I. Introduction
-- turn in
Bibles to Ephesians 6:10-18
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.
11 Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your
stand against the devil's schemes.
12 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.
13 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.
14 Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around
your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place,
15 and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes
from the gospel of peace.
16 In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith,
with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.
17 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit,
which is the word of God.
18 And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of
prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying
for all the saints.
-- this
message today is not the message that I thought I was going to be preaching --
I had started on another sermon, but it just wasn't working -- God wasn't
speaking -- He wasn't revealing His truth to me and when I tried to look up
resources and information, it just wouldn't come -- I knew then that He was leading
me in a different direction, and last night, some events happened that made me
sure
-- as all
of you know, I have been involved in one-on-one discipleship for a little over
a year now, and I can tell you that discipleship is entirely different than just
leading a church or serving as a pastor or teacher
--
discipleship gets to the heart of Christianity -- it's more than just a Bible
study -- it's more than just getting together to talk about God -- it's
learning to put feet to our faith -- it's about hearing God and actually doing
what He's asking us to do, which is something that we don't see in a lot of our
churches or in a lot of our Christians-- and one thing I've been reminded of as I've been doing this, especially over the last several months, is that we have an enemy who doesn't want us to live out our faith -- Satan's fine with us coming to church and worshiping God and even going to Bible study -- but he doesn't like it when we actually start doing what we've been called to do
-- for the first time in a long time, I have been confronted with various forms of spiritual warfare and spiritual oppression -- both directed against me and against my disciples
-- and so I thought it would be a good idea to spend some time today talking about the reality of spiritual warfare and what we can do when we are confronted with spiritual attacks in whatever form they take
II. What is Spiritual Warfare?
-- I guess
the best place to start is by defining what we mean by spiritual warfare-- when we use this term, we are acknowledging the fact that we have an enemy who is bent on our destruction -- not an enemy who is flesh and blood -- but a spiritual enemy -- someone who lives in the spiritual realm and who wages war against our spirits and God's people
-- I am, of course, referring to Satan -- who used to be the angel Lucifer but who chose to rebel against God and who was cast out of heaven along with his followers because of his sin
-- now I know that a lot of people in our day and age don't believe in Satan -- many think this was a myth that was invented by the church to keep people in line -- like the boogeyman -- or they think that this was just the way that the ancient people used to describe those who had a mental illness or epilepsy or some other type of debilitating disease
-- but, the Bible says that Satan is real -- Jesus said in Luke 10:18 that He saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven -- and we know the biblical accounts of Satan and his activities throughout the Old and the New Testaments, including the tempting of Jesus in the wilderness after His baptism and the various accounts of demonic possession
-- let me just make this clear -- regardless of what the world says, I can tell you without a doubt that Satan and his demons are real and are present and active in our world today -- I know this -- I have seen this -- and you need to accept this and believe this if you are going to live out this Christian life
-- we have
an enemy, and from the beginning of time, Satan has been actively seeking to
destroy the people of God -- beginning with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden
to Job and Joseph and Jeremiah and John the Baptist and the Apostle Peter all
the way up to us
-- because
he can't harm God, he is doing everything he can to harm God's people, because
he knows that when he affects our lives, he hurts God's heart -- he is
insidious -- he is filled with hate -- he is the father of lies -- he is angry
and he is lashing out at all of God's people who are trying to live out their
Christianity on a daily basis-- as we read in Revelation 12:12 -- Satan is filled with fury because he knows his time is short, and he is going to do as much damage as he can in the time that he has allotted to him
-- when we talk about spiritual warfare, we are referring to any spiritual harassment or oppression that comes from Satan and his demons against humans, but especially against the people of God
-- and I'll go ahead and tell you -- this does include demon possession, just like we see in the New Testament -- but, this is really rare, especially in our country -- Satan's attacks are generally more subtle and less obvious to the casual observer than what demon possession would be
-- if you think about it, what would happen if demon possession was an everyday occurrence? -- the average Christian sitting in the pews would know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that Satan was real and they would arm themselves for battle against him -- that's the last thing Satan wants -- he doesn't us to fight him -- he doesn't want us aware of his presence -- so we just don't see demon possession here in this country like we do in other countries
-- but, it is real -- it does happen -- but let me give you an assurance here -- demons cannot possess a Christian who is indwelt with the Holy Spirit -- if you've been in church at all during your life, at some point you've heard someone say, "there's a God-shaped hole in our hearts that can only be filled by God"
-- that's partially true -- we have a place in our bodies that was created to be filled by God's Holy Spirit -- but, that place can be filled by something else, too, and that's how the demons get into a person
-- if that God-shaped hole is empty -- if a person has not received Jesus as Lord and Savior and received the Holy Spirit -- then anything can fill that spot
-- not to say that this is always going to happen -- it usually doesn't happen -- but, on occasion, demons can temporarily occupy that place and exert control over a person's thoughts and behaviors
-- but, if that place is filled with the Holy Spirit, then nothing else can come in -- Christians are protected from demon possession because that God-shaped hole is permanently filled with the very presence of God
-- so, what
does spiritual warfare look like in the life of an average Christian? -- like I
said, it's subtle and it's intended to deceive or distract or discourage
-- one
thing that I have found happens to me a lot when I am involved in worship or in
discipleship or Bible study is that I get sleepy -- and it's not a normal
sleepy -- it only happens when I'm in the midst of studying the Bible or
worshiping God-- Corrie ten Boom, the Dutch evangelist who wrote the book, "The Hiding Place," based on her life experiences hiding Jews during World War II and suffering in the Nazi concentration camps, said that she noticed the very same thing in
-- she traveled all around the world speaking and telling people about Jesus, and she said that when she came to America, the moment she set foot on American soil, her body was filled with fatigue -- a heaviness wrapped around her and she felt sleepy -- but, this would lift as she prayed and asked God for strength and protection
-- the people started to talk and laugh loudly to the point that we couldn't hear each other when we spoke -- and then, believe it or not, at one point when I tried to read a Bible passage out loud, the table next to us began to sing -- eight guys started singing, out loud, in the middle of Chikfila
-- when we finally said, "let's just go," and closed our Bibles, they stopped singing and the restaurant got quiet
-- that is an example of spiritual harassment -- Satan didn't want us to meet together -- he didn't want us to read that Bible and he certainly didn't like what we were trying to do -- so he distracted us from our meeting
-- I see
that kind of attack all the time -- when people start coming to Bible study, I
tell them to get prepared, because when they start trying to read the Bible at
home, distractions are going to start -- phone's going to ring or someone will
knock at the door or something will break or something is going to happen --
spiritual attack -- Satan and his demons trying to keep us from doing God's
work
-- but
don't think that all spiritual attacks are this innocuous -- spiritual attacks
range from minor distractions like the ones we had at Chikfila all the way to
major attacks against Christians and their families, including physical and
mental anguish and even sickness and disease
III. The Christian's Response
-- that's
the reality of what the enemy is trying to do for us -- that is what we mean by
a spiritual attack -- but, that's not all there is to spiritual warfare -- when
we talk about spiritual warfare, we're talking about our response to the
spiritual attack-- that's what this passage is about -- not just knowing that we are under attack by a spiritual enemy -- but actually starting to do something about it
-- let's look back at this passage in a little more detail
-- verse 10
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.
-- instead of trying to do this through your own power and your own will and your own strength, be strong in the Lord and in His power -- success in living out the Christian life begins by saying, "I can't, but You can -- I don't have the strength or power, but You do" -- it begins by surrendering ourselves to Christ -- dying to ourselves daily -- picking up our cross -- and following Him, trusting in Jesus' strength and power to do in us and through us what we cannot do on our own
-- this is true for daily life -- and it's especially true in the arena of spiritual warfare
-- verse 11
11 Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your
stand against the devil's schemes.
12 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.
-- Paul makes it clear here that our struggle is against this spiritual enemy and not against flesh and blood -- and that's hard for us to grasp -- when we are in conflict with someone -- when someone wrongs us or hurts us or does things to us -- our natural inclination is to picture them as the enemy
-- but, Paul says they're not -- the enemy is the spiritual force -- the spiritual being -- who empowers them and who is leading them to do these things against us -- when someone does not have the Spirit of God within them, they are wide open to promptings from the devil -- they have no defense -- and they give in to temptation and they hurt God's people -- physically, mentally, and spiritually
-- but, they are not our enemy -- they are captives -- pawns -- who are being used by Satan and his minions to attack the saints of God -- remember the old adage, "love the sinner but not the sin?" -- same thing here -- we have to separate the person from the action -- we have to remember that their actions are done through ignorance and through the promptings of our spiritual enemies
-- Satan has apparently arranged his demons in a similar structure -- these terms that Paul uses may refer to the ranks of power and responsibility in Satan's demonic hierarchy
-- they may also apply to Satan's control of areas of this world or of human life -- a ruler governs certain territory, like we see in the Book of Daniel when it refers to the Prince of Persia or when Paul wrote about the prince of the kingdom of the air -- authorities exercise influence on the realm of ideas, like authorities on art or international affairs -- power means control, like those who control the media or citadels of higher learning
-- we need to keep in mind that there are two kingdoms -- the
-- think
back to Jesus' temptation in the wilderness -- Satan offered Jesus power -- he
offered Him glory -- he offered to give Jesus all the kingdoms of the world if
Jesus would bow down and worship him
-- and do
you remember Jesus' response? -- Jesus didn't say, "These aren't yours to
give" -- Jesus didn't say, "You can't offer me what you don't
own" -- Jesus responded by saying, "Worship the Lord your God, and
serve Him only"-- my point here is that Satan obviously had control over all the kingdoms of the world or he wouldn't have been able to offer them to Jesus -- Satan has considerable influence and control in this world, and he uses that to destroy the works of God and the people of God and to keep others from leaving his kingdom and coming into the kingdom of God
-- now one
quick point -- I've been using the name Satan quite a bit and talking about
Satan tempting people and Satan tempting us -- know that I'm using his name to
refer to all demonic attacks, not just the attacks from Satan himself
-- more
than likely, none of us have been directly attacked by Satan -- in all the Bible, we only know of six
individuals who were tempted or attacked by Satan directly:-- Eve in the Garden of Eden -- but not Adam
-- Job
-- Jesus
-- Judas Iscariot
-- the Apostle Peter
-- and Ananias in the Book of Acts
-- Satan is
not omnipresent or omniscient -- he's not God, even though he'd like to be --
he doesn't have God's power -- he can't be everywhere at once and he has a
limited number of helpers -- the Bible tells us that about one-third of the
angels that God created fell with Satan when he was cast of heaven because of
his sin
-- even
though Satan's influence is widespread, he is not directly responsible for
every evil or woe that happens in this world or in our lives -- when we are
spiritually attacked, it is one of his demons who is actually doing the
harassment-- so, when I talk about Satan's attacks or I say, "Satan did this," understand that I am referring to the entire demonic structure -- the rulers, the authorities, the powers of this dark world, and the spiritual forces in the heavenly places -- not Satan himself
-- real
quick, I want to go over one more thing and then I'm going to close for today
and we'll pick this back up next week
-- Paul
says, "Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand
against the devil's schemes."-- the devil is actively scheming against us -- he is actively planning to attack us -- but we need to know that are times in our lives when we are more vulnerable to spiritual attacks than others so that we can be on our guard during these times
-- new
Christians are particularly susceptible to spiritual attacks -- that's why we
need to make sure and follow up their conversion with discipleship as soon as
possible -- we can't leave them out there alone to face an enemy that they are
not prepared to face -- we have to help them and make them aware of the reality
of spiritual warfare early in their Christian life
-- we are
more vulnerable to spiritual attacks when we are going through trials and
troubles -- when we are afflicted with life -- not everything that happens to
us is a spiritual attack -- some things happen just because we live in a fallen
world and some things happen as a consequence of our actions and our sins
-- but when
we are weak and already down, that's a time when Satan likes to step in to
deliver the coup de grace -- what better time to attack than when we are
already spiritually weak?
-- the
fourth time we are vulnerable to attack is when we are idle in our faith and
not staying in the Word and not praying on a regular basis -- we'll get into
this more next week when we talk about the actual pieces of armor -- but
suffice it to say that when we let down our guard -- when we aren't prepared
for battle -- it makes us vulnerable for attack
-- and,
finally, we are very vulnerable for attack when we are isolated from others who
share our faith -- we are meant to live in community and when we are not
meeting together regularly -- when we are not coming together to strengthen
each other -- we are standing out there all alone with no one to defend us
-- if you
were Satan, who would you rather come against? -- the -- and while I know all of us here don't fit that category, we need to be on the lookout for those who do -- it is our responsibility to watch out for our brothers and sisters and to protect them by standing alongside them -- if they won't come to church, then we need to be the church for them
-- I'm
going to go ahead and close here -- I just don't have time to get into the
actual armor of God, so we're going to do that next week -- in the meantime, I
want to encourage you to go ahead and reread this passage and spend some time
this week thinking about the reality of spiritual warfare and our enemy and
look for the ways that Satan may be attacking you at this time
-- finally,
be strong in the Lord and His mighty power and trust in Him this week to help
you overcome any spiritual attacks you may be facing
-- let us
pray
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