God wills that every soul be saved and come to heaven. Satan wants every soul to come to hell and spend eternity with him. Being that the Bible says that a large majority of people will go to hell, is Satan winning the battle for souls. Is God ok with losing this battle? Thoughts?
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Satan winning battle for souls
- Thread starter joechrist
- Start date
joechrist said:
Man looks at things from a totally different perpsective than God. God's ways are not man's ways. The battle is over. Christ won the victory. He has already conquered sin and death and those whose name are written in the book of life WILL be saved.
Scripture says: " . . . For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."
How has Christ won the victory? If Christ's purpose was to save humanity, yet the majority of humanity is destined to spend eternity with Satan, how has he won? If you look at it from Satan's perspective, he sees God send his son to save the world from hell. But then he realizes that most people are still coming to him(satan) despite this move by God. Satan probably feels like Jesus's mission failed and that he is still winning the battle for souls.
joechrist said:
Christ's purpose was to free man from the result of Adam's sin - death.
Christ came that man might have life. His death and resurrection accomplished this - this was the victory.
However, you make some assumptions that are not well founded. Winning is not a matter of numbers. God did not send his son to save people from hell (ie to judge and condemn them to hell). He was sent that man might have LIFE. However, not all will have life - only those whom God chooses. Those whom he does not choose automatically go to hell - they perish because they are still 'dead' in trespasses and sin.
Ed the Ned
Member
This is my opinion at this time: God wants to be glorified by his creation, he gave us free will to decide and if we choose not to decide in this life, we choose not to glorify God now. Then why would he want you not to glorify him in heaven by giving you eternal life. Satan does not want to win souls to be in hell with him, he wants God not to win souls. There is no victory for Satan! Only victory for God, death has been conquered. Our sins have been paid for.
Adullam said:Satan is also winning the battle against the potential saints.
Will it remain so? As they are predestined, called, justified will they not also be glorified, as written? If they are indeed "potential saints" how can Satan win the battle? Or, are you saying that the saints and potential saints are different?
joechrist said:
joe, . . . that is a very common answer. . .that "we can't understand everything God does". It is usually given when a question is very hard to answer, or one to where the only GOOD answer shines a negative light on the Bible.
You bring up a very good point. And it IS a "numbers game". It is said that "God loves everyone, and wants that all should come to repentance and to be with him in Heaven". The fact that the vaste majority of souls don't (some due to their will, others due to never hearing), means that Satan (if that being even exists) is winning. Having a small percentage come into the fold is hardly a victory.
N
NIGHTMARE
Guest
joechrist said:
I dont think God is losing the battle and the millenium will play a big part in saving souls,,,,,also satan will not be spending time with people in hell,,,satan will be turned into ashes,, from within,, which means he will cease to exist......
H
Heneni
Guest
I'm not sure about a battle going on for souls. What i do no is that satan is terribly busy trying to destroy the faith of gods people, to loose their trust in him, or to not understand the magnitude of gods love for them so that they will become ineffective.
He has been working hard to increase iniquity in this world, but where sin abound in this world, grace is abounding all the more. He is fighting a loosing battle. The more he tries to suppress the glory of god, the more god is going to reveal it.
There are so many christians that have 'sneaked in among us' that proclaim to be one but is not, that we can hardly trust anybody anymore. And that in a sense is good because it simply pushes us even closer to the father to learn from the HS and not from men.
Heneni
He has been working hard to increase iniquity in this world, but where sin abound in this world, grace is abounding all the more. He is fighting a loosing battle. The more he tries to suppress the glory of god, the more god is going to reveal it.
There are so many christians that have 'sneaked in among us' that proclaim to be one but is not, that we can hardly trust anybody anymore. And that in a sense is good because it simply pushes us even closer to the father to learn from the HS and not from men.
Heneni
H
Heneni
Guest
Orion said:
Well i dont think there is a battle for souls simply because i think that god will not let satan snatch from jesus all the souls that the father gave him. Maybe satan is battling jesus for our spirits but me thinks he would be fighting a loosing battle in that department anyway.
Satan is no omnipresent, no. But he has his agents (demons) working in this world, they are pulling overtime it seems. However, having said that, many people think the devil is just some kind of loser and has no real power....well i think we have to be sober about that statement because there is nothing you can do to defeat satan on your own, which means if its you and him in some showdown, you will come second in a big way. (Thanks be to jesus who have given us power and authority over him and his schemes)
Anyway....how did satan become so powerfull?
Interesting question. He was one of the most beautiful and powerful creatures in heaven, but he lost his power and went scavenging for some. So he found adam, bless him, and stole it from adam. If he could steal the power of adam he could steal the power of all mankind, because all mankind was created with adam when he was created, they were created IN adam, and only later born. So satan was master of disaster here on earth. Until Jesus led him and his captivity over our spirits captive and made a big spectacle of him. Stripping him of his power over us. But alas, he was not drive out from the earth, and so he is still around here scavenging for power...and he gets it from the kings of the earth, or anybody who will give their power to him, knowingly or not. Satan goes from a serpent in genesis to a dragon in revelation. HOW? he gets his power from mankind. However, this time he has to get it from individuals he can just nab one guy (adam) and get it all at once.
Heneni
mutzrein said:
Yes I was probably making some assumptions I shouldn't have. I was also assuming that God wanted everyone to come to him but I did not realize that he has only chosen certain people. I admit I need to do some studying of the scripture. In that case, I guess God is not losing the battle. Thanks for the discussion.
bodhitharta
Member
joechrist said:
However, If Satan is the enemy of Man and not God then God wins by the fact that Man's advesary Satan is refining Man through being his advesary.
God by nature cannot be under threat and therefore Jesus tells us we must overcome the world so each battle of a soul is a game of one on one between Satan and the person and the numbers don't really matter that much to God.
Exodus 32
9 And the LORD said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and indeed it is a stiff-necked people! 10 Now therefore, let Me alone, that My wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them. And I will make of you a great nation.â€Â
God wanted to kill them all but Moses interceeded for them.
Joh 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father that sent me draw him:
Rom 9:17 For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, For this very purpose did I raise thee up, that I might show in thee my power, and that my name might be published abroad in all the earth.
Rom 9:18 So then he hath mercy on whom he will, and whom he will be hardeneth.
Rom 9:19 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he still find fault? For who withstandeth his will?
Rom 9:20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why didst thou make me thus?
Rom 9:21 Or hath not the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor?
Rom 9:22 What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering vessels of wrath fitted unto destruction:
Rom 9:23 and that he might make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy, which he afore prepared unto glory,
Rom 9:24 even us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles?
Mat 11:27 All things have been delivered unto me of my Father: and no one knoweth the Son, save the Father; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal him.
Nobody chooses God. God calls whom He pleases. He does not call all people. Some are vessels of dishonor that must serve His purposes. Like Pharaoh and many people you and I know today. They serve the saints of God through the purposes of God. Satan is a vessel of dishonor too and he too serve the purposes of God.
Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil. I am Jehovah, that doeth all these things.Isa 54:16 Behold, I have created the smith that bloweth the fire of coals, and bringeth forth a weapon for his work; and I have created the waster to destroy.
Its never been about who is going to win. God is sowing His Seed in the earth (the Word) and it is falling on the good ground that God has prepared before the foundation of the earth. Satan is helping to bring this Seed (Christ in us) to fruit. He does not even realize this, because he is reaping what he sowed. He sowed the lie, now he is reaping the lie. He is being deceived through his own deception.
God is going to manifest His sons and then He has done what He set out to do . Only then will He destroy this planet and create the new Earth, where the sons will be with Him and in Him and He in them, for all eternity.
Joh 17:11 And I am no more in the world, and these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are.
Finally:
1Co 15:28 And when all things have been subjected unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subjected to him that did subject all things unto him, that God may be all in all.
No contest.
Rom 9:17 For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, For this very purpose did I raise thee up, that I might show in thee my power, and that my name might be published abroad in all the earth.
Rom 9:18 So then he hath mercy on whom he will, and whom he will be hardeneth.
Rom 9:19 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he still find fault? For who withstandeth his will?
Rom 9:20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why didst thou make me thus?
Rom 9:21 Or hath not the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor?
Rom 9:22 What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering vessels of wrath fitted unto destruction:
Rom 9:23 and that he might make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy, which he afore prepared unto glory,
Rom 9:24 even us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles?
Mat 11:27 All things have been delivered unto me of my Father: and no one knoweth the Son, save the Father; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal him.
Nobody chooses God. God calls whom He pleases. He does not call all people. Some are vessels of dishonor that must serve His purposes. Like Pharaoh and many people you and I know today. They serve the saints of God through the purposes of God. Satan is a vessel of dishonor too and he too serve the purposes of God.
Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil. I am Jehovah, that doeth all these things.Isa 54:16 Behold, I have created the smith that bloweth the fire of coals, and bringeth forth a weapon for his work; and I have created the waster to destroy.
Its never been about who is going to win. God is sowing His Seed in the earth (the Word) and it is falling on the good ground that God has prepared before the foundation of the earth. Satan is helping to bring this Seed (Christ in us) to fruit. He does not even realize this, because he is reaping what he sowed. He sowed the lie, now he is reaping the lie. He is being deceived through his own deception.
God is going to manifest His sons and then He has done what He set out to do . Only then will He destroy this planet and create the new Earth, where the sons will be with Him and in Him and He in them, for all eternity.
Joh 17:11 And I am no more in the world, and these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are.
Finally:
1Co 15:28 And when all things have been subjected unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subjected to him that did subject all things unto him, that God may be all in all.
No contest.