Or is that true in our lives? Is it something true? Jesus has conquered. It needs to become a reality in our lives. Christ was manifested to destroy the works of the evil one.
I am not sure you realize that. Sometimes we consider the Lord, and we talk about His great salvation, saving us from sin and death. Brothers and sisters, He did come to seek and save the lost. But no doubt, His whole intention was to destroy all the works of the evil one, even the works that had us bound in sin and death. He has set us free in that great victory on Calvary, where, as has already been said this morning, it is finished.
And we can thank and praise Him for that. Brothers and sisters, if ever in your life things may seem hopeless, dire, and dark, may we remember those great words that were not just whispered from the cross, but shouted by our Lord Jesus Christ in His last breath: “It is finished.”
We need to triumph in those great words of the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ, because it is the finished work of the Lord. It is the basis of our Christian life—not only our new birth in Christ, but our living in Christ and living by the life of Christ.
Last week, I began by sharing from Ezekiel. I will read a scripture:
So I prophesied as He commanded me, and breath came into those dry bones, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceeding great army.
That is the burden that is on my heart. You know, Ezekiel was brought so he could oversee this valley. It was full of dry bones, full of fallen soldiers—a fallen army. Their bones had dried up.
The Lord commanded Ezekiel to speak a word to these dry bones. As the word began to be prophesied, the dry bones began to move. Life came to those bones, and they began to move once again. Then the Lord sent His wind into the valley. The Holy Spirit was sent, and He swept through the valley. He breathed life into these bones that had now taken on meat and flesh.
The Lord restored a mighty army. He restored His people to be the warriors and army of God, to bring about His purposes.
We spoke of how the Lord, if you go to the Book of Revelation, is finally able to be among the midst of His people in the house that He has built through the Lord Jesus Christ. This house that we are called to be living stones in, brothers and sisters—the bride that is to be the companion of our Lord Jesus, not only in the thousand-year millennium that is to follow this age of grace in which we now live, but on into eternity.
We are to be companions with Him, to rule and reign over all the new universes that He will create, and all that He purposes to do. We are not fully aware of it yet, because He is going to do things that we cannot even think or imagine, brothers and sisters.
But we saw last week that He needs an army today to bring about His purposes. Well, that was, and that is, my burden: a recovered army for the Lord among His people.
Let me ask you a question. How many of you—raise your hand now—have ever been on a subway? Ah, come on. Oh, that is a good many. Enoch, you have been on a subway, brother? You have been on a subway? Yeah, he has. All right. Well, I just wanted to get your attention.
But no, no, no—it is part of what I have on my heart this morning.
Well, I have been on subways in Washington, D.C., New York, and Boston. One thing you notice, in Washington and particularly in New York, is that you go down into those subways and it is a different world. It really is.
You go down there, and you go down a couple of levels toward the very bottom. There are tracks running everywhere, but there are restaurants and shops. I mean, you could live down there. It is amazing.
Now, I want you to think about this: what if you were born in a subway? Yeah? I believe it is possible. And you lived all your life underground in that subway.
You were not aware, really, of the outside world at all, but you were satisfied because that was the life you grew up in. That was the life you knew. You go from one gate to another, one tunnel to another, trains running everywhere, but you have never left the subway—unaware of the world above.
That is the point I want to make. I think—I know—that the world is unaware of the world above. Even among Christians, I am not sure how aware we are of the world above, speaking of the spiritual realm.
Therein are the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light, and these two kingdoms are at war with one another. So part of my heart in this matter of spiritual warfare and raising an army is to become aware of the spiritual realm.
Because in the Book of Daniel, if you think about it, one of its themes is that men might know that the heavens do rule over the affairs of men. We live on this earth, we do. But in Daniel, it is very clear that it is the heavens, in the heavenly realm, where things are ultimately decided and worked out.
We see the effects of what is going on in the spiritual realm affecting this earth. It affects you and me personally. That is what was on my heart in the beginning: to awaken us not only to spiritual warfare, but to the spiritual realm itself.
You know, George Lucas in Star Wars really kind of had it right, did he not? The dark force and the light force—darkness against light. You see, the world senses this, but to them it is a fairy tale.
They sense it because in this world there is so much sorrow and grief: wars, fighting, struggles, the struggle for power, the struggle for money, evil, murders—all of these dark things happening. So the world has that sense. There is something real about a force of darkness and a force of life.
But they are blinded, as we spoke of last week. Thank God, though, it says when your heart turns toward the Lord, the veil is lifted and we can begin to see. So part of my burden is that we simply become aware of the spiritual realm and the warfare in which we are now a part.
There are two kingdoms: the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light. One is the kingdom of our enemy, Satan; the other is the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. These two kingdoms are at war.
Last week, I also mentioned that on Calvary’s cross, our Lord Jesus had the full, complete, absolute victory over Satan and all of his forces. He has conquered the flesh—that self-life in us. He has conquered the world and the ways of the world. He has conquered sin and death.
He even overcame death. He went into the depths and arose from the dead, having brought the enemy to open shame, brothers and sisters. That is a final, absolute victory.
But we know that we do not yet see all things on this earth. We do not always see that victory, and we wonder what is going on.
Well, brothers and sisters, that victory in the Lord Jesus is complete, but it is made evident on this earth when we stand in faith in the victory that He has accomplished. We do not really have a new victory; we have a victory in the Lord Jesus.
If we, by faith, can stand in that victorious Lord Jesus Christ, we can see victory worked out in our lives on this earth.
You know, I think we might wonder a little bit—at least I have over the years—why this victory that our Lord won, so complete and so thorough, is not yet completely worked out in us. In our lives, we are still struggling with the enemy. We are struggling with the forces of evil, and that is very evident. You cannot deny it.
So why is it that the complete, absolute victory of the Lord Jesus is not yet complete in us? In other words, why did the Lord not just give us that victory, so there would be no enemy to resist at all? You could live a wonderful life without any oppression, without any warfare in your own life, and you would think that would be heaven.
Well, I think we have an answer in Exodus 23. You can turn there: Exodus 23:27-30.
He is—the Lord is—speaking to Moses, telling them about their entrance into the Promised Land:
I will send My fear before thee, and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come; and I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee.
And I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite, from before thee. I will not drive them out from before thee in one year, lest the land become desolate, and the beasts of the field multiply against thee.
Little by little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.
Not all at once, but little by little, would they take the Promised Land. There was an enemy there that had to be overcome. But as you read these verses, you see that the Lord is in complete control. He said, “You have enemies there, but I am going to drive them out.”
In other words, the victory is already secure in the Lord. But that victory has to be worked out on earth as they go in against these evil—and I might say, very evil—peoples.
He said, “I will drive them out little by little.” Why is this? Why is the Lord doing this?
As far as the Lord is concerned, in their going into the Promised Land, it is done. It is secure. It is secure in the Lord. He is in complete possession.
But for the nation of Israel, they would progressively—and that is a key word—progressively enter into the land. The victory of the Lord would become more and more evident as they went deeper and deeper into the land and dispossessed the enemy.
We have a victory, an absolute victory in Jesus Christ, but we enter into that victory progressively in our lives. In other words, there is still conflict that we are in.
Why does He not just give it to us without conflict? Just say, “Here is the victory. You will never have any opposition again.” Why has the Lord chosen to do that?
Well, I think the answer is in verse 30, in the very last part. The King James says, “Until thou be increased.” In other words, we can only enter into that victory a little at a time because we do not have the capacity—the spiritual growth and capacity—to occupy the land all at once.
We do not have the spiritual capacity. So the Lord actually uses the enemy to enlarge our spiritual capacity. Now, what does that mean? That means spiritual growth: to grow spiritually, to become stronger and stronger.
You do not become stronger without opposition. That is the whole theory behind weightlifting. If you never lift any weight—if you never have that opposition—you will never get stronger. But the more you lift, the stronger you get, and the heavier you can carry the load.
So the idea of progressively entering into the victory of the Lord Jesus Christ is to increase our spiritual capacity for war, for doing His will, brothers and sisters.
The Lord has a great purpose in actually leaving the enemy here as resistance to His people. It is the way He builds His church, amazingly enough. He uses all the works of the enemy to actually strengthen us and enlarge our spiritual capacity. That is why we are called to be soldiers. We are called to be warriors.
In other words, it is up to us to take up this warfare. We are not just going to be able to sit around and enjoy all of His gracious gifts to us—all the blessings of the Lord.
Now, I think we love the blessings of the Lord, and we should be thankful for them. We gave thanks this morning. But it is not all about blessing. The Christian life is not all about blessing.
The Christian life is growing into the image of Christ Himself, His life working in you. That working out of that life in you requires resistance, and that resistance comes by way of our enemy.
So we are born into a warfare. When you are a Christian, once you accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, a spiritual transaction takes place in your spirit. You become alive to the Lord, and you have been born again.
In being born again, you are born into this warfare. You are automatically a warrior for the Lord Jesus Christ. To possess all that the Lord has—even the blessings—often requires warfare.
So it is accomplished in heaven, in the heavenlies, in Christ—this victory. But we enter into it progressively and effect it on this earth.
From the Lord’s perspective, the church is an instrument that He will use to destroy the works of the evil one on this earth. An instrument—not only, brothers and sisters, a house; not only a habitation for the Lord—but an instrument, a weapon to be used against our adversary.
That is what the mature church is. Why is that important? Why is all this warfare important to increase our spiritual stature? It is so that the whole church might grow into the fullness of the stature of Christ.
You know, in Revelation 2 and 3, He keeps talking about overcoming: “He who overcomes will reign and rule with Me on the throne.” You are being trained to be with Christ in the future ages, to reign and rule over His creation. That is why there is such warfare.
From the enemy’s perspective, he wants to destroy the church because he knows that it is God’s instrument to eventually bring him down in the end. The enemy can no longer touch Christ, the Head, who is in the heavenlies and on the throne, but he can touch His church. That is why he attacks us.
We, the church, are the predestined vessel that the Lord will eventually use to initiate the casting down of the enemy—the prince of the air—from the atmosphere to the earth, resulting in the great tribulation that we have all heard about.
So the enemy knows, brothers and sisters, that as the church rises up as God’s army, his doom is secured.
Well, we need this morning to understand the origin and nature of this battle.
I have always been encouraged by Alfred Lord Tennyson’s The Charge of the Light Brigade. How many are familiar with that poem? It is one of the greatest ever written, as far as I am concerned.
It was written about a true battle in the Crimean War, when the British were taking on the Russians. In the Charge of the Light Brigade, they did lose that battle. They made a mistake. They charged the wrong position.
But it goes something like this: “Into the valley of death rode the three hundred.” There were three hundred white horsemen, cavalry—light cavalry. Into the valley of death rode the three hundred. Then the cannons began to tear them apart.
Lord Tennyson says, on behalf of the soldiers who went into this battle, “Theirs was not to reason why, but theirs to do and die.” That is a soldier.
They knew something was wrong. They knew that a mistake had been made. But it was not for them to reason why, but to do and to die. You know, that is very difficult—a very difficult attitude, a warrior attitude.
“Mine is not to reason why. I have been called to do or die.”
Brothers and sisters, I think many here have gone into the valley of death, the jaws of hell. You have gone there, and it seemed hopeless.
We as Christians will sometimes experience in our lives very deep tragedy, very difficult times, and we think we are in the valley of death.
Mine is not to reason why; mine is to do and die. In other words, brothers and sisters, in those very difficult times, in the valley of death, we have to trust the Lord. Do you still trust Him, or do you question Him?
“Mine is not to reason why; mine is to do or die. Lord, this thing is killing me, but I trust You. I trust You, Lord.”
Now, we are thankful, brothers and sisters, that in the Charge of the Light Brigade, the captain had made a mistake. They had charged the wrong position. But our Captain never makes a mistake.
If He allows us to go into the valley of death, brothers and sisters, it is for a purpose: that He might increase our spiritual capacity and our spiritual stature, that we may become more like our Lord Jesus Christ—the One who went into the very jaws of hell and came out triumphant.
So that is somewhat of an explanation of some of the dark and deep times that we face in our lives, brothers and sisters. But we have a Captain in whom we can trust.
I wanted to briefly share with you the origins of this warfare that we are in. Many soldiers do not know why they are fighting. They are just soldiers. But our Lord Jesus Christ wants us to know.
He wants every soldier to know what the battle is about, what you are in, and why you are fighting. Unfortunately, in much of Christianity, I am not sure they are even aware of the battle. Brothers and sisters, there is tremendous warfare going on. Our Lord wants us to know because He loves us.
Once again, I started out by saying you were born into it. Your spiritual birth brought you into this warfare. So how did it all begin?
Well, in Genesis 1, it says that the Lord created the earth. Brothers and sisters, the Lord is good at creating things. They are beautiful; they are perfect.
But it says in Genesis 1:2 that the earth had become void and dark, and darkness was upon the face of the deep waters everywhere. What had happened to the earth that it would go through such devastation?
The Lord’s highest creation before He created this earth and created man were angels. They were the first creation. Job 38:4-7 says that when God laid the foundation of the earth, the morning stars sang together, and the sons of God shouted for joy.
The morning stars were so named because they were first created there in the morning. Then it says, “sons of God,” because they were created by God. They are sons by creation, and this is important to remember: they are not sons by spiritual birth.
We are sons by spiritual birth. That means the very life of God has been sparked in your own spirit, and you are born again after His image and after His likeness. That is not true of the angels. The Lord spoke, and the angels came into being.
The angels, of course, as we know in the Bible, are ministering angels. They minister to those who are going to come to the Lord. They minister to God, worship the Lord, and do the Lord’s will. That is the good ones, anyway.
It was a perfect creation. The angels probably led the whole creation and all of the universe in praise and worship of the Lord. There was peace and harmony in the Lord’s creation.
How long that could last, we do not know—thousands of years, millions, we do not know. The blink of an eye is like a thousand years in the eyes of the Lord. But Genesis 1:2 says the earth had become waste and void. What had happened? How did it come into this ruin?
First of all, let us read about Ezekiel 28. Ezekiel 28:13-17. Now, this is the angel Lucifer. We know that Lucifer is the angel that became Satan, God’s enemy.
There is not much in the Word of God about his origin, but there are a few hints that we receive. God is mostly interested in us becoming His sons by spiritual birth, not in history. But there is a little bit here that we can see.
Ezekiel 28, beginning in verse 13, speaks of Lucifer:
Thou hast been in Eden, the garden of God;
Every precious stone was thy covering,
The sardius, the topaz, and the diamond,
The beryl, the onyx, and the jasper,
The sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold:
The workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes
Was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created.Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth;
And I have set thee, so that thou wast upon the holy mountain of God;
Thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created,
Till unrighteousness was found in thee.By the multitude of thy merchandise they filled the midst of thee with violence,
And thou hast sinned:
Therefore have I cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God;
And I have destroyed thee, O covering cherub,
From the midst of the stones of fire.Thy heart was lifted up because of thy beauty;
Thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness:
I have cast thee to the ground,
I have laid thee before kings, that they may behold thee.
Now let us go to Isaiah 14:12-15:
How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning!
How art thou cut down to the ground, that didst lay low the nations!And thou saidst in thy heart,
I will ascend into heaven,
I will exalt my throne above the stars of God;
I will sit also upon the mount of congregation, in the uttermost parts of the north;
I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.Yet thou shalt be brought down to Sheol, to the uttermost parts of the pit.
So what do we find with Lucifer? First of all, he was first among the created beings, the angels. He was an archangel, the most powerful of angels. As you read the Bible, the archangels are the most powerful, the warriors.
He was created with beauty and perfection. He was endowed with great talents, gifted. He was put in the highest position as a covering cherub around the throne of God. He was musical, very gifted musically, and probably was the leader of the angels as they worshiped God.
But as he began to do this, as he began to function in his place and position, what happened? Pride. Pride rose in his heart.
Brothers and sisters, that is the most devilish thing in the world: pride. In our self-centeredness, often pride has even kept us from the Lord. Pride was the foundation of his evil beginnings.
He was not content to be over all that he had been assigned by God. Five times he said, “I will.” He used the word I. He should have only been conscious of the Lord, of God, but he became self-conscious—conscious of who he was, conscious of how great he was, conscious of how great his purpose was.
He thought that he was due more honor than he had. He wanted the honor that the Lord Jesus, God’s Son, had. He looked upon his beauty, forgetting that God was the One who had adorned him. He looked at his talents, forgetting the God who had given him those talents.
He looked at his position, purpose, and power, forgetting the One who had anointed him to do such. He was now for himself and not for God. He turned from God to himself: “I, I, I. I am the one that is important, not God.”
He was able to convince a third of the angels to go in rebellion against God. He wanted to be equal with God. He wanted to have the position that the Son had. God banished him from the mount of God, the eternal throne of God.
He was most likely banished, and we think that probably the earth was part of his domain that he ruled over as an archangel, along with this universe in which we live. But the Word says it came into waste and ruin. Why? Because the angel of darkness was now ruling over it.
But God was not satisfied. That is where Genesis begins: the restoration of the earth. He restored the earth and made it a habitable place for man, whom He was going to create.
He did not create man as He had created the angels. Remember, He took the dust of the earth and breathed life into it, brothers and sisters. He provided the tree of life for Adam. In other words, it was a spiritual birth, not merely a spoken word bringing him into being.
Let me read Genesis 1:28. This shows us the purpose of man:
And God blessed them: and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it:
And have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
He gave man dominion. He put him in a place of authority and power. God gave dominion to man to rule over this earth. That is why He created man. He wanted him to bring everything to the feet of Jesus.
God effectively took away the dominion that Lucifer had and gave it to man. He gave it to Adam. There had been a transfer of authority and power. But Satan immediately began to move. He was not going to give up his dominion easily. In fact, he constructed a plan to take it back.
The enemy, Satan, realized that he had lost dominion. So he came up with a plan to regain dominion and take back the place that he had held in authority over mankind and this earth.
I am skipping through a lot of things. So what did he do? He slipped into the garden. Adam and Eve were supposed to protect the garden, but for some reason, the enemy was able to get in that day.
Adam and Eve were one together. Adam had been given direct revelation by God that he was to have dominion and reign and rule over this earth. Eve received it through Adam; Adam shared that with his wife.
So the enemy figured out a plan. It is interesting to know his plan of attack and the ways of the enemy. He did not go to Adam. He went to Eve. She did not have direct revelation.
He said to Eve, “Has God said, ‘You shall not eat of the trees of the garden’?” He asked her a question: “Hath God said?” What was the purpose? He wanted to put doubt in her mind about God.
She said, “Well, that is not exactly true. We can eat of every tree except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We will die if we eat of it.” He said, “You shall not die.”
“You shall not die. Do you not realize God does not want you to be like Him?” These are lies. Not only did he put doubt in her mind, but he began to build on that doubt. He said, “God is holding back something from you. He does not want you to be like Him.”
Not only did he get her to doubt; he got her to distrust the Lord—a lack of trust. Not only that, he got her to disobey, because she ate of the forbidden fruit.
Brothers and sisters, in our relationship with the Lord, at times I think the enemy is able to get a little doubt in. I think most of us have experienced that: doubt about Him as God at all, doubt as to whether He really loves us, doubt as to whether He is really able to take care of us.
Doubt. Once that lays hold of us, we begin to distrust Him. It is a sad place for us as Christians when we distrust our God, but it can happen, brothers and sisters. So the enemy puts these things into her mind.
Brothers and sisters, be careful about the thoughts that you allow into your mind.
He finally gets Eve to partake of the forbidden fruit. She falls into sin. She has sinned against God. But he is not finished. He wants dominion, so he has to get to Adam, the one who had been given the authority.
He deceived Eve. First Timothy 2:14, if you have time to read it, is very clear. It says that Eve was deceived, but Adam was not.
When Eve came to him, she thought she was really doing a good deed. She thought she was doing what was best for Adam and Eve. She really thought this was right. She was deceived. It was a total lie. It was wrong, but she fully believed it.
When she came to Adam, Adam immediately realized what had happened. She had sinned. Now Adam had a choice.
Was he going to obey God? Was he going to withhold himself from that fruit, from the arguments that Satan had put into his wife’s mind? Or was he going to obey God and lose Eve, which would have had to happen?
He made that choice. He chose Eve. He too ate of the forbidden fruit, disobeyed God, and fell into sin.
When that happened, dominion was lost and given back to the enemy. It is interesting that the Word says they were naked and uncovered. They realized they were naked. They were uncovered.
Brothers and sisters, the Lord is our covering. The Lord is our Head. They had lost the headship of Christ. They had become uncovered.
Most likely, when God brought them into being, they were perfect. They were without sin. There was probably a glory about them that shone out, just as we see with God Himself, like a bright light. There was something of a glory there, and it covered them.
But as soon as they sinned, the glory was gone. They realized that something dark had happened to them, and they were uncovered. They had rebelled. They had lost dominion.
Satan had gained dominion once again by deception—gained dominion of this world. That is why he is called the prince of this world, the prince of the power of the air. He got dominion not by right, not by God, but through deception.
He is a usurper in this world. He is the squatter on this world, because ultimately it still belongs to God and His Christ. He has organized the world system against God.
We used to say, “In God we trust,” as a nation. I think the nation once believed that. Most do not anymore. Our political system has become vile, and he is using that against God.
Science has definitely been used against God. I think it is interesting that people are willing to believe that out of some massive explosion, by chance, this world came into being, rather than believing that God could have created this world. There is a God, but people believe that theory.
They believe that you and I somehow accidentally came to life in some pond somewhere, and that life began to develop and come out. There is no doubt that there has been development among each species, but never a transfer from one species to another. But anyway, he has used science against us in the kingdom of darkness.
There is this kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light. God has told us not to love the world. He said, “I am going to leave you in it. The kingdom of darkness is there, but I am also putting you personally into the kingdom of light, so that you will have light even in the darkness of this world.”
The battle was lost in the garden, no doubt, but God had a further plan. He always had this eternal plan, because Christ was the Lamb of God from before the foundation of the world.
Christ came as the second man that God sent to this earth to overcome the works of the evil one and destroy him. In fact, that song we sang comes from 1 John 3:8:
For this purpose was the Son of God manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.
He became man. He operated on this earth as a man. He lived as a man. Satan immediately went after Him.
When I say He lived as a man, He lived like we live. He did not do things just because He was God. He had to depend fully on God for the power to do the things He did. So He was like you and me on this earth. He came as a man.
The enemy immediately tried to kill Him. Remember the story of how the wise men came and said, “A Savior has been born,” and the king said, “Where is He? Because I want to worship Him.” But actually, he sent out soldiers to kill Him and destroyed many children up to two years of age in that city, trying to kill the Lord Jesus.
Later, once He was baptized, He fasted for forty days and forty nights and went into the desert to face the enemy face to face, in His greatest weakness as a man. Satan tempted Him. He said, “If You are the Son of God, You can turn these stones into bread.”
Now, brothers and sisters, He would not do it. He came as a man. He said, “I am not going to do that. I am here as a man, but I am showing you what God is like.” So He refused. He kept refusing the enemy.
Finally, when Satan was unsuccessful in defeating our Lord Jesus, he left. Eventually, the Lord went to Calvary’s cross, where He died for our sins. He became the sacrificial offering for our sin.
It also says that He went into hell and overcame it and took the keys of hell and death from Satan. Brothers and sisters, the victory has been won by Christ.
You are in Christ by a new birth. The victory has been won in Christ, but for us, the war continues. He wants us to bring all things to the feet of Jesus, to come under the Lord’s dominion and headship.
Before you accepted Christ, you thought you were free. You thought you were a free man, but you were blinded by the enemy and by the ways of the world. You were really not free.
There was no warfare in your life—not the warfare we are talking about. You probably had some hard times, but you did not experience this warfare because you were already enslaved to the enemy. You were in his kingdom.
But praise God, He delivers us from that kingdom. He overcomes our sins and says, “The sacrifice of My Son is so complete in its work, and I forget the sin forever. I will never bring it up to you. They are gone in My sight.”
But once you accepted Christ, the warfare began. Brothers and sisters, we need to maintain that dominion, that high ground in Christ that has been worked out at Calvary’s cross.
Just a few thoughts: spiritual dominion, authority, and power come from the divine nature. They come from the life of Christ in you, not from within yourself.
Spiritual power depends totally on your nearness to Christ. The extent of His life that is being manifested in your life is the power that you have and the dominion that you carry.
How shall the enemy ever be overthrown and his kingdom destroyed? It is by the life of the Lamb that you now possess—the nature of Christ, that victorious nature that is in you.
The basis of authority and power in spiritual warfare is from your experience of Christ Himself, the Person, the Captain of the Lord’s host. Living faith in His victory is your way of victory. Only in Him is the victory.
You live in the flesh and try to wrestle in the flesh, but you will fail. You have to live in the victory of Christ. You have to be close to Christ. You need to abide in Christ. You must maintain this high ground.
I remember a story told about a little girl. A man confronted her. She was a young girl, and she was a Christian.
He confronted her and said, “You believe in Christ?” She said, “Oh yes, I do. I do.” “So you are a Christian?” “Oh yeah, yeah, I am a Christian.”
“You believe in Christ?” “Oh, yes.” “Do you believe in the devil?” She said, “Yes, I do.” He said, “He is pretty big and powerful, is he not?” She said, “Yeah, he is.”
He said, “What are you going to do one day when the devil knocks on your door?”
The little girl answered, “You know, I look out and see who it is. I ask the Lord to open the door. When he sees Christ, he will flee. He will not flee from me, but he will flee from the Lord in me.”
It is the Lord in you, brothers and sisters.
But there is something else. I think there are times that we open the door and the enemy is there. We do not realize he is there, and we are immediately under attack. So what do we do?
It is always presenting Christ, if you want to say that. The Word of God says and exhorts us to what? Ephesians says to stand, does it not? When the enemy attacks, you stand. It says, “Having done all, stand.”
That having done all is standing in the Lord Jesus Christ, praying, “Lord, Your victory is my victory. I stand in the victory that You have accomplished. Your blood is over me, Lord. I have been completely saved by You. I am no longer under the kingdom of darkness, but under the kingdom of Your light, Lord.”
It also tells us in James to resist the devil, and he will flee. Have there been instances in your life? I shared some last week in my own life personally where I was under attack by the enemy, and I just had to resist it, and he would leave. I have done that personally.
Let me end by reading some more scripture from Exodus 14 to help us understand. We have this victory in Christ, but we have to execute it on this earth in our real lives.
Beginning with verse 10:
And when Pharaoh drew nigh, the children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and, behold, the Egyptians marched after them; and they were sore afraid: and the children of Israel cried out unto the Lord.
And they said unto Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness? Wherefore hast thou dealt thus with us, to bring us forth out of Egypt?
In other words, the nation of Israel had left the bondage of Egypt and were headed toward the Red Sea. Pharaoh came after them. The children of Israel lifted up their eyes and saw the Egyptians marching after them. They were afraid and cried out to the Lord.
Where was their faith in the Lord who had miraculously released them from Egypt? Brothers and sisters, over a million walked out of Egypt into the wilderness. They said, “Why have You done this? Why did You even take us out of Egypt?”
That was their reaction to the enemy. They were crying out, “Lord, You have made a mistake. You brought us out here, and now they are going to kill us.”
They said:
Is not this the word that we spake unto thee in Egypt, saying, Let us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians? For it were better for us to serve the Egyptians, than that we should die in the wilderness.
In other words, they were slaves, and they said, “We would rather continue to be slaves than die.” Brothers and sisters, I hope that is not true of anybody, even an unbeliever—to desire to continue to be a slave to the enemy because you feel you might be crushed by him.
Brothers and sisters, it is better to die than to live a slave. But that is what we were.
Moses said to the people:
Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will work for you today: for the Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more for ever.
The Lord will fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.
Moses was faithful. He knew the victory was in the Lord. “See the salvation of the Lord.” That is faith. Moses said, “Lord, I believe You. You did not bring us out here to destroy us. You brought us out here to totally set us free and to cross this Red Sea.”
“The Lord shall fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” In other words, you need to calm down. You need to get your eyes on the Lord and not on the enemy. Very critical.
You can see Moses standing there, looking over his shoulder, and the enemy is coming with all those chariots. They were rolling down on them and getting closer and closer. He is saying, “Lord, Yours is the victory. The enemy is still coming, Lord. He is getting closer and closer.”
I cannot say for sure that those were Moses’ thoughts, but I think those are our thoughts so often. The Lord said unto Moses, “Why criest thou unto Me? Speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward.”
The Red Sea was still there. It was close. But He said:
Lift thou up thy rod, and stretch out thine hand over the sea, and divide it: and the children of Israel shall go into the midst of the sea on dry ground.
And I, behold, I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians, and they shall go in after them: and I will get Me honor upon Pharaoh, and upon all his host, upon his chariots, and upon his horsemen.
You know what happened. When the Egyptians followed them into the Red Sea, they were swept away and all of them drowned. But the children of Israel passed over safely.
But the point I want to make is this: He said, “Moses, do not cry to Me. The enemy is upon you. I know that. It is time for you to lift up the rod of authority. I have given you the rod of authority.”
In other words, you are to have dominion in this situation over the enemy. Take up the rod of My authority. Take up His victory. Take up His power. It was not Moses, but Moses had to lift up the rod.
Do you see? By faith, he lifted up that rod, and the waters parted. He could have cried all day long, “Lord, part these waters, part these waters,” but the Lord was waiting for him to lift up the rod of authority—the victory of the Lord Jesus over that situation.
When the rod was lifted up, the authority of the Lord opened those waters, and they passed over on dry ground. The enemy tried to follow, but the Lord closed the waters on them, and they were destroyed.
Brothers and sisters, we are part of the battle. We are in it. Thank God, we have a victory that cannot be undone in our Lord Jesus Christ.
But we as Christians, in many situations in our lives, brothers and sisters—it is appropriate to say, “Lord, I am hurting. Lord, I do not understand this.” You can say a lot of things to the Lord, and He is very patient.
But there does come a time when the Lord says, “Lift up that rod now. It is time to take authority over this situation.” We will talk a little more about that in the next session.
Today, I just wanted you to really become aware that there is a spiritual warfare, and you are involved in it. I am involved in it. We are called not only to be followers of Christ, but we are called to be warriors.
Not only the house of God, not only the priesthood, not only His companion, but warriors—to reign and rule with Christ. So that is what we are to be learning in our life today.
Lord, we just come to You. Lord, all I can say is repeat Your words, where it says the Lord’s ways are much higher than man’s ways.
Lord, I know for some this may seem much like the Star Wars story, just a story. But Lord, it is real. There is more reality in the spiritual realm. Indeed, the heavens do rule over the affairs of men.
Lord, that is where it is really settled: in the heavenlies. And we, Lord, fight through prayer. Lord, we just come to You. We pray that in these days You will encourage us, that You will send Your wind into the valley and raise up a mighty army for Yourself.
We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.