"The Christian Warfare (Ephesians)" - Pastor Doug Batchelor

and we have a number of verses we're going to be looking at today but our principle study today is dealing with ephesians chapter 6 verses 10 through oh mostly 10-13 we'll touch on verse 14 and we have a memory verse it's ephesians chapter 6 verse 12. it's uh coming to us from the new king james version in our lesson why don't you say it with me ephesians chapter 6 verse 12. you ready for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this age against spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places there is a war that is raging between the forces of god and the forces of the devil this is the great controversy the cosmic conflict there is a battle and the battleground is your heart and mine and so we'd like to encourage you to pay special heed to the study today you might even have a pencil out because we're not only going to talk about the war we're going to talk about some things you could do to be victorious in that battle this study is dealing with matter of fact turn in your bibles why don't we read the verses in ephesians it's not very much and we'll get the backdrop for what we're studying today talking about the war in general and we'll talk more about the armor and the implements of the war in our next study next week but in ephesians chapter 6 if you go to verse 10 and i'll read verse 10 through verse 14. finally my brethren you can see he's finishing up his book and this is the last chapter in ephesians finally my brethren be strong in our own might or how in the lord can't do it in your own strength in the power of his might put on the whole armor of god that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil he is a wily foe for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against you notice he doesn't deny that there's a wrestling match he just clarifies who you're wrestling we're not wrestling against flesh and blood but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this age against spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places and that doesn't mean that the devil's in heaven heavenly places there means spiritual realms therefore take up the whole armor of god that you may be able to withstand in the evil day having done all to stand stand therefore and then he goes on into the armor of god notice stand stand stand and we're going to talk about how do we stand first let's talk a little bit about the war and i will be giving out some scriptures that you could help me read in a little bit just thought i'd double check we have microphones we have somebody who's holding we've got a one microphone here is there one on this side yes we do poncho's there okay i read somewhere that since 3600 bc the world has known only 292 years of peace during this period of time there have been 1 000 no no 14 531 wars and this amazing fact is actually a few years old so you can add to that number large and small in which 3 billion 640 million people have been killed that's an estimate war on earth during world war ii upward of 50 million died in just that war the value of the destruction would pay if you could take all the money that people have spent on war the value of that destruction would pay for a golden belt around the world 97 miles in width and 33 feet thick all the money and i don't know how they calculated that but it still sounds impressive all the money that has been wasted on war in the last 200 years we've had 13 years of war for every year of peace and that's just in the last 200 years of world history since the beginning man hasn't been involved in war and you know what one of the reasons i believe that's true is because the wars we have with each other are the outflowing of a cosmic war between good and evil there is a war in the universe between christ and satan michael and the dragon and you and i are involved now during world war ii if people wanted to stay out of it you know they had all the money in these swiss banks and so it was sort of agreed switzerland is off limits and so a lot of people fled to switzerland they said who are you for i'm not for anybody i'm neutral and you can't be neutral in this war there is no switzerland jesus said if you are not with me you are against me there's one road and it goes two directions and if you're not moving forward you're back sliding you're either going up the straight road to the heavenly city or going down where the road gets wide to the city of destruction there are just two choices two sides and everybody is involved in one way or another in this war so you might think this lesson's not relevant for you yes it is because you're in here somewhere there's a war and everybody's on one side of the other you're either on the winning team that's one thing i like about the bible is i know which team wins you're either on the winning team or the losing team now if you choose to be on the winning team it doesn't mean that you're excused from battle sometimes children will take to school a slip that excuses them from physical education but you can't get one of these slips from your doctor that says you are excused from the war there is no excuse you're all involved and if you say i don't want to be involved you are more involved than ever in the losing team so there's a war and i know it's not pleasant who likes war but you can't escape it there are no pacifists in this war you can protest the war but you're in it and so it's something we must accept you are either fighting under the banner of the devil or the banner of prince emmanuel michael or the dragon jesus or satan light and darkness good and evil there's a war going on and paul makes that very clear the terms that are used in the bible are terms of war matter of fact one reason this lesson was interesting to me is you might be thinking that all of the wars you read about in the bible are sort of just history that's wasted you know you read about the battles between david and goliath that was a war between the philistines and the children of israel or you might be reading about the battle between the egyptians and the israelites or the battle between the assyrians and the people of israel and all the different wars and conflicts and battles in the bible are there for a reason you know what the principle reason is all of the history this is a very important point so record this all of the history of war in the bible and all of the different battles you read about are there to teach spiritual lessons of how we win spiritual battles in the story of david and goliath for instance what is the spiritual lesson there that it doesn't matter how big in menacing the enemy may appear to be if you go to battle trusting in the lord not looking on the outside but looking at the lord you can be victorious that's the spiritual lesson and there's a number of battles in the bible that help reiterate this you remember when jonathan said to his armor bearer there is no restraint with the lord whether to deliver by few or many in other words it doesn't matter how big the enemy forces are there was a promise in the old testament that if they were faithful to god one of them would chase a thousand it didn't matter what kind of weapons they had if you are fighting with the lord now how much bigger is the devil than us how many more numerous are the demons than than us in our own strength we're outnumbered we can't we can do nothing without the lord's help but you and god equal a majority and so in the battle between good and evil one of the lessons that runs all the way through the bible is when they went to war trusting in their own strength they lost when they went to war trusting in the lord they won now there were a couple of times they went to war presuming to trust in the lord for instance they were living in sin during the time of eli hofney and finney has the sons of eli wicked they went to battle against the philistines and they said oh let's just take the ark with us it doesn't matter how wicked our lives are as long as we have our good luck charm we can win and so they went into battle against the philistines trusting not in the lord but in this ark as though it was some good luck charm but they were living wicked lives and the battle was being led by the two most wicked priests that had ever lived but they said we got the ark where we can't be defeated and what happened they were defeated badly matter of fact the ark was captured what was god trying to tell him it's not wearing a cross that makes you holy it's burying the cross and so everything in these battles that you study there's a lesson for us that we can apply to the christian life so when you read about the wars in the bible don't skip over and say oh that's so brutal it's so gruesome you know i don't want to read this history it's disturbing there are spiritual lessons in every war even king ahab wicked king ahab went to battle against the syrians and the syrians outnumbered him ten to one a matter of fact it says they filled the country but ahab and the nation of israel it says they look like a little flock of goats in the valley but the syrians said we we're going to overcome them and uh a prophet came to ahab he said if you go to battle even though you're a wicked king if you go trusting the lord because you're outnumbered and the and the syrians think that they've got you i'll give you victory and god gave victory to ahab because he went to battle trusting the lord next year the syrians went to battle again against ahab and they said the reason ahab won is because his god is a god of the mountains and our gods are gods of the valleys we fought him in the mountains so this time let's fight him in the valleys and we'll win prophet came back to ahab he said they think they're going to win because they think that i'm only god of the mountains and i'm not god of the valleys and i want them to know that i'm god of the mountains and i'm god of the valleys so ahab had victory again even though he was outnumbered by the way that's a great verse god is not only god of the mountains he's god of the valleys you go through mountains and valleys sometimes we think he's only with us on the mountains but he's with you in the valleys too and so though i go through the valley thou art with me right anyway so there's lessons in all the wars that you then apply as a christian to the spiritual war and you'll find that they often relate someone read for me revelation i've got several verses in revelation that i'll share with you i'd like to budget these out revelation 11 verse 7 somebody else revelation 12 17 somebody else revelation 13 7 somebody else revelation 19 11. are you getting some of these i'll start with revelation 11 7. does somebody willing to read that for me hold your hand up real quick got a handle right here someone else get ready with revelation 12 17. go ahead dale twelve seven no you do eleven seven never said now when they finish their testimony the beast that ascends out of the bottomless pit will make war against them overcome them and kill them now who is the beast that ascends out of the bottomless pit who's cast into the bottomless pit in revelation 20. satan so this beast who later ascends out of the bottomless pit is the devil what does he do he makes war with and it speaks of the two witnesses if you read revelation 11 there it's talking about the two witnesses who are the two witnesses i hear someone saying moses and elijah you're right but it's not them literally they represent the law and the prophets which is the word of god which is the new in the old testament so the two witnesses is a symbol in the bible for that sword with two edges it's the word of god who does this beast make war with the word of god does the devil hate the word of god he especially hates the word of god and why because the devil hates jesus and i don't want to draw too much of a circle here but jesus is the word isn't that right he is the word made flesh the devil hates jesus he is the word incarnate and so part of this war is against christ in his word all right somebody else was going to read revelation 12 verse 17. got a hand right here someone else find revelation 13 7 and then someone else revelation 19 11. go ahead we're going to hear 12 17. and the dragon was wrought with the woman and went to make war with the remnant of her seed which keep the commandments of god and the testimony of jesus christ all right we learned something else about who the dragon's making war with the dragon who's the dragon he's the beast that ascends out of the bottomless pit and that's the devil and if you're wondering who the dragon is if you read in revelation 12 verse 7 and war broke out in heaven michael and his angels fought with the dragon and the dragon and his angels fought but they did not prevail nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer so that great dragon was cast out now tells who he is that serpent of old called the devil and satan that's all the definitions the serpent the devil satan the dragon all one and the same can you misunderstand that is that very clear and it says he makes war with the woman well the bible says husbands love your wives as christ loves the church i have likened the daughter of zion that's the church in the old testament vernacular to a delicate and comely woman john writes in third john i believe it is from one woman to the elect lady he's writing from one church to the next and he called he compares it to a church and you shouldn't really wonder who is the devil enraged with he's enraged with the woman the church so the devil is making war with the word and he's making war with the woman not any woman but it says he makes war with the woman that keeps the commandments of god and the testimony of jesus the law the testimony of jesus revelation 19 10 is the spirit of prophecy the law and the prophets he's making war with the woman that has the word of god she has the truth she keeps the commandments of god and believes in the testimony of the prophets and that's who this war is focused on the devil hates god's people can you see some examples where the devil's made war how many times has the devil tried to exterminate god's people um especially when revival or a deliverer is coming in egypt was there an effort made to eradicate the holy seed you remember when the pharaoh threw all the baby boys into the river and it was an attempt of course to destroy christ that he knew a deliverer was coming he thought it might be the messiah you remember when athaliah that wicked queen daughter of jezebel when her son died rather than have one of the royal seed the descendants of david rain she was a pagan queen she killed all the baby boys the son of david except one she missed one same thing with the pharaoh he missed one moses and then the roman army sent into bethlehem by herod the great to kill all the baby boys but he missed one didn't he the royal sea jesus but there's been this effort through history the devil hates the woman and the seed of the woman and he hates the word of god and there's this war now i don't want to scare you but if you're involved in a war and you're fighting your enemy and there's a lot of enemy out there to fight who would you especially focus your attack on do you just arbitrarily say well the enemies out there they're all wearing that uniform so i'm going to fight with anybody that's got that uniform on or do you say i'm going to see what kind of weapons what kind of arsenal they have and the first ones i'm going to focus on are the ones that have the most dangerous weapons right don't you want to take them out first in any war one of the most important uh preemptive things that a general will do is he'll find out where the strongest weapons are take them out and during the cold war where do you think our missiles were aimed at russia's missiles we weren't aiming at russia's bazookas we weren't aiming at their hand grenades that wasn't the biggest threat our missiles were aiming at their missiles and then the star wars and even remember when ronald reagan was initiating the star wars the whole thing was they hit their missiles before they hit us so if you were the devil you'd want to be a good devil wouldn't you you don't know how to answer that question do you but i mean if you were the devil you'd want to be the best devil you could be right and if you were going to take out christians which ones would you focus on first the biggest threat the ones that have the word of god if isn't that isn't this our weapon the sword and it's the only offensive weapon in the arsenal that christians have and so you want to go against the christians who don't just have the name of christ but they've got the word of christ and so the devil is threatened with the woman that has the word churches where the word of god is taught and preached he focuses his attacks on so you want to be faithful but you need to be prepared because the more faithful you are to the word the more you're doing the work of god the more of a threat you are to the devil isn't that right revelation 19 11 did someone maybe someone over here revelation 19 11 or i'll even 19 i left out revelation 13 7. did anybody have that right here yeah it was granted to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them and authority was given him over every tribe tongue and nation in the war between good and evil do christians always win every battle no in your own life there are wars with temptation do you win every war i'm not going to ask you to show your hands but i suspect you don't there are battles we know who's ultimately going to win the war don't we but are there some battles where it appears that the devil has gotten the upper hand were there times when god's people failed and they were overcome by the enemy yeah were there times during history where the devil just about eradicated true christians and they had to go underground because they were being defeated yeah and it says it was given power to make war with the saints and to overcome them and the there were times when god's people were in power in the world you think about the times of david and solomon and other righteous kings and leaders and then there were times when they were not and god's people uh went underground and so there's been a back and forth back and forth you know it's it's not biblical to say christians never lose that jesus has won every battle he will win the war but god's people have sometimes failed our commanders never fail all right revelation 19 11 which leads us into this got a hand right here revelation 19 11. you know i think after you read verse 11 you might also read verse 19 for me read verse 11 first right here then i saw heaven opened and behold a white horse and he who sat on him was called faithful and true and in righteousness he judges and makes war the the war that jesus fights he does in righteousness now read verse 19 also and i saw the beast the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to make war against him who sat on the horse and against his army all right there is an ultimate war in the bible between good and evil and most of the wars that we see raging are wars between i mean in the bible in revelation you're seeing these spiritual words is there a day coming when the spiritual war is going to become a literal war well at that time the battle of armageddon not just the spiritual battle the battle of armageddon is a spiritual battle that is going to be manifested with a physical attempt to annihilate god's people it is going to be universal where is the battle of armageddon revelation 12 17 the dragon made war with the woman it is the ultimate war to destroy god's people who's going to fight for us in that battle ultimately as in the final battle there of gideon he's going to fight for us what was gideon's weapon in his battle sword symbol for the word of god a lamp that word is a lamp symbol for the word of god talks about a loaf of bread that knocked down the tents of the enemy you know the story of gideon a symbol of the word of god trumpet say blue trumpets symbol for the word of god lift up your voice like a trumpet and so all these things that gideon used to get the victory were types of the word of god and it's also important to remember that those torches did not shine until the pictures were broken and the light of god does not shine through us unless we are broken it must be broken for the lord um first timothy 1 18 who will read that and you didn't know i was going there so i need to give you a minute to find it while you're looking that up look up james 4 verse 1 talking about the spiritual war james 4 verse 1 and while you're finding that i'll read first peter 2 11 beloved i beg you as sojourners and pilgrims abstain from abstain from fleshly lusts that war against the soul there are things that we can do that make it harder to win these battles um who has for me first timothy 1 18. did someone find that right up here first timothy 1 verse 18. and then someone else find james four verse one okay yeah thank you mike this charge i commit unto thee son timothy according to the prophecies which went before on thee and thou by them the mightiest war a good war aware by the prophecies war a good warfare uh it's telling us that the word of god is our defense now did someone find james 4 1 got a hand right here james chapter 4 verse 1 where do wars and fights come from among you do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members have you ever thought that the spiritual wars may be connected with physical wars let me read something to you that uh and this will answer maybe some questions you've got about how much power the devil has when it comes to war this is a quote from great controversy page 589 satan through his temptations he is leading multitudes to ruin intemperance dethrones reason sensual indulgence strife and bloodshed follow through physical intemperance it clouds our minds and through this physical war follows satan delights in war for it excites the worst passions of the soul and then sweeps into eternity its victims steeped in vice and blood it is his object to incite the nations to war against one another the physical wars are satan's object for he can thus divert the minds of the people from the work of preparation to stand in the day of god satan works through the elements not just trying to sweep people into eternity through physical war but even through natural disasters satan works through the elements also to garner his harvest of unprepared souls he studies the secrets of the laboratories of nature and he uses all of his power to control the elements as far as god allows there's a limit but does satan sometimes bring natural disaster is there some example of this in the bible in the book of job satan went forth from the presence of job but he was restrained in how much he could do and that's of course right here when when he was suffered to afflict job how quickly flocks and herds servants houses children were swept away one trouble succeeding another as in a moment it is god that shields his creatures and hedges them in from the power of the destroyer now before i go too far with this am i saying that all natural disasters are from the hand of the devil no we can be both the lord also the bible says his arsenal is also held in the clouds and so god sometimes did god rain down on the egyptians plagues through natural disasters yeah so they both use these things can god speak through animals can the devil speak through animals so don't try to be too uh what's the word for it too exact and fanatical saying it's the devil who causes all these natural disasters it or it's only the lord who causes these things i know the insurance company calls them acts of god wouldn't that be something if you've got an insurance form and it says we're not responsible for acts of the devil they don't ever call it acts of the devil do they let me go on here i want to finish this quote it is god that shields his creatures and hedges them in from the power of the destroyer but the christian um but the christian world have shown contempt for the law of jehovah and the lord will do just what he's declared he would he will withdraw his blessings from this earth and remove his protecting care from those who are rebelling against his law and teaching and forcing others to do the same satan has control of all whom god does not especially guard he will favor and prosper some in order to further his own designs and he will bring trouble upon others and lead them to believe that it is god who is afflicting them pardon me so these natural disasters sometimes it's the devil who brings these things and he wants people into blame god for afflicting them i'm not done while appearing to the children of men as a great physician who can heal all their maladies he will bring disease and disaster until populist cities are reduced to ruin and desolation even now satan is at work we've seen that this year in accidents and calamities by sea and by land in great conflagrations in fierce tornadoes in terrific hailstones in tempest floods cyclones tidal waves and earthquakes in every place in thousands of forms satan is exercising his power he sweeps away the ripening harvest speaking of the lost and famine and disaster follow he imparts to the air a day a deadly paint and thousands perish by the pestilence these visitations are to become more frequent and disastrous in the last days speaking of cheer up it's going to get worse all right i had a couple of other verses oh you know i was talking about um well i don't have time for all that i need to keep moving the wiles of the devil i was dealing under the section finally the war just giving you an overview of this war between good and evil the wiles of the devil let's talk about some of the specifics someone read for me second corinthians chapter 11 verse 14 and 15. and then somebody else please read for me in the first thessalonians chapter 2 verse 18. now does someone have second corinthians 11 14 and 15. gotta hand right here second corinthians 11 was that a hand or were you scratching okay right here second corinthians chapter 11 verse 14 and no wonder for satan himself masquerades as an angel of light keep going it is not surprising then if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness their end will be what their actions deserve all right so here we learn satan is the most effective in this war as a double agent you know one of the things that uh every general wants when he's fighting a war is someone on the other side who can look like one of them to give him information to be a traitor and satan sometimes masquerades as an angel of light and not only that he can masquerade as a minister of righteousness that's why jesus warns us in the last days there will be many false christs and false prophets that will do great wonders and deceive many uh so we need to be on our guard about that uh job chapter one i want to read several things to you notice what else the lord wants us to do why does he tempt us for discouragement job chapter 1 verse 11 he said stretch out your hand and touch all that he has and he'll curse you to your face god once i'm sorry the devil wants god's people to curse him job chapter 2 verse 5 stretch out your hand now touch his bone if it if he doesn't curse you when you take away his earthly possessions then hurt him physically stretch out your hand touch his bone and his flesh and he will curse you to your face job two verse nine then his wife said to him do you still hold fast your integrity curse god and die now the devil is working through someone in job's family who i mean she may have been a nice woman but she had a bad day and the devil was using her and i mean let's face it i mean it's true i hate to admit this but i think sometimes the devil might say something through me to discourage my wife and vice versa and in your families too doesn't the devil sometimes use those closest to you yeah i know we hate to ever think that we might have ever said anything wrong or inappropriate but the bible is clear one time even jesus turned to peter and he rebuked him as the devil he was an apostle i mean so satan tries to come in from the inside to discourage us from those who are close to us he masquerades as an angel of light don't miss this point here three times there in the beginning of job the devil wanted job curse god curse him to his face curse him and die the devil wants people to deny the lord to curse god it hurts god and then die die lost after cursing god he wants us to blame god for everything and then lose our lives so we have lost hope sometimes the devil hinders i talked to you about this battle first thessalonians 2 18 paul says therefore we wanted to come to you even i paul time and again but the devil satan hindered us sometimes the devil blocks the way god is leading the devil is blocking the way matthew 10 verse 16 jesus said behold i send you out in the midst of wolves be therefore as wise as serpents and harmless as doves now when the bible tells us to be wise of serpents he doesn't say be a serpent and christians are never supposed to use the devil's tools to do god's work i have often heard people abuse this verse christians are doing something unethical they're supposedly saying well the the ends justifies the means and so maybe i'm doing something that is is uh dishonest or lack of integrity but i'm doing it because i'm being wise as a serpent no that's a misimplication a christian should never use the devil's tools to do god's work you notice he doesn't say do the devil's work he says be wise as a devil all that means is understand how the devil works in a war do you need to know something about the tactics of the enemy you do you need to understand it you need to be a wise general in a championship boxing match you can be sure that those boxers are studying the video footage i guess it's not on video anymore dvd of their opponent so they can understand oh you know he'll he fades with the left and then he ducks that's when i'm gonna catch them football teams before super bowl and they know who they're going to play you don't think they get out their plays and look at what their plays are you need to understand something about how the devil works so you can be prepared i've seen a lot of christians who have been gullible when it comes to evangelism and their meetings are flopped because they don't understand how the devil works in soul winning and and even in sometimes as christians we need to be preemptive in blocking what the devil is going to do i frequently pray in the back before i come out for sabbath school that god will set a hedge of angels about this congregation that he will stifle and confound any of the devil's representatives that may come because i'd like to think that only angels come to church here but sometimes the devil has his plans and they come to distract and bless their little hearts i think sometimes the devil pinches the babies right during the altar call because you're saying something's profound and all of a sudden the devil sees that hearts are being touched and he goes and he pokes or pinches a baby i don't know if he's allowed to do that but also they start to cry and everyone goes huh they forget what you're saying or the person who's sitting around you who maybe isn't tuned into the holy spirit they start to fidget or make some noises they unwrap their bubble gum or something happens to distract you and the devil is doing all these things there's spiritual wars that are going on not only is the angel angels in this room but i believe that the devil has his representatives even among the 12 apostles did jesus have a judas who was consulting he was a plant wasn't he was consulting about how to betray him and so we just need to be aware so i pray i say lord said a hedge of angels about the people here protect them evict i've often prayed evict evil influences so that people can come and this will be a sanctuary where people can really see you and hear your voice so in our battle between good and evil we need to pray that's one of our our weapons that's part of our defense we need to understand the wiles of the enemy mark 4 15 speaking of when the word of god is sown i was just addressing this principle these are the ones by the wayside when the word is sown when they hear satan comes immediately and takes away the word that is sown in their hearts how does he do that because the people sitting around you may distract you or someone next to you starts to fall asleep and their snoring is disturbing you you can't hear the word that's being sown the devil comes and snatches it away and little things like that that he does to try to keep it john chapter 8 verse 44. someone read that for me now we're under the section the enemy we face john 8 44. if i don't get this all this week i'll take it up next week because they're related i got a hand over here go ahead john 8 44 anybody did i did i see somebody yeah yeah okay well we got one over here go ahead ye are of your father the devil and the lusts of your father he will do he was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth because there is no truth in him when he speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own for he is a liar and the father of it thank you so here we learn the devil is a murderer and he is a liar and he's a deceiver you know what deception is deception isn't just a lie deception is the commingling of truth and error which makes it a lie but it's especially dangerous because it's mixed with truth in the fbi they actually uh study the psychology of lies and they say the best psychopathic liars tell a lot of truth mixed in with their lives and so it catches people off guard zechariah chapter 3 verse 1 and 2 satan is also an accuser didn't he stand before the lord and accuse job zechariah 3 he showed me joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the lord and satan standing at his right hand to oppose him he's accusing him pointing to his dirty garments in revelation satan is called the accuser of the brethren chapter 12. and so you've got to remember that when there are people in the church who have their phd in gossip and they spent a lot of time talking about the flaws and the faults of everybody else and it doesn't matter if what they're saying is true because sometimes when the devil accuses the brethren what he's saying is accurate joshua's garments were dirty but he's the accuser of the brethren sometimes we're doing the work of the devil by accentuating the faults of the saints and we've got to be careful when the high priest were pointing at mary saying that she should be stoned before christ and accusing her was she caught in adultery was she guilty but how did jesus feel about their tactics he pointed out their sins instead it's the spirit of the devil to spend your energy focusing on the faults of the church and if you're pointing at mary and you're pointing at the dirty garments of the high priest that's not the work of christ amen all right daniel 10 19 and this is under the heading be strong in the power of his might and he said o man of god you're greatly beloved fear not peace be to you be strong yes be strong so when he spoke to me i was strengthened and i said lord speak for you strengthen me how did the lord strengthen daniel did he give him a special multi-level marketing vitamin or what did he give him he spoke when god says be let there be light let there be vegetation let there be when he says let there be what happens there's creative power and it's when the lord says be courageous to joshua be strong you can claim the power of god's word and be strengthened because the lord speaks he promises to give us strength in his word so where do we find our strength for the war in the word of god uh let's see here i already told you about jonathan and his armor bearer second chronicles chapter 14. i'm hurrying here because i'm running out of time asa was outnumbered in battle didn't look like there was any hope a million ethiopians were coming against him and he cried out to the lord and said lord it is nothing for you to help whether with many or with those who have no power help us oh lord our god for we rest on you and in your name we go out against this multitude oh lord you are our god do not let man prevail against you see when they went into battle realizing it was really a battle against god what did david say you've not defied me you've defied the lord then he won if you think winning the wars for your credit why did god reduce the army of gideon because god said if i give you victory now when you got 32 000 you'll take the credit and say hey we're really good we're all ninja soldiers that's why we won it's our ability and god said no i've got to reduce you to the point where you can't give the credit to anybody but me when asa realized that the lord it was his name at stake did he win it was an incredible victory because it was like you know a million to a hundred thousand you know they were outnumbered just it was a fantastic victory took them three days to pick up the the spoils of that war second kings 16 i'm sorry ii king six verse 16 and 17. so he answered and said do not fear those who are with us are more than those who are with them and elijah prayed and said oh lord i pray open his eyes you remember when the syrian army surrounded the little town of dothan where elisha was and a servant went out in the morning he saw this soldier he said oh my master what shall we do what shall we do we're surrounded little town dothan meant wells a couple little wells and a little village surrounded by the syrian army and elisha realized the spiritual war going on he understood it was a spiritual war and so he said lord open the eyes of my servant and the servant's eyes were open and what did he see the hills and the mountains were surrounded with chariots and horses of fire now sometimes you think you're overwhelmed by the enemy and if you would pray you'd find that god's angels are waiting there to deliver you if you would trust in them god can do a lot more for us if we trust and they won that victory psalm 27 3 though a host should encamp against me my heart shall not fear the war should rise against me in this i will be confident we don't need to be afraid psalm 91 though a thousand may fall at your side ten thousand at your right hand it will not come nigh unto thee you will not need to be afraid because god promises to take care of his people then the last section says to put on the armor of god and to stand stand stand stand and i like the story in the bible when eleazar the son of dodo went to battle with david all the army of israel got scared and left except david would not flee and they took a stand on a parcel of barley ground and they fought and they won against the philistines because they took a stand fought back to back and eventually the israelites came back and helped them we need to take a stand for what we believe oh i'll talk more about that in next week's lesson and that's our free offer the armor of god if you'd like one just send for it ask for it we'll send it to you dial 800 5387 and ask for offer number 173 i'm sorry we're out of time for today's study but we pray that you'll do extra homework for next week because we're going to talk about the armor of god

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Length: 46min 26sec (2786 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 17 2021