THE PLACE OF THE BELIEVER IN SPIRITUAL CONFLICT
We have been looking at the Book of Ephesians and looking at God’s purpose for the Body of Christ through His Son. In the last message, I talked about the fact that, not only are we united with Christ in His death and and in His resurrection, but also the fact that we are united with Him in His ascension. This is a very vital point to grasp because we have to live in all three of these dimensions in which we are united with Christ. How many understand that we have to live as those who are dead to sin but alive to God but also as those who are seated in the heavenlies with Christ? Now, this of course, being seated with Christ in the heavenlies speaks of operating and living from a place of complete and total victory in Jesus Christ. That is the place from which we are to live. This may sound fantastic and wonderful but it is exactly what the Bible teaches. There are many facets to this. There are facets of this being seated with Christ which have practical application to every day living.
Today, I want to focus on one particular dimension of this, and that is the place of the believer in spiritual conflict. If you read all of the Bible, beginning with Genesis 1:1 and continuing all the way through the Book of Revelation, you cannot escape the fact that from day one there has been an incredible spiritual conflict and warfare taking place with man right at the center. It started right in the garden and Satan tried to derail it from the beginning, as if what God wanted for Adam and Eve wasn’t important. God has had a plan and a purpose and Satan has tried, foolishly of course, to defeat that plan and purpose. Now, where is the place of the believer in this conflict and warfare between God and Satan? The place of the believer is right smack dab in the middle of it. We are going to see that in this message. I said that right from the beginning in scripture you see this conflict taking place with humanity in the middle of it. This certainly is carried on through into the New Testament. I am going to read a couple of verses here about the conflict and spiritual warfare, which are given to us in the New Testament and as I do you will note that Paul speaks of spiritual warfare and conflict as if it is business as usual for the believer and of course it is.
If you are a Christian, you will have spiritual battles, warfare and conflict. You will. It is not maybe. By nature you will. It comes with the territory and is part of what a Christian is and must deal with. I have said this before and I will say it again, if you never have any conflict spiritually, if you never have any struggle against the flesh, if you never have any issues like this in your life, I would worry. Because, by definition, what Christ has done in our lives is absolutely contrary to the flesh, to the world and to the enemy. Those dimensions of creation will not go quietly. We are called to overcome as those seated in Christ, that we might experience the victory of Jesus Christ.
Now, I want to turn to Ephesians, chapter six, and read Paul’s passage about standing against the enemy. Before I do that, in order to be able to grasp that passage, we have to get one thing settled, which is so primary, so basic and so foundational that I don’t know if you can really experience victory in Christ unless you wrap your understanding around it. The truth I am speaking of is exactly this: IT IS FINISHED IN JESUS CHRIST. To some this may not be a surprise or revolutionary, some may evens roll their eyes and say, “Well, what is new about that?” I think it is new for every one of us because we don’t see it. We know the doctrine and the verses and can parrot those but the real question is, do we live as if it was finished in Jesus Christ? Being seated with Christ in His throne in the heavenlies speaks of that. The only reason we are there is because it is finished. Jesus has died, has been risen and is seated in the heavenlies at the right hand of the Father and we have died, been raised are seated in Him. Consequently when we say it is finished, what that means is that every battle that could be won, that needs to be won, is already won by Jesus and in Him. There is no enemy of God that has not already been defeated by Jesus Christ. That is what it means to be finished and is why we are seated with Christ. His finished work made that possible.
Now, you will notice that in saying, it is finished and all the battles are won and the enemies defeated, I did not say nor does the Bible teach that the enemy has ceased to exist, or that the flesh has ceased to exist. or what is wrong with you in your natural man has been eradicated and no longer exists as a problem. No, all of the enemies are defeated - Satan, your natural man, all of it - but they continue to exist. They continue to have power, not over who you are in Christ, but only have power in the realm of the Adam nature and natural man. Therefore, we are called to live in and out from Chris as those seated with Him, as those who are dead and alive in Him, over and against living out from the old Adam nature, especially the religious Adam nature.
Now I emphasized the finality and finished redemption of Jesus Christ not only to save and redeem us but also over the enemy of humanity, the enemy of God who is the Devil, and all of his minions. I emphasize that because I noted that unless we grasp this and see it spiritually, we are not going to be able to walk in victory and we certainly are not going to understand this passage. This passage, which begins in Ephesians 6:10 is predicated upon the fact that it is already finished in Christ and that we are seated in Him in the heavenlies, seated in victory. Now to put it very bluntly and directly, we are as believers, and this is what Paul is going to be getting at here, are to be living in and out from Christ in victory. Contrast that over and against what many of us do, or have spent years doing - trying to win the victory. Christians try to win the victory and they will say, because of Jesus, God is going to give me the power and the strength to win the victory. No, He is not. What God will try to do is open your eyes to the fact that you will never have any strength to win the victory . He will never give it to you. But already, if you are a believer, He has given you Christ in whom is all victory. I say it often, but God does not give us things but He does give us His Son, Jesus Christ, in whom are all things. this applies here with the victory. God will never make you strong and you can stop asking Him to do so. God will never give you a thing called victory. Forget it! All of that is religious vocabulary based in error. What God will do and has already done, if you are saved, He will give you His Son. He will unite you with Christ in His death, resurrection and ascension and IN Christ is all victory. So, the question is, do you believe it? Do I believe it? Do we believe it to the point where we will begin to live out from Christ as our victory.
Living from out of Christ as our victory is exactly what Paul, here in Ephesians six, is going to exhort us to do. So, let’s read this and again, I want to repeat that because these things get watered down and brought into limitation with Christian teaching and doctrine and we lose the fact that Paul here in this passage is talking about living out from Christ as out victory - living out from the living Jesus Christ, with whom we are united in spirit. This is not about techniques, how-to’s, one, two, three, using your imagination, magic formulas or any of that stuff. It is about union with the living Christ as one who is seated in the heavenlies in Him.
So, let’s read here with in Ephesians 6:10, to begin with. I have to point out the very first word in verse ten - FINALLY. He spent an entire epistle unfolding to believers what Christ has done and what it means for us. He has spent this epistle unfolding what it means for believers in the eternal ages to be united with and filled with Christ. He has talked about the eternal purpose of God in Christ. He has talked not only about our inheritance in Christ but also about God’s inheritance in and through us. He is going to cap that all off by saying, “Finally my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.” Does this sound like we are supposed to ask God to make us strong or to give us power? No, the whole statement has as its premise that we already have Christ in us. In other words, “Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might,” because we already have the One in whom there is all power. Abide in Christ. Put all of your faith in Him. Give your whole self to Him.
Now, if somebody wants to know how to do this. It certainly begins with faith which is followed up by surrendering. You are never going to be strong in the Lord as long as you continue to try to be strong in yourself. How do we try to be strong in ourselves? Many times what we try to do is attempt to make ourselves feel good about something - feel strong - feel like we can overcome things. We operate in the natural ream and in emotions. Along that same line, we try to push forward in the things we think we ought to be doing for God. The truth is that the first step in being strong in the Lord and in the power of His might, is to recognize and see as truth that there is no strength whatsoever in you. God may take thirty years showing you that. Yes we are sinners, but until we see in a very real way that even as believers we have no strength in ourselves, we are not going to get very far in any of this. We have to come to an absolute end of religious strength and thinking we have something to offer for God or thinking somehow that we are something before the Lord and have power to toss around and use in God’s name. We have nothing. As those who are living out from Christ from the throne, the one thing we have is Christ. To the extent that we abide in Him and tell Him to do whatever it takes to get His will and glory, His strength will be there. This is really the key. Do you want to know how to be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might? Confess to the Lord that you have no strength and mean it and know it and then say to the Lord, “Lord, do whatever it takes IN me and through me to get your will and your glory. Lord, do whatever it takes to get your inheritance. Ignore my interests, what I want, if necessary, and do what You want to do. If we will do this, put ourselves aside and be unconditionally surrendered to the Lord to do whatever it takes to work in us and through us, then we will be at one with Jesus, and guess what? He is the power of God. God would then be able to work in us and able to work through us.
Now, if there is one thing the enemy wants to do, it is to hide this from us. How many know that by and large, the enemy is not going to attack you in a direct way if he can help it? That’s usually not the way the enemy works. The enemy works undercover in ways that you will not know that it is him. Sometimes he works by distracting you and getting you interested in the wrong things. In our natural man, if you are given to this or that malady such as depression, the enemy will stir that up and try to work on that basis. It is not necessarily an outward circumstance that he will do his work. It is inward things such as moods, emotions and depression or maybe you’re just given to elation and that sort of emotional thing that people get into nowadays, where they think that God is blessing them all the time emotionally. The enemy can work that way. He works undercover in unseen ways and we are going to read that, in fact, this is the way he works. “So, finally my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.” Let Him strip you of all of your imaginary power and it is imaginary. All that we are asking here is that God will show us the truth. “God, show us the truth.” “You want the truth, here it is, there is nothing in you. You don’t have any strength and you were never intended to. That’s the truth.” But then putting all of your faith in Jesus and being unconditionally committed to His will, to His glory, for Him to get His inheritance, is when the power of Christ can rest upon you as it did Paul. He said, “When I am weak, then I am strong in the Lord.”
Now, that is a premise here upon which so much else in the passage is based. Like I said, this is a picture of one who is living from out of the throne in an active living relationship with Jesus Christ as their life. “Finally my brethren…” Here we might interject, because you are one seated in Christ as one who is fully in Christ and in His victory. “Finally my brethren, be strong in the Lord…” You are seated with Him. “…and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God.” What is the armor of God in a nutshell? Dimensions of Jesus Christ and of abiding in Him as our life and as our strength. Everything Paul is going to describe here as the armor of God is a picture of what happens when we put our faith in Christ and put ourselves aside. “Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.” Now, we are going to read in this passage, the term ‘stand’ of ‘withstand.’ How many understand that these words could not be here unless you have something to stand in? In other words, what good would it do for God to tell us to stand against the enemy unless we had something to stand for or to stand in? so right away, the words, ‘stand’ and ‘withstand’ absolutely suggest and demand that there be a finished victory. You cannot stand in an unfinished victory. You can’t stand in your own strength as He just told us. You cannot stand in something which is not finished and established. No, you have to be able to stand in the truth of who Christ is and what He wants to accomplish in and through you. So, He says, “Put on the whole armor of God.” In other words, let your faith in Christ result in these dimensions, which Paul is picturing as armor, in order that you can stand, having your faith in Christ, in the truth and against the wiles of the devil.
This word, ‘wiles’ is significant, because in the NT Greek it means a ‘calculated method’ which is what I was alluding to above, when I said that the enemy very often will not use a direct method in trying to get at you. How many understand that there is really only one method of attack that the enemy can use against a finished victory? Think about this for a second. If the victory is finisher and in Christ you are seated and have full victory, then what is the only calculated method that the enemy can use? Well, deception. What he can do is try to convince you that the victory is not finished and that you are not seated in Christ or he can redefine and misrepresent what that means. We can read here in the Bible that we are seated in heavenly places and the devil cannot keep us from reading that, but if we are not careful, he can use our own nature against us and misdefine that as has happened so often in the world in the Word of Faith heresy. They go around preaching the authority of the believer and it has nothing to do with what the Bible reveals. The enemy’s greatest ploy is that if deception.
I mentioned that he can use your own nature against you and this is key as well in describing how the enemy uses deception to try to derail the plan of God. The enemy will play upon your bias, your unbelief, your fears, your emotions and upon your natural man to seek to blind you to the presence of Jesus Christ in you, to try to blind you to the truth. For example, we are reading here how we are dead to sin and alive to God and that we have been risen with Christ and seated with Him in the heavenlies. Those are facts and there could be no greater truths in Christ. We are reading this. Isn’t it true that despite the fact that we believe this, that there can come a spiritual condition or a spiritual force, if I can put it that way, which makes you feel that it just is not true. It isn’t an emotional thing as much as it is a spiritual thing. You can get yourself into a quandary and the enemy will be right there to play upon it. Maybe something will happen in life that will just discourage and upset you and you can get yourself into quandary where, despite the fact that you know these verses, you just can’t see it. You can’t feel it or sense it. It just seems like a dream and you cannot seem to break through it all. You can get into those things which can lasts weeks or even years. That is not just you, although you are giving ground to the enemy in that. But the enemy is bringing in spiritual forces and powers to try to lock you into that and to blind you to Christ. The only way out is to do what Paul says here, “Stand against it, stand in the truth.”
God is not asking you to beat that or to defeat it. He is not asking you to go out and win a victory over the enemy. He is just asking that you put the whole thing aside and believe Christ. I have found this to be true so many times that I can’t even number them. You can get into a whirlwind of confusion, of being upset and maybe even angry or frustrated and before you know it you are anxious and preoccupied with yourself as to whether or not you are behaving properly before the Lord in an inward way. Then you begin to become focused on yourself and get down because you know you are to doing very well and you are all wrapped up in yourself and in your circumstances. Then, you wake up to the fact that you are and yet you cannot seem to get out of it. Do you know how you get out? You get out by leaving it behind. Don’t try to fix it, it is all a lie. There is no point in trying to fix a lie. What are you going to do with it? The only way to fix a lie is to leave it alone and believe the truth. If you had a known liar walk up to you and start to spout off the worst nonsense you have ever heard, would you argue with that person? You would be a fool to do that. There’s only way to deal with a liar, and remember Satan is the father of lies, is to stop listening to him and listen to the truth. You are not going to convince him of the truth. You have to walk away. I have found that you must say, “I am finished with this. What I am doing here is not the truth and not in keeping with the truth. I do not care how I feel. I don’t care what I sense or don’t sense . I know that Jesus Christ is my Lord and that I am in Him.” I have found that if I do that and absolutely take a stand, not argue about it or waffle back and forth, but, as Paul says here, “Withstand, stand against and believe Jesus.” I have found that it breaks the confusion and self occupation that gives ground to the enemy. All of a sudden my thinking becomes clear. Once that happens, I recognize all the more clearly, the utter nonsense of going that other way.
So, put on the whole armor of God. In other words, Christ is to you the whole armor of God. If you will do this and abide in Him and in the truth He has shown you, you will be able to stand against the calculated methods of the devil in trying to drag you down from Christ as one risen and ascended with Him in His throne at the right hand of God. That is what the devil wants to do. He wants to drag us down from our place and relationship with Christ.
Note what Paul says next here, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” I think, frankly, that today’s Christians just dismiss this as applying to themselves or they take the other extreme and become devil obsessed, which is sort of like Bob Larson and his ministry of casting out demons from everyone. No, Paul says very clearly that we wrestle not against flesh and blood. Now, 2 Corinthians 10, verse 3 says something very similar to this. It says, “For though we live in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God, to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations or reckonings and casting down every high thing which exalts itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every perception to the obedience of Christ. There again, in this verse is the power of God.
Now, I want to note here what we are to cast down. We are to cast down everything that exalts itself against the knowledge of God. Of course he is speaking of the true knowledge of God in Jesus Christ. According to these two verses, those things which exalt themselves against the true knowledge of God, are not primarily flesh and blood. Can we get that? I think a lot of us think that what Paul is talking about in these two passages are circumstances or relationships in life that go wrong or situations in life and so forth. Or maybe we think he is simply talking about doctrine and intellectual teaching. He is not. He is talking about spiritual wickedness in high places. He is speaking of those things which the enemy would seek to get us to move in that would deny the truth of God in Jesus Christ.
.This is just what he did in the garden where he said to Eve, “Has God said?” Well, he can get you into a funk where it does not seem like what God said us true. I am reminded again about that particular verse in Timothy, where Paul tells Timothy that God has not given us a spirit of fear. We think that fear is an emotion. No, it isn’t. Fear is a spirit. We can react to a spirit of fear emotionally, but the core of it is not an emotion. The core of it is a spirit. Look at Adam after he sinned and the first thing that we find is that he was in fear. Fear is something which is from the realm of darkness. Paul is telling us that primarily we do not wrestle against flesh and blood people, flesh and blood circumstances and situations. We don’t wrestle with that which is seen with the eyes, though there could be effects there. But these are secondary. What we primarily wrestle with are principalities and powers and rulers of the darkness of this world; against spiritual wickedness in high places. We are, in Christ, to pull down strongholds and cast down imaginations. We are to cast down everything that exalts itself against the knowledge of God.
Now, lest this be interpreted as a calling, and to be like Bob Larson and cast out demons from every tree, shrub and person, how many understand that this begins with you and me personally? If it does not start there and if there is no victory there, we are not going to be used much in the lives of other people. We have to take a stand for truth, for Christ, in an inward way personally. We have t cast down imaginations and false reckonings which exalt themselves against the true knowledge of God personally. In other words, Jesus Christ has to have victory over us before He can use us to work His victory through us. He has to. You cannot be a defeated person and go around spreading the victory of Jesus Christ.
This is the key in all of the things God does. What God wants to use the Body of Christ for as an extension of Jesus Christ in being ambassadors for Christ and those through whom He can rule, cannot happen unless He is obtaining personal lordship over people. If we think we can bypass all of this in ourselves and be used of God, I would submit that Satan has already deceived us. This kind of teaching is everywhere today such as the authority of the believer. But very little is taught about the authority of Christ in the believer, in His death, resurrection and ascension. How many understand that God always works from the inside out? Christianity at the core is Christ in you, and the Christian life is Christ living through you. Of course, that translates into Christ living through you as one seated with Him in the heavenlies. It is all the same truth and we are as individual believers to stand against the wiles of the devil personally for ourselves. Like I said, what we do is commit ourselves unconditionally that God might get His inheritance and His glory. There are principalities, there are powers, there is spiritual wickedness right now trying to defeat the purpose of God in your life, in my life and of course, in the Body of Christ.
How many understand that right now the devil is allowed to operate as the god of this world? The devil is allowed to operate spiritually in order to try to get you to give up faith in Christ and to live as one on a lower level instead as of one who is seated with Christ. The devil continuously tries to do this. Again, he will use as his approach, your natural makeup. He will contrive a calculated method to seek to trip you up and get you to stumble in that way. Paul is saying, “Be aware of this. Be aware that this is how the devil operates. Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against these wiles of the devil. He is saying, “Don’t look out here at flesh and blood stuff.” Realize there is an enemy who is wicked beyond imagination who wants to destroy you. What he wants to do is deceive you about the very Lord who has saved you.
Now, Paul says in verse, thirteen, because there is an enemy and because we don’’t wrestle against flesh and blood and because we need to stand against spiritual wickedness in high places, “Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God.” I just explained how this is Christ manifesting Himself in us, to us and through us. He says, “Take unto you the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day.” How many understand that there is an evil day? Some of those days may last ten years. There are days in our experience that are certainly more evil than other days as far as the enemy’s attempts. If you are going to go on with Christ, you are going to have these evil days and they may try you for all you are worth. But how many understand that the whole thing is God’s way of chastising us and bringing us to the place where we make choices for Christ and get through all that the enemy tries to do. I mentioned how the enemy tries to use our natural man to trip us up. If we are alert and putting on the whole armor of God, we will recognize over the course of time what he is trying to do. It will bring us to an even greater surrender of that natural man.
Funny how God lets the enemy play upon our weaknesses in order that we might surrender the fact that we are weak to Christ so that He can become our strength in those areas. That is the armor of God, isn’t it, that Jesus be our strength in the various dimensions of life. He is the armor! So, “Put on the full armor that you may be able to stand in the evil day and having done all to stand.” How many recognize that you will encounter situations and conditions wherein you have done all and you have committed yourself unconditionally to God for His inheritance in the saints, as much as you know and put all of your faith in Jesus as much as you know and perhaps, even then nothing happens and nothing breaks it? Well, Paul says, if you have done ll, stand again. The bottom line is that what we are reading here is not simply something we do once in a while. It is an abiding aspect of the Christian walk, to stand against all in God’s will, in Christ by faith and let the devil take his shots but you are going to stand. You are not going to move because it is finished. It is not about your strength, it is about Him.
He says, “Stand therefore.” Now he just said, “Put on the whole armor of God.” I think it is interesting that the very first item he mentions which speaks of the armor of God is the truth. Unless we see the truth, we are not going to be able to stand in it, are we? Unless we see the truth, and I am not speaking about listing out a bunch of doctrines, we have that. I am talking about seeing the truth in Jesus Christ, grasping Him, coming into an inward realization of Him and being absolutely certain in the knowledge that in Christ, it is finished and we can live as those who are out from the throne. We see this and we know this and if we do, we can gird our loins with the truth. How many understand that this is a picture of a core of strength? The core of our strength is the truth. Paul will later say, “Above all, taking the shield of faith…” You can’t believe, you can’t have faith unless you have seen some truth. Faith comes by hearing the word of God. That is truth. You have to see it and you have to know it and then you must embrace it and believe it. If God does not reveal the truth, you will not have anything to believe. There are times in the Christian life when all you can believe is that God is faithful. But that is truth. As it says, “Without faith it is impossible to please God. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that He exists and the He is a responder (Greek) to those who diligently seek Him.” This is bare bones faith. You have to believe there is a God and that He will respond if you seek Him. Sometimes that is all you can do, but it is faith in a revelation in the truth that God has given about Himself and He will respond and that His Son has finished the redemption. So, stand therefore with your loins having been girt about with the truth and with the breastplate of righteous which is Christ.
Now, I want to drop down to verse 18, which is part of the stand that Paul is telling us to take. It is part of what ought to be everyday Christian living. It is part of spiritual conflict. He says, in line with this armor of God and standing against the wiles of the devil, “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit.” Now, what does that mean to pray in the spirit? Many today would have us believe that it means to speak in tongues. That is not what it means to pray in the spirit. The best way to describe what it means to pray in the spirit is to say what it does not mean. It does not mean to pray in flesh or simply with your natural man. In other words, we cannot get anywhere praying emotionally. We can’t get anywhere reacting and trying to push through to God. To pray in the flesh would also mean to pray on the basis or ourselves. No, to pray in the spirit means to pray solely on the basis of Jesus Christ for that which is to His glory and according to the truth. In other words, we bypass ourselves, who we are, our merits, our strength and pray one hundred percent on the basis of the Son of God for His glory snd for His interests according to His will. This is what it means to pray in the spirit because it is what the spirit is doing. Read what Jesus said the Holy Spirit was given to do in John 14, 15, and 16. It is all about glorifying Jesus. If you want to pray in that same holy spirit, it is going to be in accord with those dynamics in revealing Jesus and in having God get His will and His inheritance in the saints.
He says here, “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit and watching thereunto with all perseverance. I believe that certainly part of watching in prayer, is to watch out for the wiles of the devil. Tell God to give you wisdom and perception along that line and in conjunction with that, ask God to reveal to you His will, His mind. He says, “Watching thereunto with all perseverance (or endurance). In other words, take a stand again, not for what you want, not name it and claim it as in, “I am believing God for this or that…” What nonsense. We do not believe God for stuff that we want. Whoever invented that kind of stuff? I will tell you who really invented and is behind it, Satan. No, we believe God and take a stand for His will. How many understand that God has a will? If we take a stand for God’s will, we are standing on good ground that it will be done. God does not have a will that He does not want to happen. If it is God’s will, He does want it to happen. You are to take a stand with Him in a that for His will and His glory and it will not just be for yourself. It is for all the saints.
Now, if you read this passage in its entirety from verse ten on, you will notice that verse 18, which talks about prayer for all the saints, is not a tack on. It is part of the whole. In other words, your standing in Christ against the wiles of the devil, your putting on of Christ as your armor and all else mentioned here, is also for all the saints. It is all one stand. It is for you too but it is for all the saints. I have tried to note this in the last couple of messages that if you are in Christ and the rest of the saints are in Christ, everything you do, not only will effect you greatly but it will be contributing to the Body of Christ as well. You cannot walk through this world, encounter the enemy and experience the victory of Jesus Christ without that having a positive impact on the Body of Christ as a whole whenever you see it or not.
He says to pray for all the saints, so the question then would become. pray what? We do not need to guess at that because we have already seen what Paul prayed for the saints. So, if we want to know what we ought to pray, and of course I do not mean the exact words, or reading this and parroting it, we are talking here about principles. In principle and overall, what are we to pray for the saints? Of course we can pray for specific situations and for God’s will in those, no question about it. But, there is an overall that God is after which we have been mentioning all along here. That is that He would get His will and that He might have His inheritance and be glorified. This is what we are supposed to pray for each other. Above all, if Paul’s prayers are any indication, we are to pray that the saints might see. That the saints might see! Notice what he says here in Galatians 1: 16-17, “I don’t cease to give thanks for you making mention of you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Himself, that the eyes of your understanding therefore be enlightened.” So, this is what Paul prayed for the saints.
We have another prayer, in the Book of Ephesians, chapter three, which I read in an earlier message. Paul prayed that God would grant us, according to the riches of His glory to be strengthened with might by His spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith that you may be rooted and grounded in love, that you might be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the length and breadth and depth and height and to know the love of Christ and so on. Here again, we have the prayer of Paul for the saints. So, we are to pray for one another along these lines. Primary to all of this is that the eyes of God’s people might be opened to see Jesus Christ. Of course, if we see Jesus Christ, we will have discernment, revelation, enlightenment that Paul calls it there, to see and discern all else
I am reminded at this point of one other thing which his not a prayer of Paul but is the expression of his desire and longing that we find in Galatians 4:19. He desired and travailed as a woman in labor that Christ might be formed in God’s people that they might be brought into an inward realization of Jesus Christ. I mentioned earlier that God works from the inside out. You cannot skip the absolute necessity of the inward realization of Jesus Christ, bypass it all and then say, “Hallelujah, I am reigning and ruling with Christ from the throne. If you don’t know Christ, you are not even going to understand what it means to be seated with Him. This is why all Christian teaching needs to begin with the fact and be based upon it, that Christianity is Christ in you and that it is God’s purpose to bring us into an inward realization and discovery of Jesus Christ. Without that, we get nowhere. With it, we are on the road to begin to know the rest of what God wants.
One other place we can turn to which shows what other purpose God has in our praying for one another. Really, it is a statement of the overall purpose of ministry to the saved and unsaved. God wants to use His Body as extensions of Himself through prayer and through ministry. Paul, in Acts 26, talks about what Jesus Christ said to Him when He calls to him on the Damascus Road. He said, in verse 15, “I am Jesus whom you persecute. Arise and stand upon your feet, for I have appeared unto you for this purpose, to make you a minster and a witness both to these things which you have seen and to those things which I will show you or I will appear unto you.” Now, here is the purpose, “Delivering you from the people and from the gentiles, unto whom now I send you to open their eyes and to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God that they may receive forgiveness of sins and inheritance among them who are sanctified by faith that is in Me.” I really like that particular phrase there, “…and to open their eyes.” God Almighty wants to use His people as agents, as ambassadors, as the means by which the truth can be manifested, that Christ can be manifested so that others may see. It is so that the eyes of people may be opened and they can turn from darkness to light. Now that may be accomplished by God through a person , through preaching and teaching or Jesus may want to contribute life to the Body through the prayer and intercession of someone who never preaches or teaches. If you and I give ourselves to Jesus Christ, then Christ, through us, is making a contribution of life to the Body. We are making that contribution to the Body whether we ever speak a word, ever teach, ever preach or whether we ever even write something down on paper, which we would call ministry. Death in us produces His life in the Body.
Now, think about this. If there is a contribution of life being made to the Body of Christ, by Christ, through me, then am I not, in one sense of the word, preaching through the Person who actually speaks the words and preaches the sermons ? Sure, because I have contributed life and it is from that life that the preacher is preaching. We are all one in Jesus Christ and what matters is whether or not Jesus Christ is getting a contribution of life through us to His Body. What emerges from this is up to Him but what is contributed is where the real value lies. So, whether we preach or teach or whether we don’t is not as important as to whether Christ has us and through us is able to make a contribution of His life. If a preacher makes me to see, that is wonderful, but there are thousands of people behind the scenes who are contributing to that in unseen ways because they have given themselves to Jesus Christ. Ministry is the life of Christ. There are various ways for this to be manifested.
Most ministry, because it begins and happens in the spiritual realm is ministry which is unseen and yet something is happening and there is an impact. I think that you can make a general statement to this effect if you are being used of God, because it is first spiritual and by definition is going to encounter the forces of darkness. I also think you can makes the statement that initially it is going to seem like nothing is happening. It its not just a matter of teaching somebody something that they can memorize and just go out and parrot. You are dealing with the forces of darkness and invading their possessions and putting your foot down for Jesus Christ. You can’t expect that victory to happen in a moment. We are talking about the necessity of people’s eyes being opened which does not usually happen in five minutes. It did not even happen with Paul in five minutes. There was preparation time and Jesus said it would be that way. So, this is what God wants. He wants people’s eyes to be opened. How many understand that God is not going to force anyone to do anything? He will not force anybody to accept truth, accept Christ. But, God will give light. He will give light and make men see in answer to prayer. Then they will have a choice and that will be up to them.
Now, for the remainder of this message, I want to ask and answer a couple of common questions having to do with spiritual warfare and our battle with the enemy in prayer and so forth. The first question I want to ask and answer is this: Why do we have to pray to God for Him to do things He already says he wants to do? The answer to that is that God wants to do it through us as extensions of Himself. It is part of experiencing Jesus Christ. When we pray for another in the will of the Lord, it is not a matter of our launching out as independent contractors to decide what is best and ask God to do it. Neither is it a matter, when we encounter spiritual darkness, of launching out independently and beating the enemy over the head and deciding he needs to be cast out. This can be said of the entire Christian life including prayer, when we walk with Jesus and pray for each other, when we minister, it is simply a matter of our joining Jesus in what He is already doing or wants to do. We are just joining Him. Isn’t that what it means to walk in the will of the Lord and to pray according to it? His will is already set. He already wants what He wants. We are discovering it and joining Him in it. So, we become extensions of Jesus.
Now, God has ordained not to remove the power of the enemy in this age. He has chosen to allow Satan to go about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour and attempt to use his wiles and destructive devices even upon believers. He does this, so as we encounter these issues and spiritual forces, we may be pressed to Him, be exposed as nothing and as we go on and seek the Lord about it, ask Him to do whatever it takes, we may discover and experience victory in Him. I am re4minded of a scripture in 1 Corinthians 11:19, which has to do with God’s purpose in allowing heresy to remain in the church. Where we are talking about the enemy but this is related to heresy, and this scripture states the principle which applies to both the enemy and heresy. It says there, “There must be heresies among you in order that those of you who are genuine might be proven to be so.” That is the principle. God allows heresy and the enemy to walk about as a roaring lion to try to deceive even believers, so that there might be testings and provings so that you and I by faith, would have the choice to choose Jesus Christ rather than our own will, rather than walk according to the flesh. There must be these things so that we may be proven and built into those who can be used by God in this age and so that we can have our eyes opened. Then, of course, God can use us in the ages yet to come.
God, in His infinite wisdom, uses even the enemy to do a work in us predicated upon whether we are yielded to Him and seeking Him in the trials. He uses even the enemy to press us to Himself so that we may come into a greater inward realization of Jesus Christ, so that we may see. Look at the Book of Job. Job had no idea why he was suffering as he was, but he held to the faithfulness of God and continued to seek Him. At the end of that trial, despite everything the enemy was allowed to throw at him, Job was able to say, “God, now I see you.” This is the point of the fact that there must be heresies. There must be spiritual attacks so that we will be pressed to God and see Him and know Him and come into a greeter realization of His Son, Jesus Christ.
God Almighty, with a wave of His hand, could have banished all of the enemies out of the Promised Land and could have done the same here in the New Testament. But, He said, “No, I want you, as you walk with My Son, to encounter these spiritual forces of darkness.” (and we will whether we are looking for it or not) “I want you to surrender to Me for My full purpose in these battles and in the things you encounter.’ Somebody will ask the question, “Well, if we have to join the Lord and pray and be involved in spiritual conquest and conflict, what happens if we don’t? In other words, if we do not pray that God’s will be done, is it going to be done anyway? That is a good question, isn’t it? Is God relying on us? How does this work? To answer to the question, is God’s will going to be done even if we don’t pray? It is yes and no, even though that may sound like a contradiction. If we do not pray for God’s will and walk along and pray through to victory for ourselves and others, God’s will is not going to be done anyway. How could it be? We have side stepped it. We have said that we are going to get interested in other things. If we do not walk with Jesus Christ and join Him in His purpose, we are not going to experience everything in Him anyway. That is the no answer. It won’t come to pass anyway. The yes answer aspect of it is, if God does not get His will through you and me, He will find someone else. God is going to have His will, in other words. Now, He would like for us to be involved in it. He would like for us to be His will and extensions of His will. But is we will not, He will get His will. We will suffer loss because we would not allow Him to apprehend us for it.
Another question people often have is this: “How can I pray for the will of God or for His glory if I don’t know what that is? How do I know what God wants to do and how can I pray to that end?” Well, very easily. You can have faith that He knows and that it is sufficient that He does. God is going to lead you and me very often by the hand and we are not going to know where we are going but we are going to know the One who is leading us. This is the approach we need to take. When we encounter situations and we sense that we need to pray, just pray for the will and glory of God, even though we may have no idea how it will be worked out or what it will be in the end. We certainly have a general knowledge. We can say, “Lord I join you for your will in this matter whatever that is. Lord, come into this situation and do whatever it takes to make Christ known to this person. Do whatever it takes, Lord, to bring them into the fulness of Christ and to get your glory.” This is all we need to know. We simply need to know what God wants to do eternally and in lives and to make men see. We do not know how that is going to happen, what ought to happen or specifically how circumstances will work out.
How many recognize that what I just described is a stand.? It is a stand by faith in Christ for God’s will, even though we may not fully recognize how that us going to be worked out. How many also recognize that when we pray for ourselves or for others that the will of God may be done, no matter what it takes, that this stand we are taking for His glory is not a matter of saying precisely the right words? It is not a matter of saying the right words any more than it is based on a perfect understanding that we could have. This stand is spiritual. It is by faith in Christ and we pray and we stand spiritually. Words may or may not follow but our stand is by faith in Christ for His will and glory. This is what we are standing in - the truth of God in Jesus Christ. In this sense we are joining the Lord for His will and leaving it up to Him to know specifically what that is and how to work it out. That is part of what it means to walk by faith.
One last question here before we end this message. What kind of authority do we have over the enemy? Well, we have the same authority over the enemy as Jesus has. But again, we do not have authority over the enemy to launch out on our own and decided to cast out the devil and to do all the crazy things that people do. I think it is best illustrated in the Old Testament in Israel’s taking possession of the Promised Land. God had given them that entire but He did not drive out the enemy, He let the enemy remain. Now, he didn’t say to Israel, “My purpose for you in giving you this land is for you to go in and drive out the enemy.” He diid not say that His purpose was to drive out the enemy. That is not His purpose, it is a means unto the purpose. God said His purpose for them was to take possession of the land and occupy it to His glory. In order to do that, they had to enter that land by faith that the victory was finished and assured. They had to, one step at a time, put their foot down and stand in the truth that God had given them this land. As they did that, one step at a time, of course they encountered the enemy. At that point they had to drive him out. They were pressed to the Lord. They had to believe and obey the Lord. It had to be proven to them that they had no strength but that their strength was the Lord. And so it is with us. We have not been given the assignment to beat the devil over the head or to go out hunting for a demon under every rock. We have been called to walk with Christ and to take possession of all that God has given in Him. Every step we take towards doing that will be met by opposition. God has ordained that it happen this way. He has said that He is going to allow this to happen for His purposes.
So, as we begin to move forward and take possession, this opposition, this conflict will come. It is not maybe, it is going to happen. At that point, we are going to have to discover Jesus Christ in greater and greater ways. The only way, as I said, to overcome the enemy and to stand as you take one step at a time, is to be fully reduced as to your own strength and have sold out to Him saying, “Do whatever it takes, Lord, for you to get your inheritance and your will.” It is a moving stand, so to speak. As we advance through the land in Jesus Christ, every step we put our foot down, the enemy attacks and we find the Lord in a new way, regarding all of it. This is how we It take possession and more and more we will grow in Christ and more and more we are coming into a realization of Christ and God is using the enemy to accomplish this in His people. It is going to result in our reigning and ruling with Him in the eternal ages, as extensions of Him in authority.
So, from a practical standpoint as I stated at the beginning of this message, you are going to encounter the enemy every day of your life as a believer. When you stop encountering him, I would beware. You are going to encounter the enemy and be in constant warfare on one level or another, even if that warfare is a temptation to relax. What God would say to us is, “You have authority in Christ to bring the One, who is the victory, Jesus Christ, into this situation. and to join the Lord in it, to be the one in whom Christ dwells in the situation. You exercise that through living, through faith and obedience and through prayer. You are to live as one who has this authority in Christ and you stand with Him against the powers of darkness. It will seem like it is all for nothing for a while, like there is no victory. It is not our business to accumulate a shelf of trophies, where we can say, “Well, I won the victory here and I won the victory for God.” That is not our job. Our job is to join the Lord and when we encounter situations that we know are not God’s will, pray. Pray and live as one who is entering the territory that was possessed by the enemy and who has been called by God to our your foot down and take possession in Christ.
Jesus Christ said to His disciples in Matthew 16, that the Father had revealed Christ to them. It was upon that revelation, and there you have it again, the seeing and the realizing of Christ. It was upon that revelation that He would build His church and the gates of hell would not prevail against it Note that: the gates of hell shall mot prevail against the church. This is not a picture of the church as a city with the enemy trying to beat down the walls. No, this is a picture of the church as the invading army. This is taking possession of what belonged to the enemy in walled cities, and just as it happened at Jericho, the gates, the walls of hell have to fall. They do, because Christ is the victory. It is not about us doing, it is about joining Him. It is about our carrying His presence. It’s about His getting us to the place where we will stand in any situation for His glory that He might have His inheritance. Guess what? If we do that, we get our inheritance. If you stand for the Lord, no matter what, He will provide everything you need. God has given us the freedom and the grace to leave ourselves alone and trust Him to give us what we need.
This is Paul’s final word here, so to speak, in Ephesians. He says, “Finally brethren, be strong in the Lord.” So, the Christian person is going to be in a warfare one way or another on some level. But if we believe, that, in Christ, we have died, been raised and ascended, then we can live in resurrection life as from out of the throne. We can stand upon Jesus Christ by faith. We can recognize that, yes, there is a wicked enemy, but if we stand in Christ, it won’t matter what loss we suffer or what suffering comes upon us. If we stand in Christ, His victory and His will, will come to pass for us and for all those with whom God has involved us. This is ministry. This is why the body of Christ and the individual believer have been called. May God give us the grace and the enlightenment to see these truths.