THE BOOK OF COLOSSIANS CHAPTER 2:14-15 (CHRIST’S DAY OF TRIUMPH IN HADES)

Mike Balloun teaches today. 04/01/23

THE BOOK OF COLOSSIANS CHAPTER 2:14-15
CHRIST’S DAY OF TRIUMPH IN HADES

VERSES: Genesis 1:1-2, 6:4-6; 1st Peter 3:19-20; 2nd Peter 2:4-9; Jude 3-7

STUDY NOTES: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/jthx3jnl01eom22zy2bs3/h?dl=0&rlkey=fyexra4rohg53kqhagnhguz58

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“Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.”

Here Paul includes the unseen parts of this Realm with the seen earthly things, and in the doing, he brings in the ‘spirits’/fallen angels (principalities and powers) who rule on and over the Earth from the first heaven, as well as in the locale of “Death” in the underworld of Hades (Hades being the abode of the dead in the Greek). So it is, that Jesus the Christ’s/Son of God’s incarnation work of Atonement included 1) on the Earth 2) in the center of the Earth 3) in the unseen heaven surrounding the Earth, and 4) in the Heaven of heavens.

On the Earth, on the Cross, Christ put away the ordinances/decrees of God’s Law in regard to the Curse of death resulting from Adam’s sin and the Law of Moses, in that Jesus the Christ was “…made a curse for us: (He willingly gave up life on the Earth under the Curse; “forsaken” by God - Psalm 22:1) …for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree…” And after dying on the Cross, Jesus the Son of Man’s ‘internal spirit’ went back to God as all men’s do at dying; albeit Jesus' spirit was remarkable, having never been tainted by spiritual death. Then, His fleshly body went to the grave, and He as Man created as a ‘living soul’ (see Genesis 2:7, as opposed to being a spirit being) and was taken to Sheol/Hades; the intermediate place of the dead, in the middle of the Earth (as every dead soul has since Adam’s sin). See Ecclesiastes 12:7… “Then shall the dust (body) return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.” See also Luke 23:46… “And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost.” Jesus was under the Law of Moses being a circumcised Jew of the seed of Abraham. And being hung on a tree, He was Cursed by the Law of Moses as a condemned soul. Having died on the Cross, He was immediately ‘under arrest’ and brought into the place/locale of Death in Sheol/Hades by the ‘angels/spirits of Death/death’; they being the executioners of the Law upon its condemned. (Luke 16:22, Psalm 16:10) In type, it is Jonah in the belly of the Whale/belly of the Earth for three days and three nights.

SATAN RULES FROM THE HEAVEN OF THIS EARTH AND HAD THE KEYS AND FULL POWER OF THE PLACE CALLED DEATH AND THOSE SPIRIT BEINGS THERE WERE/ARE HIS TRUSTEES/TORMENTORS… They got their power over men from the ordinances of the Law.

Jesus was held as captive, and was afflicted and taunted in the lower parts of Hades; “Death”. (Matthew 12:40; 18:34, Jonah 2, Romans 10:7, Psalm 69) “…being put to death in the flesh (body as a man), but (in the God-determined moment… He was) quickened (made alive - filled with life and life-giving power from the state of death that He was in without His spirit) by the S spirit” (pneuma). (1st Peter 3:18) Which is to say, His now glorified/glory-filled spirit was sent back to Him by the Father into that place of “Death”… in the power of God, ordained “before the foundation of this (present) World… according to the working of his mighty power”. (1st Peter 1:20) In that moment and in that Place, He suddenly was no longer just a soul/man of the flesh cursed with death, but became the life-giving spiritual being. (1st Corinthians 15:45-46) All satan’s ‘spirits/angels’ in authority there in ‘Death’s locale now with all their force resisted His departure. It is then that He exerted His great conquering spiritual power as the victorious Second Adam. “And Having spoiled (in the Greek, spoiled is better understood to mean violently disarmed and stripped the) principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly (there in the place of “Death”, disgracing them by ‘leading captivity captive’ (making a show of them) throughout Sheol/Hades. That great procession being viewed by all the hordes and hosts of the Underworld. Up and out of the Bottomless Pit they came, into the upper regions of Hades, across the Great Abyss, and now in full view and the ever-increasing sound of loud cheers of those rejoicing in Abraham’s Bosom/Garden), triumphing over them in it.” (See Judges 5:12, Psalms 68:18, with Ephesians 4:8 where leading captivity captive speaks of parading prisoners of war around in triumph.)

Jesus, the Second Adam, yet in Hades, without His awaiting, uncorrupted body, having been dead is now “made alive in (His) spirit” in the power of God. He has now defeated the governing forces; the spirit/angel principalities and powers in the locale of Death, who/which could not hold Him, for the place is for law-breakers. It is the great Day of His Triumph. The victorious Son of God/Son of Man is now a life- giving spiritual being; the first begotten from the ‘dead’. (Revelation 1:5,18) And now in this, His great overcoming capacity, He determines to make a ‘proclamation’ to other spirits/angels in Hades. Those spirit-beings hearing this ‘proclamation’ are those who were not among His captives which He led in His victory train throughout Hades. Rather, these are those who had been chained for thousands of years in the dark dungeons of the prison ‘Tartarus’ located along the Bottomless Pit in the lower parts of Hades. And the timing of that proclamation being quite possibly before His departure in Resurrection from Hades back to His body in the tomb. (See 1st Peter 3:19-20 “By which also he went and preached (/proclaimed) unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.” See also 2nd Peter 2:4-9… “For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment; And spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly; And turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly; And delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked: (For that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds;) The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished…” And see Jude 3-7… “Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ. I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.”

THERE ARE TWO DIFFERENT CLASSES OR GROUPS OF FALLEN SPIRITS/ANGELS…
1) those angels/spirits who chose to give up their God-appointed government/habitation, “which kept not their first estate” in which they were to abide/remain in (who may or may not have been a part of Lucifer’s original rebellion) to become as men and who entered into this material realm which was under the curse of Adam’s sin from the Garden of Eden. And these spirits/angels/sons of God “…took them wives… and bear children to them…” The result was Nephilim/giants… an ungodly, unauthorized offspring that increased the hardness of the hearts of men towards God, in that they were wicked and filled the Earth with violence. (Genesis 6:1-5) For which God judged these spirits/angels who chose to be like men and their progeny, the Nephilim, along with natural men, to die like men in the Great Flood of Noah’s day. The Nephilim/the offspring of angels, drowned and were disembodied as the natural men (save 8) were drowned and disembodied. And the first class or group of spirits/angels, being then still spirits (not subject to physical death, but yet in the form of men - Hebrews 13:2, Genesis 19:1-4)… God chained and put into darkness in a place/locale in Hades called Tartarus. (This place/locale can be contrasted with the place where Scripture reveals wicked souls/men go who are brought into Hades; where they are delivered up to the place of Torment. - Luke 16:22-23)

A WORD ON HADES/SHEOL
(Starting with fallen Adam and Eve, souls partially restored/reconciled - being repentant and propitiated by the blood - their spirits are re-energized with eternal life, but with physical bodies, doomed to die… are then to be separated from the living. Being born-again as spirit eternal beings, with the promise of a full future restoration of spirit, soul, and body, they must then enter into an intermediate place, being yet in the continuing state of death… until the fullness of the promise is complete. (Genesis 3:15) That intermediate place for the ‘dead’ having been provided for, in that God created Hades in the Center of the Earth presumably 6000 years ago at re-Creation or shortly thereafter as a result of man’s fall, wherein there is a Garden of comfort to those souls deemed in need of comfort, and other places, such as Tartarus in Hades, which were set aside for men and spirits/angels passing from the living, who were deeded not fit for comfort, pending the final great judgement day.)

Now before we speak further on those 2 classes or groups of fallen angels… A WORD ON THAT WHICH IS KNOWN AS THE ‘GAP THEORY’… (Not to be confused with some modern-day interpretations/explanations being called ‘Gap Theory’ which vary widely and contain error mixed with partial truth.) The name comes from the observation that there is a long gap of time between Genesis 1 Verse 1 and Verse 2… Genesis 1:1… “In the beginning God (Elohim) created the heaven(s) and the earth.” The existence of a pre-Adamic World is discovered in the description of the Creation being described as in an uninhabitable condition in Verse 2… “And the earth was (“was” should be “became” here as it is translated in Genesis 2:7, 4:3, 9:15, 19:26; Exodus 32:1; Deuteronomy 27:9; 2nd Samuel 7:24, etc.) without form (Tohu - meaning formlessness), and void (Bohu - meaning undistinguishable ruin, destruction); and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” (Note that the principle of creation being cursed as a result of the fall of the being that held dominion over it is not a new concept. Just as the Re-creation was cursed due to Adam’s fall, the original Creation being cursed due to Lucifer’s set the precedent.) This judgment death of a physical kind had already been experienced by some beings, as ‘written/testified’ in the fossils of this Earth… albeit not made in the image of God as Man was, nor for the same purposes, but evidently of a similar earthly structure. Some presumably with intelligent life, were living on the Earth as a part of then unfallen Lucifer’s Kingdom at the appointment of God, and also after his rebellion (Ezekiel 28 & Isaiah 14). These pre-Adam earthly material living beings also were judged and died in the first great flood waters that first covered the Earth as seen in that ‘judged state’ of Genesis 1:2 (the Earth being in darkness, chaos, and void/without form). And those very flood waters that brought those earthly but eternal created beings death also formed their grave, becoming the habitat for these disembodied spirits. Thus, a reason and purpose for that Age-lasting existence of the water-covered Earth. And at the same time, the heavens of that/this Realm, Lucifer’s greater part of his Kingdom from which he ruled, having fallen under God’s judgments, was also in a state of destruction, and became the eternal/age-lasting restricted abode of the (then and still now) relegated fallen Cherub and his governing angels who followed him into that original sin. (The Prison/place of quarantine for him and his co-conspirators being the destroyed heavens of this world.)

Now the Nephilim were/are neither spirits/angels nor ‘living souls’/men, but were born of women in this earth’s material bodies, and when the first of them died in Noah’s day, it was in the judgment manner and form of those who were a part of the rebellion of Lucifer, whose outward bodies died in the Original Creation destruction; that is to say by flood waters. Allusions to the Nephilim/Anakims/Emims/Rephaim/ Zamzummim (all names for the ‘giants’ in various cultures) in Scripture could place their disembodied abode in the flood waters, which is to say in the Seas too with those pre-Adam beings then fallen becoming the ‘devils and demons’ who now manifest in this re-Creation Age of the last 6000 years among fallen man… “And the sea gave up the DEAD which were in it…” [Revelation 20:13a] Which ‘dead’ then would answer to the Nephilim and the ‘demons/devils', ‘intelligent beings’- but neither souls nor spirits. Revelation 20:13 is the time and the place that answers to the words of those devils being dis-possessed from a man by Christ “…art thou come hither to torment us before the time?” [Matthew 8:29] See also Job 26:5 where “dead” in Hebrew is ‘Rephaim/giants’. See also Vulgate translation… “Behold the giants (dead) groan under the waters, and they that dwell with them.”) For they are neither men nor spirits, but illegitimate beings, who presently are working malevolently on Earth out of the Seas like the ruling spirits/angels in this Realm are working malevolently out of its heaven. These unseen beings of the Sea have a certain limited freedom. In that they must for the greater part remain unseen with limited power and abilities compared to spirits/angels, but apparently are subservient underlings working willingly with the satanic forces causing disruption yet in God’s ordained salvation plan for man of ‘faith without seeing’ now proceeding on the Earth, which when accomplished, will end in all of their great demise. Additionally, the above analysis could also answer to the exclusion of the ‘Seas’ in the New Heaven and New Earth. Revelation 21:1… “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.” (The seas being associated with the taint of death, defilement, and befoulment.)

2) So the fallen spirits/angels of this 2nd class/group are not currently a part of that class or group of fallen spirits/angels who are chained in Tartarus for leaving their “estate” in the days of Noah. This second group is addressed in the prophetic Word of the Book of Revelation. These spirits/angels are far greater in number than those who sinned with women, and these had direct involvement with the rejection of the Gospel of the Messiah by the Leaders of the Nation of Israel, and were behind the torture and crucifixion of the Son of God. They have had final judgment pronounced over them according to Scripture, but, for the purposes of God, their everlasting punishment has been deferred. They currently remain in complete freedom, until Christ’s Second Coming to this Realm, when He first enters into its heaven to claim His victorious right and casts these angels/spirits out of this Realm’s heaven down to the Earth. (Revelation 12:7-13) And after that “…short time” which is 3 ½ years of great tribulation on the Earth, the chief fallen angel/spirit satan will then be chained by an Angel/spirit (most likely by one of the 2/3 original governing Angels who did not rebel leading to the great catastrophe of Genesis 1:2). And all his following are cast into that same place/locale in Hades that the first class/group of spirits/angels were chained and cast, 4-5 thousand years ago, called the Bottomless Pit/Tartarus. And together they will remain there during the 1000yr/Millennial Period time of Justice and righteousness. (Revelation 20:1-3) But after that 1000 years, they will be unchained and released for a little season to deceive the Nations. (Revelation 20:3,7) And then shortly thereafter, as set forth above, following the Last Great Rebellion, the devouring fire of God that comes down out of heaven (Revelation 20:9) engulfs the opposing deceived Nations on the face of the Earth, and brings the fulfillment of the Judgement long pending in that satan and the confederacy of spirits/angels that accompanied him in the original rebellion before the re-Creation and Adam, and continuing rebellion during this Age after re-Creation, will then be cast into the Lake of Fire to be forever in torment. (Revelation 20:10) This class or group of spirits/angels are forever condemned.

So this class or group of fallen spirits/angels are those who originally rebelled with Lucifer who did not, or have not left their habitation, ‘estate’… and are of that group of angels relegated to this heaven and are yet united with satan in open warfare against God, all the while in the over-ruling of this World, its heaven, and earth and continuing presence in the underworld, all in great opposition to Christ’s successful mission in this Age of Mercy and Grace to be followed by His return. This greater group, in terms of numbers, of fallen spirits was unaffected, as it related to the judgment chaining of the angels in Tartarus who left their “estate” in the days of Noah and King David.

Then immediately after these spirits/angels are finally put away in everlasting judgment, then those fallen spirits/angels who had left their first estate, who had been chained up since Noah and King David’s day, who therefore had not accompanied satan in his continuing war against God throughout the greater part of this Age, including direct confrontation with the incarnate Son of God, and who did not come up in the unchaining of the other spirits/angels out of the Bottomless Pit/Tartarus in the post-Millennial day for a short season, are those spirits/angels that Peter spoke of that Christ preached/pronounced to and are “….to be reserved unto judgment.” It is just then that Scripture announces, at the Great White Throne… when “…..Death’ and Hades delivered up the dead which were in THEM” [Revelation 20:13b]… (the remaining souls/men and angels/spirits in the entire underworld).

IT IS THE SECOND RESURRECTION as the First Resurrection preceded it by 1000 years. (Revelation 20:5-6 with 20:11-15) These include the souls/men who are those redeemed who remained in Hades at the First Resurrection, who were not found worthy to be a part of Christ’s Bride and adoption of the Father as First-Born sons to Co-Rule with His Son, as Kings and Priests in His Millennial Kingdom.

So it is, that the group of fallen angels now to be judged at the Great White Throne, who were chained up at the Flood of Noah, and later also, had no knowledge of the plan of God as it related to the incarnation of the Son of God, nor had a direct part in rejecting and crucifying Him. They were preliminarily judged right along with ancient men in Noah’s day, and like men generally then and now, who are all preliminarily judged at death, are then reserved/kept for final judgment. About these then, we learn from Peter who uses the comparative in his first Epistle… “By which also he went and preached (proclaimed) unto the spirits in prison’ Which sometime (or formally) were disobedient…” To the content and results of this preaching or proclamation work of Christ on that day of His Triumph, it is yet to be seen/“…to be reserved unto judgment” Day. Again, that is to say, at the Great White Throne Judgement by Christ and now His Bride of a 1000 years - is that time when these words of Scripture answer to. (1st Corinthians 6:3… “Know ye not that we shall judge angels?”)

Just a brief word about Christ’s “proclamation” to the spirits/angels chained in Tartarus for their unlawful interaction with women… Although Scripture does not directly reveal what was proclaimed, several possibilities/scenarios drawn from Scripture emerge:

1) That Christ preached/proclaimed the ‘Gospel’ of redemption to them, in that these antediluvian (pre-flood) angels, having been of the 2/3rds of the angels assigned to this Realm that had not rebelled with Lucifer nor had any part in the Garden of Eden’s conspiracy against Adam and Eve, who later, 1000 years plus, left the 2/3 unfallen heavenly Government of this Realm and took on the form of man, not as a part of a further conspiracy against man, but out of being drawn away by lust alone, and were then judged accordingly as men in that form, as they were condemned with man, save 8 souls, in the flood of Noah. And that Christ after His Triumph in Hades over satan’s principalities and powers, extended His redemption specific for man unto these relatively few now fallen spirits/angels who had been judged with men. And although they must complete their sentence, they presumably gladly received His redemption mercy, and will be judged accordingly at the Great White Throne.

2) Conversely, these spirits/angels were a 1/3 part of those spirits/angels who had formed God’s heavenly theocratic government over this Earth and heavenly Realm under the ruling Cherub Lucifer who had rebelled against God and who were culpable for the destruction waters and chaotic state of the Earth and its heaven found in Genesis 1 Verse 2. And later, a small portion of these were the key players in the conspiracy to pollute a pure bloodline, or otherwise cause mankind to completely be disqualified from taking any dominion and ultimately ruling, in this part of God’s Universe. That conspiracy, presumably motivated by satan, being that a number of fallen angels/spirits would take on the form of man and take unto themselves as many wives as they would, in order to produce a race of wicked and corrupting hybrids called Nephilim. That these Nephilim were the cause of God’s judgment of a second great flood, in whom only Noah and his survived, is documented in Scripture as related above. (Genesis 6) This was not the end of the conspiracy, as then after the flood of Noah, there was another breakout of the same kind in the Land of Canaan. Whom God eventually destroyed with the sword, the last by the hand of David, the King of Israel.

Now as fanciful and unrealistic as all this Scriptural historic events of spirits and supernatural beings physically invading the Earth may sound today, it does not stop in Scriptural history, in that in the 24th Chapter of Matthew, Christ reveals the prophetic end-time scenario that there will be a similar repeat of those days of Noah. With those historic and future catastrophic events in view, it is plausible that in conjunction with Jesus’ Day of Triumph in Hades over those governing principalities and powers of that region in Hades, that His preaching/proclamation to those chained in Tartarus, was not so much of the redemptive kind, as that of the warning kind (in that the prophetic Word of Christ in Matthew 24 could involve them personally again - Revelation 9:1 and Revelation 20:7). A warning to those spirits who were yet seemingly un-judged as it relates to eternity (as it seems there must have been some defining point of judgment between their having been chained and incarcerated and when their like heavenly compatriots’ destiny was finally sealed, that of being cast into the Lake of fire forever - that defining point being the rejection and Crucifixion of Christ?) In that it is Written and should be understood that in regards to these spirits/angels alone now in Tartarus, again are “…to be reserved unto judgment” until the day of the Great White Throne judgment.

So it is, that just as satan and his fellow angels are being cast into the Lake of Fire forever, this other class of fallen angels, having heard the Proclamation of Christ in Tartarus, then being legally served/sentenced, are released and raised up to be judged, as Death and Hades are being emptied. These places in the Center of the Earth, having served as the intermediate places for the dead, are themselves now to be cast forever into the Lake of Fire in their confining entirety; that consisting of: Abraham’s Bosom, the place of Torment, the Great Abyss, the Bottomless Pit, and Tartarus. Those dead who were not a part of the First Resurrection, having remained there in Hades until that final destruction and the time of their complete emptying in the Second Resurrection, both men and spirits and others from this Age or another, will then be judged at the Great White Throne Judgment… And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the Lake of Fire/the Second Death.” (Revelation 20:10-15)