Spiritual Warfare: The Forgotten Front
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
I hear so many Christians, murmuring about their imperfections, and their failures, and their addiction, and their shortcomings. And I see so little war! Murmur, murmur, murmur. Why am I this way? Make War! -John Piper / Make War by Tedashii (2009)
As we continue talking about this passage on the cost of discipleship, we come to the reminder that their is a war aspect to our faith
If we are honest we embrace the love aspect , but often convenently leave out the fact he is also a warrior king.
We do that because e like the idea of the prodigal son running into the loving arms, we like the love of leaving the 99 for the one, we love John 3:16, but that is just a side of Jesus, and that is a side that does not cost us much
Because if we embrace the fact we follow a warrior king, that means we are called to spiritual warfare
That means uncomfortable moments, that means being very intentional and preparing
The Christian life is not a reactive retreat from darkness, but a proactive march into battle. Discipleship is not merely belief—it’s enlistment in a holy war against sin, flesh, and the devil. This morning, the call is not comfort, but combat.
Luke 14:31-33
Luke 14:31-33
Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.
As Jesus continues the conversation of the cost of discipleship, he brings up a king having to deal with opposition
Part of counting the cost is looking at your life and seeing if you are ready for war
Your faith opens you up to all sorts of opposition (fiery darts Ephesians 6:16)
War is costly, war requires commitment and dedication to the call
Are you committed to the call? Are you willing to lay it all on the line for the gospel?
This morning consider these questions as we walk through different scriptures to see if you have truly counted the warring cost and take that aspect serious
To start with we are going to start on making war with sin, mainly in our lifes, and then we will look at making war with the devil
Make War With Sin
Make War With Sin
Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.
What are we to do to sin? put it to death
But to often we don’t, we try to appease it and contain it to a small area at the table
Anger: I can’t help it, its just in my genes. My dad, grandfather, etc. all have struggled with it
Pride: its just how I am, I can’t help it
Sexual sin: everybody is doing it, at least my sexual sin is not this sexual sin
Hate/bitterness: I love most people, but their are just some people who cannot be loved. You just do not know what they have done
Worry: In today’s world you just cannot help but to be anxious. Or I cannot help it, it is just how I am. I have always struggled with it
When we start appeasing these sins and try to contain them its like taking a water gun to a bear in your house (that is gonna eventually destroy your house and the out intot he world to wreck havoc)
We try to fight by the strength of our desires
For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.
In fighting in our desire we address the bad fruit, but not the hearts desires that allow the fruit to occur
And we have a tendency to isolate in the struggle
Executing sin:
So what does it look like to execute these sins:
Anger:
Be not quick in your spirit to become angry,
for anger lodges in the heart of fools.
Stop focusing on the outburst and managing in the moment
Focus on your spirit, what is going on in you?
What aspects of your life have you not dealt with?
A soft answer turns away wrath,
but a harsh word stirs up anger.
Through the power of God you have the ability to give a soft answer
Pride:
When pride comes, then comes disgrace,
but with the humble is wisdom.
Scripture is the beginning of wisdom
Sexual Sin:
Let your fountain be blessed,
and rejoice in the wife of your youth,
a lovely deer, a graceful doe.
Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight;
be intoxicated always in her love.
Why should you be intoxicated, my son, with a forbidden woman
and embrace the bosom of an adulteress?
sex is not a bad thing, it deepens the relationship, but anything out of God’s plan is sin and will hinder relationships
Hate / bitterness:
Hatred stirs up strife,
but love covers all offenses.
“But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,
You may be going brother Austin you do not know what they did to me or what they said.
You right I do not know, but I know what I have done towards Jesus
I know how Stephen responded to his persecutors
Worry:
Anxiety in a man’s heart weighs him down,
but a good word makes him glad.
do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
Most anxiety faced in todays world is spiritually worry, so let us stop giving worry a free pass in the sin department
“Some people assume worry is the result of too much thinking. Actually, it’s the result of too little thinking in the right direction. -John MacArthur
We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, being ready to punish every disobedience, when your obedience is complete.
We so often want to treat sin as our friend, but when we get hand in hand with sin it is worse than if we were walking hand in hand with Hamas thinking they are our friend while they are armed to the teeth and we are armed with nothing more than a water gun when have access to a vast wealth of weapons
People this morning listen to me, some of you are walking around with the demonic armed with nothing more than a water gun while you have access to the armory of God
People it is time we stop shooting at sin with a water gun and take the word of God and slay it
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.
Part of slaying sin is taking extreme measures to combat it
Joseph fleeing from Potipher’s wife (Genesis 39:12)
Sometimes fleeing from sin may involve running
Getting rid of technology / destroying items
Ending friendships that continously lead you into sinful behavior
restructuring your schedule / life
Make War with the Devil
Make War with the Devil
Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And 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. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death. Therefore, rejoice, O heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to you, O earth and sea, for the devil has come down to you in great wrath, because he knows that his time is short!”
First thing is we fight the devil through the power of the blood of Christ
We fight by the power of the Spirit and the victory has already been won
Second thing is the devil is accuser
This means he is constantly looking for ways to discredit you, this is why it is vital we follow principles such as those found in Philippians 2:14-16
Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.
Warfare requires great discipline
Navy SEALS and the Armies Green Berets spend around two years (5,000+ hours)in training, all this in preperation to face a physical risk
We are in Spiritual warfare fighting an enemy much more skilled than any foe the SEALS or Green Berets have ever faced
How many hours do you spend training? 52 hours? 104 hours? 156 hours?
If 52 hours is all you spend in training a year you only will reach 5,000 hours at the age of 96 if you started training your birth year.
How serious do you take the warfare or do you underestimate your enemy?
If we take warfare serious, we prepare, we don’t make the foolish mistake of, oh n attack could never happen here
We prepare by staying above reproach, giving no one any reason to doubt us or discredit our ministry
If we take warfare serious we learn our weapon as best as we can
is a Navy SEAL going to wait to learn his weapon when he is out in the field on his first mission? No, that is a recipe for disaster and no one is going to want him on their team.
Yet this is what we so often do as believers we have a tendancy only to learn our weapon when out on the battlefield
What I mean by this is: We do not open the word until a storm comes or until someone attacks our faith and we try to find something in the moment
If we take warfare serious we do not wait for the enemy to attack we take the preemptive strike
We do not settle with the devil sitting on the outskirts, we want to obliterate him all the way back to hell
How do we take the pain to the Devil?
Living our lives grounded in the Scripture
Combatting attacks with Scripture
With our praise
Its about the theology not soundology
With our prayers
We proclaim the Gospel
We make a stand against sin
We do not back down from what the Word says
Make no provision for sin (Romans 13:14)
Outro
Outro
We make a priority out of physical defense, why do we not make a bigger deal out of spiritual defense?
