held fast to Satan’s ‘Jesus Freaking’ cult. The lives of church leaders and those of Christian ministry CEO’s were exceedingly ungodly to say the least. I wrote a book after that, sharing my story and the reason why Satan has taken control of America now. Amazon or B & N have ‘A Nation Broken.’ I very strongly encourage you to get it and read it with a hungry heart and open mind. Not because I want some royalties, but because I want you all to experience life in Christ, and America to be healed.
Let me add something here that is extremely important. In my study I was amazed to find that God never hears prayers from sinners. That is obvious when you read Ps. 5:4-6, but I find that nobody who confesses to be a child of God wants to accept that truth. Here are some scriptures that inform you of this very important fact.
if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and TURN FROM THEIR WICKED WAYS, THEN WILL I HEAR from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 2 Chron. 7:14
If I had been aware of sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened; Ps. 66:18
If anyone turns a deaf ear to my instruction, even their prayers are detestable Prov. 28:9
We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly person who does his will. Jn. 9:31
When you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide my face from you. Even if you offer many prayers, I am not listening. Your hands are full of blood! Wash and make yourselves clean. Take your evil deeds out of my sight; stop doing wrong. Learn to do right; seek justice. Is. 1:15-16
He said to me, “Have you seen this, son of man? Is it a trivial matter for the people of America to do the detestable things they are doing here? Must they also fill the land with violence and continually provoke me to anger? Look at them thumbing their noses at me.
Therefore, I will deal with them in anger; I will not look on them with pity or spare them. Although they shout in my ears, I will not listen to them.” Ezek. 8:17-18
This of course totally destroys Satan’s ‘Jesus Freaking’ cult. One must get to know God well enough to learn to fear Him, which will allow one to repent and receive the Holy Spirit for forgiveness of sins. Acts 2:38 Then one lives in Christ where there is no sin;
Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And IN HIM IS NO SIN. NO ONE WHO LIVES IN HIM SINS. No one who sins has either seen him or known him. 1 Jn. 3:4-6 1 Jn. 3:4-6
and God will hear that one’s prayers.
I am praying for y’all, and God hears my prayers!