From Heaven With Love

How Satan Almost Succeeded

“The fullness of the time” had come. Humanity, degraded through ages of transgression, called for the coming of the Redeemer. Satan had been working to make the gulf deep and impassable between earth and heaven. He had emboldened men in sin. It was his purpose to wear out the forbearance of God so that He would abandon the world to satanic jurisdiction. HLv 22.2

Satan's strife for supremacy seemed almost wholly successful. It is true that in every generation, even among the heathen, there were men through whom Christ was working to uplift the people from sin. But these men were hated. Many suffered a violent death. The dark shadow Satan cast over the world grew deeper and deeper. HLv 22.3

Satan won his great triumph in perverting the faith of Israel. The heathen had lost a knowledge of God and had become more and more corrupt. So it was with Israel. The principle that man can save himself by his own works lay at the foundation of every heathen religion; it had now become the principle of the Jewish religion. HLv 22.4

The Jews defrauded the world by a counterfeit of the gospel. They had refused to surrender themselves to God for the salvation of the world, and they became agents of Satan for its destruction. The people whom God had called to be the pillar and ground of the truth were doing the work Satan desired them to do, taking a course to misrepresent the character of God and cause the world to look upon Him as a tyrant. Priests in the temple lost the significance of the service they performed. They were as actors in a play. Ordinances which God Himself had appointed were made the means of blinding the mind and hardening the heart. God could do no more for man through these channels. HLv 23.1