When Was Satan Cast Out Of Heaven?

Luke 10:17-18 The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” [18] And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.”

         Jesus had sent 72 disciples to go ahead of him into all the towns he planned to preach in. He said, “Heal the sick in it and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you’” (Luke 10:9). He described this victory as Satan falling from heaven. In a figurative sense, every time the kingdom of God comes near, Satan falls. But, in a literal sense, he had not yet been cast out of heaven.

         When was Satan thrown out? Jesus told when it would happen. A day or two before He went to the cross He said, “Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out” (John 12:31).

         The Book of Revelation describes it thus: “the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, ‘Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God’” (Revelation 12:9-10 ESV).

         Jesus described it as “the judgment of this world” and as casting out “the ruler of this world.” When did this “judgment” take place?  Daniel foresaw it in a vision hundreds of years previously. He described it as a court session in which the Ancient of Days took his seat and “a judgment was made” in favor of God’s people (Dan 7:22 NKJV). This judgment was made when he saw One like a Son of Man coming to the Ancient of Days with the clouds of heaven “And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed” (Dan 7:13).

         Notice that the Son of Man is pictured as not coming down, but rather as ascending in the clouds to the Ancient of Days. This scene does not describe His second coming. It describes His ascension to the Father. As His disciples “were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight” (Acts 1:9). But the heavenly host above the clouds saw Him “coming to the Ancient of Days with the clouds of heaven.” And the Father said to Him, “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool” (Psalm 110:1).

Matthew Henry agrees that “coming to the Ancient of Days” was the ascension when he says, “Our Savior seems plainly to refer to this vision when he says (Jn. 5:27) that the Father has therefore given him authority to execute judgment because he is the Son of man, and because he is the person whom Daniel saw in vision, to whom a kingdom and dominion were to be given… here we are told, abundantly to our satisfaction, that he came to the Ancient of days; for he ascended to his Father and our Father, to his God and our God (Jn. 20:17); from him he came forth, and to him he returns, to be glorified with him, and to sit down at his right hand.” The Geneva and the Jamieson Faussett Brown commentaries agree.

         That is when “the time came when the saints possessed the kingdom” (Dan 7:22). As soon as the judgment was made and the ruler of this world was cast out, John heard a voice saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God” (Revelation 12:10 ESV).

         Does this mean our troubles are over because Satan is cast out? No. It means, “the devil has come down to [earth dwellers] in great wrath.” He now pursues the church that gave birth to the Son of God and makes war with her offspring (Rev 12:12-13). But the earth helps the church with such things as “Edicts of Toleration.”

         Every time the New Testament mentions the Son of Man coming with the clouds it is not talking about His second coming. It is referencing His coming to the Ancient of Days in Daniel 7:13. Three Gospels quote Jesus as saying, “Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory” (Luke 21:29, Mat 24:30, and Mark 13:26). Jesus referenced it again when He told the high priest, “I say to you, hereafter you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven” (Mat 26:64).

         The high priest died ten years later. When did he see this? Evidently he saw it when he died since after that is the judgment. Thus, every eye shall see Him coming on the clouds when they die. “Behold, He is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him” (Rev 1:7).