The End is near ... Bible fulfillment.

[BADecker]

What do you think?


From the Bible:

In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day, Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The Lord Almighty will bless them saying, "Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance." (Isaiah 19: 23-25)

Explanation:

...

Next door is modern day Syria. This is a creation of the United Nations. It was given to France as a protectorate and has no historic significance in its current form. Israel is down on the border. And south of that is Egypt.

So what the Bible is saying is a highway will start down in Egypt and probably follow what they call the Way of the Sea that runs up the coast of Israel and crosses over into the Plain of Megiddo and off into Damascus. This was formerly the typical trade route.

Isaiah says this is a time when all of the nations are going to be living in peace. He didn't say Syria, but he said Assyria. The Assyrian Empire extended from Ur of Chaldes, up the Tigress-Euphrates valley toward Baghdad then across to the Mediterranean, taking in modern day Syria. So Assyria in the Bible included modern day Iraq and Syria.

And in the end days there is going to be a coalition between Iraq and Syria. So the events that are taking place right now are extremely significant. I can see a coalition, a federation. We are not talking invasion, but it could happen. This area right now is stirred up with hatred and bitterness. This would encompass modern day Lebanon, which the Syrians have occupied illegally.

Read more at http://www.patrobertson.com/Teaching/patprophecy.asp.

[Yorkshire]

According to the bible, brother will bear false witness against his brother; nation will rise against another nation, etc. Currently, are these not our experiences, if not on a daily basis? Signs of end time are everywhere.

[Sutters Mill]

No. People have been saying the end is nigh since the dawn of mankind and I wouldn't pay too much attention to the bible. According to the bible you should kill a lot of people for doing very minor things (working on sundays, talking back to your parents, homosexuals, adulterers, non-believers, non-virgins, entire cities if one person there worships the wrong god)


The bible says a lot of other silly stuff: https://www.salon.com/2014/05/31/11_kinds_of_bible_verses_christians_love_to_ignore_partner/

[KingScorpio]

What do you think?


From the Bible:

In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day, Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The Lord Almighty will bless them saying, "Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance." (Isaiah 19: 23-25)

Explanation:

...

Next door is modern day Syria. This is a creation of the United Nations. It was given to France as a protectorate and has no historic significance in its current form. Israel is down on the border. And south of that is Egypt.

So what the Bible is saying is a highway will start down in Egypt and probably follow what they call the Way of the Sea that runs up the coast of Israel and crosses over into the Plain of Megiddo and off into Damascus. This was formerly the typical trade route.

Isaiah says this is a time when all of the nations are going to be living in peace. He didn't say Syria, but he said Assyria. The Assyrian Empire extended from Ur of Chaldes, up the Tigress-Euphrates valley toward Baghdad then across to the Mediterranean, taking in modern day Syria. So Assyria in the Bible included modern day Iraq and Syria.

And in the end days there is going to be a coalition between Iraq and Syria. So the events that are taking place right now are extremely significant. I can see a coalition, a federation. We are not talking invasion, but it could happen. This area right now is stirred up with hatred and bitterness. This would encompass modern day Lebanon, which the Syrians have occupied illegally.

Read more at http://www.patrobertson.com/Teaching/patprophecy.asp.

according to bible whenever people try to buiild tower of babel, god confuses them with chaotic langauges,

same is with cryptos the onces understood evaluation system dollar dies and leaves chaoes and confrontation behind

[Isaac_Ramirez]

What do you think?


From the Bible:

In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day, Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The Lord Almighty will bless them saying, "Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance." (Isaiah 19: 23-25)

Explanation:

...

Next door is modern day Syria. This is a creation of the United Nations. It was given to France as a protectorate and has no historic significance in its current form. Israel is down on the border. And south of that is Egypt.

So what the Bible is saying is a highway will start down in Egypt and probably follow what they call the Way of the Sea that runs up the coast of Israel and crosses over into the Plain of Megiddo and off into Damascus. This was formerly the typical trade route.

Isaiah says this is a time when all of the nations are going to be living in peace. He didn't say Syria, but he said Assyria. The Assyrian Empire extended from Ur of Chaldes, up the Tigress-Euphrates valley toward Baghdad then across to the Mediterranean, taking in modern day Syria. So Assyria in the Bible included modern day Iraq and Syria.

And in the end days there is going to be a coalition between Iraq and Syria. So the events that are taking place right now are extremely significant. I can see a coalition, a federation. We are not talking invasion, but it could happen. This area right now is stirred up with hatred and bitterness. This would encompass modern day Lebanon, which the Syrians have occupied illegally.

Read more at http://www.patrobertson.com/Teaching/patprophecy.asp.

Well, to believe this, you first have to believe in the Bible. Why do you say the end is near? I don't see anything in this article actually talking about this event being connected with the end of the world. It talks about the events taking place now being extremely significant. Is he implying that there's going to be a union between Iraq and Syria soon that will also encompass Lebanon? Maybe I'm really out of the loop, but it doesn't seem like anybody is actually trying to do that.

I also think it's funny that the US should be "saving the world" yet again:

I would think it would be marvelous if one of the things that the United States insists on is that they make a peace treaty with Israel. We need to tell Syria you are not going to be lobbing shells through your surrogates Hizbollah into northern Israel, but make peace. Then all of a sudden Egypt has a peace treaty with Israel, and now Syria and Iraq would come together under the United States influence.

Is it really a fulfillment of prophecy, if you do it on purpose to fulfill a prophecy?

[seoincorporation]

-...-

According to the bible too, you can have a small tree in flames talking to you; you can kill entire civilizations; you can rape a woman freely; you can kill homosexuals; you can get into fire women and children for god to breathe their "aromas"; you can put all the species into a big ship; you can open the waters; you can actually walk in the water...
So maybe this is time to stop believing this book. I rather prefer to believe in the Lord of the Rings. This is a fantasy that suits me more.

[Adebisi74]

-...-

According to the bible too, you can have a small tree in flames talking to you; you can kill entire civilizations; you can rape a woman freely; you can kill homosexuals; you can get into fire women and children for god to breathe their "aromas"; you can put all the species into a big ship; you can open the waters; you can actually walk in the water...
So maybe this is time to stop believing this book. I rather prefer to believe in the Lord of the Rings. This is a fantasy that suits me more.

Please I  wish to learn more, can you please supply some references to all these assertions. It will aid in doing more research for me before concluding. Whether the world is coming to and end or not I give no danm but man should be humane to man

[omonuyak]

What do you think?


From the Bible:

In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day, Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The Lord Almighty will bless them saying, "Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance." (Isaiah 19: 23-25)

Explanation:

...

Next door is modern day Syria. This is a creation of the United Nations. It was given to France as a protectorate and has no historic significance in its current form. Israel is down on the border. And south of that is Egypt.

So what the Bible is saying is a highway will start down in Egypt and probably follow what they call the Way of the Sea that runs up the coast of Israel and crosses over into the Plain of Megiddo and off into Damascus. This was formerly the typical trade route.

Isaiah says this is a time when all of the nations are going to be living in peace. He didn't say Syria, but he said Assyria. The Assyrian Empire extended from Ur of Chaldes, up the Tigress-Euphrates valley toward Baghdad then across to the Mediterranean, taking in modern day Syria. So Assyria in the Bible included modern day Iraq and Syria.

And in the end days there is going to be a coalition between Iraq and Syria. So the events that are taking place right now are extremely significant. I can see a coalition, a federation. We are not talking invasion, but it could happen. This area right now is stirred up with hatred and bitterness. This would encompass modern day Lebanon, which the Syrians have occupied illegally.

Read more at http://www.patrobertson.com/Teaching/patprophecy.asp.

Biblical prophets are the one that have really see the future and most of the prophecies has come to pass as stated.  The end is very near then when we begin and that is why we should be close to God like never before. We are living in the earth and it seems all the humanity are against God.

[BADecker]

Biblical prophets are the one that have really see the future and most of the prophecies has come to pass as stated.  The end is very near then when we begin and that is why we should be close to God like never before. We are living in the earth and it seems all the humanity are against God.

Actually, the will of mankind is against God. As sinners, we can't understand the way that God thinks in His perfect desiring for us to be holy like He is. We might come close at times. But we never quite understand.

This is why we die. We die so that we can let go of all imperfection. Then, god will take the essence of our spirits/souls, and place them into perfection in the new life in Heaven.

So, yes! All of humanity is against God, even though He has found some of us who are so weak spiritually, that He can work saving faith in us.

[Isaac_Ramirez]

Biblical prophets are the one that have really see the future and most of the prophecies has come to pass as stated.  The end is very near then when we begin and that is why we should be close to God like never before. We are living in the earth and it seems all the humanity are against God.

Actually, the will of mankind is against God. As sinners, we can't understand the way that God thinks in His perfect desiring for us to be holy like He is. We might come close at times. But we never quite understand.

This is why we die. We die so that we can let go of all imperfection. Then, god will take the essence of our spirits/souls, and place them into perfection in the new life in Heaven.

So, yes! All of humanity is against God, even though He has found some of us who are so weak spiritually, that He can work saving faith in us.

If you do believe in the Bible, wouldn't you believe that God is a loving creator? According the Bible, He created the whole Earth for us. You could compare Him to a parent. Even Jesus referred to Him as Father. If you imagine a parent-child relationship on Earth, you can see some similarities. Parents on Earth try to create good environments for their children. They try to give them lots of opportunities. Their children don't always obey and they don't always appreciate everything they've been given. I don't think you you can say though that the children are against their parents. They just don't understand everything completely yet.

[Impulseboy]

The only end I see that is near is the destruction of the planet due to our pursuits of resources. The heat is proof of that, and it keeps getting worse. Some people do not want to believe that global warming is real but it is and if you believe in the bible, it could be God's way of telling us we are being punished because we did not take care of the planet that He gave us.

[BADecker]

Biblical prophets are the one that have really see the future and most of the prophecies has come to pass as stated.  The end is very near then when we begin and that is why we should be close to God like never before. We are living in the earth and it seems all the humanity are against God.

Actually, the will of mankind is against God. As sinners, we can't understand the way that God thinks in His perfect desiring for us to be holy like He is. We might come close at times. But we never quite understand.

This is why we die. We die so that we can let go of all imperfection. Then, god will take the essence of our spirits/souls, and place them into perfection in the new life in Heaven.

So, yes! All of humanity is against God, even though He has found some of us who are so weak spiritually, that He can work saving faith in us.

If you do believe in the Bible, wouldn't you believe that God is a loving creator? According the Bible, He created the whole Earth for us. You could compare Him to a parent. Even Jesus referred to Him as Father. If you imagine a parent-child relationship on Earth, you can see some similarities. Parents on Earth try to create good environments for their children. They try to give them lots of opportunities. Their children don't always obey and they don't always appreciate everything they've been given. I don't think you you can say though that the children are against their parents. They just don't understand everything completely yet.

When God created the Earth for us, he gave us a whole lot of freedom. We could do anything we wanted except for the one law... don't eat of the fruit of the tree in the middle of the Garden. The whole Earth was free for us. But then we accepted the info from the serpent/devil as greater than that of God. By doing this, we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules. In other words, we gave the Earth over to the ownership of the devil, at least as far as we were concerned.

If the devil had been somebody of little power, things might not be the same as they were. But check out the second half of Ezekiel 28 to see the power that God had given the devil. The devil was able, through our willing obedience of him, to effect great corruption in us at the core of our being. The result is that we no longer have any power on our own to turn from the devil.

The influence of the devil over us is so great that, if we use any of our strength to attempt to even believe in Jesus salvation on our own, we turn the Jesus salvation thing into corruption for ourselves. It is only through the working of the Holy Spirit in our hearts (our core being) that Jesus salvation can be worked in us successfully.

Since our corruption is this deep, and since we don't understand how such deep corruption works and what it does, we barely see why death is necessary for us, so that God can remake us in the New Heavens and the New Earth, where corruption can never happen again.

This whole operation is built on:
1. The gift of God to us so that we have life;
2. The various agreements we make, first with God... to have life, then with the devil to corrupt our life, and then with God again to bring us to His new gift of salvation (even though it is God Who effects this second agreement with Him, in our hearts).

None of this is as simple as you make it sound.

[GG_Maker]

There is no good evidence in support of that. If all humans would die, that would not be the end of the world, that would only be the end of all humans and if the earth would explode that would not be the end of the world that would only be the end of earth. There is no good evidence that the end of humans, the earth or the world is near. If you are extremely religious you might think something as silly as the end of the world being near, but there is no rational reason to believe such a ridiculous notion. The world has trillion billion years left, the earth has at least 1 billion years left and for humans. Not sure because of war and the monetary system but i would say at least 1000 years or even millions or even billions of years if we stop using the monetary system at some point in the future.

[BADecker]

There is no good evidence in support of that. If all humans would die, that would not be the end of the world, that would only be the end of all humans and if the earth would explode that would not be the end of the world that would only be the end of earth. There is no good evidence that the end of humans, the earth or the world is near. If you are extremely religious you might think something as silly as the end of the world being near, but there is no rational reason to believe such a ridiculous notion. The world has trillion billion years left, the earth has at least 1 billion years left and for humans. Not sure because of war and the monetary system but i would say at least 1000 years or even millions or even billions of years if we stop using the monetary system at some point in the future.

However, there is nothing that proves God isn't real. Since God is real and created the universe, He did it for a purpose. Mankind is the top creature in the whole universe - just go along with this mankind idea, since all people seem to think it.

If humanity died out, there would be no need for the universe any longer - God's view. So, why not get rid of it? I mean, what else would there be? Create people all over again, just to go through the whole process of watching them destroy themselves again?

Sounds like you have a religion of "God doesn't exist." Since all of nature shows that He does, and since nobody knows how many years the world has left (because even in science we don't know for a fact that there isn't a universe-sized black hole that is "eating" the whole universe, and is propagated itself a little slower than the speed of light so that we can't see it coming), everything you say is speculation. This makes it a religion for you.

[Emigham7]

To realize that a hundred and fifty million people could die in one hour and that could be before daylight breaks in the morning. This whole nation could become annihilated. And what do you think will take place?

When, say at least; if ten thousand planes loaded with atomic bombs, if each one would drop an atomic bomb or a hydrogen bomb on this nation, the whole world would shake plumb from its orbit. What would that do? Fulfill every word God said would come to pass. What would it do?

In the time of the antediluvian world when they built the sphinx and so forth, those big pyramids, that we couldn't reproduce it today if we had to, back in that same country where the fuss is beginning now in Egypt, a very striking Bible prophecy.

But notice, God prophesied over in Ezekiel about in the 9th or 19th chapter, That in the day just before the coming of the Lord, there would be a highway come out of Egypt and go up into Syria. And they just completed that highway after twenty-five hundred years of prophecy.

[Isaac_Ramirez]

When God created the Earth for us, he gave us a whole lot of freedom. We could do anything we wanted except for the one law... don't eat of the fruit of the tree in the middle of the Garden. The whole Earth was free for us. But then we accepted the info from the serpent/devil as greater than that of God. By doing this, we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules. In other words, we gave the Earth over to the ownership of the devil, at least as far as we were concerned.

If the devil had been somebody of little power, things might not be the same as they were. But check out the second half of Ezekiel 28 to see the power that God had given the devil. The devil was able, through our willing obedience of him, to effect great corruption in us at the core of our being. The result is that we no longer have any power on our own to turn from the devil.

The influence of the devil over us is so great that, if we use any of our strength to attempt to even believe in Jesus salvation on our own, we turn the Jesus salvation thing into corruption for ourselves. It is only through the working of the Holy Spirit in our hearts (our core being) that Jesus salvation can be worked in us successfully.

Since our corruption is this deep, and since we don't understand how such deep corruption works and what it does, we barely see why death is necessary for us, so that God can remake us in the New Heavens and the New Earth, where corruption can never happen again.

This whole operation is built on:
1. The gift of God to us so that we have life;
2. The various agreements we make, first with God... to have life, then with the devil to corrupt our life, and then with God again to bring us to His new gift of salvation (even though it is God Who effects this second agreement with Him, in our hearts).

None of this is as simple as you make it sound.

Sorry, if it seemed that I simplified things too much. I'm not the most knowledgeable on the subject. Don't you think that an all-knowing God knew that "we" would partake of the fruit? Couldn't that have been part of His plan? I never heard this wording before: "we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules". Would you mind giving a scriptural reference for that? Maybe I just missed it. I that that there was no way for us to truly be tempted without having evil on the earth. We need opposing forces, so we can make decisions. If good is all you have, they there's no choice to make.

[BADecker]

When God created the Earth for us, he gave us a whole lot of freedom. We could do anything we wanted except for the one law... don't eat of the fruit of the tree in the middle of the Garden. The whole Earth was free for us. But then we accepted the info from the serpent/devil as greater than that of God. By doing this, we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules. In other words, we gave the Earth over to the ownership of the devil, at least as far as we were concerned.

If the devil had been somebody of little power, things might not be the same as they were. But check out the second half of Ezekiel 28 to see the power that God had given the devil. The devil was able, through our willing obedience of him, to effect great corruption in us at the core of our being. The result is that we no longer have any power on our own to turn from the devil.

The influence of the devil over us is so great that, if we use any of our strength to attempt to even believe in Jesus salvation on our own, we turn the Jesus salvation thing into corruption for ourselves. It is only through the working of the Holy Spirit in our hearts (our core being) that Jesus salvation can be worked in us successfully.

Since our corruption is this deep, and since we don't understand how such deep corruption works and what it does, we barely see why death is necessary for us, so that God can remake us in the New Heavens and the New Earth, where corruption can never happen again.

This whole operation is built on:
1. The gift of God to us so that we have life;
2. The various agreements we make, first with God... to have life, then with the devil to corrupt our life, and then with God again to bring us to His new gift of salvation (even though it is God Who effects this second agreement with Him, in our hearts).

None of this is as simple as you make it sound.

Sorry, if it seemed that I simplified things too much. I'm not the most knowledgeable on the subject. Don't you think that an all-knowing God knew that "we" would partake of the fruit? Couldn't that have been part of His plan? I never heard this wording before: "we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules". Would you mind giving a scriptural reference for that? Maybe I just missed it. I that that there was no way for us to truly be tempted without having evil on the earth. We need opposing forces, so we can make decisions. If good is all you have, they there's no choice to make.

The scripture reference is right in the beginning of Genesis... how Eve was tempted to eat the fruit.

God said don't eat the fruit because you will die.
The serpent (the devil talking through it) said you surely won't die.

Genesis 3:1-5:

1Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”

2The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ ”

4“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5“For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

The problem started when the woman decided to believe the serpent rather than God. The contract was, essentially, "You believed me, so you get what I say." Since the contract with the devil was a lie, the contract was broken, because the woman did not get what the serpent said. But, the woman got what the contract with God said... death.

So, where is the good and where is the evil? The good is that God didn't want man to die. Rather, He wanted a relationship with mankind. But this relationship barely got started when mankind decided to die, and do away with the relationship. That is the evil.

When you look at the second half of Ezekiel 28, you can see the good that God placed in the devil, and the good reason why He made him this way... and how the devil changed himself from good to evil. Then, in John 8:44 we see when the devil started practicing his evil:

42Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. 43Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. 44You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! 46Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? 47Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”

People don't clearly select who their parents are (even though they might in some unknown way). But we are all the children of Adam and Eve, who became children of the devil for a time... until God rescued them by promising the Savior.

The devil's contract with them was broken, because he didn't fulfill his part of the bargain. And the contract with God was completed by mankind making their choice... to die. The death contract is fulfilled in us, who, like our first parents, die.

The new contract with God is to believe the salvation of Jesus that God set in place. Man didn't have the power to make a new contract, but God did, because He still wanted the relationship. And, part of the new contract is God working the saving faith into the hearts those people who are too weak to reject faith. There is essentially no other way to say it. Strong will is strength against God's working faith in the heart... because the will of man still clings to both the devil's broken contract, and God's fulfilled contract of death.

The point of all this is that we will all rise in the resurrection. God's contract of new life overcomes the old contract of death. But since the contract is made to apply by believing - Eve believed the devil regarding the first contract - it will hold true by believing in God for Jesus salvation in the second contract. Those who don't believe God for the second contract will get a final death, the second death, as talked about in the Revelation. And this second death will be a lot more painful and disastrous than the first death when they put you in the ground.

[darklus123]

According to the bible too, you can have a small tree in flames talking to you; you can kill entire civilizations; you can rape a woman freely; you can kill homosexuals; you can get into fire women and children for god to breathe their "aromas"; you can put all the species into a big ship; you can open the waters; you can actually walk in the water...

Can you give a reference where does this statement written on the bible? like which part of the bible this was stated? was homo sexuals stated in the bible?  Or this statements was just basically came from your mouth.

So maybe this is time to stop believing this book. I rather prefer to believe in the Lord of the Rings. This is a fantasy that suits me more.

Then so, start worshiping the gods from this fantasy. That could not save you anyways  when this world starts to demolish

[BADecker]

According to the bible too, you can have a small tree in flames talking to you; you can kill entire civilizations; you can rape a woman freely; you can kill homosexuals; you can get into fire women and children for god to breathe their "aromas"; you can put all the species into a big ship; you can open the waters; you can actually walk in the water...

Can you give a reference where does this statement written on the bible? like which part of the bible this was stated? was homo sexuals stated in the bible?  Or this statements was just basically came from your mouth.

Moses and the burning bush - https://biblehub.com/exodus/3-2.htm

Entire nations will be destroyed - https://biblehub.com/isaiah/60-12.htm - https://biblehub.com/1_samuel/15-3.htm

Raping women - https://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/22-25.htm - https://biblehub.com/niv/deuteronomy/22.htm

Execute homosexuals - https://biblehub.com/leviticus/20-13.htm

Burning women and children for God is against the Bible. Such command is not found therein except in a general way, in the general war between nations.

Noah's ark - https://biblehub.com/niv/genesis/7.htm

Dividing the Red Sea and the Jordan River - https://biblehub.com/exodus/14-16.htm - https://biblehub.com/niv/joshua/3.htm - https://biblehub.com/2_kings/2-8.htm

Jesus walks on water - https://biblehub.com/niv/matthew/14.htm


Generally you can find what you want regarding things in the Bible by searching on "Bible Hub, <your topic>." You might need several combinations of words in several searches to find what you are looking for.

[Isaac_Ramirez]

When God created the Earth for us, he gave us a whole lot of freedom. We could do anything we wanted except for the one law... don't eat of the fruit of the tree in the middle of the Garden. The whole Earth was free for us. But then we accepted the info from the serpent/devil as greater than that of God. By doing this, we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules. In other words, we gave the Earth over to the ownership of the devil, at least as far as we were concerned.

If the devil had been somebody of little power, things might not be the same as they were. But check out the second half of Ezekiel 28 to see the power that God had given the devil. The devil was able, through our willing obedience of him, to effect great corruption in us at the core of our being. The result is that we no longer have any power on our own to turn from the devil.

The influence of the devil over us is so great that, if we use any of our strength to attempt to even believe in Jesus salvation on our own, we turn the Jesus salvation thing into corruption for ourselves. It is only through the working of the Holy Spirit in our hearts (our core being) that Jesus salvation can be worked in us successfully.

Since our corruption is this deep, and since we don't understand how such deep corruption works and what it does, we barely see why death is necessary for us, so that God can remake us in the New Heavens and the New Earth, where corruption can never happen again.

This whole operation is built on:
1. The gift of God to us so that we have life;
2. The various agreements we make, first with God... to have life, then with the devil to corrupt our life, and then with God again to bring us to His new gift of salvation (even though it is God Who effects this second agreement with Him, in our hearts).

None of this is as simple as you make it sound.

Sorry, if it seemed that I simplified things too much. I'm not the most knowledgeable on the subject. Don't you think that an all-knowing God knew that "we" would partake of the fruit? Couldn't that have been part of His plan? I never heard this wording before: "we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules". Would you mind giving a scriptural reference for that? Maybe I just missed it. I that that there was no way for us to truly be tempted without having evil on the earth. We need opposing forces, so we can make decisions. If good is all you have, they there's no choice to make.

The scripture reference is right in the beginning of Genesis... how Eve was tempted to eat the fruit.

God said don't eat the fruit because you will die.
The serpent (the devil talking through it) said you surely won't die.

Genesis 3:1-5:

1Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”

2The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ ”

4“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5“For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

The problem started when the woman decided to believe the serpent rather than God. The contract was, essentially, "You believed me, so you get what I say." Since the contract with the devil was a lie, the contract was broken, because the woman did not get what the serpent said. But, the woman got what the contract with God said... death.

So, where is the good and where is the evil? The good is that God didn't want man to die. Rather, He wanted a relationship with mankind. But this relationship barely got started when mankind decided to die, and do away with the relationship. That is the evil.

When you look at the second half of Ezekiel 28, you can see the good that God placed in the devil, and the good reason why He made him this way... and how the devil changed himself from good to evil. Then, in John 8:44 we see when the devil started practicing his evil:

42Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. 43Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. 44You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! 46Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? 47Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”

People don't clearly select who their parents are (even though they might in some unknown way). But we are all the children of Adam and Eve, who became children of the devil for a time... until God rescued them by promising the Savior.

The devil's contract with them was broken, because he didn't fulfill his part of the bargain. And the contract with God was completed by mankind making their choice... to die. The death contract is fulfilled in us, who, like our first parents, die.

The new contract with God is to believe the salvation of Jesus that God set in place. Man didn't have the power to make a new contract, but God did, because He still wanted the relationship. And, part of the new contract is God working the saving faith into the hearts those people who are too weak to reject faith. There is essentially no other way to say it. Strong will is strength against God's working faith in the heart... because the will of man still clings to both the devil's broken contract, and God's fulfilled contract of death.

The point of all this is that we will all rise in the resurrection. God's contract of new life overcomes the old contract of death. But since the contract is made to apply by believing - Eve believed the devil regarding the first contract - it will hold true by believing in God for Jesus salvation in the second contract. Those who don't believe God for the second contract will get a final death, the second death, as talked about in the Revelation. And this second death will be a lot more painful and disastrous than the first death when they put you in the ground.

Thanks for taking the time to explain. I understand that most of what your saying is common Christian doctrine. I still do see the answer to my question though. You previously wrote, "we made a pact with the devil that we would listen to him and obey his rules". How is this a pact? Now you call it a contract with him. I don't see in the scriptures that Eve promised to listen to the devil and obey his rules. She just believed (presumably) what he said and partook of the fruit. Maybe I just don't understand the words pact or contract, but I don't understand otherwise.