SATAN'S POWER

Many people in this world do not believe in the devil. Even more DO believe in the devil - yet don’t realize what great and frightening power he has!

I know that is a strong statement, but it is true. You can prove it from the Bible. If you stop and think about some key biblical verses about Satan, you will be shocked by the extent of his power in our world.

God says that Satan has deceived the whole world: Revelation 12:9 “The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.”

God also calls the devil “the god of this world, which means the whole world worships him: 2 Corinthians 4:4 “The god of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”

If Satan can do all that, he must have tremendous power!

Isaiah 14:12 “How you have fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn! You have been cast down to the earth, you who once laid low the nations!” Here Isaiah is describing Satan’s fall from his status as an archangel. Notice the scripture says, “ laid low the nations”. The Emphasized Bible translation says, “crusher of nations”. The Jerusalem Bible uses the phrase, “enslaved the nations.”

Who today really believes that Satan has the power to crush nations, or lay nations low, or enslave nations?

Do you believe that Satan has power like that?

Who today really believes that Satan has the power to crush nations, or lay nations low, or enslave nations?

Do you believe that Satan has power like that?

And think about this: if he can do that to the nations, what can he do to you?

The Prince of the Kingdom of Persia

Daniel 12:4 “But you, Daniel, roll up and seal the words of the scroll until the time of the end. Many will go here and there to increase knowledge.”

The prophetic book of Daniel was written for the “time of the end”. In verse 9, the angel speaking to Daniel says Daniel 12:9 “Go your way, Daniel, because the words are rolled up and sealed until the time of the end.”

This prophecy was recorded some 2,500 years ago. It’s meaning has been closed up and sealed. But we are living in the time of the end today, and God has unsealed this prophecy! He has revealed its meaning. That is a gigantic miracle! What a thrill and a wonder to be able to understand this prophecy.

Satan is always ferociously fighting to keep God’s Word sealed.

Daniel recorded how Satan even fought to prevent this prophetic book from being written in the first place! God had given the prophecy to Gabriel - one of three archangels, the highest ranking angels, mentioned in the Bible - to deliver to Daniel. But as Gabriel was delivering the book to Daniel, he was attacked by Satan the devil!

In Daniel’s prophecy, Gabriel is recorded as saying: Daniel 10:13 “But the prince of the Persian kingdom resisted me twenty-one days. Then Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, because I was detained there with the king of Persia.”

This “prince of the kingdom of Persia” is the devil. Only he has such power to be able to fight against Gabriel! The Bible shows that Satan had been Lucifer, another of those three great and powerful archangels, before he rebelled and became God’s adversary. He still has tremendous power. When he fought Gabriel, Gabriel had to call on another archangel, Michael, to come and help him.

Clearly, Satan has awesome power, Gabriel and Michael are the most powerful beings in the universe except for God the Father and Jesus Chris - and yet Satan was there fighting against them very effectively. God made the archangels do the fighting against this former archangel, and they did eventually defeat him.

Why is Satan called “the prince of the kingdom of Persia”? The kingdom of Persia in this prophecy is the world-ruling Medo-Persian Empire, which has been written about at length in history books. Satan is called the prince of Persia because he had that much control over that world-ruling Empire!

Fighting the Devil Today

Daniel’s prophecy continues: Daniel 10:14 “Now I have come to explain to you what will happen to your people in the future, for the vision concerns a time yet to come.”

Gabriel was delivering the prophetic message of this very book of Daniel, and he told Daniel it would explain what would happen to “your people” in the latter days. Daniel was from the tribe of Judah of the nation of Israel. This prophecy is for the end-time nation of Israel.

Why would Satan fight so hard to stop this message? He obviously sees the great value of the book of Daniel and wants to thwart God’s purpose by stamping it out!

Think about this for a moment, Satan is alive today, and he still hates the book of Daniel. If he would fight so hard to prevent the book of Daniel from ever being written, what do you think he would do today when God has revealed this book and what it means for us in the latter days? Don’t you think he would fight even harder to stop this book today? Of course he would! That’s the way Satan operates. He is a spirit, and he is alive, and he hates anybody who talks about these prophecies of the end - because they describe how his works are about to be destroyed.

If you understand what this means, you realize that you cannot hang on to this truth unless you are willing to fight and conquers the devil.

Ephesians 6:12 “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”

God’s people are locked in battle with spiritual wickedness and powers in high places on Earth! Most people read over such scriptures and don’t believe them - or if they do, they certainly don’t act like it.

Do you and I believe this book enough to fight for it?

The Prince of Grecia

After Gabriel delivered this prophecy, he went back to fighting the prince of Persia. Daniel 10:20 “So he said, “Do you know why I have come to you? Soon I will return to fight against the prince of Persia, and when I go, the prince of Greece will come;”

As this verse makes clear, Satan was not also called the “prince of Grecia” at this time. This is referring to Alexander the Great of the Greco-Macedonian Empire, who was about to come on the scene. Satan hadn’t yet gotten control of Alexander, but you can be sure Satan was going to viciously fight for all the power God would allow him to have! After all, God had prophesied he would come and Satan wanted to stop those prophecies from being fulfilled. The devil worked to help the Medo-Persian Empire continue just to thwart God’s Bible prophecies.

That effort failed. God has a master plan, and He’s not going to let this ex-archangel stop that. Just as God prophesied, Alexander’s empire conquered the Medo-Persian Empire. The book of Daniel was actually written right around the time that Alexander was rising in power and the Persian Empire was beginning to fall, and there was a great clash between the two.

Though Satan couldn’t stop that prophecy from happening, he did eventually get control of Alexander as well. We know that because the Bible says all of those great world-ruling Gentile empires were heavily influenced by Satan. He has guided them and even controlled them in many cases. So Satan probably would have been called the prince of Grecia, or the Greco-Macedonian Empire, at a later time.

If we don’t recognize just how great Satan’s power really is, how could we possibly avoid being deceived - or worse - by that great being?

Think again about the sequence of events revealed in this passage in Daniel. Satan attacked God’s Work - Gabriel’s message to Daniel - and then he went back to the kings of Persia. Satan knows what is most important on this Earth: God’s Work! God’s message - God’s revelation. Satan always attacks God’s Work first! Then he goes back to the kings of the Earth and does all he can to influence them or even control them.

That is how Satan operates.

Satan’s History

Ezekiel 28:12 ““Son of man, take up a lament concerning the king of Tyre and say to him: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: “ ‘You were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.”

This is an interesting verse because it starts out talking about a king, and then it starts talking about a being “full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.” That’s not talking about a human king. It’s talking about Lucifer, who became Satan the devil.

In this verse, Satan and “the king” are used interchangeably. What does that mean? It means that Satan was really the king of Tyre!

Ezekiel 28:14 “You were anointed as a guardian cherub, for so I ordained you. God Himself gave Lucifer a position right over His throne, as a covering cherub! He was right there with God, probably the most powerful of the three archangels mentioned in the Bible.

Later, God sent him to rule the Earth, and put one third of the angels under his authority. It was after that point that Lucifer turned to evil.

Ezekiel 28:15–16 “You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you. Through your widespread trade you were filled with violence, and you sinned. So I drove you in disgrace from the mount of God, and I expelled you, guardian cherub, from among the fiery stones.”

Do you believe these scriptures? Most people do not. And the Bible explains why: It’s because Satan rules this world and has deceived the whole world! that is why there is so much confusion in this world. That is why it is such a dangerous world.

When Satan rebelled against God, he started a war. That left the Earth and the universe “without form, and void,” a state of waste and decay - a state God never created.

Genesis 1:2 “Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”

Isaiah 45:18 “For this is what the Lord says— he who created the heavens, he is God; he who fashioned and made the earth, he founded it; he did not create it to be empty, but formed it to be inhabited— he says: “I am the Lord, and there is no other.”

The passage in Ezekiel continues: Ezekiel 28:19 “All the nations who knew you are appalled at you; you have come to a horrible end and will be no more.” Satan is really the one behind all the violence and terrorism and evil in our world today!

Can the United States win its “war against terror” without God on our side? No we cannot. Satan is too strong and powerful. It is also cler, if you know Satan, that you will get nowhere trying to win that war through negotiation. Satan is the king of terror! Anyone who thinks he can be overcome without a real WAR is completely ignorant of just how powerful the devil is!

That is the clear message of the Bible. But if you tried to explain that to a scholar in this world, he would say that was nonsense.

The good news is, Satan’s power will come to an end. As that verse says, ”never shalt thou be anymore.”

The Revelation 13 Beast

Revelation 13 provides one of the Bible’s most vivid descriptions of Satan’s power.

Revelation 13:1 “The dragon stood on the shore of the sea. And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on its horns, and on each head a blasphemous name.”

Here is a vision the Apostle John received of a beast, representing a political power that had dominated human history. This is a very frightening power!

The beast represents the Roman Empire, which started in 31 B.C. This world-ruling empire absorbed all the empires that preceded it and occupied their territory.

Daniel had a dream in which he saw four beasts.

Daniel 7:2–3 “Daniel said: “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me were the four winds of heaven churning up the great sea. Four great beasts, each different from the others, came up out of the sea.”

Daniel 7:4 ““The first was like a lion, and it had the wings of an eagle. I watched until its wings were torn off and it was lifted from the ground so that it stood on two feet like a human being, and the mind of a human was given to it.”

Daniel 7:5 ““And there before me was a second beast, which looked like a bear. It was raised up on one of its sides, and it had three ribs in its mouth between its teeth. It was told, ‘Get up and eat your fill of flesh!’

Daniel 7:6 ““After that, I looked, and there before me was another beast, one that looked like a leopard. And on its back it had four wings like those of a bird. This beast had four heads, and it was given authority to rule.” ”

Daniel 7:7 ““After that, in my vision at night I looked, and there before me was a fourth beast—terrifying and frightening and very powerful. It had large iron teeth; it crushed and devoured its victims and trampled underfoot whatever was left. It was different from all the former beasts, and it had ten horns.”

Daniel likened those other empires to animals on Earth. But this beast cannot be described in such simple terms. it is so dreadful, there is no beast on Earth like it!

Now let’s compare the beast that Daniel saw in his dream to the beast that John saw.

Revelation 13:2 “The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority.”

This is why this political beast has the “name of blasphemy” - because it is empowered by SATAN! He hates God and speaks blasphemy against God all the time!

Revelation 13:5–6 “The beast was given a mouth to utter proud words and blasphemies and to exercise its authority for forty-two months. It opened its mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander his name and his dwelling place and those who live in heaven.”

What influence Satan has! This is why we have never had peace in this world. Men don’t know why we can’t have peace - but the Bible makes it clear.

Revelation 13:3 “One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast.”

This is all about when the Roman Empire was defeated in A.D. 476. But that was not the end of this beast! After that deadly wound was healed, the Roman Empire surfaced in various forms down through the ages even to our present day! It is a religious-political combine that is the most dreadful beast that has ever been!

In fact, it has been resurrected SIX TIMES, and the seventh and FINAL resurrection of this beast is occurring RIGHT NOW ON THE WORLD SCENE! You need to understand that.

Look at John’s prophecy of what we are about to see: Revelation 13:4 “People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?” People will actually worship the dragon!

This will be a combination of church and state. It will become the most frightening beast this world has ever experienced - a superpower of superpowers.

Nothing will change these prophecies. We can’t wish them away. We must face reality!

Conquering the Devil

Revelation 13:5 “The beast was given a mouth to utter proud words and blasphemies and to exercise its authority for forty-two months.”

This FINAL resurrection of the beast will only last 42 months. The the good news comes! After a short 3 1/2 years, Jesus Christ is going to return and conquer it!

This monumental event of all history will most likely happen in our lifetime! .

We must respect how great Satan’s power is, and realize that only God can conquer it. Satan will do all he can to conquer us, and God wants us to draw on His power to CONQUER SATAN INSTEAD. All those who are called during this present age must do so.

The Bible tells us how to protect ourselves from the devil very effectively. We must learn how to overcome Satan. If we submit ourselves to Gid and resist the devil, he will flee from us

James 4:7 “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” God will show us how to conquer.

God assures us in His Word that we can conquer Satan. And He shows us how. With God on your side, you won’t have to fear the devil. You will always be a step ahead of him.

Those who do conquer and overcome the devil enjoy the kind of successful, happy abundant lives that God wants all of us to live!

Why won’t men listen to God? Why won’t they quit worshipping the devil and heeding his message?

You can turn your life around. You can conquer any problem that comes your way - if you will just obey what God tells you to do. That is the best thing you could ever do in your life.