The Serpent

If you have your Bible, I would invite you to turn with me to Genesis chapter 3. Genesis chapter 3 as we make our way through the first book of the Bible.

Adam and Eve had been created. Adam and Eve probably had a plan. They knew what God had told them to do. They were co-regents, co-equal. They were to be fruitful. They were to multiply. They were to subdue the earth. They were to have dominion over the animals. They knew what God had called them to do. They had a plan, I'm sure. But something happened. Something happened that changed their plans. Today, we want to talk about what happened. Because if we miss this, then we miss what I believe is probably one of the most difficult things for theologians to talk about.

And that is the. The existence of evil in the view of the fact that God is good and everything He does is good. I want to look at the serpent with you this morning.

Spend some time analyzing this individual. And we have a lot of things to cover in a very short period of time. And so we will go very quickly. But we want to cover, first of all, his formation.

His origin, his creation, and move from his formation to his fall, from his fall to his followers. From there to his function. And there, have you leave with two facts that will help solidify, hopefully, your faith. As you embark on a warfare that God has called you to be a soldier in. Okay? First of all, his.

Formation. Where did this serpent come from? We got to look at two things. Number one, his beginning, and number two, his beauty.

To help us understand where everything originated and where it has ended up to today. Turn with me in your Bible at Colossians chapter 1.

Colossians chapter 1. It says in verse number 16, For by Him, that is Christ, all things were created, both in the heavens and on the earth. Visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created by Him and for Him. That verse tells us that God creates everything. There was nothing that is created or that was in existence that God Himself did not create. John 1, verses 1 to 3 express something similar. Exodus chapter 20, verse number 11 says, For in six days God created the heavens and the earth and all that is in them, also the sea and all that's in the sea.

So we know that there was a beginning to this serpent. Back in Colossians chapter 1 verse 16, what we just read, the phrase dominions and thrones and authorities are words that describe angelic beings. That's important. Because God who created angels. Now you're going to ask me when and where did He create the angels? And I'm going to tell you, I don't have the foggiest idea. But I do know this. It was sometime between day one and day number six, somewhere around there. If you go through your Bible, there are three verses that prove day one, day four, or day six.

Take your choice. Job 38 and Psalm 104 deal with day number one, when the morning stars and the sons of God would rejoice when God laid the foundation of the world.

So most people believe that the angels were created on day number one. Because they would rejoice and sing praises to God when he laid the foundation of the earth. That's a good point. So. Some would say that the angels were created on day number one.

Others would say, no, they are created on day four because in Daniel chapter. 8 verse number 10, Judges 5, verse number 20, Jude 13 and Revelation 1:2, the angels are referred to as stars. And because of that, they were created on the same day that God created the luminaries, the sun, the moon, and the stars. That's the argument for day number four. The argument for day number six is Hebrews chapter one, verse number four, that says that angels are ministering spirits, that God has given angels to minister to the needs of man, and therefore they were created on day six after God Made man that they might minister to man.

Good point. Only problem with that is Revelation 5 says that the priority of their ministry is not toward man but toward the worship of God. As they sing praises and glorify his wonderful name. The point is, I don't know which day they were created. I do know that Exodus 20:11 tells me that they were created sometime. Between day one or on day one and day six or on day number six. The point is, they were created. when they were created is not near as important as understanding that everything was created by God, both visible and invisible.

Things in the heavens, things on the earth. Everything was created by God. So the serpent had a beginning. It is not eternal. That is, it didn't always exist. Somebody had to create it. And we know through our study of Genesis chapter 1, it was God who created all things. It had a beginning. Second thing I want you to notice is his beauty.

Alright? His beauty. Not only did he have a beginning, but he had a beautiful. Beginning because God created everything good, and at the end of day number six, He says everything now is very good, it enhances the beauty. Of the serpent. Turn and bring your Bible to Ezekiel chapter 28. Ezekiel chapter 28, the prophet Ezekiel is Prophesying a judgment upon the king of Tyre, a literal king. This was a cruel, vicious king. Who, according to verses 9 and 10 of Ezekiel 28, set himself up as God and claimed to be God.

That's important to understanding verses 12 and following. Because what God does is help us understand what happened behind the king of Tyre. What motivated this king to set himself up as God, to want to be like God. The Spirit of God takes us behind that to help us understand the motivating factor behind the king of Tyre, which is Satan, Lucifer him. Follow with me. Verse number 12. Thus says the Lord God: You had the seal of perfection, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Now this being which is we will see in a moment Lucifer was per in beauty and had the seal of perfection.

It can 't refer to a man. Man is born into sin. Therefore, man is imperfect. But this being was perfect. He was created perfect and beautifully perfect. It goes on to say this: You were in Eden, the garden of God. The king of Tyre was not in Eden, the garden of God. Now, this could refer to the literal Garden of Eden, which, by the way, is very interesting. Because in Revelation chapter 9, for those of you who are with us in our Revelation study on Wednesday nights, there are four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.

And the Euphrates went through where? the Garden of Eden. And there are four angels that ab there and that have been bound there since the fall of man. And we will see through our study of the book of Revelation that God will release them during the trumpet judgments and upon releasing them those four angels will lead 200 million demons to kill one-third of the population of the earth.

That's just for a side note. But it all happened in Eden. Something very significant happened in Eden, and that was the fall of man. And God would bind four significant angels at the great river Euphrates there in the Garden of Eden. But this person was there. Whether it's the Garden of Eden, literally, or the Garden of Eden in paradise in the presence of God, take your choice. But this person Was there. Read on. Every precious stone was your covering: the ruby, the topaz, and the diamond. the beryl, the on, and the jasper, the lapis, laz, the turquoise and the emerald and the gold, the workmanship of your tambourines and fl.

Was in you on the day that you were created, they were prepared. So, on the day of the creation of this individual, he was adorned in jewels and beauty. He had the ability to play. He was the chief musician of heaven. Read on. It says, You were the anointed cherub who covers, and I placed you there. You were on the holy mountain of God. You walked in the midst of the stones of fire, which some commentators believe is the glory of God. You were blameless in your ways. You were beautiful. You were perfect.

You were in the garden of God. You were exactly what God created you to be in all of your beauty. This, my friend, is reference to the serpent in Genesis chapter 3. Something happened. What se is the main point? Number two, the fall.

The fall. Two things I want you to notice: the rebellion and its results. Read on in Ezekiel chapter 28. Until verse number 15, unrighteousness was found in you. By the abundance of your trade, you were internally filled with violence, and you sinned. Therefore, I have cast you as profane from the mountain of God, and I have destroyed you, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty. You corrupted your wisdom by reason of your splendor.

I cast you to the ground. I put you before kings that they may see you. The beauty of this anointed cherub. Went to its head, and therefore he rebelled against God. And that sin led to his downfall: the sin of pride, the sin of arrogance. Christ, through the prophet Ezekiel, would prophesy about the doom of Satan. And if you read Revelation chapter 20, verse number 10, that is the ultimate doom of Satan. The bottomless pit, the abyss, where he will be cast into and tormented forever. Now, let me stop right here for a moment.

Listen very carefully. Do you know that whenever we sin, whenever we sin, we do exactly what Satan did. By saying my will over God's will is that true God has a will. God has a plan for your life. Sometimes you might say, You what? I don't like that plan. I don't like that will. I'm going to do my will. God said, I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto me, which is your reasonable service. Our only logical form of worship is to present our bodies as a living sacrifice.

That's the will of God for our lives. But you know why we don't do that? It's because we have another will. That's my will. I don't want to do that, God. That's going to cost me, and because it's going to cost me my comfort, it's going to come cost me my joy. I have another will. I have a better way. That's the exact same thing Satan said. I have another will. God, my will is better than yours. I'm going to be over the angels. I'm going to rule above you and your glory. I'm going to ascend to the Most High.

I should be the king here. I should rule my own domain. I should not subject myself to your rulership. When we sin, that's exactly what we say. Oh, we won't come out and voice it that way. And yet, at the base of every sin we commit is a sin of pride that says, My way is better than God's way. I know what's best for me, God does it. Therefore, I choose this route. Therefore, I choose to do this sin. I don't care what God says.

Thus, setting ourselves up as what? As God. See, in practical language, we think ourselves as God, that we can control our destiny. And therefore, whenever we sin, we say, God, you don't know what you're talking about. I do. So, therefore, let me make the decisions about my life because I have greater superiority than you do.

That's sin. That's rebellion. And pride is at the base of every sin we commit. So why do things happen the way they do? Why does God allow Satan's rebellion to continue? Stay with me, and I'll tell you why. Okay? The third thing I want you to notice: we've looked at, number one, his formation, his beginning, his beauty.

Number two, his fall, his rebellion, and its results. Number three, I want you to notice his followers.

His followers. Nobody sins solo, my friends. Nobody sins solo. And Satan, according to Revel 12, verse number 4, Revelation 12, verse number 9, took one-third of the angels with him.

I want you to notice three things about his followers. Number one, their past position. Number two, their present situation.

And number three, their future condition. First of all, their past position. They too, the demons, were one-time angelic beings. Demons are fallen angels. That's what demons are. And the Bible says that Satan took one-third of those angels with him when he fell.

They fell from their past position. Their position of being in God with God and worship God and honoring God to a sinful state. Which leads me number two to their present situation.

Where are they now? If they fell way back when, where are they now? Well, if you have your Bible over in Jude, verse number 6. It says this about some of those angels. It says, and angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, he has kept in eternal bonds under darkness. for the judgment of the great day. Well, that tells us that there are some angels, some fallen angels, that are eternally bound in the abyss. And we do know that maybe God could send angels to the abyss because over in Matthew chapter 8, verse number 12, some of the demons were.

That God was going to send them to that abyss and be eternally chained forever. So maybe there were times that God sent them there at different times. I do not know that. But I do know that there are angels there now that have been eternally bound because of their fallen condition. And thirdly, you need to see their future destination.

And that's Matthew 25, verse number 41. Where it says, eternal fire, which has been prepared for the devil and his angels. Matthew 25, of course, is that parable of the sheep and the goats. And God takes the goats and puts them on his left. That's the unbeliever. Takes a sheep, puts them on his right, and says to the goats, depart from me. Into eternal damnation, you who practice lawlessness, and they go to the place that's prepared for the devil. And his angels. The future condition of all angels who are fallen, and Satan himself is the bottomless pit.

They will be tormented forever and ever. never. Well, this is the main point number four: his function. You see, here's the point you need to understand: Satan will do to you only what God allows him to do to you. But God will allow him to afflict you. Did you see that? He will allow Satan to do that to you. But only as far as God lets him, because God is sovereign. Satan has to ask permission. You see, Satan is used. Are you following me? To carry out the purposes of God, Satan is not self-existent, Satan is not sovereign, and Satan is not omnipotent.

That is, he is not all-powerful. He is subject to God's power. Greater is he that is in you, John chapter 4, than he that is in the world. Who's in you? The Spirit of God. And because the Spirit of God is in you, greater are you than he that is in the world, because God has empowered you and will energize you. Satan is not omnipotent, Satan is not omniscient. He doesn't know what's going on in your mind. He doesn't know what you are thinking. And lastly, Satan is not omnipresent. If Satan's here, he ain't out there.

If Satan's in your house, he ain't in my house. Thank God. He is not omnipresent. He can only be at one place at one time. And I got news for you. You know where he is? He's in heaven. Revelation 12, 10, accusing the brethren day and night. That's where Satan is. Praise God, we have an advocate, 1 John 2, who stands in our defense. As Satan says, look what he did. Look what she did. They're not fit to be one of your children. And Jesus Christ stands up and says, I have washed them in the blood of the Lamb.

They are cloaked in my righteousness. And praise be to God that we serve the king of the universe who rules this world and we serve him. Wh leads me to this: the function of Satan. What is this function? And I want to look at it in two categories: one, As he is described in his titles and as he is demonstrated by the various terms in Scripture.

One of the titles he's called is Satan. 52 times he's called Satan. That means adversary. He is not your ally. He is your adversary. He is not even the ally of those who are called Satan worship. He is their adversary as well. Oh, they think they're allies of Satan, but no, he's the evil. One, he's the deceitful one, he is their adversary as well. Oh, he's using them for his purposes, but we he is our adversary, he is not our ally. The Bible says in 1 John chapter, excuse me, John 8:4, that Satan was a murderer from the beginning, from the beginning of man, and all that man, God had designed for man.

Satan himself is a murderer. He wants to murder your life. He wants to destroy your life. If he can't destroy it physically, he'll destroy it spiritually. But because God's sovereign, Satan can't kill you unless God says so.

Because God's in control. John 8:4 says he's a liar, the father of lies. Revelation 12: says he deceiveth the whole world. 1 John 3. 8 says he's a sinner. He that committeth sin is of the devil, for the devil sinneth from the beginning. He's also an imitator. Satan is a classic imitator. He imitates Christ. He's called the angel of light. Heard about those people? Who die and have an out-of-body experience, and they say on TV, I saw a great light. It wasn't God, it was the angel of light. The imitator, Satan, making you believe that after you die and you have this out-of-body experience, all you're going to do is just go to a bright and shining, comfortable place.

He deceives the whole world. You see, Satan doesn't use murderers and drunkards and immoral kinds of people. To accomplish his purposes, he uses the religious people to accomplish his purposes because he's the great imitator. If he can deceive people into thinking they're on the way to heaven, he's got them right where he wants them. Maybe you're deceived this morning. Maybe you think because you parry the right Bible or go to the right church or give a certain amount of money or sing in the choir, man, you are on your way to heaven, man.

You got a good pass to get in. Satan might have been deceiving you all along because he's a master deceiver. He's a classic imitator. That's him. And next week, when we study Genesis chapter 3, if you look at the fall of man, we will see.

How he imitates, how he deceives, how he lies, how he murders, because he is the accuser, he is the evil one. That's his function. Which leads me to these two facts as we close this morning. The first is this, the reality of spiritual conflict.

The reality of spiritual conflict. We're engaged in a battle. We're engaged in a battle, and that battle is not the person sitting next to you. or in front of you, or behind you, or your boss at work, or the person on the road who cuts you off tomorrow morning on the way to work. That is not your enemy. That is not who you war against. The Bible tells us: we wrestle not against flesh and blood. Not against things that are seen, but are things that are unseen. The spiritual forces of wickedness. That's where the battle is.

We need to understand the reality of spiritual conflict. The moment you go through that door. The moment you go through that door this morning, you will face some spiritual conflict. Because Satan wants to destroy your faith, he wants to discourage your life. He wants to get you down in the dumps as far as he can get you. He doesn't want you to walk with God. He doesn't want you to enjoy God. He doesn't want you to be with God. God's word is eternal. It lasts forever. Be a man, woman of the word.

If you are, if you're a man of the word, guess what? It'll change your marriage. It'll change your workplace. It'll change your ministry. It'll change everything you do, everything you view about life. If you're a woman of the Word, it'll change how you raise your kids. It'll change what you do with your husband. It'll change everything you do. Everything. Be anchored in one thing, the truth. Be armed for spiritual conflict. Be alert. Know what's going on. The reality of spiritual conflict. And number two.

Response, your response to the Savior's call. Your response to the Savior's call. Christ said in Matthew 12, verse number 30, He that is not with me is against me. Christ is calling you today to follow him, to serve him, and to honor him. If you're a Christian today, I challenge you to respond to the call of God upon your life. Be a man of the word. Be a woman of the word. That's what you need to be. God's calling you. Follow me. Be with me. But more importantly than that, if you're here today, you're not with God.

Who are you with? You're with Satan. Either you walk in the light. Or you walk in darkness. Who's the Prince of Darkness? Satan himself. Christ says, You're either with me or you're not with me.

Are you with Christ today? Does he know you're one of his children? Do you follow him in obedience? Do you love him more than you love life itself? Are you like Paul for to me to live as Christ, to die as game? Is that you? God's calling you to respond to Him. To follow him. There is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. Christ is on the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me. If you're here today, never given your life to Christ, respond today.

Don't let Satan deceive you anymore. Don't go down the prim path towards eternal torment. Go down the path that says, I'm a follower of Jesus Christ. I will honor Him. I will follow Him. I will glorify His name because God is what it's all about. I tr that you would respond to the call of God today upon your life. That you'd face that spiritual conflict because you're alert, you're armed. And you're anchored in the Word of God. Let's pray.