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I did not say “everything is God.”

Authority and power was given to Messiah. Matthew 28:28 "And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth." Who gave him that power? God.

God did not put Himself under Messiah’s power and authority. When Jesus accomplished his mission, … conquered death and the grave and gave us the victory over death and the grave, he gave that authority and power back to God.

God is all in all. It’s His creation.

How did a so-called Devil get to be powerful, even as you claim as powerful as God?

Colossians 1:13 " Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:"

How did the this devil figure get a kingdom and get to be a king? Who set his up?

It looks like men have created this devil figure, and gotten tangled up so bad with him, they then have to twist other scriptures to try to make them fit.

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My apologies, Piper. Sixfoot said God is everything. I asked for a scripture that says so. And you supplied a verse out of context which appeared to say so.
I assumed you were supporting Sixfoot’s thesis. That wasn’t necessarily so, I guess.

Through deception. He deceives us into yielding him areas of our thoughtlife and we serve him by following his lies. I don’t claim he is as powerful as God.

Scripture speaks of the devil, and says he tried to deceive Jesus, but failed. We are talking of someone Jesus met and tangled with.

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Thanks Paul.

Do you give credit to the devil with causing all of the wickedness in men before the flood?

God didn’t mention a devil before he brought the flood.

After the flood he said “for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth.” No mention of a devil. God put the blame squarely on men. God created us with free will - a mixture of good and evil. It is up to us to choose good and do good. Or not.

The devil is not mentioned in Genesis. The devil is not mentioned in the Old Covenant Scripture. The Jews did not believe in a “devil.”

What we do have in Scripture is: Eve hanging around the tree. The one forbidden fruit in all of Eden, and Eve was looking at it, admiring it and lusting after it. All by herself.

Convincing herself that she wouldn’t die, (be separated from God) if she ate the fruit. After she ate it and also gave it to her husband, God separated himself from them. Putting them out of the garden to make it on their own.

Man remained in that separated state until Jesus reconciled them back to God.

James 1:13 “Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted with evil and he himself tempts no one; 14 but each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desires. 15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin; and sin when it is full-grown brings forth death.”

Tempted. Lured. Enticed. By his own desires.

No devil here.

Disobeying God is sin.
Sin causes death.
Death is separation from God.
It is not physical death.
It is a spiritual death - separated from God who is life.

We are either alive with Christ, or dead without Christ.

Sorry about that. I guess I assumed because you said the devil had a kingdom.

Later on the rest of your post.

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Isaiah 45:7 "I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things .

1 John 2:16 “For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, is not of the Father but is of the world.”

John speaks of how men are tempted when he alludes to the very things in the world which Adam and Eve were tempted and deceived in the Garden of Eden.

The writer of Hebrews speaks of the reasons why Jesus had to be of human nature.

Hebrews 4:15 “For we have not a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.”

Hebrews 2:14 "Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same nature, that through death he might destroy him who has the power of death, that is, the devil, 15 and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong bondage. 16 For surely it is not with angels that he is concerned but with the descendants of Abraham. 17 Therefore he had to be made like his brethren in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make expiation for the sins of the people. 18 For because he himself has suffered and been tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted."

His nature was to save humanity from human sin, not the angels. He had to have human nature so he could be tempted to sin.

Jesus was tempted the same way men are tempted today - “lusts of the flesh” “lusts of the eyes” and the “pride of life.” All those lusts are within humans.

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The word translated serpent/snake means whisperer. Although a snake is a whisperer, not all whisperers are snakes. But you seem to have a different bible from mine. In mine, there was a whisperer with Eve who lied yo her and deceived her whom God later cursed for his role in her downfall.

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1 John 3:8 KJV — He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.

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The word BaRa’ describes the act of reforming something into something else. God takes the evil that creatures do and uses it for some useful purpose. He does not create evil ex nihilo. Evil is a result of creatures having free will and making foolish choices that do harm. God is able to harness that evil and get some good out of it.

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A simple reading of the text shows the serpent was a “beast of the field.” God created the serpent the same time that he created all of the other beasts of the field.

Genesis 3:1 “Now the serpent was more subtle than any other wild creature that the LORD God had made.”

God created the serpent the same day He created all the other beasts of the field.

People are uncomfortable with the simple record of human guilt - uncomfortable with laying the guilt where it belongs. The story is about Adam and Eve. The serpent has been turned into a superhuman being that gets all the blame.

That diminishes human sin at the expense of the text.

If all of the blame for sin is put on the serpent, why didn’t God destroy the serpent right then? He created it.

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Sin is the result of giving in to our own natural evil desires. If Scripture calls it the devil, then that’s what it is.

Acts 5:3 "But Peter said, "Anani’as, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the proceeds of the land? 4 While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? How is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart?

Peter said Satan had filled Ananias’ heart in verse 3.

Peter said Ananias had contrived the deed in his heart in verse 4.

Humans can be/do evil without any help.

God also created us with a conscience so that we can discern when we do evil.

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I use the RSV.

Which bible translates it ‘whisperer’?

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A cursory reading might tell you that.

¶Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?

The text doesn’t say “other”. The whisperer was more subtil/cunning than any beast of the field/land. It does not say the whisperer was a beast of the field/land.

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The book of Genesis – the book of origins/beginnings.

Gen 3:1 - Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast H2416 of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?

From Strongs: Hebrew H2416 - “than any beast” is also used for “every living creature that moveth,” in Genesis 1:21.

Gen 1:21 - And God created great whales, and every living H2416 creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

“Every living creature” from the same H2416

Gen 2:19 - And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast H2416 of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living H2416 creature, that was the name thereof.

“Every beast” is also from H2416

"Every living Creature is also from H2416.

Gen 3:14 - And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast H2416 of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: H2416

Same number is used for the creation of Adam and Eve.

Gen 2:7 - And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; H2416 and man became a living H2416 soul.

God created every living thing, where did the whisperer come from?

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Do you believe angels exist. If so, where did they come from?

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They exist. God created them. Angels are translated ‘messengers’ in both Hebrew and Greek, they are servants of God. They are of God’s nature, they cannot sin. Sin is a human condition.

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How do you know they cannot sin?

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Hebrews 1:13-14 “But to what angel has he ever said, “Sit at my right hand, till I make thy enemies a stool for thy feet”? Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to serve, for the sake of those who are to obtain salvation?”

All angels are ministering spirits.

“They which shall be accounted worthy neither marry …neither can they die any more for they are equal to the angels.” Luke 20:35

Angels cannot die. “Death does not lay hold of angels.” Hebrews 2

"Sin brings death … not eternal life. Romans 6:23

If there is a possibility of sinning, there is no eternal life. If we can sin, we can die. Angels cannot die.

Saying angels sinned is a pagan belief. It makes God’s promise of eternal life meaningless.

Peter said, “bold and arrogant these men (the false teachers) are not afraid to slander celestial beings.” 2 Peter 2

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If the sacrifice of Christ is a “perpetual” sacrifice, it’s efficacy has no expiry date. There is no reason to assume that the possibility of sinning implies certain death.

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So, they are not beasts of the field that were created on day five. And being more subtil than all the beasts of the field does not make one of them a beast of the field.

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Maybe I didn’t explain that well enough.

That word “all” in Hebrews shows us that angels are not in two groups. Disobedient and obedient.

God works through His angels - Ps 103. It is not possible for them to sin.

The angels dwell in the realm where God dwells. If angels can ‘sin’ - disobey God, in the heavenly spiritual realm, so can we after this life.

Pagan beliefs. Persian myths of a good god and an evil god and the idea of fallen angels that sinned. Early Hindu vadas also had this idea.

1500 BC was the period when Moses got the Law from God on Mount Sinai. The Law of Moses which included hundreds of laws plus the 10 commandments.

The following was happening in the pagan world at about the same time. 1500 BC

Persian Mythology - Myth Encyclopedia - Greek, god, legend, names, ancient, war, world, Roman, creation

Persian mythology developed in what is now Iran after about 1500 B . C . About a thousand years later, a religion known as Zoroastrianism emerged in the region. It held on to many of the earlier beliefs but added new themes, deities, and myths. The result was a mythology based on a dualistic vision: a cosmic conflict between good and evil.

Background and Sources. The roots of Persian mythology lie in the steppes of southern Russia and Central Asia. Between 1500 and 1000 B . C ., Indo-European peoples migrated south from the steppes into the regions now known as Turkey, Iran, and northern India. Those who settled in Iran became the Persians. Their mythology had much in common with that of the early Hindus and probably developed from a common Indo-European source. In time, the Persians also absorbed influences from Mesopotamia ***** on their western border.

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Angels are not “crafty/subtil.” It is abominable to say they are. The word angel is not in the passage. The words “servant” or “messenger” is not mentioned. The word satan is not in the passage. The word (D)evil is not in the passage.

The words satan and (D)evil are not found in the book of Genesis.

Deu 29:29 “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children for ever that we may do all the works of this law.”

Isaiah 66:1 "Thus says the LORD: “Heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool; what is the house which you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest?”

God is from everlasting to everlasting. There is no night where God dwells ‘in the light’ – they don’t count time by years. God created time for mankind. Mankind started counting time 6000 years ago.

One of God’s chosen apostles had a glimpse of the spiritual realm where God dwells and he said there were no words to describe it. God doesn’t tell us when He created the angels, because in a timeless realm, “when” (denoting a time) is not relevant. We can have faith in what is revealed about the angels of God.

We can have faith in what is revealed to us in Scripture. We don’t know what physical form the serpent had before God cursed them, but we are witnesses to the serpents/snakes crawling on their bellies and eating dust. They are hated on sight by most people. The blowing viper is said to be the poison serpent that bit the Apostle Paul on the hand.

Isaiah 40:12 “Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and marked off the heavens with a span, enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure and weighed the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance?”

God is not a weakling that he would allow another being to mess with His creation. Everything is according to his plan, like it or not.