Mystery of the Ages.PDF - Blow the Trumpet

What a tragedy that, as plainly stated in Revelation 12:9, this whole world hasbeen deceived and blinded from the truth by Satan the devil, still sitting on the throne ofthe entire earth.The real truth is startling, but you will find it plainly revealed in your own Bible.Follow it as you carefully read this book.Consider! When God drove Adam and Eve out from the Garden of Eden, He setangels to bar mankind from reentering. Suppose the Eternal had left the gate into Edenopen. Man had already taken of the forbidden tree. Man had already turned to sin. Whatwould have happened? Probably the whole of sinning mankind would have surged backin to take of that tree of LIFE! Without any repentance--without even FAITH in God or inChrist--mankind would have helped himself to RECEIVING ETERNAL LIFE.THINK a moment!God Not UnfairHow UNfair would God have been, had he allowed that! Man, with all his sins--and sinhas a habit of increasing in the one who indulges in it--would have become immortal--living forever while suffering the pains, mental, physical and spiritual, that sin wouldbring on him!Man does not seem to realize that he now is the SLAVE of sin. Sin has cut himoff from God the Father. Few understand that we are not saved by the death of Christ. Weare reconciled to God the Father by Jesus' death. We are saved by his life (Rom. 5:10).Man does not realize that only a real repentance--turning from sin--and the living FAITHof Jesus Christ can FREE him from that penalty! Sin enslaves! It punishes! It bringssorrow, remorse, anguish. It inflicts physical injury, sickness and disease. It producesfrustration and hopelessness.The most UNfair, UNkind, cruel thing God could have done once Adam and Evehad taken the forbidden tree would have been to leave the way open into the garden, withfree access to all comers to the tree of LIFE--symbolic of the gift of ETERNAL LIFE!But what did God do? He drove out the man and the woman. He barredreentrance.He, however, made salvation and eternal life in extreme happiness and blissbecome available to ALL the human family. But, with godly wisdom, he set a time-orderand conditions! For the first 6,000 years--now almost completed--all but the predestinedFEW were cut off.On this point the entire world of traditional Christianity has been deceived. Hereis a most important truth: Satan sitting on earth's throne tried to kill the Christ child. Hethen tried to tempt and disqualify Jesus just before the Christ started his earthly ministry(Matt. 4). Satan caused the martyrdom of most of the apostles. He caused intensivepersecution against the Church. He caused a violent controversy to flare up in the earlymonths and years of the Church disputing whether the gospel to be proclaimed was thegospel OF Christ, or man's gospel ABOUT Christ. Satan caused the latter to win out, andin less than 20 years a false and counterfeit gospel ABOUT Christ was being proclaimedby all but the persecuted FEW who loyally remained as the small and persecuted trueoriginal Church of God.