Hello,

Could you please give me a reply in regard to a question about your faith\teachings. I would like to know what you state\believe the devil is.

I would also like to know if you believe God motivates people to do evil? Such as the following verse would\could seem to suggest.

2Sa 7:14 I will be his father, and he shall be my son. If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men:

As to is, was, will be – do you mean that you always were or that you can and will “become” one with who always was and always is (that which is born of God does not sin).

I, too, read and have been given an understanding of the scriptures according to the Spirit that “gives” life.

If you find my questions odd or bothersome please forgive me. I just would like to know these things first. There is much to read on the web site, and much of it is meant to show that there is another understanding than the literal, but it does not really speak out to what is exactly what. I am sure it does some where in your messages but searching them all for just these questions to be clearly answered is very time consuming. I read some things on the web page but they do not really address my questions. At least the one’s I read did not reveal to me the answers to these questions.

Thank you very much,

K____

Hi K____,

Thank you for your questions. They were three:

1) “Could you please give me a reply in regard to a question about your faith\teachings. I would like to know what you state\believe the devil is.

2) I would also like to know if you believe God motivates people to do evil? Such as the verse below would\could seem to suggest.

2Sa 7:14 I will be his father, and he shall be my son. If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men:

3) As to is, was will be, do you mean that you always were or that you can and will “become” one with who always was and always is (that which is born of God does not sin).

Your first question is:

I would like to know what you state\believe the devil is.

You say at the end of your questions:

If you find my questions odd or bothersome please forgive me.

I never consider any honest truth-seeking question to be either odd or bothersome. God sent you to us, and I want only to minister to your questions and to help you to better see the mind of Christ on any issue of which you are led to sincerely inquire. Having said that, I must add that what “[I] believe/state”, is of no more value than what anyone else believes or states. What is of great value is “That which is written”:

1Co 4:6 And these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and to Apollos for your sakes; that ye might learn in us not to think[…] above that which is written, that no one of you be puffed up for one against another.

So”that which is written” concerning the devil is that God created him to be the, devil, the tempter, the adversary and the destroyer as these verses demonstrate:

Isa 54:16 Behold, I have created the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire, and that bringeth forth an instrument for his work; and I have created the waster to destroy.

Mat 4:3 And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.

1Ti 5:14 I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.

Here in Isaiah 54:16 we are told that the “waster [was] created… to destroy”. He was not created perfected to ‘fall’ and become a “waster”. He was “created [as] the waster to destroy”.

We see Satan doing what he is sent by God to do in 1Sa 16:14, and in Job 1 and 2:

Job 1:12 And the LORD said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of the LORD [and did exactly what he was sent by the Lord to do. Nothing more and nothing less].

1Sa 16:14 But the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD troubled him.

A most revealing event takes place in the New Testament where Satan enters into Judas only “after the sop”:

Joh 13:27 And after the sop Satan entered into him. Then said Jesus unto him, That thou doest, do quickly.

This verse demonstrates the fallacy of the doctrine which teaches that Satan is nothing more than our flesh. The teaching of scripture is the exact opposite:

Eph 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

It was God’s own hand which “formed the crooked serpent:

Job 26:13 By his spirit he hath garnished the heavens; his hand hath formed the crooked serpent.

So God created the waster to destroy, as he destroyed all Job possessed, and did not touch Job himself until he was sent by God to touch Job’s body and afflict Job with boils.

Your second question is:

I would also like to know if you believe God motivates people to do evil? Such as…2Sa 7:14 I will be his father, and he shall be my son. If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men:

The answer to this question is easily demonstrated throughout scriptures every time we read of how the Lord sent an evil spirit to do His bidding such as:

1Sa 16:14 But the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD troubled him.

This verse demonstrates that no evil spirits are free from the will of God, but that God really is “working all things after the counsel of His own will”, even when we seem to be making decisions which are our own and which are contrary to His commandments.

Eph 1:11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

The story of Joseph and his brothers is a very good example of how God is working all things after the counsel of His own will, while at the same time leading us to believe we have free will. Notice how Joseph twice acknowledges that his brothers chose to sell him into Egypt, but in the very same breath he tells them this:

Gen 45:4 And Joseph said unto his brethren, Come near to me, I pray you. And they came near. And he said, I am Joseph your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt.
Gen 45:5 Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life.
Gen 45:6 For these two years hath the famine been in the land: and yet there are five years, in the which there shall neither be earing nor harvest.
Gen 45:7 And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance.
Gen 45:8 So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.

So, did Joseph’s brothers have a will? Absolutely, they did have a will and they exercised their will, and Joseph twice acknowledges that they did so:

Gen 45: 4 (b) …I am Joseph your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt.
Gen 45:5 Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither:

Those words “you sold me hither (here)” certainly make it sound as if Joseph’s brothers chose of their own free will to sell him into Egypt. They certainly felt they had made that choice of their own free will, and that is the way we all feel as we go about our lives making what appear to be thousands of decisions every day based upon what appears to the natural man to be his own free will. But what do the scriptures reveal to be the truth of our every decision? Here are but a few of the scriptural answers to that question, beginning with what Joseph reveals to us about what appeared to be the free will decision of his brothers selling him into Egypt:

Gen 45:7 And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance.
Gen 45:8 So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.

That is but one of many Biblical verses which tell us that our sins, which appear to be of our own choosing, are not really our own sins at all. Rather the scriptures teach that our every sin “is not [we] that do it but sin which dwells in our members”, and therefore even our sins are all a work of God, via a law that is always working in the flesh of every man and via spirits which the Lord has given to rule over us by means of this law which God Himself gave us and which He Himself sustains within us.

Here is that Biblical doctrine for all to read and believe if God has given them eyes that see and ears that hear:

Rom 7:17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
Rom 7:21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
Rom 7:22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
Rom 7:23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members,.

There is something called “the law of sin” which works “in our members”. Who gave and sustains “the law of sin”? Here is the Biblical answer to that question:

Isa 33:22 For the LORD is our judge, the LORD is our lawgiver, the LORD is our king; he will save us.

Jas 4:12 There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another?

These verses explain why we are told that God “makes all things for Himself, Yes even the wicked” man with each of us “for the day of evil” within each of us as per Romans seven:

Pro 16:4 The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

Your question is, “Does God motivate people to do evil”. The scriptural answer is that He does not do so Himself.

Jas 1:13 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted by God, for God is without temptation of evils, and he himself tempts no man.

God Himself tempts no man, but He sends evil spirits to do so as He did with Joseph’s brothers (Gen 45:4-8), with King Saul (1Sa 16:14-15), and with Job in Job 1 and 2.

Here is the direct scriptural answer to your question:

Isa 63:17 O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

Your third question was:

3) As to is, was, will be, do you mean that you always were or that you can and will “become” one with who always was and always is (that which is born of God does not sin).

The phrase “is, was, and is to come” is found 12 times in the book of the revelation of Jesus Christ, and it refers to Christ Himself, as “the beginning of the creation of God” (Rev 3:14). All things were created by Him, and for Him, and in Him all things consist simply because “it pleased the Father” for it to be so:

Col 1:15 Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:
Col 1:16 For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:
Col 1:17 And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.
Col 1:18 And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.
Col 1:19 For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell;

Christ is, was and will be:

Rev 1:4 John to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace be unto you, and peace, from him which is, and which was, and which is to come; and from the seven Spirits which are before his throne;

Rev 1:8 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.

Rev 1:18 I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.

In John 1:1 we read:

Joh 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

That being True, Christ’s Words are, were and will be, and He told us:

Mat 24:35 Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.

That is what ‘is, was, and will be”, means. Christ and His Word are, were, and will be.

If you are asking if I believe in the false doctrine of circularity or if I believe that I or anyone other than Christ and His Father preexisted, the answer is an emphatic, no, I do not!!!

That is the very purpose for Christ asking Job:

Job 38:4 Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding.

If “the sons of God” of verse 7 referred to mankind, then Job could well have said, ‘I was right there shouting for joy’, instead Job said “I am vile… I will place my hand on my mouth”, as well he should.

Job 38:7 When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

The fact that Satan came to Adam and Eve in the form of the serpent proves the spirit world was “the sons of God”, for God is said to be “the father of spirits”, good and evil, and it was they who were there, for the fowls of the air, which Christ tells us typify the evil one, were created on the fifth day, the day before God created mankind along with all the other beasts of the earth:

Mat 13:4 And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up:

Mat 13:19 When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and understandeth it not, then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart. This is he which received seed by the way side.

“The wicked one… the fowls” were created on the fifth day to fly in the heavens of the earth, and we are the “earth” with its heavens:

Gen 1:21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:22 And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
Gen 1:23 And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

Jer 22:1 Thus saith the LORD; Go down to the house of the king of Judah, and speak there this word,
Jer 22:2 And say, Hear the word of the LORD, O king of Judah, that sittest upon the throne of David, thou, and thy servants, and thy people that enter in by these gates:

These words are addressed to God’s own people. Now notice what we are called in verse 29:

Jer 22:29 O earth, earth, earth, hear the word of the LORD.

So ‘is, was, and will be’ refers to Christ and His Words by which all mankind will live in their own order (Mat 4:4 and 1Co 15:23)

I hope these verses serve to answer your questions.

Your brother in Christ’s service,

Mike