2003-02-04
Good Morning Cherished Ones,
Yesterday, we began looking at the authority each believer has been given by the Lord to use God’s word in spiritual warfare. I’m led to repeat that this authority is given for us to use only under His direction and with accuracy. From the time, Moses passed on God’s word orally and throughout its history of being written down, that has been a consistent directive. I personally find it quite compelling that despite mankind’s propensity to at times “lean on his own understanding” [taken from PR 3: 5-6] and to sin, the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls and their translation from the original Hebrew demonstrated that so far at least the OT has been passed down word for word. This was revealed particularly with the book of Isaiah, which was found in the scrolls almost in its entirety. With the tools that we have today like Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance and others, Greek and Hebrew non-speakers can go back to the original language so as to know the originally-intended meanings of words. That has allowed us to maintain accuracy in the NT as well, as it is passed down. For those of us whose faith is active, dynamic, and genuine, God has put His hand on our lives and convinced us to put His teaching from the Scriptures at the very center of them. Praise to Him that He has given us His word to remain accurately passed down from generation to generation!
Some believers don’t realize or appreciate the truth of the authority they are given to use God’s word in spiritual warfare. So it behooves us to look at some of the citations that confirm this authority we are given. Let’s begin by looking at the example of Christ giving authority to the twelve disciples in LK 9: 1-2. “Jesus called the twelve disciples together and gave them power and authority to drive out all demons and to cure diseases. Then He sent them out to preach the Kingdom of God and to heal the sick.” This is very significant, because this is our chance to see that Christ can authorize ordinary men to do extraordinary work for the Father. There is ample proof that this power to spread the Lord’s message and to heal the sick is real. An example is found in AC 3: 6-10 when Peter and John went into the temple and came upon a lame beggar. “But Peter said to him, ‘I have no money at all, but I give you what I have: in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth I order you to get up and walk!’ Then he took him by his right hand and helped him up. At once the man’s feet and ankles became strong; he jumped up, stood on his feet, and started walking around. Then he went into the temple with them, walking and jumping and praising God. The people there saw him walking and praising God, and when they recognized him as the beggar who had sat at the Beautiful Gate, they were all surprised and amazed at what had happened to him.” An appropriate addendum to this example is the very fact that the Gospel of Jesus Christ spread the way that it did as a result of the authority given to the disciples and those whom they helped bring to faith all over the world. The Body of Christ couldn’t have been established without the work that they did for the Lord.
The story in LK 10: 1-20 of Christ sending out the seventy-two, His teaching about the culpability of the unbelieving towns of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum over towns of old, and the return of the seventy-two also gives us further evidence of Christ’s ability to give authority to ordinary people. The problem before Him was that He knew there was a large “harvest” of potential believers that needed to be reaped and very few authorized workers to carry out this task. Christ told these men to pray first and then sent them out to every town where He was about to go. They were given specific instructions not to take money, to stay only in the towns where they were welcomed, to remain in the same place not moving around within each town, to heal the sick and to share the message of the Kingdom, and to say “the Kingdom is near you.” When they came to a town where they were not welcomed, they were to say, “Even the dust from your town that sticks to our feet we wipe off against you. But remember that the Kingdom of God has come near you!” Christ assured them that on Judgment Day God will show more mercy to Sodom than to that town! The point here is that at this time, a town that chooses to reject the Lord bears more responsibility for this decision because of the hindsight of history than towns of old, such as Sodom. LK 10: 16, “Jesus said to His disciples, ‘Whoever listens to you listens to Me; whoever rejects you rejects Me; and whoever rejects Me rejects the One Who sent Me.” The seventy-two came back in joy, exclaiming that “the demons obeyed us,” to the Master. Christ’s response in (18-20) is very revealing lesson for us as well. “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Listen! I have given you authority so that you can walk on snakes and scorpions and overcome all the power of the enemy, and nothing will hurt you. But do not be glad because the evil spirits obey you; rather be glad because your names are written in heaven.” What was going on was a symbol of the defeat that Satan was about to have at Calvary and demonstrates that each of us who believes and knows the word of God has been given the authority to use it to do God’s work. What happened to the seventy-two men shows us that we experience God through obeying Him. We should all take some time to meditate on how these marvelous truths impact our own lives and service to God.
PRAYER: O Lord, what Christ said in JN 15: 5-6 must be seen in the examples You direct us to examine in this portion of the messages the Holy Spirit is giving us. “I am the Vine, and you are the branches. Whoever remains in Me and I in him, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without Me. Whoever does not remain in Me is thrown out like a branch and dries up; such branches are gathered up and thrown into the fire, where they are burned.” We are imperfect, but our hearts are opened to You and our desire is to serve You effectively. By studying Your word, You show us the truth of this passage in so many ways. We do not want the words the Spirit gives us to say to be empty and useless like those of a snake oil salesman. Instead, it is our desire to know Your teaching well, to believe it profoundly, and to take apostolic action on it. We recognize our need to seek You out first for direction, encouragement, warning of danger, discernment, and courage to boldly proclaim Your truths. HE 4: 12 is seared into our minds and hearts. “The word of God is alive and active, sharper than any double-edged sword. It cuts all the way through, to where soul and spirit meet, to where joints and marrow come together. It judges the desires and thoughts of man’s hearts.” We acknowledge Your supremacy, superior wisdom, and constant loving presence. We celebrate all of these attributes and Your willingness to give us the words and direction to be authorized and empowered to do Your work. It is with joy and peace in our hearts that we pledge to empty our spiritual vessels and pray often for the Holy Spirit to fill them. Our experience is that when Your Son is in leadership of our lives, we have the courage and peace to face difficult conditions, opposition, illness, and other challenges in the course of doing the work for which You have fitted us. Our heart-attitude is revealed in the words of PS 84: 10, “For a day in Thy courts is better than a thousand outside. I would rather stand at the threshold of the house of my God, than dwell in the tents of wickedness.” In humility, we confess our sins and offer You our worship, adoration, loyalty, diligence, glory, honor, trust, obedience, thanks, and utmost praise. In Christ’s name, amen.
The question arises: Is the same authority given to those seventy-two men given to us? The Spirit leads me to write about that using more delicious citations from the Scriptures in tomorrow’s message. The picture that is brought to mind from PS 85: 12-13 is truly a gift from God. “Yes, the Lord will give what is good; and our land will yield it’s increase. Righteousness will go before Him, and shall make His footsteps our pathway.” The desire to make “His footsteps our pathway” came to us through our justification, the time at which we came to faith and He imputed righteousness to our accounts. Our God is really a good and awesome God. No human has ever topped His ability to provide, encourage, have compassion, authorize, empower, correct, protect, and teach us a way that leads to happiness and eternal life. Such joy and fellowship with our Creator is a goal worth enduring whatever fiery arrows Satan has to send our way. Through the Son, we have learned about the unbreakable and eternally durable bond that God forges between Himself, a believer, and all other believers. We can thank God for that love by helping Him in His work to establish that bond with as many believes as will listen to Him through us, as we use His word to do His work. Peter and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn