In which way is the kingdom of God to be established? God had a government and order, which was based upon His law, which in turn is a reflection of His character. That character is self-renunciation.
Satan wanted to restructure the government of God, supposedly to bring in more freedom, but actually to exalt himself. So his way of building the kingdom of God is through self-exaltation.
This booklet (originally called “The Spirit of the Papacy”) is a chapter taken from Jones’ larger historical work, Ecclesiastic Empire, originally published in 1901. I have retitled it because the majority of the content is not about the papacy, but about the development of Satan’s spirit (of self-exaltation), as opposed to God’s spirit (of self-renunciation).
It delves deeply into the principles of the rebellion as it developed in heaven, and as it spread to this earth, and how God dealt with it. The papacy is mentioned a few times, as a final manifestation and masterpiece of Satan’s way of kingdom-building. But the larger part of the historical reasons for why this is so, is contained in the other chapters of the original book (Ecclesiastical Empire).
There are a lot of precious insights into the reasons for the battle between good and evil, the development of Satan’s twisted reasoning, and why God has allowed these things to develop. The life and death of Christ are also upheld as the ultimate manifestation of God’s character of love. 66p
Updated Nov 2022: Corrections, and new formatting rules applied.
Contents
- The Spirit of Christianity
- The Origin of the Struggle
- Rebellion in Heaven
- Why Were They Not Destroyed?
- The Loss of Man and the World
- Another Mind in Man
- The Mystery of God
- Appendix: The Spirit of Christ
Note: a good companion volume to this one is Christ and Antichrist, by E. J. Waggoner.
