9. Who is the God of this world and it's system?


Just who is the God of this World and its system? You may be surprised to learn its not the one who created the Heavens and the Earth..............

Our meaning of the word 'World' comes from the Greek word 'Cosmos, which describes the world as an ordered system by arrangement or organization. Here we do not wish to refer to the world as 'all the people' or as 'the earth', but to concentrate our attention on that aspect that relates directly to the World as an organised system. That such a system exists is evident to all, because we all live in the World. What we do not all know is its intent, design and origin.

The origin, of the world as an organised arrangement, goes back to the tree of knowledge in the garden of Eden. Not only did Adam gain the nature of a sinner, by eating or partaking of this tree, but he also declared together with his independence from God, his permission for such an order of arrangement to be set up. Up until that event Adam was dependent on God and had authority and dominion over the whole Earth, but now he had to go it alone and develop his own resources in compliance with the one to whom he had subjected himself. Adam gave the Devil his authority over the Earth by submission. You will recall that after Adam did this ,not only did God forbid Adam access to the tree of life, He also expelled him from the garden. There was a very good reason why God commanded Adam not to eat of this tree, but there is also a very good reason why Satan suggested that he did.

To understand this, we need to look back further in History and see that Satan was originally Lucifer, the anointed cherub that covered the earth. Lucifer means bearer of light. His authority was to bring illumination, that is knowledge and understanding, to a previous creation of God that was upon this earth at that time. He was the anointed head of that creation. I think we all know the story of how he became proud because of his magnificence and position. He exalted himself above and beyond what God had made him to be. He had free will which enabled him to do this. He decided he was equal to God and made himself to be God over the creation he was in charge of. The result was he offended Gods Holy character, and gave birth to his nature of sin. The end result was the destruction of that creation upon the Earth and the Earth became a desolate wasteland as a result. The light that Lucifer previously had, that illuminated the Earth, turned into darkness, the truth that he had turned to lies, the life that he had became death and his creativity turned into destruction. He became a Liar, a deceiver, a thief, a destroyer and an accuser of God.

That was his state in the Garden as he re-appeared on the Earth as the subtle and crafty Serpent. Satan's intent in the garden was to coerce Adams will subtly by craft, so that Satan could commence to establish his kingdom on the restored earth. To achieve this he needed the co-operation of man. He required man to subject himself to his suggestion and comply in preference to obeying God. Adam obliged by the act of complicity. He complied with Satan's suggestion. Not only was the nature of sin included in that tree of knowledge, but also included was the nature of a system that would develop and flourish without any need of dependence on God. This system would be completely independent of God, in direct opposition to God and headed up by Satan himself as the invisible World Ruler. This system or World Order would display his image in place of God and he could then commence to do a work of destruction upon the whole of Gods creation. Today we live in the Devil's kingdom on Earth as people of the World.

Satan heads up this system as the 'God of this world'. He is the Ruler and the instrumental mind behind all that is called the World and the System of the World. The World, you could say is Satan's Palace, the Earthly home of its Prince. The World is where Satan lives on this Earth and that explains why the World is so much akin to Hell. This is the sinister truth of all that calls itself 'the world'. Satan is both the Author and the Commander of this 'world' and its system; Satan is the unseen power behind all that is seen and named as belonging to this World. Politics, education, literature, science, art, culture, law, commerce, music etc. are those things that adorn the world and provide a bases for such an organization to exist. Who would ever suspect that these things are Satanic or that these things belong to Satan? You cannot be involved in these things without interacting with the spirit and mind that is behind these things. We must be aware of this continually as Christians.

God's attitude towards the World is that He hates it. He says that if any man loves the world or the things that are of the World, then the love of God is not in him. Love not the World, neither the things that are in the World. Whosoever makes himself a friend of the World, makes himself an enemy of God (1 John 2:15). Those who make themselves a friend of the World make themselves an enemy to God. To have friendship with the world and to enjoy to participate in the things that belong to the World is to loose friendship with God and to end up making God your enemy. (James 4:4). Looking at things from Gods perspective there are only two Kingdoms on the Earth. There is the kingdom of the World and there is the Kingdom of God. The prelude to the Kingdom of God on the Earth is the Church as the Body of Christ.

When we are saved we pass from one side to the other side. A better rendition of the word saved is delivered. In baptism we are delivered out of one into another by immersion in water. When we go under the water we are delivered out of the World, when we emerge we come out of the water into newness of Life, having left the world behind us. In much the same way was Noah delivered from the World by the waters of the flood. In our identification in Jesus Christ, God has not left us an option. Jesus was crucified to the world, and in Him by co-crucifixion, so are we. It is not something that awaits us in the future, it is something already done in the past. In our hearts, that is in the new heart or in our spirit, we are separated from the world. Death means separation. Death in Christ means separation from the world and the things that are of the world. We still have to live in the world, but we are not of it as we were once.

The world with all that it offers, the pride of life, the greed of the eyes, the lusts of the flesh is not for the Christian but for those who still belong it. The world hates God (John 15:18,19) and the world hates Christians more than anything else that is upon the earth (John 17:19). This is understandable when you see who's mind it is that is behind the World and its system. If your a Christian, that is growing spiritually in Christ, Satan will attack you from those within your Church who still secretly love the world and the things that are of the world. Satan knows that now you are saved, you will not subject yourself to those outside the Church. Beware and be warned that God's worst enemies are still in the Church. The Life of Christ in you is a threat to those who are of Satan's kingdom and you because you constitute a threat to exposing them, they will do what they can to put you down. They will not be a comfort to you, they will throw cold water over anything you say, they will argue against you and if all else fails they will try to have you put you out of your Church believing they are doing God a service.

In the Church today we have the religious spirit running rampant. Those who have never been to the cross to surrender their will, have never experienced separation from the self life. These are those who still love self. The self of the un-surrendered Christian is the same as the self of the unbeliever, both are independent of God and both have their roots in the world. The Life of the spirit gives us God consciousness, the life of the physical body gives us World consciousness and the life of the soul gives us self consciousness. We get our self consciousness from Adam, it is hereditary. Adam was created a living soul, that is he had life in himself and could live completely independent of God if he chose to. His life was in his soul. His life was in himself, he possessed soul life and his life was his very own self. The Bible refers to all Christians that of this type as carnal Christians. A carnal Christian is one who is not yet able to know and to understand the real Spiritual things of God. A carnal Christian is still lead by his thought and his feeling, therefore his choice and his desire is in tune with the World through the senses of his body. Hence we come to see two classes of people in the Church.

The Christian Life is resurrection Life. Resurrection Life is a Life that comes out of death. If there is no death there can be no Life. If their is no death to the self life there can be no Spiritual Life or Life in the Spirit. The Bible says that God is Spirit and those who choose to worship Him must do so in truth and in spirit. The self life must die for the soul to be free to experience and express Spiritual Life. Those who are of the Spirit are influenced by the Spirit of Life. Those who are still of the World are influenced by the spirit of the World. These therefore continue to live from their mind and their feeling. One side of this class will follow emotional teaching that will lead them into error by deception. The other will avoid emotion but follow the reasoning's of the mind and likewise be lead into error and be deceived. Neither one is Spiritual, but both end up to be different sides of the same coin. Both are of the soul realm and neither one is necessarily true. Both have no bases of reality. The wisdom of this World does not recognise God, because it does not know God. Whatever feeling there is in the World that is of the World does not desire God. Yet in the Church we see this spirit of the World pretending to be something that its not, and no wonder because Satan is still the great pretender.

What we need in the Church today is the Revival of the Spirit of Truth, Wisdom and Revelation to get us back to the reality of who we are in Christ. The pretentious buck needs to stop right here with us. We need to be real before we can ever be Spiritual. We need to be what we are and stop putting on a garment that does not match our actual condition. Today the doors of our Churches are too wide, too open. We allow just about any body to enter. Our doors need to be open and wide enough to allow all members of Christ's Body to enter, but closed to those who are of the World. What fellowship does light have with darkness, other than to expose what is hidden in the dark?. It is the same with our pulpits, the path to the pulpit is always open to those who will preach our version of so called sound doctrine, but to those who are anointed and able to minister Life.

Bible college credentials are not recognised by God as a qualification to preach, but having the anointing does. Those who have anointing can minister Life. Only those who have self on the cross can qualify to be anointed. We need to ask the Lord Jesus to get the World out of us before we get the World out of our Churches. The Religious Church is the one that has the knowledge of God in their mind but does not know Him in their heart. Satan conspired with Adam and Eve to form the first Religious Church when they tried to cover their nakedness by sewing fig leaves together. The fig tree religious Churches of 5. the World have one basic thing in common and that is they do everything out of their mind or feeling. They try to think like God in their mind. They try to feel as God feels with their emotions. They try to be spiritual. Is this not what Satan does?. He even says he is God. Yet just as he is the great pretender, so also are all the religious of this World pretentious. These are those who try to establish fellowship with God without first having come to the cross of Christ and accepted the death sentence on the self life .

What ever originates in the self of the soul is in tune with the World, whatever originates in our Spirit comes from the Life of Christ. Whatever is of the soul is of self. Whatever is of our spirit is of the Life that is in our Spirit. Whatever is of the Spirit is Life producing Love, Joy, Peace and Freedom. There is too much unreality in the Church and there is far too much pretence in us Christians. We have become too structured and too organised because of our long association with the ways the World. Today the ways of the World govern most of our Churches and our Church Leaders. We need God's Holy Spirit of Truth to divide our soul from our spirit, so that we might have separation unto the Lord Jesus both in ourselves and the Church. We need to be delivered from all that is of Satan's system here on Earth, which is in a nutshell, The World. As Christians we remain 'in' the World, but not to be 'of' the World.

The Lord Jesus said that we were not to fear the tribulation that is in the World because He had overcome the World. We too in Him have also overcome the World. This is that spirit which is composed of spiritual pride, spiritual greed and spiritual lust. It is the same evil spirit that is in the World, but it wears a different mask. We would do well to exercise our gift of discerning evil spirits to know this character, that we may at least avoid his or her accusation, judgement and condemnation. The wolf in sheep's clothing must be judged spiritually by his character and not by appearance. Those who are wolves need to be exposed as those who love the World and the things that are of the World. All these types of character look attractive and sound good, they fool and deceive many. Test them by their attitude of love towards the World or the cross and you will soon see them for what they really are. This seeing is a view of their heart not their head. To test the spirit is to try the heart to discover whether or not it is of the World or of Christ.

To try is to test and this is not always pleasant or easy, because it usually means to upset so as to reveal. The heart of man is deceptive above all things. What we need to know here is the truthful character of the content, not the picture they paint of themselves to others. Personality is always false whenever it does not match the actual character of the person. Don't worry about testing the real spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit is not offended by our testing, in fact He rejoices whenever the truth wins out . But not so the spirit of this world, he will under such test react with hostility and reveal his true nature. Attitude is always a picture of the content in the heart. If we can read attitude, we can a persons spirit. When God looks at the Earth today, He sees just two groups of people; those who belong to the Church as the Body of Christ and those who belong to the World as the body of Satan. The Body of Christ is where Gods will is done; the World is where Satan's will is done.

All who are of the World are in the power of the evil one (1 John 5:19 NASV). All who are in the Church are delivered from that power. There is the spirit of the World which is anti-Christ, and there is the spirit of the Church which is Christ. All that calls itself the Church, that is not the Body of Christ or does not have the Spirit of Christ, is not the Church but the World. We need to distinguish today more than ever before, exactly what is the Church from what is the World. The truth about all which calls itself the Church and is not needs to be revealed. We need to divide the spirit of the Church from the Spirit of the World. All that is our new born again spirit is of that which has come out of Christ. Nothing of us is in there and it is from our Spirit that we now receive our Life.

Our spirit is now our source of God's Life, and Gods Life is now our Life. Before our life was of the soul or self, but now God has given us a new Spirit and put His Life within that new Spirit. We are an absolutely new creation. Before we were 'of self' in the soul, but now we are 'of God' in the spirit. The soul, made up of mind, emotion and self will, is no longer our independent centre or source of life. Our life is now spiritual Life, dependent on God, because or spirit has been made alive to God and the Life of Christ is both the content and the source. The Lord Jesus lives in our spirit in the person of His Holy Spirit. We need to be clear about this otherwise we will be always confused and easily deceived. We still have the faculty of the soul but it is no longer just an independent inlet from which we derive our life, but rather the outlet with which we express our spirit. This is now that sphere of our being that the Lord Jesus desires us to co-operate with Him and express His Life. It is His will that desires our will to choose to express His Life in place of self. It is His desire that we will choose to express His Life in all our thought, reasoning and feelings. He has re-made us in His image that we might choose to express His Life and therefore be like Him in all that we do, think, reason, desire and feel.

 

 

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