Preparing for Warfare 1

Preparing For Warfare: The War is a Spiritual One

Psalm 3 NIV

A psalm of David. When he fled from his son Absalom. Lord, how many are my foes! How many rise up against me! Many are saying of me, “God will not deliver him.” But you, Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, the One who lifts my head high. I call out to the Lord, and he answers me from his holy mountain. I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the Lord sustains me. I will not fear though tens of thousands assail me on every side. Arise, Lord! Deliver me, my God! Strike all my enemies on the jaw; break the teeth of the wicked. From the Lord comes deliverance. May your blessing be on your people.

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Deuteronomy 32:7–19 NIV

Remember the days of old; consider the generations long past. Ask your father and he will tell you, your elders, and they will explain to you. When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided all mankind, he set up boundaries for the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel. For the Lord’s portion is his people, Jacob his allotted inheritance. In a desert land he found him, in a barren and howling waste. He shielded him and cared for him; he guarded him as the apple of his eye, like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them aloft. The Lord alone led him; no foreign god was with him. He made him ride on the heights of the land and fed him with the fruit of the fields. He nourished him with honey from the rock, and with oil from the flinty crag, with curds and milk from herd and flock and with fattened lambs and goats, with choice rams of Bashan and the finest kernels of wheat. You drank the foaming blood of the grape. Jeshurun grew fat and kicked; filled with food, they became heavy and sleek. They abandoned the God who made them and rejected the Rock their Savior. They made him jealous with their foreign gods and angered him with their detestable idols. They sacrificed to false gods, which are not God— gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your ancestors did not fear. You deserted the Rock, who fathered you; you forgot the God who gave you birth. The Lord saw this and rejected them because he was angered by his sons and daughters.

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1 Corinthians 10:14–22 NIV

Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all share the one loaf. Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? Do I mean then that food sacrificed to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons. Are we trying to arouse the Lord’s jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

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Preparing for Warfare

10,000 Sermon Illustrations (Years of Peace)

Years of Peace

A group of academics and historians has compiled this startling information: Since 3600 B.C., the world has known only 292 years of peace! During this period there have been 14,351 wars large and small, in which 3.64 billion people have been killed. The value of the property destroyed is equal to a golden belt around the world 97.2 miles wide and 33 feet thick. Today in the Word, June 19, 1992

Why is it so difficult to find peace in the world? The reason is because the battle is not a global issue, but a cosmic issue. It goes beyond flesh and blood to the spiritual which influences us all whether we understand it or not. We do not know exactly when it began but we do know how it began. It was a rebellion began by one angel who desired to be God. When his campaign failed, he was cast from heaven to earth. Here he has continued to wreak havoc and he is behind every rebellion known to man.

He was able to carry on for a long time without much interference, until Jesus came. God allowed him to play his games, though God had set a hedge around a certain people group that He claimed as His own. Then Jesus came. We know from the message last week, that this was the most important battle in the war that had begun nearly with the beginning of time. Satan lost that battle, and he knows it is just a matter of time until his end comes. He is a wounded animal fighting desperately hoping against hope that he may yet win, but there is no possible way for him to do so. However, in hatred he is also determined to take as many with him as he can.

Greg Boyd is a pastor and author who has written books about spiritual warfare. Here is how he describes what occurred in the New Testament.

Intensifying the apocalyptic view of the time, Jesus and New Testament authors saw demonic influences not only in demonized and diseased people, but directly or indirectly in everything that was not consistent with God’s reign. For example, swearing oaths, temptation, lying, legalism, false teachings, anger, spiritual blindness and persecution were all seen as being satanically inspired. This ought not surprise us since, again, Jesus and his followers all believed the devil had significant control over the entire world (I Jn 5:19). For this reason Paul taught that whatever earthly struggles disciples found themselves involved in, they must understand that their real struggle was against “the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” (Eph 6:12, cf. 2 Cor 10:3-5). The kingdom of the roaring lion (I Pet 5:8) was an ever present reality to Jesus and his earliest disciples...According to the New Testament, the central thing Jesus did was drive out the “prince of this world” (Jn 12:31). He came to “destroy the works of the devil” (I Jn 3:8). He came to “destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil” in order to “free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death” (Heb. 2:14-15). Jesus lived, died and rose again to establish a new reign that would ultimately “put all his enemies under his feet” (I Cor 15:25). Though “the strong man” was “fully armed,” one who was “stronger than he” had finally arrived who could attack and overpower him” (Lk 11:21-22).

(Greg Boyd.https://reknew.org/2014/06/what-does-spiritual-warfare-have-to-do-with-the-cross/)

Battles do not lesson near the end; they intensify as the loser gets more desperate. We see things intensify in the early church when so many were persecuted and killed in terrible ways. The enemy was trying desperately to discourage anyone from believing. I believe we see a new intensity in our world today, because Satan knows his time is short. He is determined to fight to the very end.

It is time we recognize that we are in a battle. We need to equip ourselves for this battle. I started to equip you during the Lent season by providing you with the means to draw closer to God, so God can equip you with His power. Now we will turn our attention to the armor we need to fight this battle. You see, we are not innocent bystanders in this war. We are soldiers. It is time we take up our arms and fight.

Next week, we will begin to be trained in what our armor consists of and how we can use it. But first, we need to learn about our enemy. In any battle, it is important to gather as much information as you can about the enemy. What is their character? What makes them tick? What strategies do they use to fight the battles? If you are equipped with such information, you know better how to avoid his snares and attacks.

Stand with me as we read from God’s Word a description of this enemy.

Revelation 12:1–12 NIV

A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron scepter.” And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days. Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Messiah. For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short.”

The Word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

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I. The War is a Spiritual One

What we see is deceiving because the foundation of the war that we are in is not physical or of the flesh, but it is a spiritual war. That means, it takes place in a realm we do not see, but that directly affects each of us. It also means that the tools of war we are familiar with and use, really are useless. They do not serve the spiritual war; they only are battle tools that aid the enemy. So, to begin, we need to look at our true enemy. In order to understand who, he is and how this war began, we need to look at...

A. The Origins of This War Isaiah 14:12-20; Ezekiel 28:11-19; Revelation 12:1-12

Like usual, this is a quick overview. I have provided you scriptures you can look at more thoroughly during your week. And there are many books on this subject of spiritual warfare that are well worth reading. I have listed the two I used for this series in your notes.

The Bible does not give a full account or even a timeline regarding Satan and his rebellion. What we do know is that God created angels. These are spiritual beings meant to be special messengers and servants of God. One was given an exalted role. His name was Lucifer meaning, “brilliant,” “shining one,” or “star of the morning.” He was beautiful and had a special position above others. However, his beauty and position were not enough for him. He wanted more. He wanted the seat of God.

He gathered other angels to himself and began a rebellion that seems to have involved 1/3 of the angels. However, they failed to route God and His devoted angels. God cast him and his followers out of heaven and down to earth. It is there where we see…

B. Warfare Expansion Genesis 3

What happens next is in debate. Some say (including Tony Evans) that God created the earth and man in response to Satan’s rebellion. Others believe the angels were created when God created the Heavens and the earth and that Satan’s rebellion occurred after Adam was created. The truth is we do not know when exactly the rebellion occurred or what prompted God to create the earth and humankind. God did not disclose this to us. What we do know is that earth started out as perfect as it was in heaven. God created everything and it was good. At some point, we do not know how much time had passed, but I doubt it was too long, Satan made an appearance on the scene.

There, he took up residence and made it his business and that of his followers to continue his rebellion on earth, seeking to gain followers through the human race. He began this campaign with Adam and Eve, poisoning them with the same desire to be God. He initiated it by questioning God’s authority. They had shown no thought or interest on this before he spoke up. In doing so, he brought this cosmic spiritual battle, to earth and to its humankind inhabitants.

Have you noticed how everything that Satan touches is destroyed? Heaven is a beautiful place and filled with peace, but Satan brought corruption and war to its domain. Then after he was cast out from there, he was the cause of Eden being closed and weeds and death to come to the earth. Even serpents must have had some beauty and appeal before Satan used their form to entice Eve. Now, they slither on the ground and are cursed by God and people. They are typically something to be avoided, despite those who like to turn them into pets.

Not only did the earth bring forth weeds and pestilence, but it was not long after that this world experienced its first murder. Sin is selfish. Selfishness will always cause war because selfish desires are always at the expense of another. That is why pride and selfishness never work. They always cause pain, destruction, and death. Until this war ends, we will always find these things in our world.

Now that we know and understand the war that is being waged, let us look more closely at...

C. The Character & Strategies of Satan

To begin, let us look at...

1. Satan’s Character

I am going to go through these pretty fast, but I will provide scriptures so you can look them up later.

a. From Lucifer (shining one) to Satan (adversary, opposer) Isaiah 14:12; Luke 10:18

Isaiah 14:12NIV

How you have fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn! You have been cast down to the earth, you who once laid low the nations!

Luke 10:18NIV

He replied, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.

Lucifer was an angel of light, but now he is associated with darkness. He moved from a state of righteousness to corruption and became the father of corruption.

b. Devil, accuser, slanderer Job 1-2

Job 1:9–11NIV

“Does Job fear God for nothing?” Satan replied. “Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. But now stretch out your hand and strike everything he has, and he will surely curse you to your face.”

c. The god of this age 2 Cor 4:4

2 Corinthians 4:4 NIV

The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

d. The god of this world 1 John 5:19; Luke 4:6

1 John 5:19NIV

We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one.

Luke 4:6NIV

And he said to him, “I will give you all their authority and splendor; it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to.

e. Prince of the power of the air Ephesians 2:2

Ephesians 2:2NIV

in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.

f. Thief, killer, destroyer John 10:10

John 10:10NIV

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

g. Murderer John 8:44

John 8:44NIV

You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

h. Great red dragon Revelation 12:3-4

Revelation 12:3–4 NIV

Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born.

i. Serpent of old Revelation 12:9

Revelation 12:9NIV

The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.

j. Deceiver 2 Corinthians 11:14

2 Corinthians 11:14 NIV

And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.

k. Liar John 8:44; Rev 12:9; 2 John 7

2 John 7NIV

I say this because many deceivers, who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh, have gone out into the world. Any such person is the deceiver and the antichrist.

I doubt this covers it all, but it gives you a good idea of the character of Satan. It all began with pride in who he was and grew into greed for something he could never possess.

So, let us look next at his strategy.

2. Satan’s Strategy: Deception & Distraction

Satan’s strategy is quite simple and consists of two simple ploys. The first is deception. If we were to see God and Satan side-by-side and view a list of what each offers us, God would win every time hands down. So, Satan uses deception. He lies to us about God and like a good con man, he uses deception to make people believe they are better off on their own.

His second ploy is to keep us distracted. If he can keep us busy enough and distracted enough, he hopes to keep us separated from God.

He is also always changing his avenue of attack. Every time we figure out what he is doing in one place, he steps back and comes at us with another deceptive tactic.

Tony Evans uses an interesting illustration to demonstrate.

A certain farmer of watermelons was having difficulty with his crop being stolen. He had been unable to catch the thief, but he devised an idea to curtail the thefts. He placed out a sign that said, “Warning: One of these watermelons has been poisoned.” The next day the farmer came out and found all his crop intact. No theft had taken place. He thought the situation was well in hand until the next morning when he found his sign had been altered to say, “Two of these watermelons have been poisoned.” The farmer had no choice to but to abandon his entire crop.

Satan is devious and he is clever. Just about the time you think you have things well in hand, he strikes, and you find that you just cannot totally get ahead of his game. Now, do not get me wrong. We can still win. We have God on our side and Satan has no power over us unless we hand it over to him. We will be talking more about this over the next few weeks. But allow me to share how Satan uses deception to try to control us. Basically, he has three schemes.

a. He lies to us about our self-worth.

Satan uses people and circumstances in our life to defeat us by making us feel we have no self-worth. For example, when a parent speaks harshly to a child, they come to believe that they are worthless. If we are fired from a job, Satan is there to accuse us of being worthless. If something bad happens to us, Satan or his demons are there to whisper in our ear that God does not love us, or He would not have allowed those things to happen to us. (Of course, Satan never mentions the part about sin or his part in those bad things that happen).

Of course, there is nothing further from the truth. God made us all to be unique and special. He offers us adoption into His family to reign with His Son. If we were worthless, why would God do so?

Psalm 139:14NIV

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

Romans 8:17NIV

Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.

Satan does not want us to understand this, so he works to deceive us about our worth to God.

Another scheme of Satan’s is that...

b. He lies to confuse us regarding the damage of sin.

I cannot speak for you, but there are times when I am watching something on television and God prompts me that I need to shut it off. There have been times when I have thought, “I do not see what is so bad about this. Surely, it won’t hurt to at least finish this episode.” Then I realize that in so doing, I am disobeying God. I am effectively saying, “I know more than God.” This is exactly what Satan did and what he prompted Eve and Adam to do. He loves to under play the damage of sin, because when we sin, we allow him a foothold in our life.

Ephesians 4:27NIV

and do not give the devil a foothold.

Remember, Satan is not trying to help anyone but himself. He only wants to destroy us because God loves us and offers us so much.

The third scheme is that...

c. He lies to us about what is important in life.

Satan works hard to make us want the things of this world. He hopes to keep our eyes off eternity by luring us with money, fame, possessions. If he can turn us to worship these things, he wins.

1 John 2:15–17NIV

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.

The last thing I want you to see about Satan’s strategy is we need to look at...

3. Satan’s Allies

Demons are Satan’s allies. In New Testament times, Satan and his demons worked more visually. The people of that day believed in and feared Satan and demons. In our times, they work more behind the scenes as people often do not believe in them or at least that they are harmful. I am not saying that demon possession doesn’t happen. It does and if you have ever witnessed it, it is terrorizing. However, more often what we see is demonization. If you ever read Frank Peretti’s book, This present Darkness you will understand a little more about what I mean.

I remember the old Tom and Jerry cartoons and Tom would have an angel on one shoulder whispering in his ear not to do something while a little satan was on the other shoulder telling him to go ahead and do it. It wouldn’t hurt anything. Well, that is not far from the truth. Demons love to whisper into our spirits falsehoods and lure us with temptations. They cannot read our minds, but they know human nature. They use this knowledge to try to deceive and lure us away from God and into the darkness of their world. The more we allow them to lead us, the greater influence they have in our lives.

Of course, we have allies also. God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, as well as the angels of God, are all our allies. They have the true power and if we abide in Christ, we have power, authority, and these allies all behind us.

I am not going to say more on this; however, we will touch more on this in the coming weeks.

Conclusion:

Now that I have educated you some on our enemy and the type of war we are really waging, we come back to our subject at hand for the next few weeks. It is introduced to us by Paul. Paul understood the kind of war we are in. He had experienced it firsthand along with the Ephesians. You see, that is why Ephesians was written. The people of Ephesus were on the front lines. Ephesus was a place of strong occupation by the enemy. It was all around them every day. Paul witnessed it firsthand when he visited there. The accounts are shared in Acts 19 and we find Paul faced with it on three different occasions in that chapter alone.

First, in vv 11-12, Paul is described as casting out evil spirits and healing the sick.

Second, in vv 13-16, we find seven sons of Sceva who were Jewish exorcists. In those days, they would invoke the name of a powerful spirit —such as an angel, demon, or deity—and place it under a spell. They would then call on it to order out a lesser spirit from a person. However, this never obtained the level of success that Paul obtained invoking the name of Jesus Christ. So, these men took it upon themselves to use Jesus’ name, but they were not believers in Christ and were overpowered and attacked by the demonized man. He literally took all seven men down. The demon spoke and said he knew of Paul, but he did not know these men. In other words, Paul had the authority because Paul had a relationship with Christ. These men had no authority because they had no relationship with Christ.

Acts 19:17NIV

When this became known to the Jews and Greeks living in Ephesus, they were all seized with fear, and the name of the Lord Jesus was held in high honor.

When we are on the Lord’s side, He is on our side. But it must be a two-way street. Just claiming the name of Jesus means nothing if our life is not fully invested in Jesus’ life.

The third incident is found in vv 18-20. After witnessing Paul’s power over the demons, many Christians in the town (yes, I do mean the Christians) that had ever practiced sorcery to defeat demons brought all their books on the subject and burned them publicly. Luke reports that the equivalent worth of the books burned was equal to 50,000 days’ worth of income.

When Paul wrote the book of Ephesians, he was writing to equip them to battle this demonic atmosphere that they lived in. When we get to chapter 6, he is giving the final wrap up.

Ephesians 6:10–13 NIV

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.

Then he efficiently lays out each piece of armor that is important for us to don each day. That is where we will take up next week and you will see that this armor has already been explained in chapters 1-5. Paul is just placing labels on them. We will be looking at just what each piece of armor is and how it relates to what Paul has already shared in chapters 1-5 in the coming weeks.

We have always needed the armor, but it is even more important today. You see, the politicians of our day are not the enemy. They are all we see, but the driving force behind them is Satan and his demons. Their day is coming to an end, and they know it. They are escalating their offense. They are getting desperate. They may be able to control the world around us; They may be able to cause us some discomfort. But if we have our armor on, they can never defeat us. For us, the battle has been won. We just need to stand firm!

I do not know about you, but I know that in my life, there has been a real increase in spiritual warfare. I have talked and written to many friends across the U.S., and they all seem to be in major battles right now. Things like divorce, loss of jobs, broken relationship with people they love, and some are even questioning what they believe.

These trials are a means that Satan is using to try to weaken us, but I believe God is allowing these times as a time of grace. These moments reveal to us where we have fractures in our spiritual foundations so that we can mend them and fortify them for the days ahead. God is giving us a chance to discover and fix the problems before the rapture/tribulation take place. That is why I believe it is a time of grace. Unfortunately, I believe some will not recognize it as such and will fall away during this time. I would encourage you to not get discouraged in the days ahead as more trials come. Instead, look for your weaknesses and take steps to shore up the problem. Initiate the spiritual disciplines in your life if you have not already done so. Take note of the pieces of armor as we study them these next few weeks so you can ensure you are daily using each piece. The days are difficult, but if the news is anything to go by, they are only going to get darker yet. So, prepare yourself. Draw closer to God. Don your armor daily and stand firm against the coming tide.

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Battle Belongs Phil Wickham

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=johgSkNj3-A

Suggested reading:

Warfare by Tony Evans

The Full Armor of Godby Larry Richards