Short and Eternal

DEVOTION

THE REVELATION

SHORT AND ETERNAL

Rev 12:7-12

7 And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 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. 10 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say:

"Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. 11 They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. 12 Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short."

NIV

This scene John is watching unfold on the scroll, or perhaps being shown in some other way, certainly appears as though he is describing an event in the far past. A time when Satan, who was then called Lucifer waged a war against God and Michael being the archangel battled and won. A long time battle of evil vs good. This has not changed in all the centuries of time that have passed since that serpent lost his battle and was cast down to earth. From the very first he has accused the people of God. As he tempted successfully Eve regarding trusting what God said, he has been doing the same throughout the ages. He leads the world astray, he is a liar, a deceiver, a lover of self and desires nothing more than to prove God wrong about his people. This battle for power is portrayed by John as in heaven, but it also is about what happened and is happening on earth. Satan is here now, and still trying to win the battle, he knows his time is short, whatever that time means. It might be centuries in our time line, but in the context of eternity, it is s short time. Satan is waging a fierce battle against the people of God. He is not just trying a little maneuver here and there, he is waging a full scale war, pulling out all the stops, using every effort to destroy the church, the people of God. This war is waged on us, but it is actually waged on God. Satan is still so angry with God for casting him to earth, for losing his place of honor in heaven. Satan does not bother with all the people who by their own evil desires live in sin, in disobedience to the word of God. He cares nothing about them, he only wants to destroy those who profess Jesus Christ as the Lord of lords, King of kings and their Savior. Once we accept Jesus we have to know and be prepared for a battle against our very lives. We might think after accepting Jesus our lives will be blessed, we will be on a bed of roses, life will be but a bowl of cherries. Although all of that is true, God will care for us, he will protect and provide for us, Satan is all about making our lives as miserable as he can. Of course we know that he that is within us is greater than he who is in the world. We know Satan does not win. He and all his followers will be cast into the lake of burning sulfur. But for now he is after all of us who love the Lord. He attempts to make us disbelieve what God said, he casts doubt toward us. Will God really provide for you? How come you are having so much financial trouble? Will God really heal you? How come you are having this illness, or this pain? Will God really protect you? How come some of you are being hurt by others? He still lives in the spiritual realm and as he did with Job, he can still accuse us before God. He can still tell God to see how we fail him. He gets us to doubt, then he accuses us of being doubtful of all God promised us. He tries to get us to lose our faith in God and return to our old way of life. But he will be the one who fails. He will never get us to doubt God, no matter what happens in our life. God has a plan, he has a purpose and he will accomplish his plan and purpose for our lives. We only need to remain true to him, always trusting, always believing, and always knowing deep within our being that he has everything under control. Satan can do nothing to us without the authority of God, just as we saw with Job.  Satan has no authority of his own over us. He can only tempt, but he cannot make us yield to that temptation. His time is short, but ours is eternal.