A dear friend of mine since 1991, who is a native of New York City and was raised orthodox Jewish, accepted a long-standing invitation this past Sunday to attend a morning church service with me.

Basically, he slept through much of the Sunday School lesson and then the subsequent sermon. I was very impressed, though, that he joined in the singing of the bulletin’s chosen hymns for the day—Saved by the Blood; The Solid Rock; He Hideth My Soul (by Fanny Crosby) and J.C. O’Hair’s Life Begins at Calvary.

What got my friend to the point of agreeing to come to church with me had to do with a spontaneous discussion we had the other weekend about Lucifer as I was driving him to Auburn, Indiana (near Fort Wayne) where he rented a table as a dealer for a postcard show.

My friend, now 69, was once a long-time major ad executive in Manhattan (former accounts included Alka-Seltzer, General Mills, Excedrin, on and on) and has been a collector of postcards, baseball cards, magazines, retail promotional collectibles, etc., etc., since his early 20s and is now making big bucks selling the stuff.

I remember he said out-of-the-blue on our car drive home, “I’m really fascinated by what you told me earlier about Lucifer. I’d never heard it explained that way before.”

Here is a great passage from a study my associate preacher, Alex Kurz, gave earlier this month:

“Remember what Lucifer did way back there? Remember how he merchandised his plan of iniquity? He sold his plan of rebellion to some of these other angels, principalities and powers.

“We were just talking about that last week at a Bible conference in Seattle. The question asked was, ‘Why would Lucifer think he could be like the Most High God?’ That’s a good question.

“He thought, ‘Well, God created me to be like Him.’ You see what’s going on in his mind? Was he not ‘the sum of all wisdom and beauty’? Lucifer’s looking in the mirror and he’s saying, ‘Why else would God make me the principal anointed cherub?! Why would God make me wiser than any other creature?! Why would God make me beautiful?! Why would God make me the object of adoration and esteem?!’

“In Lucifer’s thinking, his only conclusion is, ‘If I want to be like you, why would you be upset? You made me to be like you.’

“You see how he’s justifying what’s going on? And you know what, humanity is nothing more than a reflection of that heart of arrogance that possesses Satan and that’s why Romans says what it says and people think, ‘God is no better and no different than me.’

“Paul says they ‘took the glory of God’ and what did they do? They made him into an image of men and four-footed beasts and what? Creeping things. Men reflect the heart attitude of Satan—he’s the king of pride. They say, ‘We’re equal with God.’ That’s what Lucifer thought!

“In Lucifer’s distorted, corrupted thinking he probably was surprised that God would be all upset with him. That’s what sin does, right? ‘Why are you mad at me? You made me a sinner?!’

“You ever heard that argument? ‘How can God punish me? I am what God made me and if I do what I do . . .’ You see, all of this is lame excuses and diversionary tactics to avoid accountability before a just God.”