We’ll be addressing the Old Testament God and where evil came from and what God intends to do about it.

<p>We’ll be addressing the Old Testament God and where evil came from and what God intends to do about it.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

CORE Evangelism School

Dee Casper

Does God Care? - Part 1

So let's pray and we'll begin our study again entitled, Does God Care?

God in heaven, I thank you so much that you are not intimidated or scared by our heavy, heartfelt questions in the midst of pain and difficulty, and in the midst of this great controversy between good and evil.

And so as we start a two-part process of addressing the issue of, does God care regarding the existence of evil and what's going on?

Lord, I pray that you would bless us with fresh insights, that you would bless us with clarity from your Word.

And Lord, I pray that you would speak with power and conviction and clarity for the benefit of the hearers.

And so I ask that you would do this for us now and thank you in advance, in Jesus' name.

Again, the problem of evil is the first part here of Does God Care?

Let's go ahead and go straight to Revelation chapter 12, where this whole thing went south, how this whole thing began.

And some of these texts may be familiar, but we're going to use some unfamiliar texts as well, but we just need to lay a groundwork addressing the issue of the existence of evil, where things all went wrong.

Revelation chapter 12, and we're going to begin in verse 7 through 9, then we'll jump back to verses 3 through 4 just to make 1 quick reference, and then we'll keep going.

Okay, so Revelation chapter 12 verses 7 through 9 says this, and war broke out in heaven.

We are 6 words in and we're already, you know, our mouths are gaping open.

War and heaven are not 2 things that should go together in the same equation, right?

Heaven is a place of peace, of Edenic glory and joy and so forth, but yet the Bible says that war broke out of all places in heaven.

And it says, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer.

So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world.

He was cast to the earth and his angels were cast out with him.

So there's a war that takes place in heaven between Christ and Satan.

Satan's angels, a third of the angels end up taking Satan's side.

They sympathize with him and they are cast out, we're told.

But go back to verses 3 and 4, we see that it says a third of the angels go with him.

It says, another sign in verse 3, appeared in heaven, behold, a great fiery red dragon, having 7 heads and 10 horns and 7 diadems on his heads, he has tailed you a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth." He's talking about the same event, Satan represented as a dragon here, and a third of the angels are cast out with him.

But here's the big thing I want to address here.

The word war that's used in the original language is the word polemos.

Our word for politics and polemics come from this Greek root word.

Both of those involve verbal disputation, political nonsense, right, bartering back and forth.

And so the idea here is it is primarily a war of words that took place in heaven, a war of ideas.

Now there certainly is a physical element.

If a third of the angels are removed from heaven, I doubt that was a peaceful event.

But this is largely a war of ideas and a war of words that we see in Revelation chapter 12 that's alluded to.

Okay, now we get some more insight into what went on in this war, how it began, in Isaiah chapter 14.

So go to Isaiah chapter 14, the Old Testament, the first of the major prophets, Isaiah chapter 14, and we're gonna see some of the reasons for this, and then we'll unpack it from another text to get even more clarity on what's going on.

But Isaiah chapter 14, beginning of verse 12, says this, "'How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning.'" Lucifer means day star.

And it says, "'How you were cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations.

For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven.

I will exalt my throne above the stars of God.

I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north.

I will ascend above the heights of the clouds.

I will be like the Most High." Then it says, "...yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the lowest depths of the pit." Now, the first thing here is that Satan has upward ambitions.

All right, that should be very clear just from the language that's used.

12 upward words are employed in this short series of verses, okay?

You said that, I will ascend, this beginning of verse 13, you will ascend 1 into heaven, 2, you will exalt 3, you're thrown above 4, the stars of God, 5, I will also sit on the mount, 6 of the congregation, on the farthest sides of the north, 7.

I will ascend 8, above 9, the height of the clouds, 11, 10 and 11, and I will also be like the most high.

He wants to be in a higher position than he is.

Now the question could be, A logical question from this would be, now does he want to be like God in character?

He's wanting to put his throne above the stars of God, above the other angels, and he wants to be even above God himself.

He believes that he would be a better party to be in charge, and this is part of what fueled this rebellion that began in the beginning.

We get some more insight into this in Ezekiel chapter 28.

Get to the book of Ezekiel chapter 28, And are you guys able to read what's on the screen back there?

Can you at least get some form of visual for that if you need to double-check the references?

You can just type something in the chat there.

But Ezekiel 28, beginning at verse 11, says this, Moreover, the word of the Lord came to me saying, son of man, take up a lamentation for the king of Tyre, and say to him, thus says the Lord God.

What we're going to find out here is this is not really referring to the King of Tyre, but actually the source of evil that's behind the dastardly deeds that he's doing.

And we'll see this clearly in the language it says, or in the language that it uses in the text.

It says, thus says the Lord God, you were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.

But it says that you were in Eden, the garden of God.

The sardius, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and emerald with gold, the workmanship of your timbrels and pipes was prepared for you on the day that you were created." Right?

He's a created being, and it was perfect when he was created.

It says, was prepared for you in the day that you were created.

You walked back and forth in the midst of the fiery stones.

You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created.

Then it says, till iniquity was found in you." And we're gonna cover a few more verses and we'll come back to this.

By the abundance of your trading, you became filled with violence within and you sinned.

Therefore I cast you as a profane thing out of the mountain of God, and I destroyed you a covering cherub from the midst of the fiery stones.

Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty, and you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor.

I cast you to the ground, I laid you before kings that they might gaze at you.

You defiled your sanctuaries by the multitude of your iniquities, by the iniquity of your trading.

Therefore I brought fire from your midst, it devoured you, and I turned you to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all who saw you.

All who knew you were among the peoples are astonished at you.

You have become a horror and shall be no more forever." All right, I want to unpack some things here in this particular verse.

He clearly again has upward ambitions in mind, pride has filled his heart, and In the context of this statement here, the fact that he's lifting himself up, he's arrogant, he's trading, he's been filled with violence within and he sins, I want to look at something here.

Philippians 2, we'll come right back to Ezekiel 28, but in Philippians 2, I want to see something here that Satan has upward ambitions as we saw in Isaiah chapter 14.

Look at how Christ responds in response to this, or how Christ lives and does life in distinction or in comparison to how Lucifer has done life in Isaiah chapter 14.

Does God Care? - Part 1

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