Page 7 - Our God of Love, Mercy, and Justice

His law perfect. Satan had made it appear that he himself was seeking to promote the
good of the universe. The true character of the usurper, and his real object, must be
understood by all. He must have time to manifest himself by his wicked works. . . .
Even when it was decided that he could no longer remain in heaven, Infinite
Wisdom did not destroy Satan. Since the service of love can alone be acceptable to

God, the allegiance of His creatures must rest upon a conviction of His justice and
benevolence. The inhabitants of heaven and of other worlds, being unprepared to
comprehend the nature or consequences of sin, could not then have seen the justice
and mercy of God in the destruction of Satan. Had he been immediately blotted
from existence, they would have served God from fear rather than from love. The
influence of the deceiver would not have been fully destroyed, nor would the spirit of

rebellion have been utterly eradicated. Evil must be permitted to come to maturity.
For the good of the entire universe through ceaseless ages Satan must more fully
develop his principles, that his charges against the divine government might be seen
in their true light by all created beings, that the justice and mercy of God and the
immutability of His law might forever be placed beyond all question.
Satan's rebellion was to be a lesson to the universe through all coming ages, a
perpetual testimony to the nature and terrible results of sin. The working out of

Satan's rule, its effects upon both men and angels, would show what must be the fruit
of setting aside the divine authority. GC 498.

The Fall of Man
And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his
nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. Genesis 2:7.

God made man upright; He gave him noble traits of character, with no bias
toward evil. He endowed him with high intellectual powers, and presented before him
the strongest possible inducements to be true to his allegiance. Obedience, perfect
and perpetual, was the condition of eternal happiness. On this condition he was to
have access to the tree of life. PP 49.
The tree of knowledge, which stood near the tree of life in the midst of the garden,
was to be a test of the obedience, faith, and love of our parents. While permitted to

eat freely of every other tree, they were forbidden to taste of this, on pain of death.
They were also to be exposed to the temptations of Satan; but if they endured the trial,
they would finally be placed beyond his power, to enjoy perpetual favor with God.
God placed man under law, as an indispensable condition of his very existence. He
was a subject of the divine government, and there can be no government without

law. God might have created man without the power to transgress His law; He might
have withheld the hand of Adam from touching the forbidden fruit; but in that case
man would have been, not a free moral agent, but a mere automaton. Without
freedom of choice, his obedience would not have been voluntary, but forced. There

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