Jesus said;- I saw Satan fall from heaven

“The seventy returned with joy, saying; Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!
And he said to them; I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven” (Luke ch10 vv17-18).

We cannot understand what Jesus meant, unless we keep his words in context. As the above quotation shows, they were his direct and immediate response to the report of the seventy disciples. He cannot be talking about some event before the Creation of the world, as at the beginning of Paradise Lost, because that would not fit into the conversation.

We should remember that the idea of “heaven” is ambiguous in the New Testament. On the one hand, it is the place where God dwells, or sometimes a euphemistic substitute for the name of God. On the other hand, it may mean the physical heavens, the location of the stars and the planets and the home-base of the spiritual powers associated with the stars and the planets. That is why Paul says we are fighting against “the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Ephesians ch6 v12).

At the same time, we should understand “fall” as a fall from power. It is the metaphorical fall that occurs when somebody is removed from a “high” position.

That is how the two above-quoted verses fit together. The subjection of the demons is one of the symptoms of Satan’s fall from power. Satan’s fall from power is the explanation of the subjection of the demons. The servants of Satan cannot stand up against the name of Jesus. And this fall from power has been happening, “like lightning from heaven” (i.e. suddenly) while the seventy were out on their mission, which is why Jesus is announcing it now.

The connection between the two events is explained by the New Testament’s other reference to the fall from heaven;
“The great dragon was thrown down… Satan, the deceiver of the whole world … The accuser of the brethren has been thrown down, who accuses them night and day before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony” (Revelation ch12 vv9-11). Of course “the blood of the Lamb” means “the fact that Jesus died”.

Satan appears as an “accuser” in the first chapter of Job. In fact the word is a reasonable translation of his Hebrew name. His function there seems to be to report back to God on all the bad things he finds in the world. In other words, he gets people into trouble by making God aware of their sins, and that is the real source of his “power”. It is the power of the informant or blackmailer. It is a power founded upon the existence of unforgiven sin.

That is why his power is destroyed by forgiveness. If God is not going to act on his reports, then the ground is cut away from under his feet. So the disciples of Jesus overcome him by means of the Cross, which makes forgiveness available, and by the word of their testimony, which is about telling the rest of the world that forgiveness is available.

In the rest of Revelation ch12, and in the following chapter, we learn how the frustrated Accuser gets his revenge by turning himself into a Persecutor. If he cannot get Christians into trouble with God, he will get them into trouble with the Roman authorities instead.

I suggest that the “fall of Satan”, in the sense of Revelation ch12, was already happening in Luke ch10. They are the same event.

The seventy disciples had been sent out to do what Jesus was doing, and to proclaim what Jesus was proclaiming.

Their message is summed up, twice, in the declaration that the kingdom of God “has come near”. (This translates ENGIKEN, a word with much-debated shades of meaning)

It is reasonable to suppose that they were actually presenting the fuller message of Jesus, summed up for us by Mark as “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” (Mark ch1 v14).

And what was his gospel? Evidently it included the promise of forgiveness of sin in response to repentance. The clearest evidence is in the conduct of the woman who washed his feet (Luke ch7). Jesus saw it as evidence of her gratitude, and he told her that her sins were forgiven. But the cause of her gratitude must have been that she knew about forgiveness already; she had learned about it from his previous teaching, and that prompted her joyous reaction. Her faith in his message was the faith that “saved” her.

So the seventy disciples were going round the country presenting what Jesus taught about the forgiveness of sin (they could not, of course, make any reference to the Cross), and THAT was enough to bring about the “fall of Satan” which Jesus was watching. They were overcoming him “by the word of their testimony”.

imho
satan 'fell' twice. first time is the one referred to in Luke; he rebelled and lost his position in the Kingdom. I guess he was removed from the top Heaven and exiled to the lower heaven ('prince of the air?'). the Job account suggests he still has access to heaven but can't stay.

Revelation records satan's final rebellion. he is defeated and exiled down to earth. last part of the tribulation and he causes all sorts of trouble.

eventually he will be exiled from earth to hades (for a thousand years)

a reply to: ElGoobero
I see Revelation ch12 as a "flashback". it's explaining how the tribulation of the church is Satan's revenge for the atonement, which takes away his power over forgiven sinners.
Note exactly how Satan has been defeated there; "by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony".

In chronological sequqnce, ch14 actually follows on firectly from ch11. That's why v6 has "another angel"; "another", that is, following the angels of ch11.

a reply to: DISRAELIHe cannot be talking about some event before the Creation of the world, as at the beginning of Paradise Lost, because that would not fit into the conversation.

Do you believe the world at the time of Gen 1:3-32 that the earth was perfect?

a reply to: ElGoobero

Which Kingdom?

a reply to: ChesterJohn
The point is not relevant to the question "What was Jesus talking about when he spoke those words?"
The answer is to be found in the context, and in the fact that a reference to pre-Creation events would not have been relevant to the conversation.

never mind.

My judgment stand on you. You mix worldly with spiritual and make your opinion as if it is scriptures.

a reply to: ChesterJohn
There is a serious difference in approach here.
I believe in understanding what the Bible says, and founding doctrine upon that basis.
You have the very bad habit of doing things the other way round. That is, you formulate theories about what the Bible ought to be saying, and then push Biblical statements away from their natural meaning to make them fit. This example, admittedly, is a mistake which modern American evangelism has agreed to adopt en masse (which does not make it right). The stupid misinterpretation "a man finds a treasure in a field and goes and hides HIMSELF" is all your own, justified by you on the same ground- that is, the need to force the text to make it fit one of your theories.
That approach is what makes you a bad reader of the Bible and a misleading guide.

a reply to: DISRAELI

Approaching the bible with preconceived ideas, adding opinion as if it is scriptures and runing ideas contrary to scriptures. Pretextualized ideas on what the scriptures say is not presenting the truth of what the BIble actually says..

Well that is what you have been doing for years.

We are not expecting you to change until after the gathering to Jesus in the clouds. My wonder is if you will be there or left behind.

a reply to: ElGoobero

satan 'fell' twice. first time is the one referred to in Luke; he rebelled and lost his position in the Kingdom.

I had never heard that Satan had fallen twice from the heavenly abode. That is very interesting. The NT does tell us that all of the fallen angels are in Sheol and I had assumed that it meant all of them. By the way which Satan did Jesus rebuke?

a reply to: DISRAELI

That is how the two above-quoted verses fit together. The subjection of the demons is one of the symptoms of Satan’s fall from power. Satan’s fall from power is the explanation of the subjection of the demons. The servants of Satan cannot stand up against the name of Jesus. And this fall from power has been happening, “like lightning from heaven” (i.e. suddenly) while the seventy were out on their mission, which is why Jesus is announcing it now.

I cannot agree with your premise. Satan was cast to this universe [earth] for his sin of pride and desire for power. The Word of God was Satan's Creator in the first creation according to the Apostle John chapter one. John also tells us that the Creator [Word of God] is none other than the incarnated Jesus of the NT. Jesus was testifying a fact that as Satan's Creator He saw Satan fall from the heavenly abode for his sins.

Why should this be necessary? Because the apostles were born and raised without the knowledge of Jesus' and his doctrine and are being schooled in this matter of who Jesus really is. Finish the entire thought from Luke 10: 17 to 24 ----

a reply to: Seede
I still think the comment needs to fit into the immediate context of the conversation, which is the fact that the disciples have just come back from their mission round the country.

a reply to: ElGoobero
You must have studied the Bible for yourself 🙂 This is accurate - Satan still has access to the throne , & when he is permanently expelled from Heaven he will manifest as the Antichrist on Earth.
Heaven is a violent place right now, the war on Earth is just a shadow of the war in Heaven. People think it's all peaceful there, but that's not what I read

a reply to: Imjustasimplegirl

You must have studied the Bible for yourself 🙂 This is accurate - Satan still has access to the throne , & when he is permanently expelled from Heaven he will manifest as the Antichrist on Earth. Heaven is a violent place right now, the war on Earth is just a shadow of the war in Heaven. People think it's all peaceful there, but that's not what I read

Satan only has access to appear before his Creator when he is called to do so. Otherwise he is confined to Sheol just as the Job account tells us. We are not told where that was located. Some people imagine it was in heaven and others imagine it was in Sheol. Just as Moses and Elijah were called up on the Mt. of Transfiguration here on this earth, it is stated where they were but here with Job it is not revealed exactly where the meeting was taken place.

But Satan has no power over this creation except the power given to him by his Creator. If God has the power to cast Satan into the lake of fire in the end of time then He most certainly has that power to do the same at any time. I have no idea of what you read but I have nothin in Scriptures to tell me that there will be another war in heaven. Can you explain this confusion?

originally posted by: Seede
a reply to: Imjustasimplegirl

You must have studied the Bible for yourself 🙂 This is accurate - Satan still has access to the throne , & when he is permanently expelled from Heaven he will manifest as the Antichrist on Earth. Heaven is a violent place right now, the war on Earth is just a shadow of the war in Heaven. People think it's all peaceful there, but that's not what I read

I have no idea of what you read but I have nothin in Scriptures to tell me that there will be another war in heaven. Can you explain this confusion?

Rev 12:7-9
And war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

source: www.enterthebible.org...

a reply to: ElGoobero

Rev 12:7-9 And war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

Yes, i agree that Satan and his angels were cast down to this universe after being expelled from heaven. That was the very first and only war that was fought by the angels in the realm of heaven.

Then the Creator cast them into Sheol where they are today. But that is not the end of the story. These were not the angels that left the heavenly abode and pro created Giants with humans. That happened in the days of Jared.

Jude 1:6 And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

2Peter 2:4 For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment;

By this we are told that that there were two invasions of this world by angels but only one war was involved in heaven. The second invasion came as some angels came to this world and forsook their heavenly home. The women of Adam's children mated with these angels who forsook the heavenly realm and created a race of Great Giants. These Great Giants procreated another race called Nephiliym who in turn procreated into a third race called Eliouds. All three races were an abomination to the Creator.

Those are the only two invasions that i can understand happening in the past. There will be other invasions in the great tribulation as the gates of hell are opened but that is in the future. Can you give more information?