Michigan Camp Meeting 2023: The Boldness of the Cross

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

Plenary

Jim Micheff

The Boldness of the Cross

Stephen Bohr

Deadly Camouflage

The Certainty of God’s Promises

Seven Times Washed

The Mother of All Conspiracies

Fishers of Men

Randy Skeete

Adam and His Family

No Prisoners

Somebody is Lying

You are about to enjoy a presentation recorded at the 2023 Michigan Conference Camp Meeting held at Cedar Lake, Michigan.

We pray that the Lord will bless you as you listen.

I want to invite you to bow your heads as we pray.

Father in heaven we come before your awesome throne in the all-powerful name of Jesus because we know that when we come in the name of Jesus, you incline your ear to hear.

We ask that you will be with us as we open your holy word.

Speak to our minds and speak to our hearts and transform us through the power of your Holy Spirit we pray in the precious and holy name of Jesus Amen the book of Revelation tells us that Lucifer was successful in deceiving one-third of the angels of heaven.

So his methods of deception must have been very, very strong.

And then of course we know that Satan tempted Eve, Eve Adam, and that's why we're here today.

The big question is what methods did Satan use to deceive our progenitors?

In the present study we are going to attempt to determine Satan's methods in deception.

I want to begin by reading a statement that we find in manuscript releases volume 10 and page 162.

If the angels were deceived by Lucifer's ingenious methods of misrepresenting God, if Adam and Eve were deceived by his declaration that God was withholding from them the higher education that would make them as gods, is there not danger that men today will be deceived?

Please read the first chapter of Patriarchs and Prophets and see if the precious truths contained in this book are not given by the Lord to protect his people from deceptions that are urged upon them just now.

There's something special about studying the first chapter of Patriarchs and Prophets, which is a description of the origin of evil in heaven.

So what we want to do is go back to the Garden of Eden and examine the methods that Satan used to deceive Eve and then through Eve to tempt and lead Adam into sin.

God created Adam and Eve with every spiritual and physical blessing.

He gave them fresh air, radiant sunshine, luxuriant emerald green fields, luxuriant plants, fragrant flowers, luscious fruit, delicious sweet water, animal companions, human companions, angel companionship, and Adam and Eve had the privilege of having face-to-face communion with their Creator.

God, by giving all of this to Adam and Eve, was revealing his love to them.

It was a sign of God's unmistakable love for them, but God hoped that they would return that love, that they would reciprocate that love.

He created him with the capacity of reciprocating God's love.

God, the lover, wanted a response from Adam and Eve and of course they had to choose to respond to God's love.

Thus we find the covenant formula already in the Garden of Eden.

It is I will be their God and they shall be my people.

But God decided to place a test in the Garden of Eden.

Adam and Eve had to choose to show their love for God And so God placed a tree, the tree of a knowledge of good and evil in the garden to test the love and loyalty of Adam and Eve to him.

You know Jesus said, if you love me you will keep my commandments.

And so God by placing the tree in the garden was saying, if you love me you will keep my commandments.

And so God by placing the tree in the garden was saying if you love me you will not eat from the tree you will keep my command.

Let's read about that command in Genesis chapter 2 and verses 15 through 17.

Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it.

And the Lord God commanded the man saying, of every tree of the garden you may freely eat, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.

God did not give them a long list of rules and regulations.

Just 1 prohibition for them to show their love and loyalty toward him.

If they were hungry, they could have eaten from any of the trees of the garden.

So the command was simple, clear, and easy to obey.

Now there's a very important point in the story that we find in Genesis 1 and 2.

And that is that Adam and Eve, as evidence that they loved God, were to obey God's command without explanations, or without God giving them any reasons.

Now God told them what the consequences would be if they ate from the tree, but God did not tell them what was in that specific tree, why God forbade it to them.

So God expected them to obey without any explanations.

He wanted unquestioning obedience to his command as an evidence of their love for him.

Ellen White wrote in Patriarchs and Prophets page 53 the following words, should they attempt to investigate its nature, that is the nature of the tree, they would be exposed to his wiles.

They were admonished to give careful heed to the warning that God had sent them and to be content with the instruction that he had seen fit to impart.

Don't ask me why you can't eat from this specific tree that according to Ellen White looked like just the other trees, it was just as beautiful, simply take me at my word and don't eat from the tree.

No explanations, no reason given, but yes, the consequences if they ate from the tree.

Furthermore, we find in the Genesis story that God defined what is good and what is evil.

God was the arbiter, if you please, of good and evil.

The standard of right and wrong was not internal but external.

In other words, God defined what was good and what was evil.

This is totally contrary to postmodern thinking, where the idea that you can define good and evil is not given objectively by God, but comes subjectively from your own heart.

So we're going to find that Satan was the first postmodern, if you please, in the history of this world.

Actually Satan had already used this argument in heaven.

The argument that the definition of right and wrong does not come from outside in an objective source from God but comes from inside that you define good and evil yourself.

He used the same argument for the angels in heaven.

He, that is Lucifer in heaven, reiterated his claim that angels needed no control but should be left to follow their own will which would ever guide them right.

He denounced the divine statutes as a restriction of their liberty and declared that it was his purpose to secure the abolition of law that freed from this restraint the hosts of heaven might enter upon a more exalted, more glorious state of existence.

Angels don't need an external source of right and wrong.

Their own will will always lead them to what is right.

Now God had warned Adam and Eve that a powerful angel had fallen from heaven and that he was going to come to the garden to try and convince them to eat from the forbidden tree.

Now, Eve thought, well, if this angel comes from heaven and tries to convince me to eat from this tree, immediately I'm going to know that this is the angel that God spoke to us about.

And so Satan could not appear as an angel of light.

Let me ask you, can Satan transform himself into an angel of light?

The Bible says yes, but if he came as an angel, Eve would detect him immediately.

Patriarchs and Prophets page 53 Ellen White wrote, Had she been addressed, had Eve been addressed, by a being like the angels, her fears would have been excited.

But she had no thought that the fascinating serpent could become the medium of the fallen foe.

He hid himself by using a serpent because he knew that Eve was expecting an angel.

Now we're going to find in our study that Satan used 5 methods to lead Eve into sin and then through Eve, Adam.

The first thing that Satan did was to perform a counterfeit miracle.

Is Satan going to use miracles at the end of time to deceive the world?

Yes, signs and wonders were told in Matthew chapter 24 to deceive if possible even whom?

You say what was the counterfeit miracle that he performed in the Garden of Eden.

Well let's read Genesis chapter 3 and verse 1.

Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made, and he said to the woman, let's stop there for a moment.

I assure you that if you went to a serpentarium and you were looking into a cage where there was an anaconda and the anaconda lifted its head and said good afternoon, you would be out of there in a hurry.

Back to Menu

Series

Plenary

Deadly Camouflage

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Prophecy's Final Countdown

02 Signs and Wonders

1h 2m

You’re Being Conditioned for a Lie

31m

Talking Points 2nd Quarter 2024: The Great Controversy

10 Spiritualism Exposed

30m

Prophesy Again

1h

Channels

55m

Q & A

46m

The Rise of Spiritualism and the Occult

The Rise of Spiritualism and the Occult

1h 11m

His Way is in the Sanctuary

20. As a Thief in the Night

57m

Dare to be a Daniel

03 Final Character

45m

The Mock Trial

1h

Preparing For the Crisis in End Times

47m

Talking Points 4th Quarter 2022: On Death, Dying, and the Future Hope

11 End-Time Deceptions

30m

Sound Doctrine