The Spiritual Realm - Part 7
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Today, we are going to cover rebellious spirits. In light of that I want us to keep 1 John 4:1–6 in our minds.
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already. Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. They are from the world; therefore they speak from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us; whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.
Jesus has won through the cross and resurrection, and he is in us. This is our reality.
Let’s review what we have covered so far.
The current realms are the third heaven, the earth, Sheol, Tartarus, and Hell.
The five terms of nature are: spirit (ruah) (pneuma), god, gods (el) (elohim) (theos) (theoi), heavenly ones (samayim), stars (kokab) (aster), holy ones (qedosim) (hagios).
The second seven of the 26 terms of status for Yahweh are: Everlasting God (Olam Elohim), Creator (Bore) (Ktisantga), Most High (Elyon), Almighty (Shaddai) (Pantokrator), Lord of lords (Adonai adonai), God of gods (Elohim elohim), Holy (Qados).
The seven terms that describe the status of Spiritual Beings are mainly aligned with Yahweh: Archangel (archangelos), Assembly (Edah), Congregation (Qahal), Council (Sod), and Court (Din), Sons of God (Bene Elohim), Prince (Sar).
This week, we will cover four of the nine terms that describe the status of Spiritual Beings who are not aligned with Yahweh. They are: Satan or the Devil, Belial, Nephilim, Rephaim (giants, shades, departed spirits, or the dead), Death (Mot, Thantos), Azazel, Demons (shedim, daimon), evil spirits, unclean spirits.
Though each of these beings has rebelled against Yahweh, Yahweh still restricts their actions, and they have to submit to his ultimate authority, as all will, for every tongue will confess Jesus as Lord (Yahweh) to the glory of God the Father.
Satan / the Devil is the first term of status for rebellious spirits. The term does not start as a designation of status but of function. “Satan” in Hebrew means “adversary”. ”Devil” in Greek means “adversary”. The legal term for both of these is “plaintiff”.
We see both function and status used in 1 Peter 5:8.
Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
The OT does not use satan as a proper name, though the translators have chosen to do so in 18 passages because they are interpreting the OT passage through the Second Temple writings and the NT. An example of this would be Job 1:6.
Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them.
Satan is first used as a proper name in the Second Temple period in the Book of Jubilees 10:7-11 and the Life of Adam and Eve 9:1.
Book of Jubilees 10:11 And we acted in accord with all of his words. All of the evil ones, who were cruel, we bound in the place of judgment, but a tenth of them we let remain so that they might be subject to Satan upon the earth. (James H. Charlesworth, The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, vol. 2 (New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 1985), 76.)
Life of Adam and Eve 9:1 Eighteen days went by. Then Satan was angry and transformed himself into the brightness of angels and went away to the Tigris River to Eve and found her weeping. (James H. Charlesworth, The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, vol. 2 (New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 1985), 260.)
We then see the term used by Jesus as a personal name in the NT in Matthew 4:8-11.
Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written,
“ ‘You shall worship the Lord your God
and him only shall you serve.’ ”
Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him.
We will be doing a deep dive later in the series on the details of Satan’s origins.
We must remember that Jesus is greater than the adversary. He is greater than Satan. The believer has overcome him because Jesus is in us (1 John 4:4).
Belial is the second term of status and is used in 2 Corinthians 6:14-16.
Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said,
“I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them,
and I will be their God,
and they shall be my people.
Belial is a synonym for Satan, used first in the Dead Sea Scrolls, especially the War Scroll and the Thanksgiving Scroll. An example is 1Q33 Col. XIII.
“They shall begin speaking and say: Blessed be the God of Israel for all his holy plan and for all the deeds of his truth, and blessed be all who serve him in justice, who know him in faith.
Accursed be Belial for his inimical plan, may he be damned for his blameworthy rule. Accursed be all the spirits of his lot for their wicked plan, may they be damned for their deeds of filthy uncleanness. For they are the lot of darkness, but the lot of God is for everlasting light. (Florentino Garcı́a Martı́nez and Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar, “The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition (translations)” (Brill, 1997–1998), 133–135.)
May we make all our decisions from our place of identity as God’s temple, not yoking ourselves to the work of Satan.
Nephilim is the third term of status. It is used 3 times in Scripture and alluded to twice in the NT. Genesis 6:1-4 is the key passage.
When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose. Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years.” The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.
There are two interpretations of this passage: the naturalist interpretation and the supernatural interpretation.
The naturalist interpretation says the “sons of God” are of the line of Seth, and the “daughters of men” are of the line of Cain, which produced the Nephilim, who are mighty men, men of renown.
These interpretations of the “sons of God” and the “daughters of men” are pressed on the text rather than coming from the text. Nowhere in the Bible do we see the “sons of God” referred to as the line of Seth, and nowhere in the Bible do we see the “daughters of men” referred to as from the line of Cain.
The supernatural interpretation says the “sons of God” are spiritual beings who left their proper abode by going into the “daughters of men”, who bore children to them. This produced the unclean race of Nephilim beings that are an abomination to God’s creation.
The NT affirms this in 2 Peter 2:4-5 and in Jude 6-7
For if God didn’t spare the angels who sinned but threw them down into Tartarus and delivered them to be kept in chains of darkness until judgment; and if He didn’t spare the ancient world, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others, when He brought a flood on the world of the ungodly;
And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day— just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
The OT and Enoch see this improper union creating the Nephilim and present them as giants. See Numbers 13:33; Enoch 7:1-2.
And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”
This brings us to the next term of status, Rephaim.
Rephaim is the fourth term of status. It is used 25 times in the OT and has a range of meanings depending on context.
It is translated as giants, shades, departed spirits, or the dead. With this broad usage, we are challenged to identify them. It would seem that sometimes they are giants, quasi-divine beings, or disembodied spirits.
Scripture depicts them as giants in Deuteronomy 2:10-11; 1 Chronicles 20:4.
(The Emim formerly lived there, a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim. Like the Anakim they are also counted as Rephaim, but the Moabites call them Emim.
Turn to Numbers 13:33 and compare this passage to Deuteronomy 2:10-11.
And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”
We now understand that Scripture teaches that the Nephilim are Rephaim.
Rephaim is translated as shades in Isaiah 14:9; 26:14
Sheol beneath is stirred up
to meet you when you come;
it rouses the shades to greet you,
all who were leaders of the earth;
it raises from their thrones
all who were kings of the nations.
Rephaim is translated as departed spirits in Psalm 88:10
Do you accomplish amazing things for the dead?
Do the departed spirits rise up and give you thanks?
(Selah)
Rephaim is translated as the dead in Job 26:5-6.
The dead tremble
under the waters and their inhabitants.
Sheol is naked before God,
and Abaddon has no covering.
We see from the biblical usage that the Rephaim are depicted as both physical and spiritual entities, opposed to Yahweh and his people. If you take the supernatural interpretation of Genesis 6, they are unclean beings from an unnatural union.
The Second Temple writings build on this concept and teach that some of the demons or evil spirits come from the dead Rephaim. We see this in Enoch 15:6-12 and in The Book of Jubilees 10:1-9.
Enoch 15:6 “You were living eternal spirits and not dying into all the generations of the age. 7 And because of this I did not make wives available for you; but the spirits of heaven, their dwelling is in heaven. 8 And now the giants who are born from the spirits, even the strong spirits of flesh upon the earth, their dwelling will be on the earth. 9 Evil spirits went out from their body, for they came from the higher places, and the beginning of their creation and foundation is from the watchful holy ones. They will be called evil spirits.” (Rick Brannan et al., eds., The Lexham English Septuagint (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012), Enoch 15:5–9.)
I have run out of time. I want to leave you with 1 John 4:1-6
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already. Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. They are from the world; therefore they speak from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us; whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Go, bring the presence of Jesus into the world knowing that he is in you and greater than all.
