Transcription
[Music] Readings of Jesus' name. I'm Bishop Chester. Rightness of the video teaching series, Praying in the Spirit. This is lesson number 20 of part 1. Part 1 is focused on learning how to pray in the spirit. And in lesson number 20, we're going to be talking for a few minutes about one of the primary arenas of praying in the spirit, which is the arena of spiritual warfare.
I've mentioned this a couple of times in these lessons that I've taught a lot of other lessons and other series and other occasions on this, but it is appropriate in this series of lessons to have a lesson that is focused just on this because this is such a very important topic for all believers, for everybody that wants to be a part of the kingdom of God. We need to be a part of His kingdom supernaturally and participate in this conflict because we're called to this conflict.
Now, Jesus said for us to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. That's Matthew 6:33. And then, I believe it's Luke 12:31, we're told to seek first the kingdom. He doesn't mention righteousness in Luke 12, but we're supposed to seek first the kingdom of God in both those places. That's the instruction for us.
Well, just to start off as basic as I can here, not to insult your intelligence, but just to lay a foundation. The word kingdom comes from two words: king or king's dominion. So, the kingdom of God is what occurs when the king, with his power and authority and all his resources, gains a victory in a territory to the place that he has dominion over. What's taking place in that area? We also call that government. We call it rule. So, the government is able to put up signs that say, "55 miles an hour." Now, you can go faster than that if you want, but if you get stopped for going more than 55, you're going to be penalized, whatever that means. And that's the case in something as small or simple as having a sign on the street that says, "There's a curve coming up here. Our recommended speed is X," or having a yield sign versus a stop sign, or any other way that government exercises dominion over our lives. And we submit to that dominion for the purpose of peace.
Now, I don't want to get off the subject, but what if that government, that dominion, becomes oppressive? That's exactly what happened in the Garden of Eden. When you study Genesis 1 and 2, especially, you will see that it was God's plan from the very beginning for man to be the source of God's conduit to exercise God's infinite authority in the earth and have dominion over the whole earth. Man named all the animals. Man had dominion, and man ruled over the earth. But, and didn't understand, he only had been authority when he was obedience to God.
So, the serpent, and we know that Satan used the serpent. Who was Satan? Satan was Lucifer, one of the archangels who had iniquity in his heart and was kicked out of heaven along with all the angels under him who followed him rather than follow God. Now, that's inconceivable to me that there was one angel that was under suffer that didn't realize, "Hey, wait a minute. You're not God. I'm not following you." But apparently, none of them did. They all followed Lucifer. And what Lucifer said, "He wanted to be like God," he meant that he wanted to make his own decision. Lucifer knew he was finite, and God was infinite. He knew that he could not be God. He could only be in one place at a time, and he knew God filled all the universe, even though I'm sure he didn't comprehend everything that was going on outside the universe, where that where the universe was in the infinite God.
Now, while the infinite God was in the universe to whatever degree infinite can be a part of finite, finite can't the infinite. So, Lucifer knew that was the case. But somewhere in this process where God was making all the decisions, Lucifer decided that that wasn't acceptable to him anymore. And so, the Bible says that his sin was not pride. It was iniquity. Ezekiel 28:15. There was iniquity found in his heart. And we know from Matthew 7, verses 21 through 23, that Jesus said iniquity is not doing the will of the Father which is in heaven. So, if Lucifer had iniquity in his heart, that means he decided at some point to be like God. He couldn't be God. Finite can never be infinite, but he wanted to do that one thing that God will did, and that was to make his own decisions. But there can only be one will in heaven, one will. And so, therefore, Lucifer got kicked out of heaven.
Well, here's this being, this God flesh, Lucifer's made of the substance of God's Spirit, but this being made of the dust of the earth that God gave dominion over, that being over the entire planet Earth. Well, that didn't sit real well with Lucifer because the thing is, when Lucifer was kicked out of heaven and all of his with him, they weren't loosed into the void and the expanse of the in the infinite of the universe. They were cast down to the earth. So, God took the place that that Lucifer was cast out of heaven from down to before man was created and created this man, that's being lower than the angels, and gave that man authority over the whole earth.
Well, that didn't sit real well with the adversary. And so, he utilized a serpent, or at least the form of a serpent, in a in the tree, the one tree that Adam and Eve were told they could not eat from. And he gently, easily, subtly deceived Eve into thinking that God was depriving her. And so, she violated the Word of God. And then Adam, realizing that this was the other half of himself and not trusting the same God who gave him a wife and to give him another one if God had to destroy this one, because Adam is the one that God said, "To the day you eat the tree of the fruit of this tree, you're going to die." He chose to eat with her. And whatever happened to her happened to him.
Now, the problem is this: When Jesus, the second Adam, was in the wilderness after being baptized, Lucifer and his temptations and testing of Christ, trying to defeat this Adam like the first Adam was defeated, kept trying to deceive him. And in one particular case, which he did twice because the order is different in the two primary accounts of this, Luke of Matthew and Luke, and in one of them, going up to the high mountain to see all the kingdoms was the second of the three temptations. And in the other one, it was the third of the three temptations. Which means when he said he took him again to this high mountain, that there were actually four times he was tempted. And two of those, the second and the fourth one, was with all these kingdoms. And he said, "If you would bow down to me," I think this is particularly in Luke, "if you will bow down to me, I will give you all of these kingdoms of the world because they were delivered to me."
Well, if you look at that Greek word for "delivered," it means they were surrendered to me as the spoils of war. I won them in battle. They were surrendered to me. They were delivered up to me because I won. The problem is, Adam and Eve, especially Eve, because she was the one directly confronting the serpent on the serpent communicating with her, she didn't realize she was in a spiritual battle. The adversary did. And he confessed that when Satan confronted Jesus in the wilderness and said, "If you'll bow down and worship me, I will give you this power and authority because it was delivered to me. I won this in battle. It was surrendered to me because the one that had it lost." And then that's why the Lord said when he came to visit Adam and confronted Adam and Eve and the serpent, he says to the serpent, "Your seed is going to bruise the woman's seed, heal, but her seed is going to bruise your seed's head." So, before they ever left the garden, this conflict was established.
And this conflict, when owned without it being obvious to man after that point that Satan was behind all of these things, but you don't hardly hear the devil mentioned in very many situations from the end of the end of their time in the garden all the way until Christ was born. Oh, we have the story of Job and a few other places where Satan is referred to. I believe it's in Isaiah 14 and of course in Ezekiel 28 and a few other places. But in most cases, man does not realize that he is actually dealing with the supernatural. And because of that, he is constantly becoming a victim of it.
But of course, when Jesus was born, the adversary tried to kill him as a child through the jealousy of the king. And God delivered him here and delivered him there and all of that. But right after he was baptized, he was led up to the spirit to fast and pray. And the adversary saw his opportunity. Since he could not kill him, he wanted to recruit him because the adversary believed he was just man. So, Jesus went into the wilderness in the spirit, Luke says. But he came out of the wilderness in the spirit and with power. And from that point on, we find him casting out devils. How many times did he do that? He was casting out devils. And then to prove his dominion, he gave 12 men the power to go cast out devils, and they did. And then, just to make his point, he gave 70 more disciples the power to cast out devils, and they did. In fact, when they came back from one journey of ministry and they were rejoicing because the devils were subject under that under them through his name, Jesus said, "Don't rejoice over that." He said, "Behold, I give you power," the Greek word there is authority, "as you see, not Dunamis, to tread on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you."
He said that right after he said, "Behold, I saw Satan as lightning fall from heaven." And I believe personally that that was meaning that was the last opportunity that Lucifer had to access the throne of God because, according to Job, Satan, not not the demons, but Satan had the opportunity to go before the throne of God. And so, he is the accuser of the brethren. He doesn't do any good choosing us to himself, so he accuses us to us and he accuses us to God. That's what he did with Job. He accused Job to God.
So, this conflict is going on. And then finally, Jesus said, at the establishment or the prophecy of the church coming upon this rock, I will build my church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it. Under the I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, or whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. So, Jesus was saying to us, those that would be a part of the church, that in the establishment of the church, whatever he did to establish the church, he was going to begin to restore to man the dominion God had given man over the earth. At that point in time, now he gave, he said he was going to put his kingdom as hid within us. When he told us that we could not spoil the strong man's house unless we first bound the strong man, and then we could spoil his house. He said that in three different Gospels. So, he told us of the conflict that of our mission would be the set people free that were bound by Satan by his walls of fear and bondage and lies, deception, behind the gates of Hell, which are the authority of Hell. That if, but he promised that if we would attack them, we would have the victory. We'd have the victory. They couldn't, they couldn't defeat us. We can defeat them.
And so, all of these things happen. And the Lord promised us that he would give us the power of his name and the power of his kingdom to do these things. That's why both John the Baptist first for six months and then with Jesus, they preached that the kingdom of heaven was at hand. Now, the Jews were expecting the Lord to restore the Kingdom of Israel. Well, he is going to do that. It's called the millennial reign of Christ because man is going to have that full authority, reigning fully over the earth again, when the man Christ Jesus, as the visible representation of Almighty God, born of the seed of David and the seed of Abraham, is going to sit on David's throne in Jerusalem for a thousand years after this seven years of wrath that will take place at the starting at the at the rapture of the church, or literally spiritually, the catching away of the bride. And so, God is going to fully restore the literal kingdom and dominion of man on the earth because Jesus is going to sit on the throne of David in Jerusalem and rule over the world.
So, here we are. What about now? Well, now it's not an earthly reign. It is a spiritual kingdom. And so, therefore, the Church of the Living God, the body of Christ, and the earth is supposed to exercise the authority and the power of God in this spiritual kingdom. And so, Ephesians chapter six says, beginning with verse ten, "Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world." Again, the King James says, "against spiritual wickedness in high places." The Greek is literally, "against wicked spirits in the heavenlies or in the atmosphere." Because Satan is the Prince of the power of the air, the god of this world. That's exactly what the scripture says about him. He is the Prince of the power of the air. He is the god of this world, not of the earth. The plant, the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. But the system, the cosmos, the translated world is this world's system of things. And because Satan took the dominion from man in the garden, he has been exercising that dominion over man all of these many years. And God has saved man out of that over the years. God's had a plan of salvation in every different dispensation or a period of time that he's dealt with man. But Satan has still been in dominion or in charge. But God, in reestablishing all of that, because he is the second man, Adam. And just like Eve was taken out of Adam's side, when God took the rib out of his side, Jesus on the cross, when they put the spirit aside out of that side came blood and water. And the blood and the water are applied in repentance and water baptism in Jesus' name. So that then he can breathe the breaths of life into this bride he has created, just like he breathed the breath of life into Adam and then Eve. Just like he breathed the breath of life into Christ, the groom, he's going to breathe, he breathes the breath of life into the bride, the church. Except we're not just the bride, we're the body of Christ. And we're not just the body of Christ, we are the army of God in the earth.
So, the Church of the Living God, it is the, the ark of salvation, it is the, the, the bride of Christ, it is the body of Christ, but it's also an army of soldiers. Paul said that we should endure hardship as good soldiers and that we are to fight the good fight of faith. And so, Paul says here in Ephesians 6 and 12, "But we wrestle not against flesh and blood, against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all to stand. Stand therefore."
So, what I stand because in the typology of that kind of warfare, being knocked off your feet was almost certain death because it is very difficult to defend yourself from one and usually several soldiers would pounce on the one. I don't mean literally to jump on them, but would gather quickly around the one on the ground because they know how vulnerable the person is. So, God's will for us to stand in this battle. And He's given us protective equipment from Him to protect us in that battle so that we not only can survive, but thrive and have victory in that battle. And so, He says for us to take on the whole armor of God, that we may be able to stand. Stand therefore. Have your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness, and your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. Above all, taking the shield of faith. Everything else we wear, but we take, we hold it. The shield of faith, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.
: And again, what is the grammatical rule of a colon? That which follows the colon explains or expounds upon what precedes the colon. And so, we're putting on all this armor. And once we got the armor on, the shoes are though are the boots of peace, the girdle of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, and the helmet of salvation. Then we take the, the, the shield of faith, where we to be able to quench the fiery darts of the wicked. We put on the helmet of salvation, and we take up the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God.
: And here is the arena that we use all of that in. This wrestle. And he didn't mean wrestle by physically wrestling, but in the conflict. This club wrestling is close personal struggle, one against another. And the combat of that day, almost everybody in that day was involved on face-to-face, person-to-person conflict. You didn't have a sniper scope you're shooting somebody. You can't even hardly see their face from 2,000 yards away. You're not an airplane where you're, you're shooting another airplane or firing missiles at the ground from above. No, you know, I'm gonna take that. All you've got is a dot on a on a radar screen that you're shooting at at a distance. It was face-to-face personal conflict. It's the Lord called it wrestling, not from the sense that we don't use all what you can. If you got all this armor on and you're wrestling, you're in a disadvantage. So, he obviously wasn't speaking of physically wrestling that other person. He was talking about how close and intimate the conflict was. And where do we use all of this? Verse 18: "Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit, watching thereunto with perseverance and supplication for all saints." And for me, Paul said, "that utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in bonds." For therein I speak boldly as I ought to speak.
And quickly here, reading these final verses of this lesson, I'm going to read these last three verses again about the arena of spiritual warfare. First of all, from the amplified: "Pray at all times on every occasion in every season in the spirit with all manner of prayer and entreaty. To that end, keep alert and watch with strong purpose and perseverance, interceding on behalf of the saints, God's consecrated people, and pray also for me." Paul was requesting them to pray for him that freedom of utterance may be given unto me, given to me, that I may open my mouth to proclaim boldly the mystery of the good news, the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in a coupling chain in prison. Pray that I may declare it boldly and courageously as I ought to.
And then, we're translated. It says this way, through the instrument talents, verse 18 again: "Through the instrumentality of every prayer, supplication for need, praying in every season by means of the spirit, and maintaining a close alertness, a constant alertness in the same with every kind of unremitting cheer and supplication for all the saints, and on behalf of me, in order that there might be given me utterance of the opening of my mouth in every fearlessness, in every fearless, confident freedom of speaking to make known the mystery of the good news on behalf of which I am an ambassador in a chain, in order that I may, that in it I may speak with every fearless and confident freedom as it is necessary in the nature of the case for me to speak."
And then, finally, the New Matthew Bible, New Testament. This is translated from the King James Greek men stripped of Texas Receptus. "And pray always with every sort of prayer and supplication, and that in the spirit. And keep vigil also with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints, and for me, that utterance may be given to me, that I may open my mouth boldly to utter the mystery of the gospel, for which I'm a messenger in bonds, that I may speak freely therein as I ought to speak."
My brothers and sisters, I believe in the church gathering together for prayer and praise and teaching, instruction, ministry, and to be sent out from that. I believe that with all my heart. I believe that's the will of God. It's the Word of God. But I do not believe that everything we're about is about church services. And I don't believe that biblically, that it is the will of God for us to use as our primary, if not only, method of seeing the Lord saved is church service invitation evangelism. But why do we resort to that? Because first of all, too many churches are not houses of prayer. And I'm not talking about the building, I'm talking about the people. Or too many churches, the emphasis of those people is not prayer in their lives collectively and individually. And since we're not a house of prayer, we don't often confront the adversary because he's not worried about us because he knows God well enough to know God doesn't answer most of the prayers we pray because most of our prayers we pray about God blessing church services and God giving us something to preach in church services and God bringing people, drawing people to our services, God and save them here. And while it's the will of God for you to have His Word to preach and for you to preach it by His power, not by your own intellect, and while it's the will of God to meet with us because He promised it, "where two or three are gathered in my name, that there I would be in the midst." So, it's the will of God for the, for the Lord to be present in our midst and manifest Himself. And it's the will of God for people to be saved. It is not the will of God for us to do all of that in the arm rather than the field. But why do we do that? Because we're trying to avoid conflict with the devil. And we do that because we're timid and afraid because too often we don't pray enough to even put on the armor of God, not even counting using that armor in this conflict.
If you, my brother or sister, want to see the revival that God and harvest that God has promised for the end-time church before the rapture, you're going to have to get involved by the spirit in spiritual warfare. You're going to have to do that. And you don't have to worry about where to go to fight the devil because he sends minions at the very least to visit your prayer meetings and our church services quite regularly. He is not infinite and he's not omnipresent in the universe, but he only has to focus on the planet Earth because he doesn't have any right, like, like to leave here because this is where he's been bound to until he's cast into the lake of fire. So, he's not worried about most of the world. Most of them are serving him whether they know it or not. But anytime you or I step out of the shadow of this world and step into the light and we give ourselves to the Lord Jesus Christ to do His will, to do His purpose, the kingdom of darkness takes notice. And when it does, we've got a conflict on our hands.
Now, you can make a deal with the devil to leave you alone if because you're gonna leave him alone, and he'll make that deal. But he won't keep it. So, we'll back off and leave him alone, but he's not gonna leave us alone because his time is short, and he's trying to defeat God and embarrass the kingdom of God in every way he can. And so, he wants to steal every soul out of the kingdom of the can. He wants to prevent everyone that's out of the kingdom from getting in the kingdom that he can. But greater see this in us and hitters in the world, and this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith. And how do we express that faith? According to Paul in Romans, in Ephesians 6, we pray all kinds of prayers, using the armor of God and the sword of the Spirit and the shield of faith to defeat this atmosphere adversary. That we have the promise that his gates cannot prevail against us in Jesus' name. We have that promise. But the problem is, how many who have been filled with the spirit and equipped with these things don't use them because we want to be on the back line on R&R? I'm not trying to be unkind here, but the world is going to hell, and they have no hope of being saved unless the church defeats the gates of hell so that they can be freed enough to even make a decision whether or not they want to be saved.
So, one more time: "Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints, for the body of Christ, and for those who have been called to lead the body of Christ, and for every individual who is obeying God and submitted to His will and is communicating the Word of God to anyone, anytime, anyplace, by all means, that their ministry would be effective." One place, Jesus, Paul prayed and requested prayer that his ministry would, the word would have free course to his ministry. That word "free course" in Greek means that it will run swiftly and be effective in doing the will of God. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, by the Spirit of God, by the Word of God, by the grace of God, in the name of Jesus, I loose the Word of God and the Spirit of God to go forth to you and I right now, to every member of the body of Christ, to call us and to renew our call and our commission to be a part of the kingdom of God in the earth, that we would do the will of God in confronting the kingdom of darkness as members and soldiers and the kingdom of light, that their eyes would be open, it that they would be able to see, the blindness would be gone, and that they would be delivered from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ, that they would see the light and be freed from the darkness. That's what we've been called to do. And I'm praying in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that you and I will obey Him in order to do that exact thing. God bless you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord loves you, and so do I. Let's fight the good fight of faith to His glory and to the salvation of the lost in Jesus' name. Amen.
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