Text: Genesis 2:15-17
Memory verse:
”“How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, You who weakened the nations!“
‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭14‬:‭12‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

God alone is authority in all things, while all the other authorities on earth are instituted by Him. They are delegated authorities.
Violation of God’s direct or delegated authority is rebellion, and the product of rebellion is sin (Isa 14:12-15). To violate God’s authority or His order is to operate the principle of satan. Rebellion changed him from Lucifer to satan. Rebellion brought the fall of man. God’s principle is obedience.
God made man to reflect His authority on earth (Gen 1:26). He made man to be subject to His own authority and also gave him authority over all that He created and the woman, not because of superiority but of order. According to His order, authority belongs to the first to be created and the first to be saved.
God put the whole garden under man’s authority but gave him order not to eat of the fruit of tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The main goal wasn’t to place a ban on Adam but to put Adam under authority that he might learn obedience. So, Adam was under God’s authority and had other things under his authority. Nothing guarantees a fall as to attempt to be an authority without being under authority.
Adam rebelled and was disobedient to God’s authority when he ate of the forbidden fruit. Any action that lacks obedience and not done in subjection to authority, no matter how spiritual it may appear, is a fall, and any act of disobedience is rebellion. Are you serving God or leading your family with the principle of satan, like Saul (1 Sam 15:20-22).
To obey is to know the will of God and to yield to it, rather than being governed by the knowledge of good and evil, that is, the sense of right or wrong. Our sense of right or wrong is in the hand of God. To be self-willed is to follow your own sense of what is right or wrong, and this leads to a fall. God’s pattern for the father is to know His will and be governed by it.
We are all under men’s authority as well as having men under our authority. A godly father knows who is above him and obeys, whether at home, school, church, workplace , or society.
Dear fathers, let us reflect the authority that God has put on us by choosing His will and obeying authorities. May rebellion not be found in us, in Jesus’ name.

Prayer points
1. Pray for yourself and for all fathers that we may all reflect God’s-patterned authority.
2. Pray that none will serve God and his family with the principle of satan.

Today’s declarations
1. I have authority, and I am under authority.
2. My life is not governed by the sense of what is right or wrong but by the will of God.