Quote:
Originally Posted by Jo S
The simple fact that at Christ's tempting Satan showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time and said to him, 'All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it. If thou wilt worship me all shalt be thine.' (Luke 4:5-7), shows that Satan couldn't have offered Christ what wasn't his to begin with otherwise there wouldn't have been no bases for Christ to potentially sin in the first place.
And then there is 2 Corinthians 4:4;
"In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not........."
Again, God establishes ALL powers on earth (Romans 13:1). If Satan is "ruler of this world", it implies God allowed him to establish it. Nothing was taken from God that wasn't allowed by him in the first place.
Satan is a thief relative to man but not God. Satan did not "usurp" as Lee or the commentators put it or take anything by force. Instead by sin, he subjected man to himself and with that, man's dominion. Force was not involved in any way, man sinned willfully.
As long as man is subject to sin, he is subject to Satan. Therefore, if fear and terror come through sin and creation is subject to it, it follows that creation is subject to Satan. This is the conclusion the apostles reached otherwise they wouldn't have called Satan "god of this world".
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In John 14 Jesus said, "The ruler of this world is coming, and in me he has nothing." If Jesus calls Satan the ruler of this world, who are we to argue?
I was considering the prayer where Jesus says, "Thy will be done on earth as in heaven". In such there are indeed "rulers over five cities" and "rulers over ten cities" (Luke 19:17,19) - the idea being that in heaven, God's will is done through deputies, in hierarchy... but on earth, God's will is done by our taking the least place. On earth, Jesus took the least place, because of sin. Paul made this very clear.
Then the self-anointed Super Apostle interposed his own fallen human will whilst calling it God's will, and the dupes were happy for a time, with new-found purpose and meaning. "Go out and take the cities of the earth" they were told. "Preach the high peak, recovered truth". Then at some point the Super Apostle imposed his admittedly unspiritual son as Office Manager, who then ran roughshod over local church elders and thus "the cities of the earth". What a scam.
I don't know much about the NAR but I see similarly in that a fallen sinner convinces other sinners to come under him, that this will incur God's blessing. Because of sin, we should not presume pride of place. Dominion, in Christan terms, is self-control, and the ability to resist evil and do good (help others, show love). Those who lack self-control will then try to control others. See, e.g., Witness Lee, and sons Timothy and Philip.
We called it "the flow" from the throne of God, through Witness Lee, but it was the God of this age tricking man into taking a position that was not his to claim. Remember that Jude 1 has a warning, repeated in 2 Peter, about the angels who did not keep their place? In the church there is the temptation to leave our place, and to begin to lord over others. This is exactly what is seen with Nee, Lee and the "recovery".