Seveth-day Adventisms have taught, since the middle of the ninetheen century, that we have lived in the time of the investigative judgment. What is God doing with our world? I used to think that He was moving about in the garden of His people, plucking out weeds. Other church members have also shared the view that the investigative jugdmnet involves a spiritual weeding. And I used to feel like a weed. What is God doing with our world? Can i survive the investigative judgment? What is God looking for? Let's review again the background of the conflict between God and Satan.
Contention first began in heaven over God's law. It describes the way the moral universe must operate. Even deeper, it tells us who God is, descibes His character. God says to His children, "Be like Me." But Satan argued that it was not an adequate basis on which to run the universe. He interpreted it as a superimposition that denied the creatures native freedom. "God, you are not an adequate center around which the world can revolve," Satan charged. "It is not practical to ask a universe to serve You just because they love you. You are not that kind of a God. No one will serve You for Your own sake. You've got to scare us into it."
Then we find, as we have considered before, that while the contention went on, God vreated our earth. The Lord brought man into existence because He needed him to be a vehicle for His love. Man had no bias, had not seen what had gone on in heaven. He could listen with an objective mind to the arguements God would present and to those Satan would offer, and the universe would watch and determine, "Is God's law realistic? Can they be like Him, and will they want to be like Him just because they love Him? Or must God use some extrinsic method of inducement to maintain moral allegiance in man?"
Man, instead of becoming part of the answer, quickly contributed to the problem. Things looked bad for God. It seemed as if nobody could obey Hus law. The universe wondered if it were unrealistic to ask people to be like Him. Furthermore, the question arose as to whether God is the Person He claimed to be.
However, looking at calvary we see what God is like and what sin is like, and we realize that God's law is not arbitrary. Rather, the moral law merely reflects the basic fabric of life, for it could not be any other way as long as God is God and we are made in His image. But an issue still needs settling. Can anyone else keep the law? Certainly, Christ observed His Father's law. He was it's embodiment. But Adam failed. Can anytone else follow it?
Since Adam and Eve first sinned, God has searched for people who will serve Him just for the fellowship involved. One of the early hightlights of His search appears in Job's experience (Job 1,2). There we find Styan coming to the gates of heaven as the earth's representative. (When man sold out, Satan, by default, became the head of our planet until the cross. So when heaven had councils, he met with them.) On one such excursion God asked him, "Where have you been Satan?"
"Well, I have been wandering around the earth looking things over."
"Tell me, Satan, what do you think about my friend Job? I think he is a good person."
"Well, let's not be foolish," Satan replied. "You and I know that Job serves You for what he can get out of You. You have a hedge about him. He's a wealthy man. Why shouldn't he serve You? He knows where his bread is buttered. But now let me at him, and I will show You what kind of stuff he is made of."
So God said, "All right, but don't touch him. You can touch the things he possesses, but don't touch him."
It is an interesting aspect, as we follow the drama, that Job thinks God causes all the trouble. Here is something to keep in mind, because it becomes even more remarkable when we realize that Job has some distortion in his theology, but he knows enough about the character of God to justify his loyalty. But we find that it is Satatn who systematically destroys his possessions, his flocks, and even his family. Now we look at Job in mourning. "I came into this earth with nothing; the Lord has given, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." "In all this Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly" (Job 1:22).
The story tells about another meeting at the gates of heaven. God asks Satan, "Now aht do you think about Job, my friend? He is a good person, isn't he? He serves Me because he loves Me."
"Certainly not!" Satan snaps. "The thing that really counts is that You have not let me touch him."Remove Your hand and let me touch him, and I will show You that when I touch a man's hide, I touch a man's character."
So God said, "all right, but don't kill him."
And then we see Job smitten with boils, in pain, itching. He scrapes pottery over his skin to get some relief, but it only adds to his misery. Finally his wife demands, "Why don't you give up this integrity bit? Why don't you curse God and die?"
"You are talking like a foolish woman," Job answers.
And the records says that Job still did not sin.
After this, Satan does not appear again in the book. He leaves defeated. As we follow Job's thinking, even though he doesn't clearly understand what is going on and doesn't really see God in the true light, he states, "Though he slay me, yet will I trust him." Here we see what God looks for - a relationship prized because each person has value as a person, and not as an instrument for secondary gain.
Now we move ahead to the time when our Lord walked the earth. After He had been with His disciples for about two and a half years, He had become a controversial figure. As they neared Caesarea Philippi He asked His disciples, "Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?" (Matthew 16:13). His question was interesting because after two and a half years the apostles were getting impatient with their Master, and, with the rest of their nation, they couldn't understand why He didn't grab the political bull by the horns and push the Romans out to establish His kingdom. Not only would He not take over politically, they couldn't even get Him to call fire down from heaven for one or two individuals who stood in the way. He just didn't fit into their concept of how the Messiah should operate, and they wondered, "Really, who is He?" Our Master, tuning in on their thoughts, asked, "Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?"
They answered, "Some say thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others Jeremias, or one of the prophets."
"Whom say ye that I am?" Now God put Himself to the test.
Going back in time for a moment, we find that God had wanted recognition in heaven for what He was in His character. Christ walked among them as an angel - Michael, the arch-angel. The very manisfestation that God used to secure their allegiance on the basis of love, so that He would not overwhelm them with His majesty, becomes the occasion for Satan to claim, "Look, He's no different form anyone else. Why should He be honored as God?" Up until then they had honored Him as God because of His character, not because of His majesty.
Coming back to the earthly situation, we see our Lord raising the same issue. "Do you see me as God, or must I perform celestail fireworks to convince you? Do you love Me just because of Me, even though I don't meet all of the expectations you have for Me? Who do you say that I am?"
And Peter, speaking for the group and under the inspiration of the Holy Sprit, testified, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God." They saw Him for what He was. Then our Lord, with a play on words, replied, "Now, on this moral quality that is rooted in Me as the Rock of your salvation, I am going to build my church. Peter, you are going to be one of the stones. This is going to be the quality of My church: people who will serve Me because they love Me - not for what I do for them, but for what I am to them."
