Satan and His Kingdom 57 people are once more practising the “abominations” which caused the Lord to cast out the nations of Canaan before His people Israel. Abominations which Jehovah solemnly forbade Israel to touch. (Read Deut. 18:9-12.) But all is in fulfillment of the Apostle Paul’s forecast of the latter days. The grievous times are upon us. Men are “lovers of self, lovers of money, . . . lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God; holding a form of godliness” while denying the power thereof (2 Tim. 3:1-6). V. SATAN CONQUERED AT CALVARY Satan was conquered at Calvary. The disobedience of the first Adam was met by the obedience of the second—the Lord from heaven. The punishment of death was carried out upon the sinless One who took upon Him the sins of the world, and died as the Representative Man. The fallen race of Adam which God said must be “blotted out” (Gen. 6 :7 , m.; Gen, 7:23, m.), because, “every imagination of the thoughts of the heart was only evil continually,” was nailed to the Cross in the person of the second Adam, and by the Cross the Lord from heaven triumphed over the prince of darkness. “Through death ”—the very result of sin; “through death ”— the very weapon by which the evil one held his subjects in bondage; through death —the Prince of Life destroyed “him that had the power of death, that is, the devil” (Heb. 2:14). Satan has fallen from heaven. He was “cast out,” his power destroyed, his kingdom shaken, at the place called Calvary. But though the adversary was conquered at Calvary and cast down from his throne of power, he is left at large while the proclamation of the victory is sent throughout his domin ions, for the purpose of giving the choice of masters to every human being. How bitterly the adversary resists the work of the Holy Spirit in men as their eyes are opened to the tru th ! But far more keenly does he resist the full enlightenment of the believer which makes him so possessed by the Holy Spirit
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