Satan thought he had won the first step in God’s defeat and dethronement due to Adam’s defection.  A horrendous conflict began. God did not minimize its sinister seriousness, but he triumphantly claimed victory over his enemy on the very threshold of the conflict.

Genesis 3:15

And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.

God’s declaration of war is contained in this prophecy promise. A battle is to be fought to the finish between two seeds. What is the issue at stake? The sovereignty of God. The immediate objective of the conflict is the redemption and reconciliation of the human race that was ruined through sin. The ultimate aim is the restoration of God’s undivided sovereignty over all of His universe; in other words, the rule of the Kingdom of God.

Enmity will exist between the two seeds, the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman. Satan’s seed traced throughout Scripture is the Antichrist; the woman’s seed is the Christ. All Scripture prophecy converges towards these two persons pitted against each other in a final conflict.

Ever since this first Messianic prophecy was uttered in Eden, Satan’s malicious attacks have been against the Person and work of the Lord Jesus. Satan knows that Jesus Christ is “the seed of the woman.” He is whom the devil hates. From the moment God said, “I will put enmity between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel,” until Christ the Savior fulfilled that prophecy on Calvary when He cried, “It is finished,” Satan had waged relentless warfare against the Person of the Lord Jesus.

The history of the Old Testament repeatedly revealed the many attempts to destroy the line through which “the woman’s seed” would come, thus preventing the incarnation. These being brought to nothing by God’s protecting intervention, he then sought to kill the Christ Child at birth. Failing in this, he tried to impede the fulfillment of God’s eternal purpose in His Son by tempting the Lord Jesus in the wilderness to declare His independence from God. Defeated in his direct appeal, he used indirect means to keep Him from the Cross of Calvary. He used both Christ’s friends and His enemies as his instruments. He used His friends to discourage Him from the voluntary sacrifice of Himself as the world’s Savior. He instigated His enemies to kill Him, and repeated attempts were made upon His life. His defeat in all these varied efforts infuriated him into an attack upon the Son of Man’s spirit, soul, and body in Gethsemane, his final and futile endeavor to block the way to Calvary. Jesus Christ went to the Cross; He died and rose from the grave: the seed of the woman bruised the serpent’s head.

Satan failed in his attempts to hurt the Person of the Lord Jesus. For the past nineteen centuries, he has been occupied by his attempts to nullify His work.  He is accomplishing this by deceiving men and blinding their minds, thus, leading them to disbelieve and deny the truth of the Gospel. He hopes to delay the final fulfillment of the prophecy regarding his own utter defeat.

God has made steady progress from the moment of the pronouncement of this prophecy promise to its fulfillment. It was announced in the garden of Eden; it was actualized in the manger at Bethlehem; it was accomplished on the Cross of Calvary, and it will be attested on Mount Olivet.

The kingdom belongs to God. Satan maintains his claim only as a traitor and a usurper. Christ came, lived, died, rose, ascended into Heaven, and will come again that He may sit upon His throne and reign until every foe is conquered and all is put again under the divine sovereignty of the triune God.

Acts 2:30

Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, He would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne.

Acts 2:35

Till I make Your enemies Your footstool

1 Corinthians 15:22-28

²² For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. ²³ But each one in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, afterward those who are Christ’s at His coming. ²⁴ Then comes the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when He puts an end to all rule and all authority and power. ²⁵ For He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet. ²⁶ The last enemy that will be destroyed is death. ²⁷ For “He has put all things under His feet.” But when He says “all things are put under Him,” it is evident that He who put all things under Him is excepted. ²⁸ Now when all things are made subject to Him, then the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all.

Satan’s final fate was clearly announced in Eden. “It shall bruise thy head.” It is to be a fatal blow that affects his ultimate defeat, dethronement, and destruction. The doom pronounced upon the devil in Genesis 3:14-15 is an eternal doom: the end for him is eternal torment in the lake of fire prepared for him and his angels.

Matthew 25:41

Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Satan’s final fate was actualized in the manger of Bethlehem. The Lord’s incarnation meant the beginning of the end for Satan, and he knows it. That is why he fought the birth of the Christ-child and why he now denies the God-breathed truth of the Virgin Birth. His destruction was actualized when God-manifest-in-Christ entered openly and aggressively into the field of operation to lead His forces to victory.

Satan’s final fate was accomplished on the Cross of Calvary. There, his doom was sealed. God’s eternal purpose in Christ’s Saviorhood was realized. From now on, Heaven looks upon the devil as a defeated foe. In anticipating His death upon the Cross, Christ regarded it as the time and place of the devil’s defeat.

John 12:31

. . .now the ruler of this world will be cast out.

But not until on the Mount of Olivet, when the Lord Jesus Christ returns from Heaven in all His majesty and glory, will the final fate of Satan be attested. Then, the sentence pronounced upon him in Eden, will

be executed. Through God’s permission, the traitor-prince still rules the kingdom of Satan. Still, when God’s eternal purpose in Christ Jesus is carried out entirely, God’s judgment upon Satan will finally be executed.

Source: “Life on the Highest Plane” by Ruth Paxson

Great God, we praise You for Your precious word in Isaiah 55:11

So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

In Him,

Marion