2002-12-11
Good Morning Cherished Readers,
In yesterday’s message, I ran out of space to discuss all of the strategies God has given us to use in the heat of battle with Satan. These strategies, like so many other things we have from Him, are some of the blessings that came with our salvation. While we didn’t deserve it, God extends His grace to us, and all we had to do was to repent and come to faith in His Son. His Son, Jesus, is the One God sacrificed on the cross for us, so that people could be saved from slavery to sin and certain spiritual death. Never have soldiers been better equipped than those of us, fitted to fight evil in God’s army to victory in Christ’s name. To recap, the steps discussed so far have been: 1) Evaluate the thought [PHIL 4: 8]; 2) Reject the thought, if it’s evil [2 COR 10: 4-5]; 3) Voice determined resistance where such a tactic applies [JAS 4: 7]; 4) Claim victory on the grounds of the cross [1 JN 5: 3-4]; 5) Repeat Scripture out loud [2 TIM 3: 16-17]. Now, I’m led to share more.
6) Pray for strength and to overcome Satan. This is what King Jehoshaphat and his Jewish army did before the impending battle with the Edomites, Ammorites, and Moabites in 2 CH 20: 5-6. God stepped in and brought victory. I am always amazed at the seemingly radical promise that Christ makes in JN 15: 7, “If you remain in Me and My words remain in you, then you will ask for anything you wish, and you shall have it.” That presupposes that we know God’s will, of course, and the only way to do that is to study the Scriptures daily and keep an open channel of prayer (two-way conversation with God, where we let Him speak first). If my own experience is any teacher, I find that things have a way of working out faster and sooner if I pray for God’s will to be done first. Now, that doesn’t mean that anything I do or even my praying will cause God to change His decision about when or even whether to do something. It just means that I’m letting God know that He makes the decisions, I am taking the time to seek Him out to let Him know what is in my heart. This is precisely why I believe that denominations that teach that our works can bring about our salvation are so wrong. God is supreme, sovereign, wise, just, righteous, compassionate, and fair. His wisdom allows Him to know the greater perspective on a situation. When God told the Jews facing the battle mentioned above, “Do not be afraid; the battle depends on God not on you” in 2 CH 20: 15, He gave these Jewish warriors an entirely different perspective than the one which would have come naturally to them.
7) Rely on the Holy Spirit for help. This doesn’t come naturally to us; it is learned behavior. What it does is shift the balance of power away from man and into the only hands capable of handling it, the Trinity. PS 103: 5, “He fills my life with good things, so that I stay young and strong like an eagle.” We think of the eagle as a strong and capable symbol, so the writers of the Scriptures use that metaphor to help us grasp at an understanding of God’s power. Look at IS 40: 31, a message all of us should take seriously. “But those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed. They will rise on wings like eagles; they will run and not get weary; they will walk and not grow weak.” This is a picture of our Abba Who is both powerful and caring. If we look at the very best people in our lives, they are given power by their humble and wise application of God’s teaching in their lives. They are both powerful and at the same time, genuinely caring. All of that goodness comes from God. When we are in a heated discussion with someone to whom we are witnessing to our faith, it is the Holy Spirit, not ourselves, that has the power to bring that person to faith. When we have a question about incoming idea from outside of us, it is the Holy Spirit Who gives us the discernment to know if that idea conforms to God’s will and teaching. When we see lack of ethics in the workplace or questionable behavior in our families or congregations, it is the Holy Spirit Who puts us on alert that something is wrong and leads us to seek a godly solution.
8) Recognize that Satan is always trying to block God’s purpose with his fiery darts. The cold, hard fact is that Satan lives to oppose God. His evil all began before his expulsion from heaven [IS 14: 14; EZK 28: 15-16]. It’s a fact that Satan is angry, because he knows his time is short before God will eventually cut him off [REV 12: 12]. Satan is a murderer and the father of all lies [JN 8: 44]. We are told definitively that this enemy of God and his evil angelic followers will do anything in their power to thwart God’s plan and exact their malevolence. GA 5: 17, “For what human nature wants is opposed to what the Spirit wants, and what the Spirit wants is opposed to what our human natures wants. These two are enemies, and this means that you cannot do what you want to do.” Once Adam and Eve pulled God’s safety net out from under them by committing the original sin, all their descendants, and that’s us, had no choice but to inherit that sin. However, God provided a way out with Christ’s Atonement, and our willingness to repent and have faith in Him. But, that doesn’t mean we can’t sin; it just means we now have the choice as to whether or not we sin. It’s not enough to come to faith in the first place; we must live a self-disciplined, God-centered life in Christ after our initial decision to come to faith. We must persist in that, even in the face of seemingly gigantic challenges to our faith.
PRAYER: O Lord, we come before You today as soldiers in Your army. We are imperfect and in need of the purification only You can provide. Alone, we are useless and helpless. With enduring, trusting, and obedient faith in You, we are powerfully equipped to meet Satan and beat him at every turn. We recognize he will give us his all to stop us in carrying out Your purpose, but we dedicate ourselves to claiming victory in Christ’s name. Today’s prayer is a plea for Your presence and Your direction. Our eyes and ears are open for them, and we await Your commands with the plan to carry them out joyfully. We acknowledge the truth of PS 37: 39, “The salvation of the righteous is from the Lord; He is their Refuge in the time of trouble.” We place our trust in You as David did in PS 9: 10, “All those who know Your mercy, Lord, will count on You for help. You have never forsaken those who trust in You.” We boldly approach Your throne, Dearest Abba, knowing that as long as our pleas align with Your purpose, You will answer them. HE 4: 16, “Let us boldly approach the throne of our gracious God where we may have mercy and His grace to find timely help.” You give us comfort in our time of trial in PS 37: 23-24, “The steps of the godly are directed by the Lord. He delights in every detail of their lives. Though they stumble, they will not fall, for the Lord holds them by the hand.” Your promises are valuable beyond measure, so we take You at Your word when You tell us in 1 COR 2 :12, “We have not received this world’s spirit; instead, we have received the Spirit sent by God, so that we may know all that God has given us.” We humbly confess our sins and offer You our utmost adoration, worship, loyalty, diligence, trust, obedience, glory, honor, thanks, and praise. In Christ’s name, amen.
The Spirit has led me to even more strategies God has given us to battle Satan and win in Christ’s name. These will be the subject of tomorrow’s message. I have a habit of beginning a topic the Spirit leads me to thinking, “this will be short, a breeze.” Such foolish arrogance on my part! Instead, He brings me to learn more than I ever thought I could. That’s the power backed by love that God has for me as a writer. It’s the same love that He has for each of us. Satan gave me that foolish arrogance, and the Spirit’s power is piece by piece chipping it away. My faith tells me that eventually the Spirit will win out in cracking this rather hard nut to expose what is inside, what God created to be with Him in the first place. What I just described is the process of sanctification that He is working on all of us who believe. Now, I admit, some of us are harder to bring to perfection than others, but He has the power to do it for anyone who endures in faithful obedience to the Father. We are all so blessed that God is as persistent and consistent in loving us as He is. Peter and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn