“How Art Thou Fallen From Heaven, O Lucifer, Son of the Morning!”
By R. A. Underwood
THE exclamatory sentence at the head of this article is one of the scriptures which was written aforetime “for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.” Lucifer, one of the bright stars in heaven, posed as a reformer. He set up the claim that the “administration” of God’s government was oppressive, and held its subjects in bondage. However, he professed loyalty to God, yet he proposed to bring about reformation in the government of God that would bring liberty and freedom to the angels and all created beings not enjoyed under the existing “administration.” The preceding statements are clearly sustained in “Patriarchs and Prophets,” pages 37-42. “While claiming for himself perfect loyalty to God, he [Lucifer] urged that changes in the order and laws of heaven were necessary for the stability of the divine government. . . . He denounced them [the angels] as deluded10slaves, . . . and announced that he would no longer submit to this invasion of his rights and theirs. . . . He promised those who would enter his ranks a new and better government, under which all would enjoy freedom. . . . The only course remaining for him and his followers, he said, was to assert their liberty. . . . By artful perversion [he] cast doubt upon the plainest statements of Jehovah. . . . All evil he declared to be the result of the divine administration.” From this quotation the inference is clear that Satan will lead men to adopt arguments and inaugurate movements against the working of God in the time of the finishing of the gospel, which were characteristic of his deceptive movement among the angels. The Scriptures show that every scheme invented to deceive, every charge made against the government of God, and every criticism of the administration of the work of God made by Satan since sin entered to mar the peace and harmony of the universe, will be used against the remnant church of Christ. Such movements are only evidences, or signs, that Christ’s coming is near. For we read, “Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved.” 2 Thess. 2:9, 10. We are admonished at this time by the apostle, to take heed and beware lest we be led away with the error of the wicked, and fall from our own steadfastness. Position or long experience of “steadfastness” in the truth is not a guarantee of safety at this time. We can be kept only by the power of God, received through abiding faith.