God is in Control, the Enemy, is Not

"We know that we are of God,

and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one" - 1 John 5:19.

But the whole world lies in the power of the evil one 

only by permission and his power will be brought to an end

after it has served the purposes of God.

At the end of creation week, Jesus stood back and looked at everything He had made and said it was "very good."  (Gen. 1:31)  This included the creation of angels.  Satan hadn't fallen yet.  But then something happened.  Satan rejected Jesus as his King and as his joy.  He set out on a course of self-exaltation.  One third of the angels rebelled with him.  They wanted to have authority over themselves and exalt themselves above God.  They no longer wanted to serve God.  

Satan fell according to the counsel of God's will.  Ephesians 1:11 says that God works all things after the counsel of His will.  Satan fell, not because God was helpless to stop it, but because it was part of God's plan.   God is never taken off guard and what He permits is for a reason, an infinitely wise reason.  

Satan has power over the world because God gave it to him.  The verse above states that the world lies in the power of Satan.  Daniel 4:17 tells us that God is the Most High ruler over the realm of mankind and bestows it on whom He wishes.  Satan rules only by God's permission.  He does not move without God's permission and every move is part of God's overall purpose and plan.  This is true in such a way that God does not sin, ever.  He is infinitely holy and infinitely mighty.  Satan is evil, but He is under the all-governing wisdom of God.  (The book of Job)

Satan ultimately glorifies Jesus.  Colossians 1:16 tells us that all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities -all things have been created through Him and for Him.  Satan and all the pain he causes, in the end serves to magnify Jesus.  We would not know Jesus as fully as we know Him if He had not defeated Satan the way He did at the cross.  Satan magnifies the power and the wisdom and  the grace and the love and the mercy and the patience and the wrath of Jesus.  

Satan's evil is bad now and it is going to get a lot worse before it is brought to an end.  Horrible atrocities are occurring now.  I saw a picture online the other day that caused me to cry.  It was a picture of a mother who was forced to have an abortion in her seventh month of pregnancy.  The murdered baby was laying on the bed beside her.  I didn't click on the picture to enlarge it.  What I saw was enough.  I literally cried out, calling on God to bring an end to such evil.  And God is going to someday.  Satan is behind these things, but we have not reached the very last days of evil yet.  The evil we are witnessing and experiencing now is being restrained.  God in His plan is going to step back and allow Satan to unleash his anger on Israel and believers all over the world.  (Revelation 12:7-17)  I really don't think we have an idea of how bad it is going to get.  Many are going to be put to death.  It will be the worst holocaust to ever occur.  I believe that we are going to be tempted to despair that what will be occurring at that time is out of God's control.  We need to know the character and the plan of God before we enter into those days.  Nothing in this universe happens out of God's control.  Ephesians 1:11 is a good verse to put to memory.  "...God works all things after the counsel of His will."

So how should we relate to evil?  

• We should expect it - 1 Peter 4:12
• We should endure it - 1 Cor. 13:7
• We should give thanks for the refining effects of the evil that comes upon us - Eph. 5:20
• We should hate it - Romans 12:9
• We should pray to escape from it - Matthew 6:13
• We should expose it - Eph. 5:11
• We should overcome it with good - Romans 12:21
• We should resist it - James 4:7
• We should not fear it, because God is with us - Psalm 23:4
• We should never give in to the sense that evil is absurd and meaningless.  Romans 11:33 tells us that God's judgments are unsearchable and His ways are unfathomable.  God used the greatest evil ever committed, the murder of Jesus, to provide for the greatest gift, our salvation.  God permits evil to exist to serve His purposes.
• We should never give in to the thought that God sins or is unjust or unrighteous in the way He rules or in what He allows to exist and happen.  The Lord is righteous in all His ways - Psalm 145:17.  
• We should never doubt that God is totally for us, even when evil is happening to us.  Romans 8:31, 35-39.  If God is for us, who is against us.  Who will separate us from the love of Christ?  Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?  Just as it is written, FOR YOUR SAKE WE ARE BEING PUT TO DEATH ALL DAY LONG; WE WERE CONSIDERED AS SHEEP TO BE SLAUGHTERED.  But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.  For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Satan's end.  Revelation 20:10 - And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.


Keep buried in the Word, bathing in God's character.  Hide those scriptures in your heart so when you feel the fiery darts of the enemy, you stand firm in the character of God.