One of the problems with trying to get our minds wrapped around true evil and truly evil people is that they don't do things according to Reason they never do and and we always try to figure out like why did you know why did a shooter a carry a gun into the covenant church What was what was her motive and there really is no motive beyond just wanting to do evil as hard for us to get our mind wrapped around I hope for you if that makes sense to you then I really want to talk to you But it's it's just hard to get our minds on they don't do what normal people do what healthy people do for instance To use an extreme example when it became absolutely obvious that the the Nazi Army could not win World War two Hitler's generals began pleading with him to negotiate a piece negotiate a piece Don't destroy Germany in your effort to the When this war and his response was this if the German people are not brave enough to win this war they do not deserve to live In a well-appointed country. He said all military traffic communications Industrial and supply installations and all objects within right territory Must be destroyed either now or later He Just wanted to destroy everything with no intention of with no reason That that's That's what it is hard And that's what it's at Satan's heart We're what we studied last week, and I hope it really found a route in you is that Jesus by his death Destroyed the power of sin Sin no longer has power over you and it cannot condemn you and Jesus by his resurrection Destroyed the power of the grave and so we no longer live in fear of the grave and and It has no power over us and Satan knows that But that does not mean he's going to retreat or withdraw He just wants to inflict suffering. He just hates us and he hates us because we look like Jesus We are the image of God. We're created in the image of God and he has hated us in the beginning for that reason That's it, and so he just wants to do all the damage that he can but I've got good news for you. I got good news for you Satan is powerful and he can overcome anything except The gospel and Jesus The Satan can overcome anything except the gospel and Jesus your soul is in no danger Please stand as we read What I like to call the comic book section of the Bible Revelation chapter 12 is It is the entire story of the Bible in comic book version Frankly and I always enjoy reading here the word of the Lord Now war arose in heaven Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon and the dragon and his angels fought back But he was defeated and there was no longer any place for them in heaven and the great dragon was thrown down that ancient Serpent who was called the devil and Satan the deceiver of the whole world He was thrown down to the earth and his angels were thrown down with him and I heard a loud voice in heaven saying now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come For the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down who accuses them day and night before our God And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony for they love not their lives even on to death Therefore rejoice so heavens and you who dwell in them But what do you owe earth and sea? For the devil has come down to you in great wrath because he knows that his time is short and When the dragon saw that he had been thrown down to the earth he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child But the woman was given two wings of the great eagle so that she may fly from the serpent into the wilderness To the place where she used to be nourished for a time and times and half a time in the Serpent poured water out like a Like a river out of his mouth after the woman to sweep her away with the flood But the earth came to the help of the woman And the earth opened up its mouth and swallowed the river that the dragon had poured from his mouth Then the dragon became furious with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring On those who keep the commandments of God and Hold to the testimony of Jesus And he stood on the sand of the sea That's far the reading of God's word all men are like grass and all of our glories like the flower of the field Grass withers and the flowers fall but not God's word God's word stands forever. You may be seated
Jesus has defeated Satan His death has defeated sin and the power of sin his resurrection is defeated death and In the power of death death no longer has a sting has no victory over us And Satan cannot win. He cannot get us away from him But he just wants to make war with the church the woman here is is the church Church in the wilderness. That's the church in the dispersion as the church out all over the world And Satan is making war with it. He cannot defeat the church Jesus clearly said that on this rock. I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it Satan cannot defeat the church and so what does he do? He makes war with the children of the church. That's us He's just making war with the children of the church That is us Before we jump too far into it. I want to tell you what Satan cannot do Satan has been thrown down to earth. He is no longer in heaven You remember that strange story in the book of Joe where Satan is talking to God. He's in heaven He's one of the heavenlies and He has power He has power in heaven to accuse and and and to destroy and he's bargaining with God over the Joe but but At some point during Jesus's ministry while he was going around casting out demons Jesus Satan was cast out of heaven. Jesus said I saw Satan fall from heaven like lightning and What we and there's so much back this we want to know like we're so curious Some got a battle going on in heaven. There really was and Satan really was cast out and at that point he lost the war. He knew he had no chance of overthrowing Jesus and So it comes to make war with us, but what can he not do? What are his limitations? He cannot separate you from God? He cannot Jesus says and in John chapter 10 my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me I give them eternal life and they were never they will never perish and no one will snatch them out of my hand My father who has given them to me is It's greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of the father's hand I and the father are one When I was very young campus minister in Isaac. I mean not as before I was a Brunner's and Harold were a little bitty and I went to speak at a camp as a small camp and one day at that camp we were going out on we're gonna go InterTube River the Nana Halo River. I think I don't know something down in South Mississippi. I'm not sure what it's called Preacher's not the Nana Halo because I said that anyway. You don't care and it was a true redneck outfit and the way you knew it was a true redneck outfit was I went in and we weren't going to the inner tube with my children like about chill babies. You're very young children and Asked you have life jackets that can fit them and they were like, no, I don't think so Do you have life jackets that can fit me? Yeah, we've got those somewhere around here. Okay, here we go. This is gonna be fun Most of the rivers about this deep wasn't That dangerous And so we're in an inner tube with our kids in our labs We're hanging in there. We're just gonna do this. This is what we're going to do today And most of us was, you know, just the right speed. It was lazy and no big deal. It's kind of fun And there was just one or two kind of places where the river sped up and one of those places a tree had fallen down and It was under the water about this much, but if you went around it was you know fine and I went around it and I looked back to see my wife and She was going to straight at it. There was nothing I could do and she got spun around and she hit that tree from behind And I saw her legs go up in the air and I was terrified because she had her old in her lap and So they get out and they're fighting the current and you know yelling and doing all the things and crying and I'd swim over and got her a tube and got And she kind of got herself like I said, it was only three feet of water and You know nothing permanent happened. It wasn't terrible. There was bombs. There was bruises. There were stretches But there was a lot of fear and Harold was trying and I said actually wasn't trying it got thought was fun I said Harold was that scary goes. Yeah, it was scary. I Said but you made it didn't you and he said I made it because I held on to my mommy. That's cute. That is not true He made it because his mommy held on to him We are in our father's hand and Nothing can remove us from his hand Satan cannot separate us from God Secondly, Satan cannot possess your soul. I think Satan loves stupid movies like the exorcist He just gets you all freaked out, you know, and you're worried about when you think of Satan You think of like you know babies with their head is turning around and you know, you don't think of like greed and Wall Street you think of vomit and terrible things right and so I think he loves those movies, but just know that that's that's not something he can do to a critical Christian he can't possess people before Christ. I can possess people who seek him out He can certainly oppress us, but Jesus says when a strong man fully armed guards his own palace. His goods are safe When one's stronger than he attacks him and overcomes him and it will recon he takes away his armor and he in which he trusted and divides his spoil He's just talking there, but that's in the context of him casting out demons He is the stronger man who has stripped Satan of his armor and you are safe You're safe He cannot Get into you. He cannot own you. You are guarded by the blood of Christ and Satan cannot step over it He cannot separate you from God. He cannot possess your soul He cannot stop the gospel and Jesus Ask his disciples who do you say that I am and Peter said you are the Christ the the son of God the anointed one and and Jesus says blessed are you for flesh and blood is not revealed this to you, but the spirit of God is revealed it to you And then Jesus began talking about the cross Remember that he's like I'm going to go to the cross. I'm going to be persecuted arrested killed And on the third day I will erase from the dead and and Peter takes him aside and says that's not gonna happen to you And then what does Jesus say Get behind me Satan Satan was trying to keep Jesus from going to the cross That's what he did is whole the whole time Jesus was on earth Satan was trying to keep him from the cross But he couldn't do it and he can't stop the gospel now He can't stop the gospel now in 1953 Chinese Revolution communist revolution took place all Christian missionaries were expelled from the country of China There were about a million Christians we think at that point 60 years later 70 years later After no missionaries were there there were no no western Christian influence Uh, the liberal Boston University the fourth most liberal College in Massachusetts. That's pretty high list right estimates there are a hundred million Christians in China He can't stop the gospel He tries He cannot Keep the Holy Spirit from spreading the word and the more he tries the more he fails Not only that he cannot frustrate God's purposes He can try Right Genesis 50-20 Jacob says um Joseph sorry Joseph says as for you you meant evil against me that God meant it for good To bring it about that many people should be kept alive as they are today Satan keeps trying to defeat To do evil to do harm and God keeps using it for his good It's fascinating I um as you know I've got a lot of friends in Nashville and this tragedy in Nashville is hit very close to home and um You know a friend of mine's daughter was killed and um it was interesting I've had a friend from Nashville in town this week and we're talking about it and he sent me this video I said how's the Lord is Lord work what's going on? He said you would not believe it and he sent me this video the chief of police The Nashville chief of police was asked what have you learned from this? He said I'll tell you what I've learned. I was sitting at the funeral at Covenant's Church And all the kids from Covenant Church was going we're going up front and laying flowers on the casket And I was crying and our officers were crying and our our fire department was crying And everyone of those children came by and said thank you for your service those children who believed in heaven were comforting us
He said this Has restored my faith in God
You know fastening things to be said on public television On a news conference. This is restored my faith in God I don't think that was Satan's intention to you He cannot frustrate God's purposes He cannot stop the gospel He cannot possess the soul of a Christian and he cannot pull you away from your father's hand Lock those things in your heart. What can he do? Okay, let's just get the worse one out in the open first, right? This is the worst one Let's talk about it He can kill you I can incite others to kill you. I really wish that weren't true But it is Jesus says do not fear those who can kill the body but not the soul could fear him who could destroy both body and soul
John a Jesus talking to the Pharisees and he says you're the father that your father the devil your will is to do your father's desires He was a murderer from the beginning It does not stand in the truth because there's no truth in him When he lies he speaks out of his own character for he is a liar and the father of lies And John 16 Jesus says they will put you out of the synagogues Indeed the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God People are going to think they are doing the righteous thing when they kill Christians That was true and the very first century. It is still true today. It is still true today We have those who follow false gods and who think they are serving him When they kill Christians who whom they call infidels And yet wherever that happens the gospel still grows it grows so significantly that a second century Second century teacher named Who was it tertulian? Sorry, I know it's important you that I got that name right tertulian said the blood of martyrs is a seat of the church Where ever Where ever Christians have been killed for the sake of the gospel the gospel has grown He can't kill us I think that's the worst. I wish I could say you couldn't That's not really too positive news, but he cannot destroy the soul And remember we have no fear of death. What else can he do? He can deceive us He can dress up as an angel of light and he can affect us by creating not only Individual lies but entire cultural lies where we're just the the air we breathe is so polluted We don't even know that it's pollution and we just assume certain lies and those those lies lead us to destruction We just assume them There are two shows on Apple TV They're really like and they're really harmful Um One of my you know one of my we've talked about before is Ted Lysso I think there's some great things in Ted Lysso There's also a lot of incredible profanity so reparenates just be warned um And but the the whole story is really it's about Mental health and how to maintain your mental health and how to build Trust and healthy organization and everything about it is so good except The writer clearly believes in an order to be fully mentally healthy you have to have no strings attached sex And he's like really Everything else you're talking about here, you know confession and forgiveness and trust and openness and and often says the everything else is right But you think that that Abnon relational Casual sex is that important to people's psyche It's just a lie It's not true It's harmful we know that
Satan Creates a culture of lies whenever you see someone lying or trying to create a culture of lies you know that Satan is at work there When ever you see someone lying trying to get people to believe lies or Develop a culture of lies Satan is at work there Whether it's Nazism or Communism or Yes, I'm going to say at nationalism This belief that somehow you're a special person Greater than others. That is just Satan. It works very dangerous He can't kill he can't create a culture of lies. He can Make you feel this is an interesting Piece of wisdom from my friend Brian who's who knows a lot about Satanism He's been in prison most of his life and he knows a lot about it and he says Satan can make you feel it can make you feel terror He can make you feel oppressed Psalm 31 13 says I hear whispering of many terror on every side as though they scheme against me as they plot for my life He makes us feel afraid Like we're in great danger He makes us feel anxiety like like if anything we do we just get paralyzed because we believe that anything we do is going to lead to destruction He makes us wake up in the middle of the night absolutely convinced that our children are dying in a ditch somewhere He he's always doing that. He's always at work calling us to question the faithfulness of God and the the ability of God to protect us He's also able to make us feel hopelessness Psalm 88 you've caused my beloved and my friend to shun me Darkness is my closest friend He he he blocks out all the hope we have in the gospel and so the only thing we believe is is that there's there's nothing for us Things are not going to get better He he blocks us into thinking that the best days are behind us That's a lie He but he makes us believe that we're ruined He accuses us We read this text today Um The authority of Christ has come for the accuser our brothers has been thrown down who accuses them day and night before our God He sits on our shoulder and accuses us. He makes us Feel guilty makes us feel dirty makes us feel like God is sick and tired of us makes us feel like we're unworthy of God's grace Unworthy of his attention like there's something wrong with us. It will never be fixed He he sees us on our weakness and he says You someone like you who can't control himself around the internet can't control himself around Food can't control himself around drug drink you you think God wants anything to do with you And we know the answer is yes But he convinces us that it's now He's constantly accusing us. That's what Satan can do He can kill the body, but not the soul. He can't make us believe lies. He can Make us feel oppressed and he can't accuse but what can he not do how do we defend ourselves against those How do we defend ourselves against the things Satan can do first of all believe the truth Remember the truth recite the truth bring your sin to light The thing that Satan doesn't want you to do more than anything else is bring your sin to light Man, I love the book by Nathaniel Hawthorne the scarlet letter Such a wonderful book so accurate in his depiction of how Satan Torments us as long as we keep our sins hidden And for those of you who remember it And for those of you who haven't read I'm assuming yours not going to so I'm going to ruin it for you And the final scene the Reverend who's committed adultery has been tormented by this guilt Climes up onto the scaffold and Declares his sin to the entire city and and the man in the story who represents Satan is climbing up after him And he can't start going no don't go there don't go there They're going to hate you and then finally he says you know. This is the one place. I can't follow you You cannot follow us in the confession Bring your sin to light In the light it will wither and die Bring your sins to light learn to preach the gospel to yourself when Satan accuses you of your sin No, no, I'm not really like that own it Cut his head off of his own sword Yes, I'm a sinner but you know what the Bible says The Bible says this is a faithful saying worthy of all acceptance that Jesus Christ died to save sinners of whom I am the chief That word sinner that's me. That's my name in the Bible The Bible does not say Jesus Christ died to say bricky. I Look I read the whole thing But sinner that's in there Yes, thank you Satan for reminding me Jesus Christ died to save me Believe that own it own your righteousness in Christ that he has closed us in righteousness that our sin is wiped away as far as the east is from the west so far as God removed our sin from us. He remembers them no more There's an old gospel song written Centuries ago well my my accuser roar of the many sins that I have done I know them all and thousands more Jehovah know with none They're gone They are they are gone There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus and you got to own that And you got to believe that you have to remember that and whenever Satan stands on our shoulders and he starts accusing us We tell him to give us six feet. Give me six feet, buddy I'm in Christ You can't get around me and then This is radical spiritual warfare. You ready? Pray There's a hilarious story in the Bible when Jesus comes down from the mount the transfiguration and it disciples are surrounding this man and his son has a has a demon and None of the disciples have been able to cast it out And Jesus says you know, kept Jesus cast out the name and And all these disciples gathered around him and say why weren't we able to do it and he said This kind of only comes out by prayer You didn't ask You thought you could do it You can't do it You have to ask And I want you to know that that is still true. Jesus gave the keys to the kingdom to the church and the church still has them Because some of you may be oppressed You would know I don't but we We've been called in on several of the houses Houses where people felt just oppressed by darkness Usually it has to do with with people who have experienced trauma this terrible trauma And somehow Satan kind of marks them through that. I don't know how Maybe it's just exposure to evil people. I don't know all the details Um, there's just a lot of things we don't know but I do know this We've had people come to this session and ask us to pray for them and the reason why is whenever we start to offer communion They feel this overwhelming desire to vomit all over the table Whenever we preach the gospel tool and they feel this overwhelming desire to stand up and start screaming profanity And they don't know where it comes from and they want to be freed from it We've had people come to us and ask us to pray for them because when they try to get to sleep at night They see they swear. It's not a dream. It's a vision They see a huge wolf above them and they want it and it wants to eat them We've had people ask us to come and pray because they are locked into this desire to commit suicide And they want to be free from it, but they can't get free and we take the elders over to them And we annoy them with oil and we pray for them because that is what the Bible tells us to do
And so far it's worked Jesus is still at work Satan is still at work And if you're oppressed pray Ask the church to pray for you. We give you this opportunity every Sunday And it's not just something we say if you need to be prayed for whether it be physical sickness or spiritual sickness Come let us pray for you. There's a there's a power in the midst of worship It's just not there when we pray for our own I don't know why but when the elders pray for us when they gather together more than one and pray for us It's the power of the church. I don't understand it. I just do it the way the Bible says do it
believe pray and trust him Trust him Versailles promises What is the Apostle Paul say at the end of Romans 8 If God is for us who can be against us He who do not spare his own son that gave him up for us all How will he not with us grace with him graciously give us all things Who should bring any charge against God's elect it's God who justifies Who is to condemn Christ Jesus is the one who died More than that who was raised who is at the right hand of God and who is an interseeding for us Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Chuck Tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword No In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us For I'm sure that neither death nor life nor angels nor rulers That's demons or Satan Nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor death nor anything else and all creation Will be able to separate us from the love of God and Christ Jesus our Lord Believe it Read it Pray it until it gets into your heart you are safe Nothing can separate you from the love of God Please pray with me Father in heaven we pray that you write these words large on our hearts We pray that you would Bring them to our minds in the middle of the night when we are scared
And cloudy rainy days when we are sad and we know there's no reason to be and we get Sad because we're sad and get locked into a spiral of darkness bring these things to our mind
When we feel accused and condemned and guilty Remind us No one can charge us No one can condemn us for we are in Christ