The Light Frees Us from the Power of Darkness - Acts 26:15-18

©December 20th, 2020 by Rev. Rick Goettsche SERIES: Advent

Throughout history we have unfortunately seen many despotic rulers. People like Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong Un, and many others have ruled their people, forcing them to do their bidding. Under such despots, the people are faced with few choices: either do what the ruler says or face the consequences (which are often severe). These countries are terrible places to live when they are under the control of such terrible people.

Fortunately, throughout history we have also seen many of these rulers overthrown. Often this is accomplished by a military force from outside coming in and forcibly removing the evil leader from power. In many instances, wars have been fought to remove such people.

Many of the countries that have had terrible dictators removed from power have thrived once they have been set free. Some have not. Some have returned to their old ways and ended up in the same situation they were in before, just with different leaders. But when an evil ruler is removed from power, the people who were formerly enslaved have the freedom to start life anew.

I mention this because there is a correlation between what we have done to remove evil leaders from power, and what Jesus did to set us free from the power of Satan. As we look at our fourth example of light and darkness, we see how Jesus defeated the powers of darkness and sets us free from Satan’s grip. We’ll unpack that truth and the difference it makes this morning.

Christ’s Power Over Darkness

We start this morning in the book of Acts, where the Apostle Paul was explaining the commission God had given him. In it, we see some important truths about Jesus’ role as the ultimate light. Paul was telling the story of how God confronted him on the road to Damascus.

15 “ ‘Who are you, lord?’ I asked. “And the Lord replied, ‘I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting. 16 Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and witness. Tell people that you have seen me, and tell them what I will show you in the future. 17 And I will rescue you from both your own people and the Gentiles. Yes, I am sending you to the Gentiles 18 to open their eyes, so they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God. Then they will receive forgiveness for their sins and be given a place among God’s people, who are set apart by faith in me.’ (Acts 26:15-18, NLT)

Paul explains what the Lord told him when He blinded him on the road to Damascus. Paul was turned from his own darkened thinking to seeing the light of Jesus Christ. Now, God was calling him to share that light with others, specifically with the Gentile people. What is noteworthy for our purposes this morning, however, is how God described Paul’s mission.

Paul was being sent to the Gentiles so that they might open their eyes, turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God. If they did this, these Gentiles would receive forgiveness and a place among God’s people. This was a pretty hefty mission for Paul, and a pretty amazing promise for the Gentiles. As Gentiles, we ought to be eternally grateful to the Lord for extending salvation to us!

God tells Paul something we may not realize—the world of darkness is a world ruled by Satan. Like a despotic ruler, Satan continues to exercise control over the people who walk in darkness. We have looked at several of the benefits of the light of Christ coming into the world, but today we see that the light of Christ drives away Satan. He sets us free from Satan’s power and we are free to live in the light. Because of Jesus, we are much like people who are set free from a tyrannical ruler.

Satan’s Rule

Any time we talk about Satan, people’s ears may perk up. There are lots of false ideas about Satan. One of the biggest is that Satan and God are equal and opposite forces. God and Satan are not equals! Satan was created by God. As a created being, he is ultimately subject to God. But why would God create an evil being? The answer is, He didn’t create an evil being. Satan was not created evil, but he chose to rebel against God (in much the same way as humans have done), and as such, he was banished from God’s presence. God didn’t create Satan evil; he became evil as a result of his rebellion against God.

So, if Satan was created by God, then why does God allow him to persist? I don’t know the answer to that, but I do know that God won’t allow Satan to persist forever. The Bible promises that one day Satan will receive the just punishment he deserves. But for now, the Bible also describes Satan as having power in this world. Jesus actually described Satan as the ruler of this world! (John 14:3) Satan wields power in this world, but this is only because God allows him to do so. Satan is defeated, though he may not fully realize it yet.

If you go back to the book of Genesis, you see that Satan’s defeat by Jesus was actually prophesied right after Adam and Eve sinned. If you recall, Satan tempted Adam and Eve by taking the form of a snake and telling them to eat the fruit of the tree God had said not to eat from. God announced a punishment for Adam and Eve, the earth, and also for Satan. Listen to what God said to Satan,

And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.” (Genesis 3:15, NLT)

God tells Satan that he would strike the heel of one of the offspring of Eve, but that offspring would strike (or crush) his head. This verse, at the very beginning of the sin problem, looks forward to Jesus. At the cross, Satan struck or bruised the heel of Jesus in causing His death. Jesus, for a moment, appeared defeated. But He was not. When Jesus rose from the grave, He accomplished salvation for those who would believe, and He ultimately defeated Satan’s power. Because of Jesus, Satan has been crushed. He is defeated, but he doesn’t know it yet.

Relevance for Us

This has been a pretty theoretical discussion up to this point, so we should ask what does this mean for us as Christians? Why does it matter that Satan is defeated? What impact, if any, does that have for us as we live our lives?

It means we are no longer slaves to sin. Prior to Jesus coming into the world, we were overmatched in our battle against sin. Satan is more powerful than you or I. He has the ability to enslave us to a sinful lifestyle, even though doing so causes us more pain. In this sense, he is much like an evil dictator who compels people to a miserable existence. But because of Jesus, we are told that we now have the power to overcome Satan and live differently.

We see this truth throughout the scriptures. In the book of 1 Peter, listen to what he tells us about Satan.

8 Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. 9 Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your family of believers all over the world is going through the same kind of suffering you are. (1 Peter 5:8-9, NLT)

Peter says that Satan is still prowling around like a roaring lion, looking to devour people. He wants to harm us. But Peter’s exhortation is that we should stand firm against him, being strong in our faith. Why would Peter tell us to resist Satan if we didn’t have the power to do so? Remember what God told Paul—those who trust in Christ are no longer subjects of the kingdom of darkness (Satan’s rule) but are subjects of the Kingdom of Light (God’s rule)! This means we have the ability to stand against Satan’s continual attacks on us. He has not given up trying to harm us and trip us up, but we have the power of God on our side…if we will utilize it.

This is a wonderful truth! We do not have to continue in a pattern of sin any longer. Paul, in 1 Corinthians told the believers this,

13 The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure. (1 Corinthians 10:13, NLT)

One of Satan’s most powerful tactics is to make us feel like we are all alone in our fight against sin. When we fall, he wants to make us feel like we have messed up worse than anyone else ever could. He wants us to believe the temptations we face are far worse than the temptations everyone else faces, so we have no choice but to give in to them, because we cannot resist such powerful temptations. This causes us to beat ourselves up, conclude that we are hopeless, and give up.

Paul was reminding us of a couple of things. First, everyone is tempted. You may think it terrible that you face certain temptations. You may imagine that no one else is tempted to do or think some of the things you do. You may be ashamed by some of the temptations you find so difficult in your life. But you are not the only one who is tempted by such things. Each of us is tempted. Some are tempted by different things, but many of us are tempted in similar ways. You are not alone in your fight. You are not a lost cause. You are not somehow worse than everyone else around you.

Second, Christians have the power to resist temptation. Paul shares a wonderful promise in this verse. He says that God will not allow us to be tempted beyond what we can bear, and He will always give us a way out. We will always have a choice when we are tempted to sin. God ensures that we always have a way to stand firm against Satan’s temptations. So when you are tempted to sin, take a moment and look around you. Consider your options. Realize that sin is not your only option, but that God will help you to resist those temptations and stand firm in your faith.

Later, in the book of Ephesians, Paul reminds us of some of the tools God gives us to fight against Satan’s schemes in our lives. He calls these tools the armor of God, which enable us to stand firm, no matter what Satan throws at us. Here are the tools Paul describes,

· Truth. Satan loves to tell us lies. The best way to combat a liar is with the truth. We see the truth by looking in God’s Word. If we keep reminding ourselves of what is true Satan’s lies lose their power.

· God’s righteousness. Because of Jesus, we know that no matter what Satan throws at us, we cannot be ultimately defeated. Even when we fail, there is forgiveness through Jesus. This is a powerful tool to have at our disposal.

· Peace. Paul says peace comes from understanding the message of the gospel. Here’s a truth Satan doesn’t want you to know—the outcome of the war has already been decided! Satan is defeated! This means no matter what comes in this life, we can face it boldly and have peace in the most turbulent circumstances, because we know victory is assured.

· Faith. Faith is our trust in God. We may not have faith in ourselves, but we can have faith in God. When we trust in His power and His promises, we will be safe from whatever attacks Satan launches.

· Salvation. Similarly, knowing our place with the Lord is assured gives us the strength to keep fighting and to keep picking ourselves back up when we fall. We never give up, we never lose hope, we never conclude we are a lost cause. God has assured our salvation, so we can stand firm.

· God’s Word. This is one of the most powerful weapons at our disposal. It is our source of truth, which helps us combat Satan’s attacks in our lives.

· Prayer. Paul finally reminds us that we don’t fight alone. We can ask God for help, knowing that He will answer that prayer.

We need to use the tools God has given us as we battle the temptations Satan throws at us. He has given us all we need to stand firm.

Applications

When a person trusts in Christ, they move from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. This means that not only do we have a guarantee of heaven in the next life, but we also have a guarantee of God’s presence in this life! We are set free from Satan’s power, because the Light of Christ drives away the darkness.

Since believers have been set free from Satan’s power, our lives ought to change as a result. The ways of this world are sinful and evil, but that is because the world is under the control of Satan. They are walking in darkness and cannot see the right way to go. And they don’t have the power to stand against Satan. We do. Because of this, we should work at living according to God’s Word.

The apostle Paul explains this using two lists in Galatians 5. He gives us examples of the kind of behaviors we expect from the world and contrasts that with the kinds of behaviors we should cultivate in our lives. These lists should help us focus in our fight against Satan.

19 When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, 21 envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

22 But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! (Galatians 5:19-23, NLT)

These two lists give us some focus in the fights we should be fighting. We should be fighting to set up a different pattern of behavior than the world around us. The first list is the areas of our lives we ought to be trying to weed out. This isn’t an easy process. We’ve spent a lot of time developing these patterns of behavior in our lives. Sometimes we are going to fail. We are going to fall back into those familiar patterns sometimes. But just because we fall once does not mean that all is lost. We don’t have to keep going down those same, well-worn paths that lead to sin. We can go a different direction. It’s a lot easier to keep doing what we always have, but with Christ’s power, we don’t have to. We can go a new, different, and better way.

And that’s the focus of the second list. These are the kinds of traits we should work to cultivate in our lives. Paul uses the analogy of fruit. Most of you know that growing fruit takes time. It requires a lot of work before you see the payoff. It may take years before your trees grow apples, or before you get the harvest you hope for from your strawberry plants. The same is true with cultivating new patterns of behaving and thinking. It will be a fight to break one pattern and establish a new one, but it is a fight worth having.

One of the wonders of Christmas is that as the light of Jesus comes into our lives, we can walk further and further from the life of darkness we lived before. And we get to experience greater and greater freedom as we do.

Conclusion

As we get closer to Christmas, we need to remember these truths do not stop being relevant because the Christmas holiday is over. Jesus was not only the light when He was born in Bethlehem, but He continues to be the light for us every day. We must choose to live in the light and not in the darkness.

At the beginning I pointed out that some countries who have been freed from tyrannical rulers have thrived once they have been set free, while others have ended up in an endless cycle of violence, oppression, and bondage. The reason for this is that change is hard. We are comfortable in our familiar patterns of thinking and acting. It’s scary to try to do something different. In order for a country to move from a place of despotism to a place of freedom, it requires them to make some major changes. And sometimes people just aren’t willing to change. The result is that they end up right back in the same quagmire they always have been in.

We face the same choice as well. Christ has broken the power of Satan in our lives. We no longer have to live according the sinful pattern of the world around us. But…that pattern is familiar to us. We will not start moving in a new direction naturally—it will take work. It will require us to fight against Satan, the lies he tells us, and the patterns we have developed over the course of our lives. It’s a fight that’s worth having.

One of the benefits of Christ’s coming into the world is not only that He has defeated Satan, but that He continues to help us in our fight against him. You don’t have to fight alone, and you don’t ever have to give up.

So let me challenge you to take a look at your life and pick an area you’d like to change. I’m sure there are many, but for now, just pick one. Think about the sinful patterns you’ve developed and what it would take to live differently. Then focus on building a new pattern in your life. It will take time and it will take a concerted effort. There will be missteps and setbacks along the way, but if you’ll keep working at it, I promise you’ll see new patterns develop. And if we keep focusing on doing the hard work of blazing new trails, we will enjoy a freedom we had never known before. And we can do this only because of Jesus coming into the world. Jesus is the gift that keeps on giving.

©December 20th, 2020 by Rev. Rick Goettsche SERIES: Advent