The Pattern for the Church

From The Sword & Trowel 2013   

This article about the sufficiency of Scripture presents Bible texts showing that the apostles established a pattern, standard or model for the church of all ages.

When we speak of the sufficiency of Scripture, we mean that the Word of God provides all that we need to know in order to be saved, to be sanctified, to worship, and to organise and operate the church of God (2 Timothy 3.16-17).
   Historically, Baptists, Independents, and Brethren have been notably keen to take account of the last part of this definition, believing that there is a ‘pattern’ church in the New Testament, the apostles having consciously left an authoritative blueprint for churches to the end of the age.
   It is true that the pattern church of the New Testament has never been popular with denominations that reflect the very earliest stage of the Reformation, such as Lutherans and Anglicans, who inherit their clerical and liturgical systems (cleaned up doctrinally) from the Church of Rome. They took the view that Christians may devise for themselves church organisation, methods and manner of worship, limiting the sufficiency of Scripture to salvation and sanctification. (Evangelical Anglicans still hold this limited view.)
   Most evangelicals, however, until recently, believed they should seek to identify and follow the New ­Testament prescription for the church. But times change, and now we hear the voices of those who know better than the Lord, and who abandon the sufficiency  of Scripture and its authority on church matters.
   They tell us we should be ‘doing church’ (their term) differently, and reorganising everything to suit the culture of the world. The wheel of the church is to be re-invented. Congregations will never look the same. There is, they insist, no pattern church set out in the Bible.
   The Saviour said, ‘The scripture cannot be broken,’ but today’s ‘reformers’ think the traditional church found in the New Testament is out-of-date and unsuitable for the present age. They favour innovations that bring the world into the church in many ways.

"Long-term Resentment in the Young"

From The Sword & Trowel 2013    

As Christian parents, how are we training our children for adult life? Parenthood is a tremendous responsibility, and we should be glad for every word we have in the Bible showing how we should go about it.

Paul’s Teaching on Child Training

And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord (Ephesians 6.4).
It hardly needs to be said that ­­­­parenthood is a tremendous responsibility, and we are glad of every word we have in the Bible showing how we should go about it.
   In Ephesians 6.4 Paul gives direction to fathers. Mothers seem to be out of the picture, but obviously this cannot possibly be the case. Everything that is said here about fathers must apply also to mothers. However, the apostle avoids using the Greek word for ‘parents’, but puts the chief responsibility (and accountability to God) on ­fathers.
   He begins by challenging fathers to think about how they may provoke their children to anger. This refers not only to immediate ­anger, but also to exasperation and resentment which may not emerge for several years. How, exactly, may we stir up anger and frustration in our children?
   No parent should feel condemned by the answers given here, because every one of us has failed in so many ways. The purpose of this article is to help, not to hurt.
   This caution not to provoke our children to exasperation, applies to children and young people of all ages. Do not frustrate and embitter them, says Paul. So important is this that he mentions it before giving any positive exhortation.
   Clearly, bitterness can be provoked by ill-tempered and violent behaviour, but that is not the whole story. There are other mistakes of parenting that produce the same painful reaction in children.
   Here, then, are seven ways in which we may anger and exasperate young people, both short-term and long-term.

1. Indifference

Firstly, and most obviously, we may give long-term bitterness and frustration to children by being indifferent to them and their concerns. This is very easily done these days. We live, after all, in the most complicated days which have ever occurred in the history of the world.
   We are burdened by numerous responsibilities, and a vast amount of information constantly bombards us in this media age. It is all too easy for parents to find the needs of children tiresome and trivial. We may tend to sometimes ignore them or forget about them. Or we may leave all the close involvement to the other parent. We may take little interest in their developing views and distinctive interests, scarcely even noticing that one child is different from another. We may also become indifferent to our children’s need of companionship.
   The time may come, as children get older, that they reject parental authority. But the reality may be that respect and authority was forfeited long before, through parental indifference.
   When children reach mid or late teenage, parents want to protect them from the moral snares of society, and difficult conflicts sometimes arise. How much easier it is if their affection and respect for parents is intact.

2. Over-direction

 A second action likely to provoke exasperation in children needs to be considered alongside the previous point. Parents may take too much interest, in the sense that they over-channel their children in their ­decisions. They over-direct them. Parents decide entirely by themselves that the child is going to go to a particular kind of school, or will engage in particular sports, or will take up particular subjects. Parents push the child all the way, so that independent judgement or taste is crushed.
      This may occur due to pride on the parents’ part. The child must do this or that, because these things are what parents will be proud of when the child gets to late teenage, and on into adult life. The child’s course of life is predetermined. Compulsory direction which takes no account of the child’s tastes and inclinations (however gently carried out), may possibly embitter a child in the long term.
       Over-protectiveness may equally frustrate a child. There are so many things that rightly concern parents, and from which children have to be protected. But we have to be careful not to overdo this protection, so that growing children are denied virtually anything which may appeal to them. Children are not blind. They see what other children are free to do. Unreasonable protectiveness may produce bitterness.
           This is not a matter of skipping discipline. Parents who let their young children get away with rudeness and bad behaviour store up trouble for the future. To introduce reproof at sixteen is to court resentment, contempt and rebellion.

3. Too much criticism

Thirdly, children may become deeply angry if they are over-criticised and discouraged. Their minds and abilities are developing. They constantly do foolish things, measured by adult standards. Their ideas are frequently immature, and their method of carrying out projects sometimes bizarre. But they are children, and parents must ration their criticisms in the light of this. Children can only take so much criticism before being undermined and frustrated.

If children are younger, we should not behave as though we are counselling older teenagers

It is easy to discourage the young by crushing their dreams and aspirations. Children have all kinds of schemes and opinions, and these may change every couple of years, or even every couple of months. We cannot keep pouring cold water on them. If their dreams are not intrinsically bad, let them dream (particularly in the case of younger children). They are not committing themselves to a lifelong course of action. If children are younger, we should not behave as though we were counselling older teenagers. What does it matter if a child’s heart is set on being a train driver or an astronaut?
   When older teenagers form totally unattainable or inappropriate dreams, it may be necessary to find amicable ways of talking them round. Even here, care and respect is called for. But the intellectual activity of a child, if morally wholesome, should not be crushed.

4. Failure to adjust to growing up

Fourthly (and building on the preceding point), exasperation may be produced in children by the failure of parents to adjust to their growing up. We are all slow to make this adjustment. Little by little, children become adults. And little by little, responsibility for their lives must be yielded to them, even if it means they make mistakes. If we find we are treating a child virtually the same way at 15 as at 10, we may be courting deep-seated rebellion in the future.

5. Ill-temper

   Fifthly, everyone agrees we provoke our children to anger by hostility, ill-temper, and far-too-­severe punishments. If tired and tense, parents may react to misbehaviour in an unjustifiable way. Despite fondness for their children, they may give way to bad temper, punishing children out of frustration, rather than in a proper spirit of correction. The scale of the punishment will be according to the parent’s emotional state.           Deep frustration may not be immediately apparent, because children seem to bounce back and get over their trials. But within them, a kind of debt may build up, and the time may come when they resent all unreasonable treatment. Then parental authority will be discredited and undermined.
         What we do to a child may not come home to roost until the child is a teenager. We must take care that hostility and over-punishing does not provoke to wrath.

6. Unfairness

Sixthly, unfairness embitters and frustrates children, especially over time. The previous point covered unfairness in the scale of punishments. Unfairness may also arise in the assigning of blame between children. To decide a ‘case’ often requires the wisdom of Solomon. But if there is freq­­uent unfairness, parental authority may be shattered. Exasperation may also build up in children if the reason for discipline is not apparent, or is not explained. Does it come like a bolt from the blue? A child may ask, ‘What was wrong with that?’ or, ‘Why can’t I do that?’
   The unfairness of favouritism may be another failing. If one child regularly gets more than another, a parent may not be conscious it is happening, but the child who goes short most certainly is. If one child is punished more than another for the same offence, or one is encouraged more than another for the same achievement, parental guidance and authority could be at risk. If there is any unfairness in the giving of warmth or approval, trouble may lie ahead.

7. Lack of example

A seventh way of exasperating children is the failure of parental example. It is obvious that if parents do things themselves for which they punish or reprove their children, resentment and confusion may result. Beside this, children very often acquire the behaviour of the parents.  

By their own conduct these parents produced instant exasperation in their children, and forfeited authority

Many years ago a husband and wife came to see if they could be helped to master a serious problem. They said, ‘We cannot stop arguing.’ The evidence was soon seen, because even as they described the problem, the sparks began to fly. Immediately after discussing this, they raised a second problem. Their children were very volatile, and violent to each other. They could not be pacified. Why were their children so bad?
   The answer was that they had learned their behaviour from their parents. By their own conduct these parents produced instant exasperation in their children, and forfeited authority. They were not credible people in the eyes of their youngsters.
   To sum up, seven potential danger points for either short- or long-term ‘wrath’ are the following:
1. Indifference
2. Over-direction or over-protectiveness
3. Over-criticism
4. Parental failure to adjust to growing up
5. Hostility or ill-temper
6. Unfairness or favouritism
7. Bad parental example

‘Bring them up’

   Moving on to the positive side of child rearing, the apostle says – ‘but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord’. Bring them up has been rendered – ‘rear them with tenderness’. Before we consider how we rear them, we must appreciate the concept of tenderly, thoughtfully rearing children, and see it as our commission and responsibility.
   The key question is – What are we bringing them up for? What is our aim? It may sound a trite question, but it is not always correctly answered. We are bringing up our children for life, not for childhood.        Some parents say, ‘I want to enjoy my children, and enjoy watching them grow up.’ We do not fault that attitude. A home with children is a wonderful blessing. But at the same time we should never forget that we are rearing children not only to be happy as children, but for their future lives. We ask, ‘How am I training my children to prepare them for adult life? How do I prepare them for the kind of world which they must soon face?’ The following suggestions say nothing about instructing children spiritually, as it is assumed readers need no persuading about that.

‘in the nurture’

   We are to rear children in the nurture of the Lord. Nurture means training. If only we knew how to produce in children diligence, so that they may one day bring great glory to God in their work and witness! If only we could impart initiative! How wonderful it is to have people who can respond to circumstances and carry on initiatives, both in their personal lives and in the service of the Lord. How glorious it is to have people in the church who have inner energy and tenacity! Is there anything we can do to promote these virtues in our children? These are the kind of concerns that we should have.    If only we could discover how to bring about a sense of duty in our children, and how to make them considerate and polite! If we had the secrets, the answers to these questions, we would be happy parents. We may take heart, because the Scripture gives us answers to those questions. We can help our children to be all these things as we prepare them mentally, spiritually, morally and socially for the journey of life.
   Nurture includes chastening, but it is broader in scope. The difference between nurture and admonition has been explained in this way: Nurture is what you do to the child, while admonition is what you say to the child.

Spoiling is one of the worst disasters of all, because scars often remain even after conversion

What we do to a child encompasses all the restraints and constraints that we put the child under. Nurture means that we design activities, circumstances, rules, duties and rewards in the life of the child. It is the opposite of spoiling. If we spoil a child, it is because there are no rules and restraints. (Spoiling is one of the worst disasters of all, because scars often remain even after conversion, and have to be eradicated over time by the process of sanctification.)
   Nurture is more positive than negative. We want to train children socially. We long that they should know how to relate to other people, whether in the family, the church, the school, or the place of business or study. We want to bring out, where appropriate, the shy child. Equally, we want the more extroverted child to know how to control and contain himself, and to have consideration for others. We want our children to be observant, and sensitive to needs. These are aims to keep in view as we develop our approach to them.
       By nurture, children are given a scale of reference; a framework by which to judge, assess and think. They come to know that they may do one thing and not another, for clear reasons. They will spend their future lives under the discipline of both divine and human providences and ‘systems’. They will sometimes have ambitions which cannot be attained. The ‘system’ may bar the way for them. It will not allow them to do what they want.
       This will be intensely frustrating unless children have been reared to understand and endure limiting influences. Human beings cannot do everything they want to do, when and where they want to do it. Nurture enables them to come to terms with limitations.    To have a system around them teaches them values. It develops a capacity to come to terms with things they don’t like, and exercise self-control with things they do. It helps them to control their appetites. All this is very positive and strengthening.
   Many of the troubles of moodiness and disillusionment afflicting young people (along with self-indulgence and self-centredness) are due to the fact that nurture has been regarded by modern society as repressive. They have grown up without goals or restrictions.
    A simple example of restraint in the home is that of ‘no-go’ areas. In every household, from a child’s earliest years, there should be some prohibited places, especially certain drawers and cupboards relating to their parents. This is most helpful to children. It teaches respect and restraint.       On the other hand, parents may say, ‘Oh, there is nowhere where my children cannot trample freely. They may scramble over my bed at five o’clock in the morning. They may open any drawer and sift through anything. Nothing is private; nothing is sacred; nothing is special.’ But such a liberal attitude denies a child vital strengths of self-control. Who knows whether a young adult’s gross act of adultery may not have been encouraged by the lack of prohibited areas in his life! Prohibitions in childhood may have developed emotional muscles of respect and self-control.      This applies in church also. It is not a good idea for young children to be running here and there, in and out, say, of the minister’s or the deacons’ rooms, and respecting no part of the building. If no place is out of bounds, and if nothing is to be regarded as special or sacred, how will a child ever learn that he is a small unit in society, and bound to respect its rules and systems? How will he be helped to respect the Word of God and the church which is the pillar and ground of the Truth? There must be places that are out of bounds.
       Another amazingly underestimated nurturing tool is that of table manners. Someone once said to this writer, ‘What is the point of middle-class table manners? Why do some people take them so seriously?’
       Table manners are hardly middle-class. Every so-called ‘class’ has, in the past, had its distinctive approach to table manners. They could well have been devised in Heaven for the benefit of children being nurtured in this fallen world. Table manners inculcate control over appetites, and the value of restraint. They also teach sensitivity to and consideration for others, who must be passed the plate first.
       Table manners communicate the practice of noticing the needs of others, and habits of helpfulness and hospitality. They teach that appearances are important, because to behave like hogs is offensive to others. Children learn to bear in mind how they come across, and how they appear from the other’s point of view. All these things are easily learned at the table.
         Overall, manners provide a remarkable means of imparting to children some of the virtues referred to at the beginning of this article.
          Chores and duties are another important tool of nurture. We should assign reasonable and achievable duties to children from their earliest years. If we leave it until a child is ten, we may face difficulties. If the child has never lent a helping hand before this, nor had a regular duty or responsibility, there may obviously be great reluctance to cooperate.
         Personal organisation and tidiness on the part of the child should always be well rewarded.

‘and admonition...’

We have observed that nurture is the framework of training actions applied to children, whereas admonition is what is said to the child. Admonition, therefore, is not training by actions and rules, but by words. In short, we are training them mentally. By words we straighten out and forge the thinking of children, helping them to appreciate principles and higher values, and the right way of looking at issues.
   We are developing, stretching and fashioning their minds. That is why parents need to be helpful to children in what they read, and the kind of conversation they promote. To be a parent we need, ideally, an ever-expanding general knowledge to keep ahead of our children. We are feeding their minds. We are informing them.
   We must be alive to many things that are of interest to children. If we do not know about such things, we shall have to learn about them. It may be that a parent is an academic whose entire education has been in the world of literature and classics, yet whose children are interested in science and machines. Such a parent will need to find out about some of these things.
   If we want to impart to a child some worthwhile information, but the child won’t receive it and has another idea, we should not steamroller the child down. It is sometimes a very good thing for the child to win the encounter (and even an argument). Another day will come. We have not lost the campaign. Another opportunity will come when the child may be more interested.

Parental ­authority

Parental authority is a vital and precious commodity, but authority must be earned. Some may think it is unbiblical to say this. We do, after all, have a biblical ‘office’ as parents, by which we possess the right to train and correct our children. But if our parental authority is to be well received, then we have to see it as something to be earned and deserved.

Authority must have a friendly face... If we forfeit friendship with our children, we forfeit authority

To be respected, authority must have a helping face. Equally, authority must have a friendly face. Authority must have a rewarding hand. Authority needs all these things. If we forfeit friendship with our children, we ­forfeit authority. If we forfeit reasonableness, we forfeit authority. If we forfeit integrity, we forfeit authority. How disastrous it is when a parent is grossly inconsistent, and not even honest.
    Authority needs integrity. Even in matters of general knowledge, if we hold forth on a subject that we don’t know much about, we are ultimately risking authority. A child quickly attains teenage, and may know more about the matter than we do. We must be careful not to expound things we know nothing about. It is no bad thing that children should know that we get some things wrong. But for children to see us authoritatively asserting something foolish leads to forfeiture of integrity and respect.
    Parental authority must be blended with a measure of liberty. Even adult Christians have to be given time and opportunity to struggle forward little-by-little in the walk of sanctification. Occasionally someone will rush up and say, ‘Something must be done about that person!’ Often, it is not a serious moral matter, but one to be handled in a context of respect.
      We all must be allowed a certain amount of liberty to slip and slide; to go wrong; to offend, but then to put ourselves right before the Lord. We do not expect people to correct their faults successfully the very next day. They need time to get on top of things, and so do children.
        Therefore, if we have to reprove or redirect a child, we should not necessarily impose intense parental scrutiny to see if the matter has been immediately put right (although this may be appropriate for a very serious offence).
         Children are normally entitled to a degree of leeway even to do the wrong thing, and to take time in getting it right. We look for progress, not for instant success. Patience is a pillar of parental authority. Children must develop their own readiness and capacity to recognise wrongs, and to put them right. It would be no use if when launched on the ocean of adult life they were still dependent upon constant intervention from their parents.

Service for the Lord

   There is sometimes debate among Christians about whether parents should participate to any extent in church activities. It is often said that a parent’s service for God is to take care of the family, but this is a great mistake. We are always under the command of the great commission to engage in evangelistic efforts, though not, of course, to the exclusion of the care of children. There is a balance to be maintained.    However, it is worth saying that whenever parents (with proper balance) are active and committed in fields of Christian service, their children benefit. Far from being deprived of attention, they see their parents diligent about the work of the Lord. They see them loyal to something above them. They grow up knowing that the family has a noble cause to which it is committed. It is a magnificent lesson for children to see that their parents are under the authority of God, and that they love him and serve him. A parent’s Christian service is a crowning witness to a child. There is no greater authentication than this.

"Satan’s Limitations"


How do we defeat the devil? Says James – ‘Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.’ It is an amazing thought, that this mighty, evil being will run from weak believers. He is powerful and invisible to us; he will tempt and suggest evil things constantly, and is armed with unimaginable cunning. Yet, if we know how to resist him, he will flee from us.

Before we outline the way to ­resist, we may derive encouragement from setting his powers against his limitations.
Satan may accuse us, but he cannot condemn us. Sometimes he will remind us of our sins, and bring us very low so that we almost lose our assurance, but then we run to God trusting in grace alone, and He strengthens us. Satan can certainly accuse, but he cannot condemn the one who is in Christ, because he has no power or say in how the Lord views His people.
 
He can tempt us to sin, as we have said, but he cannot make us sin. He can goad and press but never force us. He can take away our joy and peace by giving troubled thoughts, but he cannot take away our salvation, nor ever possess us. Charismatic teachers say that the devil can either possess, or oppress a believer, but both in their usage mean virtually the same thing, and both are wrong. Satan can trouble us, but never possess us, because the principle of 2 Corin­thians 6.15 and other scriptures teaches us that Christ and Satan cannot co-exist in a soul.
 
Satan can masquerade as an angel of light, and quote Scripture in our ear, as he attempted to do even with the Lord at His temptation. But he cannot withstand our substituting the thought by quoting a Scripture promise.
 
He can hear us and see us, but not read our thoughts. By his deep knowledge of human nature and behaviour, and by close observation of us, he is able to discern or guess many of our reactions to temptation, and to seemingly interact with us, but he cannot see our hearts. If we speak to him (and we should not), whether by word or thought, he will ‘hear’, and some of our thoughts may be very ‘loud’ and obvious to him, such as hatred to someone, and great pride, but in the ordinary way he cannot read our minds. If a person’s temper is rising, or if he is looking at things with lust, the devil is very shrewd, and will read the signs and know what is going on.

But never think he can get into the mind and actually read our thoughts from the inside. Many deeply introspective and serious-minded Christians have been painfully tormented by the idea that the devil has a telescope right into their thought lives.
He can fire thoughts into our heads from the outside, but he cannot make them stick, unless we let him by harbouring those thoughts.

Satan can bring breaches between husbands and wives and between friends, and we are not here thinking of serious misconduct such as adultery, but day-to-day matters.
He can fire into the mind hostile thoughts, and by this temporarily break relationships, but he can do nothing to prevent godly reconciliation in answer to prayer. He can bring us right down to the gutter if we let him, but only if we let him, because he cannot force us to make a disastrous fall.
 
Satan watches us, by his host of demons assigned to follow us and to notice every omission of spiritual duty, every neglected prayer, every missed reading of God’s Word, every ignoring of a sermon, every delay in carrying out a good work, and every act of worldliness or of uncommitted conduct.

Under scrutiny will be the things we look at and engage in, and by these things our vulnerability to temptation will be ascertained by the tempter, and the next assault upon us planned.
Every day Satan – by his demons – will hinder our spiritual work, putting distractions in our way. When we begin to pray, our attention may be drawn to any number of matters, interesting, troubling, or alluring, to divert us from the throne of grace. But, once again, he cannot succeed unless we let him.

Satan’s Purposes


A number of names are used of Satan in the New Testament, shedding light on how he acts, and his objectives. Satan means adversary, and he is also called the accuser of the brethren, an enemy of the souls of men, and the devil, which means slanderer.

He is called Abaddon and Apollyon, names which mean destroyer of souls, and he is described as a dragon, indicating his great ferocity, and also as a serpent, expressing his cunning and subtlety.
 
He is referred to as the father of lies, indicating the method that he has always employed, and also as the murderer of souls, the prince of demons, and the prince of this world who guides the minds of unbelievers open to atheism and ready to show hostility to God. He is called the tempter, and an angel of light making evil appear good, and suggesting justification for selfish, covetous and other wrong actions.
 
Satan was cast out of Heaven for challenging God, and hates Him with all his being, opposing and frustrating His plans if he can, and keeping souls away from Him. Satan is intensely jealous of human beings and hates them also. He acts to tempt into sin both the lost and the saved, particularly striving to lead God’s people into error and failure. If Satan can get into churches, inserting false teaching and bringing believers down in sin, how he triumphs! He therefore constantly seeks to discredit the church and the Gospel in the eyes of the world, and also to thwart and hinder Gospel work by tempting believers to worldliness, laziness, and indifference to the plight of lost souls.
 
Satan is always working to erode the faith of believers and spoil their assurance, peace and joy. He does these things by a process of attrition, causing believers to give way little by little to doubts and temptations, until he has gained victory over them. He also inspires false prophets and evil workers, putting into their minds ideas that are unbiblical, and succeeding wherever they fail to prove all things by the Word.
 
He controls people who are opposed to the Gospel, blinding their minds, and through them shaping society. When we see the world today, ruled by aggressive and vindictive secular humanism, with immorality legalised and encouraged, and laws passed to punish those who oppose these things, we see the orchestrating hand of Satan. How similar is the ‘script’ justifying these things in all parts of the world! Thus Satan is ‘the prince of the power of the air’.

Against Christians he uses cunning strategies and traps, called ‘the wiles of the devil’, and ‘the snare of the devil’. The latter means that he will surprise ­believers with sudden temptations, if he is able to do so.
 
There are three sources of temptation, for the devil is not the only tempter. According to Scripture the world lures us with sinful habits, practices and finery. Then we are tempted by our own hearts: our appetites and sinful desires always wanting to do or possess things. And then we are tempted by the devil, who also makes much of and amplifies the first two forms of temptation.

"Powers of Angels"


We know a good deal about Satan from the fact he is an angel, though a fallen one. As such he was created without a body or physical aspect, for angels have no bodies, unless God clothes them with a temporary appearance in order to send them as messengers or witnesses into the world, as in the case of the angels that sat in the tomb of Christ.

Angels evidently have an appearance in Heaven, but are not normally visible to human eyes on earth.
Angels are immortal only by God’s sustaining permission and power. We read in Scripture that they have mysterious differences in ‘rank’, so there are higher angels. Though spirits, they operate in dimensions of time and space, for they are not infinite and outside time, as God is.
 
Angels clearly have powerful intelligence, and although the day will come when believers, as glorified people in Heaven, will be greater than the angels, while on earth we do not have their powers of mind. They ‘excel in strength’, says the Scripture, which places them above people on earth in ability.
 
Angels have great knowledge but it has a limit. So, for example, we are told in Ephesians 3.10 that they look down from Heaven in wonder at the conversion and sanctification of people on earth, marvelling at each case, and learning about the ‘manifold wisdom of God’. The Gospel age has been an immense education to the very highest angels.
 
This also shows that angels cannot tell the future, apart from knowing the Word of God, as we also may know it. When Old Testament prophecies began to be fulfilled with the coming of Christ, they observed with wonder these events, things which ‘the angels desire to look into’ (1 Peter 1.12). In this they are not like God, Whose knowledge is infinite, and Who continuously knows all things that happen throughout eternal history.
 
Angels clearly have power to communicate with each other. They cannot create anything or kill anyone at will, though they may sometimes be appointed by God as His agents to terminate life. Even Satan is shown seeking the express permission of God to inflict disease and take life in the book of Job. Angels cannot do these things of themselves. Angels cannot change earthly substances, altering one element into another, nor can they alter or override the laws of nature, except at God’s direction.

They are bound within these limitations. It follows that angels cannot work miracles unless God empowers them to do so.
As fallen angels, Satan and his demonic hosts share all these limitations. And here is another limitation, common to both good and evil angels, and one which is of very great importance to us in our battle with the devil.

Angels cannot search our hearts and read our thoughts. They cannot enter into the innermost recesses of our thought-lives. An old Christian adage runs – ‘Demons can speak to the soul, but not search the heart.’ We will say more about Satan’s inability to read thoughts in due course.
 
All these limitations are clear from the Bible, which ascribes infinite intelligence and knowledge, power to create and end life, working of miracles, and searching of hearts, to God alone. These things are exclusive to Him. Indeed, the devil and his demons are more limited than good angels, because God would never appoint or delegate to them His own wonder­-working power.

We are taught in 2 Thessalonians 2.9, that when the man of sin is revealed, who will operate under the rule of Satan, his miracles and wonders will be ‘lying wonders’, or counterfeit deceptions. Satan and his demons cannot perform true miracles.
 
Satan, we need hardly say, is utterly evil. He is described as an unclean spirit, and the leader of the vast host of unclean, fallen spirits. However, since Calvary he cannot determine the actions of human beings irresistibly, over­riding their freedom and responsibility, unless they have altogether yielded themselves to him and co-operated with him in opposition to God, so that they are ‘taken captive by him at his will’ (2 Timothy 2.26). And even such people are not beyond redemption.
 
Satan cannot make us do anything. He cannot so dictate to us that we are bound to do his bidding, but must work by deception and persuasion. It is therefore wrong to say, ‘Satan made me do it.’ He may urge us, suggest things to us, press us, and lie to us about the outcome, but he cannot make us do anything. We must never ascribe to Satan powers which belong exclusively to Almighty God; and while we should be very aware of his power, we must never fear him as invincible.

"What Satan Can and Cannot Do"

    

How can such a powerful enemy be resisted? Here are the purposes and limitations of Satan, and why we must never ascribe to the Devil powers which belong exclusively to Almighty God.

With Calvary before Him, the Lord spoke these remarkable words

‘Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out.’ He was referring to His imminent suffering on Calvary’s cross, which would immediately accomplish salvation for His people, and judgement for Satan. From the time of Calvary Satan would be curbed in his power, a defeated enemy, still able to work much wickedness until the final day, but severely limited.

But how exactly was Satan cast out  by Christ’s death?

We know that Christ’s death saved vast numbers of people from eternal death, and by so doing, saved the human race from becoming extinct. Since the Fall of man in the garden of Eden not one person would live a perfect life, nor anything like it. The entire human race would therefore be condemned, leaving Satan triumphant and victorious. By tempting Adam and Eve he had utterly thwarted the purpose of God in making the human race, and

God appeared to have failed in His design. Satan could flaunt himself throughout time as the murderer and conqueror of the human race, and, in a sense, the conqueror of its Creator.
But Christ came as the representative of His people, and in every conceivable way obeyed His Father, even to the death of the cross.

And through that perfect obedience culminating in Calvary, His people (and therefore the race) were saved from condemnation. By His righteousness and atonement, a continuing human race was purchased, so that a glorified earth could be thronged by ransomed people. The human race would no longer be a failed concept, and God’s design would be restored and redeemed.
 
Satan’s apparent triumph was crushed, leaving him susceptible to judgement and curbing. No longer would he be able to keep people from the Truth.
 
The curbing of Satan’s power after Calvary is clearly revealed in the New Testament. The Saviour spoke, for example, of how ‘with the finger of God’ He cast out devils, to mark that the kingdom had arrived (Luke 11.20).

This was judgement language, referring to a limitation of satanic power operating from that time.
Demons themselves knew that Christ would end their liberty, and this is seen in their anguished cries as the Lord cast them out. Possession was common in the time of Christ, but His ministry marked the end of demonic liberty to occupy human souls at will.

We are aware that today there are still some reports of New-Testament-style demon possession, but only where people have voluntarily (and strenuously) invited demons into their lives by deep involvement in occult practices. (We disregard the unauthentic claims of demon ­possession made within the charismatic movement.)

Satan via his demons can no longer enter uninvited into human souls to possess them since the work of Christ, this being one aspect of Satan being ‘cast out’.

Another of Satan’s limitations is that he is not allowed to reveal or show himself, being forced to work entirely by secrecy and stealth. He is a vicious enemy to all human souls, but non-appearance is a significant containment of his power. We learn in 2 Thess­alonians 2 that Satan must content himself with an appointee, the man of sin, who will appear on his behalf at the end of time, only to be immediately destroyed by the brightness of the coming of Christ.
 
Satan is now a spiritual vagrant, powerful, yes, with a vast host of fallen angels doing his bidding, but he must tempt us from ‘outside’, and secure our co-operation for everything he wants us to do. He is certainly the prince of this world, but a prince with no palace or rights – a dispossessed and a doomed prince.

This limiting of Satan is also referred to in the book of Revelation, chapters 12 and 20, the last of these telling us that Satan would be bound during the Christian era so that he would not be able to deceive the nations any more by keeping them in total spiritual darkness. All nations would be penetrated by the Gospel of Christ.
 
We read in Ephesians 4.8 that on Calvary Christ led captivity captive, binding a multitude of captives – the devil and his demons. In Colossians 2.15 we are told that Christ ‘spoiled principalities and powers’, making a show of them openly, and triumphing over them. In other words, He took powers away from them and contained them – terms for the curbing or limiting of the devil and his hosts.

However, we repeat that he remains until the last day a dangerous and evil enemy of souls, and for this reason we need to know all we can about his powers and limitations.

PHIL: 3

"PRESS ON!"

 Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me.  Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, ¹⁴ I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
 
Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you.   Nevertheless, to the degree that we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule,let us be of the same mind.