Sabbath School Lesson 5 | "The Controversy Continues" | Pastor Paul Penno

Lesson 5: The Controversy Continues

Sabbath School Today

With the 1888 Message Dynamic

Rebellion and Redemption

Lesson 5: The Controversy Continues

In this short essay it is not possible to do justice to all the people in the Old Testament mentioned in this lesson—David, Goliath, Bathsheba, Elijah, Hezekiah, Esther, and Nehemiah. All faced events in their lives that involved them in controversy—we've often read their stories. However, there is one that is synonymous with a message that will be prominent in these last days of earth's history, a message that will "lighten the earth with glory"—the Elijah message. Therefore, we will focus on the prophet Elijah in this edition of "Sabbath School Today."

 

Our lesson for Monday says that Elijah "has to be one of the most colorful characters in Scripture." However, much more than a "character" acting out a part in a play, Elijah is the "Next Great Event on God's Calendar." [1]

 

The prospect intrigues thoughtful people worldwide. Elijah was the man who single-handedly confronted apostate Ahab and wicked Queen Jezebel during gross apostasy in Baal worship (talk about controversy!). When the nation's rulers tried to kill him he had to hide in an unknown spot by the Brook Cherith, and later as a guest of a widow in the heathen land of Sidon.

 

Elijah is not dead—he was translated without seeing death, a type of those living today who will welcome Jesus at His second coming in glory. God's great promise is given in Malachi 4:5, 6: "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, ..."

 

But why hasn't God's promise been fulfilled? Or has it, and we haven't known it? What is Elijah going to do when he comes? He must be someone special, for he was chosen to accompany the resurrected Moses to visit with Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration (Matthew 17) and encourage Him as He faced the horror of His cross.

 

Where Elijah is in the universe no one knows. If God has already kept His promise and sent Elijah, and we haven't known it, has there been some modern "Ahab" and "Jezebel" who opposed his coming and tried to slay him again, or at least silence him? Is Elijah II being forced to hide in some modern "Brook Cherith" or as a guest of some foreign "widow of Zarephath" who is outside "Israel"?

 

When Ahab and Jezebel tried to kill him and Elijah found refuge in Sidon, Jesus cited that fact to the acute embarrassment and anger of the true church of that day. What made them angry were Jesus' words: "'I tell you truly, many widows were in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was great famine throughout all the land; but to none of them was Elijah sent except to Zarephath, in the region of Sidon [a pagan land]. ...' All those in the synagogue, when they heard these things, were filled with wrath ..." (Luke 4:25, 26, 28).

 

Could it be that God has had to entrust the modern "Elijah" with believers outside our ranks? Could our sin be as great as that of God's people anciently? Does modern Israel hate Elijah II as much as ancient Israel hated Elijah I?

 

THIS PROMISE OF SENDING US ELIJAH IS SURE

Jesus promises, "I will come again," and we believe it; that's why we are Seventh-day Adventists. We must believe His promise of sending us Elijah too! It's the next great event on His calendar.

 

Actually, what the Lord wants to tell the world is good news, and Elijah's message is good news. He encourages our children. He wants a New Covenant motivation to replace our time-honored Old Covenant one.

 

Elijah's work and message will be found in the unique remnant church truth of the cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary. That raises the question: has our neglect of that truth (as a people) forced "Elijah's" message to take refuge with what we call "outsiders" like the "widow of Zarephath"? We know that most of God's true people are still in "Babylon." We too easily forget that the three angels' messages of Revelation 14 are primarily directed to the Sunday-keeping churches, where most of God's people are to be found.

 

WHAT WAS ANCIENT ISRAEL'S FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM?

Something called "Baal worship." We are inclined to think the people were ignorant to confuse such an apparently clumsy counterfeit as Baal for Him who is the true God. But it was extremely sophisticated and subtle. Don't kid yourself into thinking you are too smart to be misled. Almost everybody got swept in, the elite included.

 

Who was Baal? Is there such a thing as Baal-worship today that presents a challenge to us as it did to ancient Israel? Ellen G. White has some serious insights. It's a time of crisis in the Lord's work:

 

"Infidelity has been making its inroads into our ranks; for it is the fashion to depart from Christ, and give place to skepticism. With many the cry of the heart has been, 'We will not have this Man to reign over us.' [Luke 19:14] Baal, Baal, is the choice. The religion of many among us will be the religion of apostate Israel, because they love their own way, and forsake the way of the Lord. The true religion, the only religion of the Bible, that teaches forgiveness only through the merits of a crucified and risen Saviour, that advocates righteousness by the faith of the Son of God, has been slighted, spoken against, ridiculed, and rejected" [2]

 

The date gives this startling statement its true context: Ellen White says that the 1888 message of Christ's righteousness was "in a great degree" rejected by "our own brethren," and "kept away from the world":

 

"By exciting that opposition Satan succeeded in shutting away from our people, in a great measure, the special power of the Holy Spirit that God longed to impart to them. The enemy prevented them from obtaining that efficiency which might have been theirs in carrying the truth to the world, as the apostles proclaimed it after the day of Pentecost. The light that is to lighten the whole earth with its glory [Revelation 18:1-4] was resisted, and by the action of our own brethren has been in a great degree kept away from the world" [3]

 

A simple definition of Baal-worship, both ancient and contemporary, is this: the worship of self disguised as the worship of Christ. It's the assimilation of the thinking of "nations" around us in modern "Babylon." The only remedy for it: the crucifixion of self "with Christ," but that becomes possible only as we understand what happened on the cross.

 

On Mount Carmel, Elijah taunts the Baal preachers, demands that they demonstrate before the crowd the lie that their imported Baal worship is, and he prays a prayer that gives us a clue to what the modern "Elijah" will do when he comes again: "Hear me, O LORD, hear me, that this people may know that You are the LORD God, and that You have turned their hearts back to You again" (1 Kings 18:37).

 

Did you catch it? "Turning hearts" is Elijah's main concern, and that will be his work for the church and for the world when he comes just before the return of Jesus. And we know that turning alienated hearts in atonement (at-one-ment) is something only the message of Christ's cross can accomplish. Therefore it follows that Elijah's message will be lifting up "Christ and Him crucified." Jesus says something parallel to sending Elijah,

"'Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.' This He said, signifying by what death He would die" (John 12:31-33).

 

WHO IS "ELIJAH" TODAY, AND WHERE IS HE?

God honored the faith of the honest Jews of Christ's day and sent them "Elijah" in fulfillment of Malachi's promise because they sincerely expected that the coming of their Messiah would be "the great and dreadful day of the Lord." Even the disciples wondered "who" and "where" their "Elijah" was. Jesus told them not to look in their future; he had already come in the person of John the Baptist (Matt. 11:11-14).

 

But John's day was not "the great and dreadful day of the Lord." That day is now. Therefore we may expect "Elijah" to come as a message in the same way that John's message was the fulfillment of Malachi's promise.

 

Is there Biblical evidence that Elijah understood and preached the grace of God, that is, righteousness by faith? Was he stern, hard, lacking compassion? We know this:

 

1. God sent him (1 Kings 17; 18), and "God is love" (1 John 4:8).

2. His message was preeminently reconciliation of alienated hearts in home and national life (Mal. 4:5, 6). That took "grace unlimited."

3. His prayer on Mount Carmel was calm, simple, heart-felt, and gracious.

4. The people's "heart" was "turned ... back again" (1 Kings 18:37).

5. What did it was God's acceptance of the blood sacrifice that clearly prefigured Christ's sacrifice on His cross (vs. 33). It's not too much to say: Elijah preached to the nation a great sermon on the cross that day.

6. The people responded, believed, humbled their hearts before this divine revelation of the abounding grace and forgiveness of God. But the priests of Baal hardened their hearts against it; in hopeless rejection, they would crucify Christ a thousand times over. This demonstration was in miniature the judgment at the end of the millennium (Rev. 20:11-15). To execute the priests of Baal was the people's choice, their unanimous will. It was clear: their sin was the unpardonable one.

7. The fruit of Elijah's ministry? Genuine reformation and revival. And God translated him! (2 Kings 2:11). Pretty good evidence of grace.

 

It will be the best Good News the world or the church has ever heard. His message will be the "third angel's message in verity," which will be a clearer concept of "the everlasting gospel" understood since Pentecost's message. Even Ellen Harmon failed to grasp it until after the Great Disappointment of October 22, 1844. When she was in her 60s she eagerly welcomed a message brought by two young men, A. T. Jones and E. J. Waggoner, to the General Conference Session in 1888 that was a more clear understanding of justification by faith, the beginning of the Loud Cry of Revelation 18.

 

Now, in our time, cooperate with "Elijah" in this grand work of telling the world this "heart-turning" message! You'll meet him some day; you'll be happy to have worked with him.

—From the Writings of Robert J. Wieland

 

Endnotes:

[1] The title of an article written by Robert J. Wieland, "The Next Great Event on God's Calendar—The Coming of Elijah the Prophet: Who? And How?"

[2] Ellen G. White, Testimonies to Ministers and Gospel Workers, pp. 467, 468; 1890.

[3] Ellen G. White, Letter to Uriah Smith, Selected Messages, book 1, pp. 234, 235; 1896.

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Raul Diaz about.me/raul.diaz

Sabbath School Lesson 4 | "Conflict and Crisis: The Judges" | Pastor Pau...

Lesson 4: Conflict and Crisis: The Judges

Sabbath School Today

With the 1888 Message Dynamic

Rebellion and Redemption

Lesson 4: Conflict and Crisis: The Judges

Israel's time of the judges was early in their history, after having entered the promised land. Almost immediately after Joshua's death, and the death of his generation, "there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord, nor yet the work which He had done for Israel" (Judges 2:10, NASB). The result was entirely predictable: "Then the sons of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served the Baals" (vs. 11). It wasn't a dramatic decision, just a quiet failure to teach the next generation how the Lord had led and taught His people in the past.

 

The cycle began with this seemingly insignificant neglect. Israel went her way, got into trouble, called on the Lord and He rescued them. During this time, He raised up what were called judges to have special access to Him ("And the Spirit of the Lord came upon him, and he judged Israel," Judges 3:10). During each judge's lifetime, Israel was at peace, but once the judge died, Israel went her own way and the cycle began again.

 

In the 128 years since the General Conference of 1888, there have been some similarities to the experience of Israel in the Seventh-day Adventist church. It is not within the scope of this little paper to trace the parallels, but thoughtful people are concerned.

 

The concept that God provided "judges" is significant. A nation that learns to respect the rule of law is a nation that does well. Israel had an on-again, off-again relationship with respect for the law, generally dependent on the existence of a living judge in the land. Again, we notice that almost everything depends on the leadership. God seems relegated to plod along behind His chosen people, but He is still in control. Because of Israel's choices, He allows surrounding nations to oppress them, so they cry out for deliverance. Here enters the reluctant Gideon, whose faith is apparently not as strong as that of previous judges Othniel and Deborah. We love to tell the children (with the adults listening) the wonderfully colorful story of Gideon.

 

In one of the first conversations Gideon had with God, the Lord sets forth a condensed gem of the concept of righteousness by faith. "And the Lord said to Gideon, 'The people who are with you are too many for Me to give Midian into their hands, lest Israel become boastful, saying, 'My own power has delivered me'" (Judges 7:2). God is trying to reiterate the lesson Israel refuses to learn. They view the descent into sin lightly, as if God will allow the "rebellion, apostasy, disaster, cry out, forgive, and deliverance" cycle to continue indefinitely. Anything that tends to make people think they accomplished something for God without Him cannot be endorsed by God. We cannot forget that anything that is not of faith is sin. God will not lead us into temptation. The more the problem seems impossible to overcome, the more we will see His, and only His leading in the solution.

 

The cycle of rebellion and deliverance continued for a while. Various other judges were raised up in cycles of approximately 40 years. Again, there was peace and prosperity while the judges lived. The Philistine oppression had been allowed for 40 years, and this time God introduces a new concept in their deliverer. Samson's birth is divinely predicted, and his parents are given instructions for setting him aside as a Nazirite "and he shall begin to deliver Israel from the hands of the Philistines" (Judges 13:5). Samson wasted much of his time in ministry by taking the glory for his supernatural powers. How much more God could have done with this man had he been willing to humble himself and listen to God's guidance.

 

Samson's life is a micro demonstration of the corporate life of Israel. He presumed on the patience of God, and tested it throughout his life. Samson's enraged "superman" style acts were not part of a cohesive plan to redeem Israel, but were rather more of a circus demonstration of his (really God's) power. His last act to deliver Israel from the Philistines also caused his own death, and little was done to stop the descent into deep apostasy.

 

It took the living parable of the Levite and his concubine to bring the nation to see its condition. The symbolism of cutting the dead woman into twelve pieces, and sending them to the leaders of the tribes, was powerful. They realized they were responsible for turning away from God, and they deserved to be punished for abandoning their God and His promises. Like the mysterious story where Abraham cut the sacrificial animal pieces in Genesis 16, Israel had abandoned the promises of the Lord to be their God since they kept turning away from His instruction and teaching. Finally, the nation was unified enough to see their wrong, but the tribe of Benjamin held out and civil war broke out. They saved the tribe, but the final verse of Judges gives a sad state of affairs: "In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes" (21:25)

 

The story of Ruth is the beautiful response the Lord gives us as a ray of hope through the rubbish Israel made of herself. When the three women left Moab, Naomi was returning to a leaderless people where everyone did "what was right in his own eyes." Other than the possibility of avoiding famine, the Israeli society probably wasn't much different than what they experienced in heathen Moab. It would have been easy for Orpah and Ruth to justify staying in Moab and letting Naomi go, but at least for Ruth, a change had happened in her heart. She must have seen something in the religion of Israel that was different because she stayed loyal to the religion of her dead husband by staying with Naomi.

 

What does this have to do with the message the Lord gave us in 1888? The stories of God's interaction with people throughout the Bible were given to explain the principles of righteousness by faith repeated and enlarged through human experience. God wanted a church to actually live the principles embodied by Ruth, who wasn't even an Israelite. We as Seventh-day Adventists were to demonstrate the Lord's ability to change stubborn and rebellious hearts in preparation for the return of Christ.

 

It is this spirit, lived in the life that will show the world that the message of righteousness by faith is not just a dusty old doctrine, but is capable of quickening hearts into vibrant life and joy. That God chose to bring His Son through the line of Ruth cannot be coincidence. That line produced God's "heir" for the human race through which we are all reborn "in Christ."

 

Have we, as a corporate church met the challenge of showing the world the change of heart? Since it is the final message which will result in the Lord's return when fully given, we have to humbly answer, no, the church has not fully met that challenge. Perhaps the answer involves preaching the message more fully. Perhaps we need to tell folks that the incarnation of Christ placed all of humanity in Him, so by His birth, sinless life, universally atoning death, and resurrection He rewrote the history of the entire human race. It is this vital information that is to be presented to the world so people can make their choice to remain where Christ put them, in Him. So much of Christianity teaches that we are born in some kind of limbo, where we must find Christ on our own, then make the right choice in order to be saved. A variation is that we are born already condemned and must make enormous efforts to avoid the slippery slope into hell.

 

There are verses that make it sound like those scenarios are supported by scripture. Ephesians 2:1 describes us: "You were dead in your trespasses and sins." Think of the death of Christ as reaching backward and forward in time. The entire world was plunged into condemnation and death when the first Adam sinned.

 

"This sentence of death was made known to Adam as soon as he was placed in the garden of Eden, as a warning against sin. When he sinned, he at once came under condemnation, doomed to suffer the threatened penalty. But right here came in the gospel. The sacrifice of Christ was just as efficacious the day that Adam sinned as it is today; he is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. For all practical purposes Christ was crucified as soon as Adam fell, for God 'calleth those things which be not as though they were.' Christ was given at that time. The sacrifice on the part of God, to give His only begotten Son, was already made; God loved the world then just as much as he did four thousand years later.

 

"If it had not been that Christ was given for man's redemption, death would have ended all for Adam, and for all the human race. But the promise of a Redeemer carried with it another probation, and so the execution of the sentence was suspended until it should be seen what use men would make of that probation. God has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by Jesus Christ (Acts 17:31); and until that time the sentence will be held in abeyance. Christ has suffered it, and all who receive him, receive the penalty in him, and his life answers for theirs. But those who reject the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God will abide on them. They will receive the penalty in themselves, and thus the course of sin will be brought to a close, and the law will be vindicated" (E. J. Waggoner, Signs of the Times, Aug. 4, 1890).

 

Thus, Christ's sacrifice was effective from the date God promised it, so it covered the entire human race as comprehensively as Adam's sin. This is the Good News of the Gospel as taught by the 1888 messengers. It places each individual solidly on the same footing as the next person. No one is at a disadvantage, because all have the same advantage by virtue of their position in Christ. Since it has all been accomplished by Christ, our works flow from gratitude, not the need for assurance that God loves us. God gave us His Son. That proves He loves us.

—Arlene Hill

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Raul Diaz about.me/raul.diaz

Sabbath School Lesson 3 | "Global Rebellion and the Patriarchs" | Pastor...

Lesson 3: Global Rebellion and the Patriarchs

Sabbath School Today

With the 1888 Message Dynamic

Rebellion and Redemption

Lesson 3: Global Rebellion and the Patriarchs

Welcome to this study of the patriarchs in the book of Genesis. According to the Lord's apostle Paul, Genesis is the "gospel book of the Bible": "And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the nations by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, 'In you all the nations shall be blessed'" (Gal. 3:8). Genesis is the Romans of the Old Testament!

THE 1888 MESSAGE AND GOD'S PROMISE TO ABRAHAM

The biblical "new covenant" is simply God's promise to write His holy law in the human heart so that it becomes a joy to live in harmony with His holy will for our happiness. The biblical "old covenant" is simply the promise of the people to obey "all that the Lord has spoken," an expression of their own righteousness--which of course nobody has. No human has innate righteousness; what genuine righteousness there is, has to be always the gift of God.

In His love and mercy, God tried to give ancient Israel the new covenant, but they wouldn't humble their hearts to believe it (see Ex. 19:1-8). He wanted to renew to them the new covenant promise He had made to their "father" Abraham (he had believed the new covenant promise after decades of his and Sarah's "old covenant" unbelief). With their hearts humbled in repentance, Abraham and Sarah had enjoyed the blessings of imputed and imparted righteousness--by faith. Thus by his faith, Abraham earned the right to be forever called "the father of the faithful." Under the glorious provisions of the "new covenant," all of Abraham's true descendants (those who have his faith) would have the whole earth as an "everlasting possession," which meant they must also receive the gift of everlasting life.

CAIN AND ABEL FROM AN 1888 PERSPECTIVE

We know what Cain's problem was: he was trying to find acceptance with God by the good works he was doing. And he was a great farmer! His offering represented the very finest, most patient and hard-working horticultural skill and devotion possible! But Cain's problem was his "work"; his problem was his strict obedience to the commandment of God when He told Adam and Eve, "cursed is the ground for your sake; in sorrow you shall eat of it all the days of your life. ... You shall eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread" (Gen. 3:17-19).

Hadn't Cain sweated as he did just that? He was happy as a lark when he brought his "offering" to the altar that day, rejoicing in his "obedience," positive that God would reward him for his "works," but disappointed when God ignored it. What Cain missed was simple heart-appreciation for the shed blood of the Lamb of God; his problem was "unbelief," a failure to appreciate what it cost the Son of God to save him. Let's learn the lesson!

Abel brought a lamb that he sacrificed--a confession of his faith that no "gift" can enrich God, but Abel's offering said that in his heart he appreciated the Unspeakable Gift God was giving for our salvation. Genesis 4:4 says that God "respected Abel and his offering." Fire came from heaven. God was happy for evidence that Abel was someone with a melted heart, someone who said, "Thank You, God!" for the cross of Christ.

When Cain saw that his splendid bouquet, and fruits and vegetables, were wilting on the altar unaccepted, he got into the world's first "road-rage" and murdered his brother. If he could have gotten his hands on God, he would have murdered Him too--thus he was the world's first crucifier of Christ.

JOSEPH AND THE 1888 MESSAGE

The backdrop of Joseph's thrilling drama is the great controversy between Christ and Satan. It's far more than a novel; the fate of the plan of salvation is in the balance with that son of Jacob. In Genesis chapters 12-17 God has promised and sworn on oath (placing His own existence and His throne in jeopardy), that from Abraham's "seed" will come the Messiah, the Savior of the world. Otherwise, there can be no Savior of the world.

Jacob's twelve sons are that "seed," and Satan knows it. He inspires ten of them with murderous hatred of the one whom God has called to be the "savior" of the "seed." Failing to kill him outright, they sell him into hopeless slavery.

If only he can crush Joseph's spirit of love, Satan may win! Just embitter the young slave, an abandoned exile alone in a foreign nation and culture, if only--then the "seed" will perish with no "savior" and with them will perish God's only possible plan of salvation.

The great God of heaven has put all His eggs in the Joseph basket. Into one fallible mortal, a sinner by nature, a man inclined by his DNA to be bitter toward those brothers who betrayed him into miserable slavery. Can we imagine how breathless were the inhabitants of heaven as they watched the drama unfold.

Joseph endures the test! After all those years of bitter separation, when he meets his once-hateful brothers, his heart still loves them; he forgives them. Satan slinks off defeated. Joseph as "savior" of the "seed" demonstrates to the universe his link to Christ, the Savior of the world who prays for His crucifiers and is the Vindicator of God's oath to Abraham.

Is Joseph a type of the church that will proclaim a message that "lightens the earth with glory" in our last days? This special church is given "the spirit of prophecy" as Joseph was gifted (see Rev. 12:17; 19:10). It must pass the test of moral purity, as Joseph passed the test with Potiphar's wife tempting him. "Fornication" or "adultery" is not to be even mentioned among that people who overcome even as Christ overcame (Rev. 3:21).

The church that proclaims a message that lightens the earth with glory will suffer persecution, as Joseph suffered it from his brothers and even his father. The last-days' message will save people; lives will be changed; characters will become "at one" with God. Joseph saved many people's lives; the "remnant church" will proclaim a message that will lead many souls to eternal life.

But every one who will partake of the blessing will know first-hand "the chastening of the Lord" (Heb. 12:5-11). That will make more distinct how much the Lord loves him or her! That agape will be the dominant element of the final message. That in turn is the work of our great High Priest in His current task of cleansing the heavenly sanctuary in preparing a people for translation at the second coming of Christ.

These stories are not dry; they are stories that are intensely interesting. And as we study them we find the miracle growing in our own human hearts--the miracle of heart-reconciliation ("atonement") with God. We see Him disclosed in the stories, and to see Him is to be reconciled to Him.

--Paul E. Penno

Note: "Sabbath School Today" and Pastor Paul Penno's video of this lesson are on the Internet at: http://1888mpm.org

Raul Diaz

Lesson 2: Crisis in Eden

Sabbath School Today

With the 1888 Message Dynamic

Rebellion and Redemption

Lesson 2: Crisis in Eden

How did evil get started in the perfect world which God created "in the beginning"? The answer is astonishing: Human beings invited the devil in, opened the door to him, welcomed him—Adam and Eve. The devil could not push himself in unless our first parents should invite him into their home. We can understand this even today, for evil cannot intrude into a person's heart and control him unless he first gives his consent. In creating man "in His own image," the Creator endowed him with the ability to reason and to choose. The enemy took advantage of this freedom and deceived man.

The name that our enemy has earned for himself is "the great dragon, ... that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan" (Rev. 12:9). This key unlocks the account in Genesis so that we can understand how Satan was able to deceive the first parents of the human race. God had faithfully warned them: "Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" (Gen. 2:16, 17).

Disguised as a creature of great beauty and intelligence, and pretending to express concern for our happiness, "the serpent" intruded himself at the forbidden tree. "He said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? ... God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods [Hebrew, God], knowing good and evil" (Gen. 3:1, 5). The path by which Satan found entrance was a temptation to taste-test something which God had wisely forbidden, "the knowledge of good and evil." The temptation was not a bald attack on "good." It was to invite evil in also. Satan knows better than to tempt us to renounce "good" completely. All he needs is to get us to combine good with evil.

It is true that "in the beginning," God did create opposites, evening and morning, night and day, male and female, earth and water, etc., and all were to be harmonious. But He did not endorse evil as an opposite to good; it was to be totally rejected. The serpent's argument went like this: If God has created all these opposites, if male and female are to be one, why not see evil as an acceptable opposite to good? God was holding back something from them, he said, some knowledge that would enhance their happiness and actually enable them to realize that they too were divine, yes, were "God." They could discover Him within themselves. Our mother Eve embraced the deception, seized the fruit and ate, and then persuaded her husband to join her in the experiment.

Eve actually believed the serpent's deception; Adam did not. He joined her in the evil step only because he loved her. Whatever this mysterious, unknown thing to come might be that God said was "death," he chose to share it with her. But mother Eve's original deception included the idea that there would be no death: "Ye shall not surely die," the wily serpent had assured her. Here is the origin of the idea of the natural immortality of the human soul.

His three deceptions were woven together into one strand: There will be no death, for Eve believed the serpent that man's nature is immortal; "knowing good and evil" is essential, for there is a conjunction of opposites; and "ye shall be God," for divinity dwells within every immortal human soul and only awaits self-realization.

Something unwelcome arose in the minds of our first parents following their sin: the sense of guilt. Its immediate effect was a painful shame and the desire to hide. The conscious mind could not tolerate the unwelcome thought of guilt repugnant to the conscience.

The 1888 message helps us to discern the deeper meaning of the entrance of sin into our world. What the tiny acorn is to the mighty oak, the sin of our first parents in Eden was to Calvary. As the oak is in the acorn, so the sin of Calvary was in the Edenic sin. But as the oak is not visible in the acorn, so the sin of Calvary was not discerned by Adam and Eve in their sin. They saw the "acorn," but could not dream of the existence of the "oak." "Every sin committed awakens the echoes of the original sin." [1] They with us are equally guilty of crucifying the Son of God. The original sin of the first pair was the acorn that grew into the oak of Calvary.

The basic sin of Adam and Eve was an unconscious one. Hence the prayer of Christ included them: "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). The full magnitude of a conscious realization of their sin would have overwhelmed Adam and Eve so terribly that they would have died on the spot as God promised they should. But as the conscience could not endure this knowledge of guilt, it was thrust back by censorship, and the mechanism of repression began. In the expulsion from Eden commenced the separation between the conscious and the unconscious systems, and the beginning of the function of a psychic barrier between them.

The descendants of Adam and Eve heartily repented of Eve's folly and maintained a firm loyalty to the original truth of God. Genesis calls them "the sons of God" (Gen. 6:2). They became the progenitors of an unbroken line of generations of faithful worshippers of God who believed that man had forfeited immortality by rebellion against Him and could obtain it only through faith in a divine Saviour to come and in His sacrifice. These faithful believers in God's truth cherished the promise that He made to the serpent in the presence of the guilty pair in Eden: "I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel" (Gen. 3:15). A. T. Jones explains, "This putting enmity between man and Satan has broken up man's contentment with evil, and now he hates it. In the hatred of evil there is also created a desire for the good. And as good is found only in God, and as Christ is the revelation of God, this desire for good is the desire for Christ." [2]

This "enmity" against the serpent is something not natural to the human heart. No one is born with it. God puts this enmity against evil in the heart through the grand sacrifice mentioned in this promise. It is a gift of grace. Satan will have his followers known as "thy seed." "The woman" will also have "seed." And there will be "enmity" or war between the two "seeds." A Deliverer will come in the person of the woman's "seed," a descendant of Adam and Eve. This is a prophecy of the coming of Jesus. Satan will succeed in wounding or "bruising" the woman's seed on the "heel"—an "acorn" prophecy of the eventual crucifixion of the Son of God on His cross. But Christ's apparent defeat will prove to be a glorious victory—He will crush the serpent's head and kill him. Satan (the serpent) has been defeated by the sacrifice of Christ, and the long reign of sin and evil is to be brought to an end.

—Paul E. Penno

Endnotes:

[1] Ellen G. White, "The Warfare Between Good and Evil," The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, April 16, 1901.

[2] A. T. Jones, "Faith a Free Gift to All," The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, April 24, 1894, p. 265.

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Sabbath School Lesson 1 | "Crisis in Heaven" | Pastor Paul Penno

Lesson 1: Crisis in Heaven

Sabbath School Today

With the 1888 Message Dynamic

Rebellion and Redemption

Lesson 1: Crisis in Heaven

Welcome to a new cycle of Sabbath School lessons on the great controversy theme in the Bible. The purpose of Sabbath School Today is to let the dynamic of the 1888 message shine through these lessons.

We can understand how war breaks out in this dark, sinful world; but how could there be "war in heaven"? (Rev. 12:7) Heaven is a perfect place! Who started it?

The Bible says clearly that sin originated with Lucifer, the highest of the angels. [1] He sought to spread rebellion. And many angels joined him. [2] But who started the conflict that resulted in "the great dragon, ... the Devil, and Satan [being] ... cast out" (vs. 9)?

Ellen White says that Lucifer's new idea of "the ... exaltation of self, contrary to the Creator's plan, awakened forebodings of evil in minds to whom God's glory was supreme." [3] This quiet, clever, secret "exaltation of self" would have gone on and on had it not been that some "minds" loyal to God were "awakened" to oppose it. They were the ones who started the "war in heaven"! They were not content to let this underhanded work proceed unopposed.

This war against God did not begin in hell, for there was no hell at that time, but it began in a perfect place in heaven. It was there that Satan invented the principle of self-love. This was a new idea in God's universe of peace, which had been filled with unselfishness and harmony. The Book of Revelation describes the war between Satan and "Michael," another name for Christ.

"There was war in heaven: Michael and His angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him" (Rev. 12:7-9).

From this we learn some important truths. Satan's weapon in the battle was lies; Christ's weapon was truth. Truth triumphed over lies (it always will triumph!). Some of the angels joined Satan in his rebellion, believing his lies. Satan deceived "the whole world," so that now he and his angels are on this planet waging war against God. The vast majority of earth's inhabitants are "deceived" by the devil and his evil angels (or spirits). Thus there is no safety in following the crowds! On that fateful Friday morning in Pilate's judgment hall when Jesus stood before him, it was the crowd that yelled, "Crucify Him!" Those who were loyal to Jesus were a minority, and they always are such.

Satan was "cast out into the earth" because our first parents welcomed him (Gen. 3). Now the cosmic controversy continues here until "our brethren ... overcame him [Satan] by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony" (two things!), and "loved not their lives unto the death" (Rev. 12:9-12). When among them that original "exaltation of self" is renounced, the final victory will come.

Satan's lies must be unmasked and he must be defeated in order for the Kingdom of God to be established. The war between good and evil cannot go on forever, for if it does it will prove that God is impotent. And that will mean that truth cannot prevail. No news could be worse than that. Victory for righteousness must come.

And this is where the 1888 message cleansing of the sanctuary truth emerges brightly. During the trial, often spoken of as the "great controversy," God is to the inhabitants of this earth, at least, in a kind of exile. As King David felt obliged to vacate the throne in Jerusalem and leave for temporary exile when his son Absalom rebelled, so God sets up temporary "field headquarters" from where the warfare is directed in putting down the rebellion. The sanctuary is God's "tabernacle" or "tent." [4]

The honor of the sanctuary is the honor of God's throne. That honor is in jeopardy until the issues are settled finally. As the word "Pharaoh" to the ancient Egyptians connoted "government house," so the "cleansing of the sanctuary" means the vindication of God's "house" or government in relation to the problem of sin. The sanctuary is the setting for all the activities of Christ.

Victory for righteousness is precisely the scenario that the Bible unveils in the Book of Revelation: "I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death" (Rev. 12:10, 11).

True "salvation" is greater than our personal security. It is the salvation of the cause of righteousness and truth. Our personal salvation is involved in that greater salvation, like saving your finger from drowning is included in saving your body. In fact, our personal salvation would be worthless without that greater salvation having been achieved. There is no way that "saved" souls can exist independently of God!

This setting up of "the kingdom of God" is the same as the goal of the Lord's prayer: "Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven" (Matt. 6:10).

Satan's enmity and warfare are now directed against "our brethren," that is, against all who are loyal to God. Those who are loyal to Satan remain on his side. All human beings are therefore involved in this great spiritual war, and no one can exempt himself from being on one or the other side.

Loyalty to God is expensive, for it means (for many at least) the sacrifice of life itself.

But this is not difficult for them, for they are loyal "unto the death" through faith in "the blood of the Lamb." Christ was loyal to them "unto death," "even the death of the cross" (Phil. 2:8). They say "Thank You" for such a sacrifice.

--Paul E. Penno

Endnotes:
[1] Eze. 28:12-15; Isa. 14:12-14.
[2] "The third part," Rev. 12:4.
[3] Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy, p. 494.
[4] Cf. Heb. 9:2; 9:11; Rev. 13:6; 15:5; 21:3.

Note: "Sabbath School Today" and Pastor Paul Penno's video of this lesson are on the Internet at: http://1888mpm.org

Raul Diaz