(Ver 1.2)  This is now Part 2 in a series of Bible lessons concerning the nature and character of God and the subject of “Is God in Control of Everything that Happens”.  If you have not read “Part 1“, I would recommend that you go there to begin your study in this series.   In first lesson I asked a direct question that has bothered a lot of people in the church.  Is God really in control of everything that happens in the world?  This question often goes into deeper thoughts of why is there so much evil in the world if God is really controlling everything and that becomes a much more difficult question to answer.  While we can come up with many of man’s opinions and theories on this subject, we should determine what God thinks about it by examining His Word for clues to determine the actual truth.   I have already given you several great scriptures on this subject in my last lesson that conveyed a transfer of ownership and responsibility from God to man, concerning the dominion of the earth.   I don’t know if people think I provided enough evidence or not for this belief, so I will provide another verse witness that also says God put man in control of what happens on this planet:

Hebrews 2:7  Thou madest him a little lower than the angels, thou crownedst him with glory and honour, and didst set him over the works of thy hands:

If you read the preceding verse you will see this is speaking of Man or Adam and the sons of Adam.  It says God has crowned us and that denotes that we were given rule and authority of this earth.  Then the verse says man was put over the works of God’s hands.  To be put over something denotes clear responsibility and accountability for not performing what was expected.  Again if I gave you a million dollars, do I have any say after you take it as to what you do with it?  No I don’t.  The money would belong to you and now you are responsible to keep it or to burn it or do whatever you want to do with it.  That is called a transfer of power and authority.  This is exactly what God did for Adam in Genesis 1:26.

Then in my last blog I ended up with a verse in Matthew that had Jesus telling us that “All power both in heaven and earth has been given to me.”  The clear inference given is that before His resurrection and ascension, not everything was under God’s control.  So now we have a dilemma that God is controlling everything again and we still see evil, murder, terror, rape and death still prevalent in the earth.  So what is the situation and who is really in control still needs to be resolved using the Word of God.

Before I go there, let’s determine who had dominion over the World before the resurrection of Christ.  We can see from earlier scriptures that dominion and authority was given to Adam to control everything on the earth and in the earth, including the air and the sea.  So what happened?  Did Adam transfer this gifted ownership, rule and authority to someone else?  I gave you a clue that Adam did this by showing you what God said about Satan in 2 Corinthians 4:4 being called the “god” of this world.  What we learn from this single scripture is that if Satan has become the god of this world then how can God be in control of everything that happens here?   This is a hotly debated new topic.  Many theologians believe that Satan is God’s pawn and can do only what God gives him permission to do but that is in violation of most revealed scriptures.  For example, we should be able to see this more clearly by examining this verse when God was present on the earth in the flesh:

Luke 4:5  And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.

We can clearly learn and see that Jesus in this temptation of Satan is being taken up to a very high mountain and is shown “ALL” of the kingdoms of this world.  That information would leave nothing out, would it?  Then Satan makes this statement to Jesus that is absolutely critical to see and understand:

Luke 4:6  And the devil said unto 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.

This is an incredible statement of revelation being given to us by God’s Word.   According to what is spoken by Satan all authority over the planet was “delivered” or “given” to him by someone.  That statement denotes new ownership and control rights thereof.  Satan then says that he is able to give it to whoever he wants to.   Remember who Satan is speaking to, this is God in the flesh who created him and he is either very stupid or he is telling the truth.   God would certainly know if Satan is not speaking the truth and He would have just said you are a liar, leave me and Satan would have had to leave if God was in control.  So we can see a very clear statement concerning who is in control of what happens on the earth and that  it is not God.  This is of course Satan speaking so many will say it is just a lie, but if it is just a lie then it could not have been a temptation to Jesus.  It has to be a real offer to Jesus in order for it to be a temptation for Him to take it.  Remember when Jesus walked the earth during his ministry?    Demons and religious people would constantly question his authority and his right to be here and to do what he was doing.  You’ll find instances like this in Mark 1:24, Luke 4:34 and Matthew 8:29.  Demons when confronted would question Jesus and call him God and ask what right do you have to do these things to them.

Mat 28:18  And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.

This verse occurs after Jesus was raised from the dead.  Here Jesus literally tells us that authority has been given back to him here on the earth and even in heaven.   Why would God tell us that this authority was again transferred to Him if He already had it?  Can you answer me that?   So apparently Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection caused something to occur to transfer control back from Satan.  In 1 Corinthians 2:8 we have a statement about Satan and his demon cohorts that says, “If they would have only known what was going to happen, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory.”  That was my paraphrase of the verse, but that is what it basically says.  You are free to go and study this verse for yourself.  The demons are called “princes” and that Greek word simply means a ruler of this world.  Therefore we know that if Satan would have known the consequences of killing Christ on the cross then he would not have done it.  So apparently killing Christ caused a major and even devastating blow to his plan.  I hope that you are grasping these concepts give to us by God.

Apparently from what I can see in the Bible God got back what Adam had lost and given away to Satan through the works of Jesus Christ who was a literal son of Adam (man) by his death on the cross.  Jesus was a direct descendant of the first man Adam.  Jesus being a man, had the right to take man’s authority back, as God in heaven He did not have the right to do this since it was God in heaven that gave the authority to man and man could do with it whatever he liked.  If you go through the law in the Old Testament you will see what gave Jesus the right to redeem what Adam had sold, but I won’t go into all of that detail today in this lesson.

So who is in control today?  We still have a problem with responsibility?  Who’s responsibility is it to preach the gospel?  Who is going to get men saved?  Who is going to be the missionary to Africa and Asia?  Is this God’s responsibility?  Is God going to send angels to preach His Word?  I don’t think so.  No what we have is a statement by Jesus that helps us to see what happened.  Earlier I gave you the verse in Matthew after  Jesus was raised from the dead and He said “all power is given to me both in heaven and the earth,  what was His next statement to us in the church?  Let’s read this verse and see what Jesus did with His new authority:

Matthew 28:19  Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:

Did you see it?  Here we have another transfer of authority and responsibility.  We have been given the highest authority on the earth again being transferred this authority by the LORD JESUS!  Jesus said “I have been given all power, now you go.”  The “Now you go” is a conveyance of authority back to the church.  Have you ever asked yourself this question “Why if all authority was given to Jesus, wasn’t Satan just cast out into hell?”  That of course is a very interesting question to think on.  Apparently something still gives Satan the right to be here on the earth, even if he doesn’t have authority over Christians any more.  Perhaps you need to go back and read the verse that I mentioned earlier in Matthew 8:29.  This demon that Jesus confronted in this verse knew that there was a set time for them to be here.  That is why this demon said are you come to torment us before the time?   We need to understand what this time is because it is rapidly approaching.   There is coming a time when the devil and his demons will be cast into hell and that will be the end of them until after the 1000 year time of rest occurs but I will not teach that in this lesson today.

The Bible is such a rich and complex book, with so much deep information spiritual information given to us in it.  It certainly is challenging to put all of the puzzle pieces together correctly, but with God’s help I believe we will come to a mature understanding of the truth before Jesus returns.   Thank you for taking the time to read my Bible studies.  I hope and pray that something positive was planted in your spirit that will produce much fruit for the kingdom of God.   Be continually blessed and come back and share these lessons with your friends.