"The restraining Spirit of God is even now being withdrawn from the world. Hurricanes, storms, tempests, fire and flood, disasters by sea and land, follow each other in quick succession. Science seeks to explain all these. The signs thickening around us, telling of the near approach of the Son of God, are attributed to any other than the true cause. Men cannot discern the sentinel angels restraining the four winds that they shall not blow until the servants of God are sealed; but when God shall bid His angels loose the winds, there will be such a scene of strife as no pen can picture."(6T 408).

"Satan is the destroyer. God cannot bless those who refuse to be faithful stewards. All He can do is to permit Satan to accomplish his destroying work. We see calamities of every kind and in every degree coming upon the earth, and why? The Lord's restraining power is not exercised." (6T 388-389)

"The Jews had forged their own fetters; they had filled for themselves the cup of vengeance. In the utter destruction that befell them as a nation, and in all the woes that followed them in their dispersion, they were but reaping the harvest which their own hands had sown. Says the prophet: "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself;" "for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity." Hosea 13:9; 14:1. Their sufferings are often represented as a punishment visited upon them by the direct decree of God. It is thus that the great deceiver seeks to conceal his own work. By stubborn rejection of divine love and mercy, the Jews had caused the protection of God to be withdrawn from them, and Satan was permitted to rule them according to his will. The horrible cruelties enacted in the
destruction of Jerusalem are a demonstration of Satan's vindictive power over those who yield to his control.

We cannot know how much we owe to Christ for the peace and protection which we enjoy. It is the restraining power of God that prevents mankind from passing fully under the control of Satan. The disobedient and unthankful have great reason for gratitude for God's mercy and long-suffering in holding in check the cruel, malignant power of the evil one. But when men pass the limits of divine forbearance, that restraint is removed. God does not stand toward the sinner as an executioner of the sentence against transgression; but He leaves the rejectors of His mercy to themselves, to reap that which they have sown. Every ray of light rejected, every warning despised or unheeded, every passion indulged, every transgression of the law of God, is a seed sown which yields its unfailing harvest. The Spirit of God, persistently resisted, is at last withdrawn from the sinner, and then there is left no power to control the evil passions of the soul, and no protection from the malice and enmity of Satan. The destruction of Jerusalem is a fearful and solemn warning to all who are trifling with the offers of divine grace and resisting the pleadings of divine mercy. Never was there given a more decisive testimony to God's hatred of sin and to the certain punishment that will fall upon the guilty." (GC 36, 37)

We note:
1) It is when God withdraws His Spirit and tells the restraining angels to release the winds of strife, that the horror predicted in Revelation takes place.
2) Satan is the destroyer.
3) To those who refuse to obey God, He turns over to Satan to do his destroying work.
4) God does not stand toward the sinner as an executioner of the sentence against transgression.
5) God leaves the rejectors of His mercy to themselves, to reap that which they have sown.
6) The sufferings of the wicked are often represented as a punishment visited upon them by the direct decree of God. It is thus that the great deceiver seeks to conceal his own work.

After reviewing the last few posts, I want to go on record that my post regarding the GC editions was really in response to Dora's post.

Danielw's GC quotes being related to this topic were not being questioned by me whatsoever.

Hi:

I am a member over at the TRO The Remnant Onlin forum. We have had this discussion on one of our forums in what is called the Laodecia forum.

Let us start with these few questions:

1. Do you love satan?
2. Do you hate satan?
3. Is there any Bible or Spirit of Prophecy direction to love satan?
4. Do you think God hates satan?

Liane

Hi Liane;

Greetings. I'm glad you dropped by. I hope things are going well with you.

Good questions you've posed. I'll add one or two to yours if you don't mind - Does Satan love God? Are the righteous supposed to love the wicked? When Babylon through the image beast persecutes the saints and God eventually interviens on their behalf and sends the plagues (by withdrawing His protective Spirit from the earth) are the saints supposed to weap for the wicked or are they commanded to rejoice?

It may also be helpful, if it hasn't been done yet, to define what we mean by unconditional love. I have a simple way of looking at that: God sends his blessings on the good and the bad. He waters the crops of the wicked and the righteous. But He is hoping for a response to His love isn't He?

Hi Mark:

Thanks for the greeting. I came by to update my password and saw this topic. Have not been posting on this forum in years and when I saw this topic could not resist the desire to read what has transpired. So thus my post.

The term "unconditional love" came up many years ago for me when I first joined the church and studied it over the years and have come to terms with what God has blessed me to understand and I have learned.

We have two things we are dealing with here on this topic. Unconditional love and hate. Does God use both? Or either? Or none?

From what I have come to know is there is no such thing as unconditional love by God. There is eternal love. There is forgiving love, there is love that is deep, wide and willing to do anything necessary to save His children, but all are based on one thing. God's love is a covenant and like so many covenants by God there is a role that the person must do and God does.

We must also realize that this love endures forever and is never ending. So how can hate fit into this. We must look to other parts of His Word to understand that.

We must realize that love does have a period for some people at a certain time in the course of events of this earth as we know it. It will happen on the day that our High Priest will leave the Most Holy Place and all mercy shall be closed to mankind from that point on.

Until then God does extend mercy with justice and loves the sinner and hates the sin. But someday the sinner and the sin will be so meshed within a person that not even God can separate the sinner from the sin and thus God does hate sin and the wicked will be so consumed by sin that there is no difference to God or us.

For God so loved the world that He gave His onmly Begotten Son and to those that believe upon the Son shall have eternal life.

Some have said that if God could hate that they could not believe in Him ever again, that it would destroy any trust they would have in God. I look at it another way. If God can destroy those that he loves, how can one trust that love at any point in their lives?

Let me be clear the very foundation and character of God is love. It is what makes Him God. If we are created in His image and we have emotions I do believe that God has emotions as well. Love is a force that God has given us, hate is an emotion that we feel. In other words love should be so grounded within us that it motivates all that we do. Hate, fear, anger are emotions that affect us at any given time and can change. The same goes for joy, happiness and peace.

When we understand love as is connected with God then we can understand everything else. There is love, but there is no unconditional love, love without conditions. The word love does not need anything before or after it to describe it. LOVE IS and is all the essence we need to know about God and His love.

Maybe none of this will make sense to anyone, but it has sustained me for many years. It has helped me to understand the word Love according to God and has given me the trust that I feel toward Him always.

Liane

Here are a couple of more questions.

1. Is there any command in the Bible or the SOP for us to hate Satan?

2. Is there a Bible or SOP reference to God hating Satan?

Pastor Mike

Hi Mike:

Yes it does. In Matthew 6:24 the Bible speaks of not being able to serve two masters. That one can love the one and will hate the other. One cannot serve God and satan at the same time.

In John 8:44 we are told that satan is the source of sin. He is sin. We are told to hate sin. One cannot separate satan from sin for it so consumes the being of satan that there is not way to love this being.

When we read in the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy the deeds of satan we see that God hates the evil deeds that is done. If we are the children of God then we will love that which He loves and hate that which He hates.

We are told to love the sinner and not the sin. We are told to love our enemy. This is true, but we are told to do this because we do not know the outcome of the sinner, only God knows presently.

But there will be a day of reckoning in which we will know and there will be no doubt about the status of each person once Jesus leaves the Most Holy Place. Their deeds will follow them and their hatred of God will be seen clearly and we will have no compassion or love for them.

Liane

Hi Liane!

I am also happy to see you here too.

Let's bring this down to another interesting level; the level of parents love for their children, notwithstanding the sad things that are even happening in this area re child abuse, etc. But that's another topic which fulfills the "without natural affection" aspect of the signs of the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.

To those parents who really love their children, as God loves us all as His children, is their love for their children unconditional love or is it conditional love?

Hi Liane,

The Matthew 6:24 text is not a command it’s a statement of fact. You can not give ultimate loyalty to two anything. Ultimate loyalty can only be given to one. It is a statement of comparison. Look at Luke 14:26
“If any [man] come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. “
Is Jesus saying here that we should literally hate our families? Of course not. What this is saying is that our love and loyalty to Christ is so complete that in comparison our love for our families seems to be hate because it is so much less than our love for him. We must love Christ supremely. We see it clearly in the parallel passage in Matthew 10:37
“ He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. “
So we are said to “hate” something when we don’t love it as much as something else. This is not that burning passion against something that we often think of when we use the term hate.

Also Matthew 6:24 refers to mammon not Satan. Mammon is usually understood to be money or worldly goods. We are not called to hate money. The warning is not to serve money. This quote from Adventist Home brings that point out.
“ When we love God supremely, temporal things will occupy their right place in our affections. If we humbly and earnestly seek for knowledge and ability in order to make a right use of our Lord's goods, we shall receive wisdom from above. When the heart leans to its own preferences and inclinations, when the thought is cherished that money can confer happiness without the favor of God, then the money becomes a tyrant, ruling the man; it receives his confidence and esteem and is worshiped as a god. Honor, truth, righteousness, and justice are sacrificed upon its altar. The commands of God's word are set aside, and the world's customs and usages, which King Mammon has ordained, become a controlling power. {AH 372.2}”

We are to love God more than money and so serve Him. In contrast to this our relationship to money is said to be one of “hate.” This is like the description of our relation to our family cited above in Luke 14:26.

It’s going a long way to try and extrapolate a command to hate Satan from this verse.
The same goes for the treatment of John 8:44. The verse teaches that Satan is the originator of sin. You go beyond the verse to say Satan is sin. Then since we are to hate sin you say we are to hate Satan. So your statement that we are to hate Satan is built upon your extrapolation rather than on the verse itself.

However the Bible does give us a clear command to love our enemies. Matthew 5:43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
5:44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
5:45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
5:46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?
5:47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more [than others]? do not even the publicans so?
5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

Are there any clear statements that would show this does not apply to Satan? I am not saying it necessarily does. But in the face of a clear command it seems there should be something equally clear to show that it doesn’t apply.


In Christian love,

Pastor Mike

----------------
edited for grammer - Mike

[ August 29, 2004, 09:11 PM: Message edited by: Mike Carner ]

Hi Daryl:

In Romans 3:23 the Bible states that: All have sinned and come (fall) short to the glory of God.

Isaiah 64:6 states: But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags...

None of us has that perfect love, no less are able to love that to the point of unconditionally. We love as much as we can love if we have the love of God in us. All other love is conditional, because we have a fallen nature.

God is love, 1 John 4:8. The best that we can do is seek God and learn of His love and grow in His love. Desire to be like Him in His love.

I do not believe that any parent can love their child unconditionally. What they can do is love them as much as they are able on this earth.

I will ask you this question. Could you love unconditionally your adult child that goes around molesting and killing children?

You may still love your child, but to love that child unconditionally to me would be to justify their actions. There would have to be some part of a parent that changed in their heart and mind about the love they feel for that child that commits sins against mankind and God.

Liane