If God created all things with a purpose, what was the purpose of Creating Lucifcer?

Was he created with a free-will? Or was He created specifically to rebel against God?

I realise we can only speculate as Scripture is not clear, but has anyone (other than me) ever wondered this?

I realize about the only scripture we have to go on are the statements "I WILL" but is it possible He created for that purpose?

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Bobbi Clark
Covenant Member
Pinewood Pres. (PCA) Middleburg

When I kept Silent, My bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. Psalm 32:3

Lucifer was created, as all things were created, to demonstrate God's glory. Make a list of the attributes of God, communicable and incommunicable, and then check off the attributes that we would know little or nothing about had God not ordained that sin enter his creation.

We would not know his mercy, his wrath, his justice, his love, his supremacy, etc. Our picture of God would be missing the 'weightiness' that we find in the story of redemption. We would not know God at all. What is the chief end of man? To glorify God and enjoy him forever.

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Bob Vigneault C.O.L, L.E., G.E, Dr.O.P., O.U.T.
The Heartbeat of Heaven (blog)
Deacon/Christ Presbyterian Church, Janesville, WI OPC www.christ-opc.org

Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?

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Been hanging with Rick Warren too much? LOL

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Bruce
PCUSA
Ocean City NJ

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http://www.villagecommunitychurch.org/


"Preparing a sermon is like cooking a meal. You need pots and pans and utensils, but you don't bring them out to the table where people are eating." Derek Thomas


Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?

To glorify God and enjoy him forever.
Created with free will just like man was.

Read through James chapter 1. There is no possibility of God sinning or being the author of sin. Satan was created good just as all God's creatures were. But he was created mutable like us. And he made the same sinful choice we did. But we are shone mercy. Give thank to the Lord for he is good, his love endures forever!

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Patrick
MDiv, RTS Jackson
Pastor, Grace Presbyterian Church (OPC), Lisbon, NY

"He does well, that discourses of Christ; but he does infinitely better, that by experimental knowledge, feeds and lives on Christ." Thomas Brooks.
"Let us not please ourselves that we have deep understandings, but let us shew our understandings by our practice." Richard Sibbes

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~Gloria G.~
Bride of Warren G.
Member of Trinity Presbyterian Church, PCA, Southeast Georgia

"Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways." Psalm 119:37

I believe God created Lucifer to make him the author of sin, and thus would use him as a fallen angel to accomplish His plan. Note that the supralapsarian scheme is true for angelic election, there is not disagreement among Reformed theologians about that.

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Jean-David Jutras
URCNA
Alberta

Lucifer is actually a transliteration from the Latin Vulgate borrowed by the translators/editors of the 1611 KJV - there really is no individual with that name in the biblical account - The Satan is NEVER referred to by this title. Milton also popularizes it in Paradise Lost, books 3-4 - Christian's have, unfortunately, bought into the "myth". You might read Calvin on this issue - Isaiah 14.

Respectfully,
John

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John
Evangelical Free Church, no offices held
Langhorne, PA

[B]δός δοξαν τῳ θεῳ.[/B]
[B]ιδου ποιω τα εσχατα ως τα πρωτα.
הבל הבלים[/B]

Indeed, Isaiah 14 is about the pride of Nebuchadnezzar. Thanks for the helpful clarification.

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Pastor Steve Bradley
Trinity Reformed Presbyterian Church (RPCNA)
www.trinityrpc.org
www.sermonaudio.com/trinityrpc
www.reformedvoice.com/trinityrpc
Riva, MD

Yep,

Lucifer = lux (light) + ferre (to bring/bear/carry)

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Davidius
Husband of Emily
Member of All Saints Anglican Church - Chapel Hill (AMiA / Anglican Church of North America)
Student: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, German and Classics

John Brown of Haddington, Brown's Dictionary of Bible Characters:

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Andrew

NEOGILLIST:

So, God created Satan as a fall guy so that Satan would do what God was restrained from doing?

I assertively disagree with your wording and would point you to Patricks fine explanation to counter your explanation.

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Pergamum


"If a commission by an earthly king is considered a honor, how can a commission by a Heavenly King be considered a sacrifice?"
-- David Livingstone

Yea, sort of. I heard this position first from a Reformed Baptist pastor. It makes total sense to me. From my understanding of God's sovereignty, the devil is like God's bulldog that He unleashes especially against wicked people, but not invariably (as was the case for Job). Take for instance
Timothy 2:26. I've heard many pastors and even theologians wrongly interpret this verse by thinking that 'his' refers to the devil's will. If you look up the Greek NT, Vines concordance or the Amplified version, it makes it clear that 'his' refers to God's will, which is consistent with our reformed understanding of God's sovereignty. (I don't know, there could be textual variants, of course). The devil is there to do God's sovereign will.

"24(A)The Lord's bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, (B)able to teach, patient when wronged,

25(C)with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, (D)if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to (E)the knowledge of the truth,

26and they may come to their senses and escape from (F)the snare of the devil, having been (G)held captive by him to do his will. "

But it sounds like you say that God created him to do the evil that He cannot do...

It sounds like God could not do evil but wanted to, so He created middlemen who could manage this for him.


Satan was pure and holy but fell through his free will and now is God's enemy and tries to thward His plans. And He does oppose the plans of the saints, though this is only by God's allowance.

I prefer to speak of God's allowance of Satan's and Adam's sins.


There are dangers in the Supralapersian scheme, but perhaps this is for another thread...

Either way, we naturally tend to link the word "evil" with someone other than God directly, for it seems difficult to do otherwise. But, scripture speaks plainly of God doing evil. See Judges 9:23; I Sam. 16:14-16; 18:10; 19:9; II Sam. 12:11; I Kings: 21:21,29; II Kings 22:16; II Chron. 34:24,28; Jer. 11:17; and Prov. 16:4. But, in our limited minds, we find it hard to fathom how to reconcile God doing evil with his being good. We get confused in the definitions. We have to realize that we cannot define good by our perception of what good is or is not, because our "perceiver" (for lack of a better word) is too small for the task, and it is still corrupted. It is unable to comprehend how God can do both and yet be good, because it is incapable of doing so. Good is defined as an action performed by a good being. Therefore, we must conclude that, when God does something that we refer to as "evil", he is doing good because his being is good. He is, by definition, good. He is the definition of good. He defines good, not Webster's Dictionary; so, since his nature is good, the actions brought forth from his nature are good, whether words such as "good" or "evil" describe such actions. We who have been born again, however, have two natures, one evil and one good, and therefore cannot perform some actions and call them good entirely, yet we also cannot call them evil entirely, for our actions are always the fruit of both principles. Those not born again can only do evil, for they have only one principle within them, that being the principle of evil. Satan was a created being, just like Adam was, and therefore did not possess the heavenly, eternal nature of God inherent within him. The absence of the Spirit of God is evil, and so the explanation for Satan being evil and of Adam becoming evil when God withdrew his Spirit from him.

This is how I piece it together for now, with my still depraved mind.

Blessings!

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Charles Plauger
Member/Grace Reformed Church
Oakland, MD

God never does any sort of moral evil. Moral evil is a sin and God is all holy. TO say otherwise is very erronous.

God can decree a natural evil, such as an earthquake or tsunami, but there is a difference between a moral and a natural evil.

You wrote "The absence of the Spirit of GOd is evil.." what do you mean?

Genesis 50:20
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.

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-JD

"And God sent an evil spirit between Abimelech and the leaders of Shechem, and the leaders of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelech" -Judges 9:23

"Now therefore behold, the LORD has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; the LORD has declared disaster for you." -1 Kings 22:23

"Now the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and a harmful spirit from the LORD tormented him." -1 Samuel 16:14

"The next day a harmful spirit from God rushed upon Saul, and he raved within his house while David was playing the lyre, as he did day by day. Saul had his spear in his hand." -1 Samuel 18:10

"Then a harmful spirit from the LORD came upon Saul, as he sat in his house with his spear in his hand. And David was playing the lyre." -1 Samuel 19:9

"Thus says the LORD, 'Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house. And I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun." 2 Samuel 12:11



Just wanted to type out a few of those verses you quoted.

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Greg Carpenter
Attending Lake Osborne Presbyterian Church
Lake Worth, FL

"It is a throne of grace that God in Christ is represented to us upon; but yet it is a throne still whereon majesty and glory do reside, and God is always to be considered by us as on a throne." –John Owen

Here is a good article about the whole issue of a good God decreeing evil by John Piper. I read it last summer and thought it was pretty good. Of course, there must be bigger and more scholarly works written by Reformed theologians on it.

Is God Less Glorious Because He Ordained that Evil Be? :: Desiring God Christian Resource Library

Also, I do agree with Pergamum that it is preferrable to speak of God 'permitting' evil and the fall of Satan than causing it. There are actually some hypercalvinist websites that will teach that God is the author of sin and causes people to sin. Like Arminianism, hyper-Calvinism is an attempt to do away with different tensions concerning doctrines that we find throughout Scriptures. On one extreme, one strain of Pentecostalism will teach that God and the devil are at war like two war-lords, which is obviously a rejection of God's sovereignty, and on the other one strain of hyper-Calvinism teaches that the devil is God's puppet.

I guess accepting all the teachings of Scriptures despite these various tensions is what true faith is about.

I find this true though. The evil one can only do what God has him do. ie Job. 12Then the LORD said to Satan, "Behold, all that he has is in your power, only do not put forth your hand on him."


5"(C)However, put forth Your hand now, and (D)touch his bone and his flesh; he will curse You to Your face."

6So the LORD said to Satan, "Behold, he is in your power, only spare his life."

Notice in each occurance, Satan tells God to put forth His (God's) hand. And God send Satan to put forth His(God's) hand for him. There is a literal puppet imagery here. God's hand is inside of Satan just as we use puppets today.

Nothing HC about this. 100% biblical

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N. Robert; Trinity Reformed Church RCA, Holland MI

"Once in a while you can get shown the light, in the strangest of places if you look at it right."

I didn't mean to redirect the thread. But, somehow the presence of evil has to be accounted for. If God was before all things, and God is sovereign, then where does the principle of evil come from? Did it exist with God from eternity? If so, did it come from outside of God or from within him? And, if it was formed by him, was it formed apart from his causing it to form? It cannot come from outside of his sovereignty, or else we have lost our definition of sovereingty.

My statement "the absence of the Spirit of God is evil," was a thought that came to mind while dwelling on the subject. It made sense to me, because it is the same way we define "darkness", "impurity", and so on. Darkness is, by definition, the absence of light. Imputity, by definition, is the absence of purity; and so on. In my mind, it would make sense to define evil by saying that the absence of good is evil; and, since God is the source, fountain, and definition of good, as Jesus said in Mt. 19:17: "There is only one who is good.", I would lean towards saying that the absence of God is evil. If good is a quality that only God has, (for scripture says "there is none good" - Rom. 3:10-18), if good resides in God only, then the absence of God is evil. So, since the Holy Spirit is God, it made sense to me to say that the absence of the Holy Spirit is evil. That's what I meant by that statement. Hope that clarifies my thoughts for you.

Also, I agree that prudence is demanded when speaking about such things to others. And, when much light from God is not given into a subject, few statements ought to be made regarding it.

Blessings to you!

Pergamum;


it could be discussed on this thread, I don't mind..I had a question so I asked, it was answered and I appreciate all the answers. Thank you

So if you want to further the discussion on a deeper level, I'm okay with that, I'll just read along...and continue to learn..no need to start another thread for that..so please discuss away..