by juci32 18 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
I have been thinking lately about how the JW's believe that Satan was kicked out of Heaven in 1914 after the War in Heaven.
First of all, why did it take so long for Jehovah to finally decide to kick him out of Heaven from the time that he decieved and turned his back on Jehovah in Genesis? Why was Satan allowed to have access to Heaven in the between time up until 1914?
Also, if Revelation is supposed to be a future event, why do the JW's use that event as "already occurred"?
How does one go about waging war with the Almighty?
Isn't that a bit like a guy with a rubber band gun waging war against a guy with a tank?
So, how does one fight a war against a being which is, according to Christians:
all knowing - so if you are going to attack him, he knows about your attack before you do
all powerful - so there is no weapon that can defeat him
all seeing - scratch that surprise attack
everywhere - well, at least we know where to attack
invisible - oops, how can we attack that which we cannot see?
eternal - we can't kill him
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I guess we could send taunts in his general direction.
I wonder how such a mighty spirit as Satan could be confined on this insignificant planet earth. And where is the limit, troposphere or higher? Gagarin saw no God up there but he did not tell if he met big S.
Also, if the WT teaching was true, would it then be easier for us to 'breathe' on the moon, because in the biblical sense the moon is part of the heavens? This might be a good reason to set up a colony there.
some indirectly but real answers to these questions may be found ... here
wantingtruth
Thanks..Wantingtruth!
The war in heaven is not against God, but between Satan and his angels and Christ and his angels.
In reality, what it was was a COURT TRIAL! It was an intellectual and legal argument over whether Satan deserved death or not under the circumstances. The basic consensus opinion handed down was that even though Jehovah had made Satan so beautiful and Satan could claim that that in somehow predisposed his fall and rebellion, nobody thought that that excused trying to kill billions of innocent humans. I mean, if you're unhappy with life and God and just can't take it any more, jump off a cliff. But when you try to kill lots of people also just to make your point or be vengeful, sorry, you're just evi, angry and vindictive.
So Satan was kicked out of heaven on December 25, 2009 after his trial. But the angels in heaven partied for the next three days!!! So Satan must have been an astronomical pain in the arse up there. They were glad to see him kicked out.
So that is more of what the battle was like, a court case, Jesus and his angels vs Satan and his angels. Jehovah was just overseeing things.
Even so, just before this, Jehovah was talking with Satan. But that's not surprising because after the 1000-year abyss, Satan comes back to test post-millennial mankind. Don't you get the idea that Satan is cooperating with this effort?
So even though Satan is the arch opposer of God, apparently he is tolerated and is used by Jehovah, even down to the last minute.
A MOCK TRIAL. I will note, however, in the big picture, the trial was a mock trial. It was just to examine the issues. Satan's death is not a result of his rebellion or sins. Basically, after Satan became a problem, God decided to kill everybody off, typical, and then start over. The good angels volunteered to die too. The idea is that if God killed all the angels, just on GP, just as a general rule that all angels must die once just as a part of the creation cycle, then God would be able to get rid of Satan on that basis without showing favoritism. That is, all angels die, good or bad, including Jesus Christ. No one was exempt. But after everybody has died once, of course, God can bring back his favorites. Thus death is only significant if it is permenant. So since Satan was going to die anyway, along with all the angels in heaven, the 6000 years of pain and suffering in the earth and these psychological battles between Christ and Satan is "just for the record" to establish a moral and legal context beyond the inevitable.
LS
JC, oops sorry, Larsinger58,
But when you try to kill lots of people also just to make your point or be vengeful, sorry, you're just evi, angry and vindictive.
Unless you are god presumably? Then killing lots of people is fine and dandy?
According to Luke:
17 The seventy-two returned with joy and said, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.”
18 He replied, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. 19 I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. 20 However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”
Luke uses the word theoreo which means
1) to be a spectator, look at, behold
a) to view attentively, take a view of, survey
1) to view mentally, consider
2) to see
a) to perceive with the eyes, to enjoy the presence of one
b) to discern, descry
c) to ascertain, find out by seeing
Jesus's own words confirm that he saw Satan fall, not WILL SEE or that it WILL HAPPEN, but that it did/was happening and Jesus also says that He has given them power of "the enemy", power over Satan, somehting that is reiterated by James when he says, "resist the devil and he will flee".
Just in case someone has missed the logical conclusion of PSac's post, Satan wasn't kicked out of heaven in 1914. It was long before that, before Jesus came to earth, apparently, since he spoke of the event in past tense.
