Those who worship God merely from fear would worship the devil, too, if he appear.
~Sir Thomas Fuller (1608-1661)
“How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low! 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. Those who see you will stare at you and ponder over you: ‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble, who shook kingdoms, who made the world like a desert and overthrew its cities, who did not let his prisoners go home?’ All the kings of the nations lie in glory, each in his own tomb; but you are cast out, away from your grave, like a loathed branch, clothed with the slain, those pierced by the sword, who go down to the stones of the pit, like a dead body trampled underfoot. You will not be joined with them in burial, because you have destroyed your land, you have slain your people.
~ the demise of The Satan, foreseen in Isaiah 14
Oh beloved, it is true. There is a great enemy of our souls. There is one who has made the attempt to attain the summit of all creation. And this being is indeed among the most powerful of all creations. This being did indeed stand among those in the near presence of the Creator.
Somehow though, it came into the mind of this one that one created could usurp his Creator. There did grow from this selfish and prideful thought a movement in Heaven. This enormously powerful and exceedingly beautiful being swung one third of the messengers of Heaven to join him in his rebellion.
But as this enormous dragon of an angel took a swing at G_d, he failed and swept the defeated minions he had recruited out of the presence of G_d with him. And this Satan did fall. However, in falling away from his Creator, he did not lose his pride and desire to be seen as deity.
The problem for this enormously powerful being is that he is now limited in his ability to gain the worship he seeks. Not only is he outnumbered 2 to 1 against the Heavenly hosts, the potency of his of his weaponry is limited only to attempts to twist what is already true, and to introduce a fear of everything we should not fear – while attempting to distract us from fearing the One we should.
Regardless, in this liar’s attempts to defeat The L_RD OF HOSTS, we begin to see what the core of the problem really is. Fear. Fear is a way of focusing our attention on something. So, the devil will use fear to both get us to look away from G_d, and to get us looking at the things the devil has perverted for his own uses.
And everything we look at, that is not G_d, bears within us an anxious, dry and bitter fruit that does not satisfy. So, as we look around this Satan continues to divide our attention into more and more things that will continue to separate us from the One who can satisfy us. Oh, it is not that the liar cares about us. He merely wants to deprive his Creator of any satisfaction and joy.
In separating us from Him, this divider gains a fallen and perverted sense of worship as we look at all the things he is destroying and esteem them of value. Oh, once again the liar does not care for a personal relationship with his worshipers. The Lover of our souls seeks us as a bride. But the Satan only seeks whores to do his bidding.
Can we see it? This is why we are to abstain from fearing anything but G_d. Fear of any thing is the surest path to worshipping the one who is not worthy of our praise. But, fear of G_d, is a direct focus on the only One who can and will and does deliver us from the bondage of fear of things and into pure worship in spirit and in truth.
So, are you afraid of many things in this world? Perhaps it is time for you to understand how dangerous fear of anything but G_d really is. Tonight is your night beloved. Look away from the fear of things in this world. The one motivating this fear is simply trying to usurp your worship of the One who is truly worthy of praise.
Be gone Satan. My focus is on Him. And He has already declared your work destroyed through His precious blood. Be gone.
