Pastor John,
I apologize if you covered this and I missed it:
Do the scriptures say that Satan entered Judas before Judas went into town and revealed Jesus’ whereabouts for 30 pieces of silver (Luke 22:3)?
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It was before.
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If so, was it actually Satan (in Judas) who gave up Jesus’ location to those men? It seems that Satan would have done that if he could because it would have pleased Satan to put Jesus in a position where Jesus had to reveal himself as king of the Jews—which (he thought) Jesus surely would HAVE to do now to save himself from the men who wanted him dead—that is—if Jesus was ever going to occupy his place as a (worldly) world ruler—as Satan understood Jesus’ place to be.
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What Satan did was equally what Judas did after Judas was possessed. The Accuser didn’t make Judas do anything. They were as one.
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With that, and assuming Satan believed that once Jesus fulfilled his position as world ruler (Satan’s current position), Satan would be free to move into the higher position he felt certain was coming his way…
If Satan believed he had Jesus in this “pickle” where Jesus would have to go ahead and occupy his place as world ruler (even if it wasn’t God’s time yet), would that have been reason (a good enough reason in Satan’s mind) to forever leave his glorious cherub body – believing that a new and better body waited for him just around the corner along with his assumed promotion?
Thank you
Jerry
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Yes, Jerry. I mentioned that in our last reading. Here is one portion of the Father and Son book which dealt with that:
“Satan’s original sin was pride at being “perfect in beauty” (Ezek. 28:12), and he would never have left his perfectly beautiful body to possess a human except in hope of receiving something greater. It may even be that Satan thought that if he was granted to sit at God’s right hand, he would be given a body more glorious than the one he first had. That may not be the case, but either way, the promotion he hoped for was of such glory that whatever was lost in the process of attaining it would be worth it. That hope is the only thing that could have lured Satan out of his perfectly beautiful body to possess the lowly body of a mortal man. The significance he attached to this mission is revealed in the fact that Satan had never before abandoned his body to personally possess anyone. Sensing that it was a mission of unparalleled importance to God, it would have been a mission of unparalleled importance to him, as well.”
Pastor John
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