Hello Friends, welcome to Sunday2Monday.

The place where we say it again!

As my pastor says: Repetition brings revelation!

This week in part 2 of Free Indeed, we are unpacking an essential of the gospel. Pastor Lynn said, “ If you talk to people and asked them the question, ‘why did Jesus come?’ They would say things like ‘He came to save us, He came show us how to love, He came to forgive us, He came to reconcile us to the Father.” All of these things are true but they are the fruit and the effect of why exactly Jesus did come.

1 John 3:8b  The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.

Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil! This word destroy means to untie, to untangle, to be released. Jesus came to release us from the web of deception. Many of us would have liked to read in the Bible gospels how Jesus came with fire, with power, as God of angel armies, as the Lord of Hosts, the Mighty Man of War to overturn the devil but it was the wisdom of God, in the way that He came that confounded His enemy.

Pastor Lynn wanted us to understand that we were trapped in a web of deception. The condition of mankind was tangled that we could not get out. Sin has so bent us and stripped us of who God made us to be that we were literally more like Satan than God. Through the deception that Adam and Eve believed, the devil introduced into the world and subjected us to a new world order. Like a spider that spins a web to catch its prey. The devil succeeded in interfacing his destiny with man’s destiny. Through sin and deception, he could accuse us day and night to the Father, showing our sin to God and essentially saying “If you judge me, you have to judge them!” He intertwined our destiny with his.  How? People say things like “why does God let bad things happen? If He is so powerful why doesnt He just wipe out sin and evil?” He can’t and He won’t. He would have to wipe us all off the face of the earth. He loves us. He wouldn’t do that.

So what happened?

God is a God of order and a God who delegates authority. God gave Adam and Eve free will to choose what they would and would not do. He made the earth and gave Adam and Eve dominion over it. Through deception, Satan targetted them and offered them the ability to be like God, knowing good and evil. When they ate they gave up their freedom to a slave master and became a slave to Satan. The devil then had dominion over the earth and all mankind and Jesus came to take it back! God didn’t create a race of slaves. He created sons and daughters who are free to choose. We are free to choose heaven or hell. We are free to choose just as Adam and Eve were free to choose the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Every doorway has its effect and we are free to open the door.

John 12:31-32  Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out. ³² And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.”

Jesus brought judgment! That word world is age, cosmos. Jesus came to judge the age. The current way of being, the arrangement that had been put in place. Satan became the ruler of this world but that arrangement did not work for Jesus. He came to take us back out of the slave mentality and out of the fear of death that we had been held captive too our whole lives.

Jesus came as human- fully human and fully God. The demons recognized Him in the spirit. They said, “we know who you are but why are you here!” They didn’t get it. Satan knew the terms. He knew the arrangement. He had been able to kill every human from the beginning. Satan in his pride and arrogance launched a plan to destroy the Son of Man. He killed Jesus thinking “Now I am God!” But God uses the what seems foolish to confound the wise. Satan didn’t think this thing through. In his haste he missed something. The Bible says that the wages of sin is death. You can kill a man for his sin. It’s justified but you cant kill a sinless man because if he dies it was unlawful for him to be killed in the first place and he won’t stay dead long! Jesus came to change the arrangement. He came to untie every knot. Adam got us into the mess and Jesus, the last Adam came to take us out of captivity.

1 Corinthians 15:45  Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

When Satan killed Jesus, the sinless Son of God, he broke the rules of the arrangement and Jesus forgave those who were party to his death. He willingly chose to take every sin that man had committed and would commit, upon himself. He tasted death and hell. Jesus (the last Adam) became a life-giving spirit able to give this life to whomever He chooses.  He gave His life for all.

One of the most profound things that Pastor Lynn said was this, “There are people out there living in sinful acts but God doesnt hold charges against them. They are forgiven! They may not have heard the news. They may not have received the gift. But they are forgiven!” Jesus unraveled the web! He cut off Satans ability to accuse us. Let me ask you a question said Pastor Lynn, “If Satan can’t lay a charge against you and no demon in hell can accuse you because of what Jesus did on the cross. Why do you condemn yourself?” – Tweet That!

 

 

 

Thanks for Listening,

Starla