No. 27 - THE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT AND HOW WE FIGHT (SERIES ON WAR PART II) By: John J. Blanchard Friday, November 22, 2002 We are in a three-part series that we have entitled “The War”. This is the second in that series. The title of this sermon is “The Rules of Engagement and How We Fight.” REVIEW OF PART 1 I would like to first point out that as we looked at in the first sermon, “Focus On The Real Enemy, Series on War Pt. I”, we realized that our true enemy is not a physical enemy. The scriptures plainly say that we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places (or in high places, as some renderings state it). That is Ephesians 6:12. So our real enemy is not Saddam Hussein, it is not the armies of the world nor it is not the gangsters. These are certainly people that Satan can be using to tyrannize the rest of mankind, but they are not our real enemies. They are motivated and moved by our real enemy, Satan, and by his hosts that are in high places. They influence the lives of men to do crazy things. They want them to harm one another, to bring about war upon the face of the earth and all manner of evil and despicable things. These are the attitudes that Satan is constantly broadcasting to mankind in order to pull us down and destroy us with one against another. He wants to turn group against group and nation against nation, religion against religion and race against race. He wants to do anything to divide and weaken the nations and mankind. Our real enemy, as we understand from scripture, is Satan. He is the one that Christ is going to depose. He is the one that Christ is going to liberate the world from. I would like to turn to I Corinthians chapter 6. We are going to be given a lot of responsibility in the not-too-distant future. This is a responsibility that is really upsetting to Satan and turning him against us in a very big way, especially in this last time as we get close to receiving this responsibility as a church. I Corinthians chapter 6, starting in verse l: “Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?” So this is brethren being admonished that if they have a disagreement between each other, not to go to the judges of this world. Can’t you settle this as Christians amongst yourselves? Verse 2: “Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world will be judged by you, are you unworthy to judge the smallest matters?” That is a very good question. If we cannot get along amongst ourselves and settle our disputes, how are we ever going to judge the world? Then Christ, through the apostle, goes on to say something even more amazing. Verse 3: “Do you not know that we shall judge angels? How much more, things that pertain to this life?” We are going to not only judge the world, but we are told here we will judge angels! If that is not a frightening concept to Satan and his demons, what is? Does that not explain his tremendous hatred for the Church? As time runs out, and Satan realizes time is running out, he is staring this judgment in the face and so are the demons who followed him and terrorized mankind for 6,000 years now. This explains, in part, why he hates us so much. It also shows us the grave responsibility that we are going to have in the not-too-distant future, that is to judge the world and to judge angels. That is a very big part of the job that we will be doing. We will be doing this as a part of that government of Jesus Christ. Let us turn, please to Isaiah chapter 9, starting in verse 6: “For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end...” This government of Jesus Christ is going to grow in power and authority throughout the entire universe and just keep expanding. How? We do not fully understand that yet. But the scripture is not wrong. The government is upon His shoulder and His ever-growing government is based upon the Church. The Church is the government that will be ruling the universe. The Church is the government reigning with Him that will judge the world and angels. That is part of the responsibility we will have being in that government. In the first sermon we concluded with two points. One: we are the body of Christ and currently we are under judgment, being tried, tested and measured to see if we are going to fit into that government. Will we fit into a slot or a spot in that government? Christ is going to be extremely careful. When He sets someone in the government, they are going to do His will, and they are going to have love, compassion and mercy as He does. He is not going to give a rod of iron to anyone who in any way shape or form is going to act like Satan all over again to tyrannize, terrorize and oppress. He cannot do that. He will not do that. Therefore, this trying, testing and measuring that we are undergoing now is measured by the compassion, love and character that we can develop in our life. This is incredibly important to understand. It is not how much Bible knowledge we have. It is not based on what a wonderful athlete we are, how rich we are or whatever attribute we can think of that the world would desire. This is after Godly love. This is what we are supposed to be fashioned after and growing in. Once we can master the fact that God is trying to develop mercy and compassion in us, then He can say I have a servant here that I can give a rod of iron to because I can trust this person. I can bring them into My government and they can rule. I can know they will not tyrannize or be cruel and harsh but rather kind and merciful like Myself and My Father. I am speaking Christ’s words as He would say it to us. You good and faithful servant. You have learned these things and here is your reward. This is what we need to learn. The second point was we concluded that Satan and his demons are very much against us. They are very much against the Church because they hate the position in this government we are being offered because they wanted to rule forever. They wanted to have the government. They are being denied what we are being given. Secondly, as I pointed out just a minute ago, they hate the fact that we are actually going to judge them for what they have done. We are going to help Jesus Christ put them in their place and judge them. These two things bring their hatred to bear upon us, the Church. It explains why this enemy of ours, Satan and his demons, are so awful and so dead set against us. This is why they will do anything to stop us. HOW DO WE FIGHT SATAN? I want to look at the war that we are involved in today in this sermon from the point of view of the rules of engagement and how we fight. How do we fight Satan? How do we fight his demons? What kind of a war and what kind of rules do we go by? We understand we have a ruthless enemy, but I do not know if any of us can conceive the hatred that this being has for us. As people we cannot fathom the amount of viciousness and hatred that that being has for God and for His Church. I want to turn to I Peter chapter 5, verse 8: “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world.” Mankind is being persecuted and tormented by Satan, and the brotherhood, the body of Christ throughout the world, is being tormented by Satan as well. We all suffer his attacks. We all suffer his attempts to destroy us, but God says resist him and He will help us. He goes about like a roaring lion because he looks for the weak. He looks for the points in our character in which we can be attacked. He knows our mind thoughts. He knows how we react. He knows our weaknesses and there he will attack. When a lion goes after a flock of sheep or antelopes in Africa or whatever, they are going to go after the weak ones, the old ones, the sick ones, the easy prey. The fast, the fleet and strong they will avoid. That is the way lions are. This is the way Satan is with us. He is compared to a roaring lion, and we need to stay strong in order to resist him otherwise he will pull us down. We are going to see some interesting things as we go through this sermon of what it takes to be strong. We will see what it takes to resist. Turn, if you would now, to Revelation chapter 12, verse 10: “Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, ‘Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down.’” Satan is our accuser. He always has been. He wants to accuse of everything rightly or wrongly we have ever done. Many times when he goes before God with an accusation, it is correct! But God knows we had a weakness and Satan exploited it as well. Satan goes right in there and makes it as bad as possible for us and tears us apart if he possibly can. God knows this. He knows we are weak. He knows without His help and the Holy Spirit we really do not stand a chance against this being. So He offers us all kinds of assistance and we are going to see this in this sermon. We need that help of God. There is no way we can stand up against such a cunning and vicious adversary such as Satan without God. It is impossible. THE GOD OF THIS WORLD Satan’s viciousness is shown or is utilized through his authority that he rightfully has! This is what is amazing. He has a certain amount of authority because he is the god of this world! We are going to see this in a couple of scriptures in a moment. His authority is such that he can literally do the things he is doing. He has this authority over a 6,000 year period until God puts an end to this. I do not know how that was set up or was determined initially, but he does have authority. Turn, if you would, to Luke chapter 4, starting in verse 5. This is the temptation of Jesus Christ Himself. “Then the devil, taking Him up...” (taking Jesus Christ up) “...on a high mountain, showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said to Him, ‘All this authority I will give You, and their glory; for this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore, if You will worship before me, all will be Yours.’” Undeniably this was true! Satan was telling the truth here in this case. He had that kind of authority and could have turned it over to Jesus Christ if Jesus Christ had worshipped him. He said I will end this war right now. If you will bow down to me, I will end this war right now and I will give You these kingdoms that you want. You want to save mankind? I will give them to you, but you have to worship me! You see if Christ had fallen for that, Satan would have won and would have had a position of authority forever in God’s government. Satan knew that. Christ knew that. Christ did not fall for that temptation. This was a mental battle between Jesus Christ and Satan. Satan had the authority to wage it. Incredible! Turn, if you would now, to II Corinthians chapter 4, verse 3: “But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age...” (in some translations, “the god of this world”) “...has blinded...” That is Satan. So Satan is the god of this world. That is important to keep in mind. That is god with a little “g”. He is no where near the level of God the Father or Jesus Christ. But he wants to assume the power of God the Father and Jesus Christ. That is his goal. That is the sort of being we face. He has the power to wage war and he has the authority to do so. We do not stand a chance without God’s power. We have to get that fixed firmly in our minds. Then we have to understand how to utilize God’s power. Satan wields his power for two purposes: afflict mankind and destroy God’s Church. He wants to afflict mankind and rule over them harshly and very cruelly. He wants to use mankind as his pawns to do his will. His will right now is to destroy God’s Church and to actually assume the position of Jesus Christ if he could possibly do that. It is hard for us to imagine as people that anyone would have the audacity to think that or think that they could get to the level of God. That is the kind of being we face as our enemy. If you would, turn to Isaiah chapter 14. Clearly he makes that statement. Isaiah chapter 14, starting in verse 12: “‘How you are fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How you are cut down to the ground, you who weakened the nations! For you have said in your heart: “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High.”’” Can you imagine a being who actually says I am going to be like you God. I am going to take your place! God says, “No!” You have weakened the nations, you have ruined My creation but you are not going to take My throne. Jesus Christ and God the Father set up a system that in the midst of this evil, perverse and cruel period of time, (the 6,000 years when the god of this world rules on earth) that out of that cruel, hatred filled, oppressive time would come a Church that would overtake the rule of Satan! It would be a Church that would be ruled by Jesus Christ. It would be a Church that would be called His body, His temple. That is what we are called to. It is an awesome promise and an awesome position of authority in which we will actually help judge the demons and angels! We will probably reward good angels and help put the evil angels in their place, as well as judging all of mankind. It is an amazing thing that we have offered to us, but we have to learn how to fight the fight that Jesus fought. If we look, what happened? Did Jesus lose because Satan killed Him, killed His physical body? No! Christ won the mind game of Satan. He did not lose it in His brain, in His mind, in His heart. He stayed true to the truth, and by doing that He claimed the right to depose Satan. It is amazing! We are the body of Christ. So it would make sense that our warfare is a spiritual warfare in our mind just like it was for Jesus Christ. We fight this being with this huge ego and he has a master plan to try to defeat God. He is brilliant! He has a great deal of authority, but there is no way he can defeat Christ’s body. Just like he could not defeat Jesus Christ, he cannot defeat the body of Christ if the body of Christ is letting Christ work through it and live through it. He can defeat the individual members of that body if they weaken and if the Spirit is allowed to be quenched. If that Spirit goes out enough, Satan can actually make a spirit-begotten being, a human being as part of the body of Christ, weaken and fall! That can happen only if we do not resist. We have all the power at our disposal to resist! We have to learn how. Because when we look at the Church out there today, we see that the Church has been overrun. The Church is being destroyed! Satan is running rough shod over God’s Church, the body of Christ. We cannot let that happen to us. God is trying to preserve a few, and it is incumbent upon us to allow Christ to work in us to such an extent that we cannot be defeated. With Christ living in us, we cannot be defeated! That is what Christ is doing right now. He is fighting through His body! It is interesting that Christ has a body composed of people and a temple composed of people, and He says I will live in you. My Father and I will dwell with you. They live here but we have to allow Them to work and bear Their fruits in our lives. As They do, we become strong in the spiritual war. We are going to see that as we go through here. We have to keep in mind, as we fight this mental war, that we should never under estimate the power of Satan. He fights with no holds barred. He fights without mercy, and in his mind he knows it is all or nothing. He either achieves a total conquering of God’s Church or he has lost everything. He knows that so he has pulled out all of the stops here at the end. He is doing remarkably well, but he will not succeed. The gates of hell shall not prevail against God’s Church. They may come close, but they will not prevail. The amazing thing about Satan is that he is so full of hate that if he cannot defeat God’s Church in the end, he would like to destroy all of mankind. As we have seen in past sermons, God is so powerful and wants to win in such a big way that He says I will not only save My Church, I am going to preserve My creation! I am not going to allow Satan to totally destroy the planet Earth and hand My Son a pile of ashes, a pile of rubble to rule over. No, when We are done, We will have succeeded so wonderfully that we can enter a Millennial period that will be beautiful with billions of people living into it. It will be a fantastically gorgeous Earth with all of the animals having their nature changed the way they should have been before Satan, the god of this world, corrupted them. With mankind living in an atmosphere without the influence of Satan the Devil, what a beautiful planet this will be! That is what God is going to do, and He is not going to be defeated in either case, with the Church or the world, by Satan. He is going to win! It is up to us if we want to help. THE FOUR HORSEMEN Scripture shows us that Satan has four evil powers at his disposal. These four powers are called the four horsemen. Sometimes they are called the four horsemen of the Apocalypse. I do not know if these are four separate powers or if because they are called four horsemen there are four super demons in rank underneath him. Just like the angels are divided into ranks. You have Michael and Gabriel at the top and Lucifer was with them at one time. Then you have other lesser angels. It would not surprise me if that is exactly how this is set up in Satan’s kingdom. He may have four super beings over say four armies of demons. These four horsemen have a certain amount of power upon this Earth to do damage. If you want to read about that, we can turn to Revelation chapter 6, starting in verse 1: “Now I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures saying with a voice like thunder, ‘Come and see.’ And I looked, and behold, a white horse. He who sat on it had a bow and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer.” The reason I say this could be four super demons over four armies is this first one is a description of an army, and it has a horseman that is different than the three other horsemen. So I would say these are four separate and distinct horsemen. Verse 3: “When He opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, ‘Come and see.’ Another horse, fiery red, went out. And it was granted to the one who sat on it to take peace from the earth, and that people should kill one another; and there was given to him a great sword.” So the first one seems to conquer through war and the second one seems to just turn people against people. It is to turn people against one another. This could be any kind of crime: violence, racism, persecution. Different sorts of attitudes like this would come underneath the horseman who was red, the red horse. Going to Verse 5 of Revelation 6: “When He opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, ‘Come and see.’ So I looked, and behold, a black horse, and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four living creatures saying, ‘A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not harm the oil and the wine.’” This one obviously causing shortages of food, famine. Verse 7: “When He opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, ‘Come and see.’ So I looked, and behold, a pale horse. And the name of him who sat on it was Death, and Hades followed with him. And power was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword, with hunger, with death, and by the beasts of the earth.” So we have this fourth one called Death. It uses a variety of things to cause death and destruction - the pale horse. Now I want to go look at these four horsemen again. If you have extra paper in front of you, you can take a clean sheet of paper and put three vertical columns on it. Divide it with two lines up and down so you make three columns. In the first column you would put “horse” at the top. We will start with the white horse underneath that. In the second column at the heading put “physical/the world.” In the third column put “spiritual/the Church”. The descriptions of the four horsemen I just gave you are the typical descriptions that you could find in almost any publication that talks about the Book of Revelation and about war, famine, disease and death. When you look at the Church, you must see that there is something different here. I am going to fill in underneath these three columns and how the horse affects the earth (the physical creation) and how it affects the Church (what God is trying to do spiritually). Underneath the white horse you have this conquering and going about to conquer with a deception, which is rank paganism. Satan conquered the world with rank paganism and getting people to do his will through paganism. It traces back to Nimrod, Babylon, the Chaldean mysteries and those sorts of things from thousands of years ago. Some of the bidding that he got them to do was religious wars, persecutions, creature worship, sun worship, even things as cruel as human sacrifice. You will see this if you go look at a lot of the pagan religions. That was the deception of the white horse upon the world. Upon the Church, the deception is a spiritual warfare that is much deeper. He put in place, after Jesus Christ’s first coming, a false Christian church. He actually set up a Christianity that was false! This deceived any person that would leave paganism and come to Christianity. They immediately left from one sort of deception and fell into another one! A lot of the wars on the Earth have been fought between “Christian” nations as well. They have been fought between different sects, different denominations, different religions or brands of Christianity. He did the same thing he did with the pagan religious groups and nations. This false Christianity looked very much like the true Christianity. It had its roots in rank paganism as well. It took upon itself pagan holidays and now called them holy days and made them look Christian. It took on pagan traditions and made them look Christian. It changed the times that God had set for His holy days. It changed those times and seasons to suit his pagan religious groups. So he has this white horse that is also doing a form of deception upon Christianity. He is attacking the Church constantly that way. He is constantly trying to get the true Church to bring into itself pagan holy days, pagan traditions and changing times (like going from the Sabbath to Sunday, observing the wrong holy days). All of these things is Satan trying to impose his will on the Church through a false Christianity. Now we go down to the red horse: war and the machines of war. In terms of physical destruction upon the earth, we could be talking about tanks, missiles, bombs, guns, or whatever weaponry Satan moves mankind to use on other peoples. He moves men to go to war. He may combine the red horse with the white horse, that is, one religious group fighting another one or one pagan group fighting another one. He uses these machines of war to do it. In the Church, we know that our warfare is a spiritual warfare. We just read that. Ephesians made it clear. It is a spiritual war. In Ephesians 2:2 we find that Satan is also called the “prince of the power of the air.” He fights through waves that enter our minds and causes us to have bad attitudes, bad thoughts and bad emotions that lead to sin. This is how he wants to destroy the Church. It is another way of destroying the Church. If he can get the Church to become sinful and unrepentant, he has conquered the Church there once again. He knows that if he can get the Church, as with the white horse, to fall for false Christianity, he can conquer us. He also knows if he can get us into unrepentant sin, he can conquer us. So we can see here that this red horse gets the world to fight with physical machines and weapons, but when it comes to the Church, we are not afraid of guns and bombs. We are afraid of bad attitudes, thoughts and emotions. We fear the prince of the power of the air. That is our enemy. That is the lion trying to devour us! We need to understand, with God’s power we can defeat him. Without God’s power, we are pretty much hopeless! The third horse, the black horse: famine and disease. We always hear about the black horse marching and bringing about famines that are around the world and disease around the world. In the Church of God we know Amos 8:11 that in the last days there would be a famine of the word. You can write that down and look at that later. You have heard it many times. Another way this black horse attacks the Church is through a famine of God’s word. It makes the Church grow gaunt and weak because it is not fed. It is starving to death! He does this with the sword. If you were to look up the sword that comes upon the Church the first definition in the Hebrew translation is drought. Satan’s sword is to bring a drought, a famine, because of the lack of water or lack of God’s Holy Spirit! If he can do this (if he can get us to starve to death) he can weaken us. He can also cause things like pestilence. Pestilence out in the world to cause disease is one thing, but pestilence in the Church is different. If you were to look up that term “pestilence” the first definition is #1698, which is a pestilence, a disease. But it comes from #1696 which means “to speak in order to subdue”. In other words false doctrines. False doctrines are a sort of pestilence. It is a force that Satan can use to conquer the Church. In other places it is called leprosy. It is a disease that rots you out. False doctrines rot the Church! This is another way that Satan can weaken and destroy the Church! The fourth horse, the pale horse, as you drop down through these columns, is death. Obviously physical death in this physical life is the end of what good or evil we could do in our life. We cannot grow anymore in character once we have died. It is done. When it comes to spiritual death, if Satan can get a God-begotten being to reject Jesus Christ, that is the ultimate harm that Satan can do to a son of God. That is ultimately what he wants to do to God’s entire Church! He wants to kill it with spiritual death and get us to reject Jesus Christ after we have been baptized and after we have received the Holy Spirit. We know from Hebrews 6 if we do totally reject after having first received that, that is it! Christ cannot die twice for us. He will not do that. Therefore, we have God’s promise that He will give us all the resources we need to resist Satan and win. We have to allow Him to work in us. Christ works through His body. Let us go back and read Matthew 10:28. Christ told His apostles, “‘And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.’” In other words, physical death itself is not what we are to be afraid of. We want to fear losing it and God will not let that happen as long as we let Christ work in us. As long as we continue to bear fruit, we will be fine. We have that promise! We have that guarantee. THE SLEEPING CHURCH I believe that many, many of the brethren out there who have fallen asleep, in one sense, have received the loving protection from Jesus Christ. He allowed them to fall asleep so they do not totally reject God. That is another subject in itself. I think Christ is allowing the Church to be deceived just before a person would get totally defeated by Satan. Christ allows them to get deceived and fall asleep so they do not reject. It is just a thought. It helps comfort me, and it may help comfort you because I hate to see Satan defeating so many of God’s people in the ultimate sense. I think God has provided a way out for many of them. I Corinthians 3:12-16 explains that. There is a lesser reward for people who stop bearing fruit, and that is why there is gold, silver and precious jewels in the temple. There is also wood, hay and stubble. We do not want to be stubble because that is a useless thing, but there are uses for wood and for hay. God has it set up so that people can still be preserved it says in those verses right there. Let us read it. I Corinthians chapter 3. Let us refresh our memory for just a moment. I Corinthians 3, starting in verse 12: “Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is. If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.” We understand, as well, that we are the temple of God. But as it says here, “...if anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss...” (that is, loss of reward) “...but he himself, will be saved, yet so as through fire.” So I think there is a certain protection for someone who is deceived and falls asleep rather than rejects God. Unfortunately, I think some are going to actually reject God. I think that will be a small minority. God is a very loving God, and He is trying to provide for His children every which way He can. We see that Satan wants to destroy God’s Church. He already has the world held captive. This world that is held captive is basically his pawns. He uses them and moves them to help destroy the Church as well. Whether it is through war, temptation or any sort of means, he will use the world and move them in order to destroy God’s people. He has done it to the Jews for thousands of years. He has tried to cut us off, and later generations, from receiving the truth (the oracles of God). He tried to destroy Christians over and over again through the moving of men and nations to destroy God’s Church. Let us turn to Romans chapter 8, starting in verse 18: “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God.” So this captive creation is waiting for the sons of God to be revealed, and they do not even understand that! Continuing in verse 20: “For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now. Not only that, but we also who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body.” Verse 24: “For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.” Brethren, that is what we must do. We cannot see the kingdom of God yet, we cannot see our reward; but we believe and trust God it is there! We are part of the hope of mankind that will help liberate them. They are waiting for us to be revealed, but first the body of Christ must be finished being prepared as the bride of Christ! We have to get this last generation ready. How long will it take? I do not know. Only God knows! I can see that our little group is trying desperately to please God, to purify, to allow Him to work in us. I assure you that reward is there for us, that He is working with us and He is trying to develop His love and compassion within us! It is important for us to allow Him at every turn to exercise His qualities, His character in us. We have to let Him do it. That is our job. That, in essence, is our job and how we are part of the hope that the world is waiting to see. They are waiting for us to be revealed at some point. Unfortunately, right now it does not look good! God is doing a miracle, I think, within a few. He has preserved a few. If you were to look at the Church of God as a whole, it does not look good. Turn, if you would, to Revelation chapter 3. There is an expression: It is always darkest just before the dawn. I think in God’s Church that is the case. With the dawn being the return of Jesus Christ, I think it looks the bleakest for God’s Church just before Christ returns. If you notice in Revelation chapter 3, verses 1-6 the Sardis era almost also totally perished! Revelation chapter 3, verse 1: “‘And to the angel of the church in Sardis write, “These things says He who has the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars: ‘I know your works, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead.’”’” So He tells this Church you are basically dead! You are not accomplishing anything. “‘Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die, for I have not found your works perfect before God. Remember therefore how you have received and heard; hold fast and repent. Therefore if you will not watch, I will come upon you as a thief, and you will not know what hour I will come upon you. You have a few names even in Sardis who have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy. He who overcomes shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the Book of Life; but I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’” We need to take this warning to heart too! They were dying. What did God say was the antidote? Repent, overcome, put on white garments, get cleaned up and you shall live! I will not blot your name out of the Book of Life! What was good for Sardis is good for Laodicea. We need to repent. We need to overcome. What worked for Sardis, can work for us as well! We have also been overcome. We have been overcome and we have to help God by allowing Him to work in us. Look at Revelation 3 starting in verse 14 and you can see the condition of our Church era. “‘And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, “These things says the Amen, the Faithful and True Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God; I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’ and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked - I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”’” There again, we are told again to repent. Allow Christ to put eye salve on us so we can see ourselves for what we are. We have entered this era blind to the fact that we are miserable, naked, wretched and poor! We cannot see our condition because it is a spiritual condition! We have become so physical. Satan has overrun the Church and yet the Church has become so self-righteous! I heard one explanation by a member up north here that I thought was very good. He said if you look at the Church as a vase or a piece of pottery as the complete Church when Mr. Herbert Armstrong died, the temple was almost ready to go. Then it was smashed to the floor. It became hundreds and hundreds of little pieces and yet each of those little pieces you could pick up and look at as a miniature vase, a miniature piece of pottery. You would think of it as being all okay with us. We are all fine. It is the rest of the Church that is no good! It is the rest of the Church that does not have it right! This is the case in every group. Every little group seems to think they are okay. They are the Philadelphians and the rest are the Laodiceans. This is a blindness that has shot through and through the Church. It is a deception of Satan! Without repentance and without asking God to open our eyes and let us see what we are really like, we are doomed to stay that way! We do not have any help from Jesus Christ then, so Satan can run rampant through the Church! It is a vicious circle. That is why Christ keeps saying lest you die, repent and put on righteous garments. This is what we need to do. This is our job. This is what we need to focus on. If we do not, that lion is out there ready to pull us down! He will find where we are weak. He will find where we are not repenting. He will find where we are not bearing fruit, and he will exploit that weakness over and over again until we go down! We have to learn to repent and grow and allow Jesus Christ to work in our lives. I keep saying that the Church has been overcome. I am not saying that on my own authority either. If you would turn to Revelation chapter 13, we will see that this is the condition of the Church at this time. It states that we are overcome. Starting in verse 4: “So they worshipped the Dragon who gave authority to the beast; and they worshipped the beast, saying, ‘Who is like the beast? Who is able to make war with him?’ And he was given a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies, and he was given authority to continue for forty-two months. Then he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme His name, His tabernacle, and those who dwell in heaven.” Verse 7: “It was granted to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them. And authority was given him over every tribe, tongue, and nation. All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. If anyone has an ear, let him hear. He who leads into captivity shall go into captivity; he who kills with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.” We see that this beast overcomes the Church! It makes war with the Church and it overcomes the saints. That is our condition right now. The world is out there, not knowingly, saying who can make war with the beast? I am telling you, those who can make war with the beast are those who let Jesus Christ live in them! We are not talking about fighting a physical army. FIGHT THE GOOD FIGHT Satan has deceived the Church into thinking they have to fear physical armies. It is not physical armies destroying the bodies that destroys the Church. It is destroying the spiritual part of the Church that is so awful. So who can make war with the beast? It is those who know how to fight the good fight! It is those who know how to fight wicked spirits in high places. That is our warfare. The ones who understand that can make war with the beast. They can make war with Satan! That is the point of this sermon. How do we make war with Satan? How do we win? How did Christ win? He won in His mind. He won in His heart. He won with purity. He won with love. That is how we must do it as well. It sounds hokey but it is not. That is why Paul said when I am weak, I am strong. Otherwise he would have tried to have the finest chariot, the finest shield and the finest sword! He was not interested in those things. He was interested in how to fight the spiritual war and win. That is what we need to do. We need to learn to fight the spiritual war and win. We have to start by admitting that we have been overcome, the Church has been over run and we have all gone down to some deception or another. We are very weakened as a Church. It is high time some of us stood up and become strong by being weak! We get strong by telling Jesus Christ I got defeated. I was poor, blind, naked, wretched and miserable. I want that fixed! I want Your righteousness in me. I want You to live in me, Christ, so that I can help defeat Satan. I want to help You fight this fight! Up to this point since Christ died, He has been fighting through His body. His body nearly perished in Sardis. Now here we are in Laodicea and it is all but dead! It is all but destroyed! It is all but overcome by Satan. God the Father and Jesus Christ have preserved a few. We are going to learn how to fight, brethren. We are going to learn how to fight very well and it is going to make us have an awesome power, but it is a spiritual power. We are going to learn how to fight because we are going to let Jesus Christ live in us like we have never let Him live in us before. This is our job. This is how we become part of that hope in Romans 8. We are part of that hope for the world. They are groaning, suffering physically, and suffering mental anguish under the tyranny of Satan. They are groaning under that tyranny waiting for someone who can defeat him. That is why it says here in Revelation, who can make war with this beast? Who can fight this lion? Well, it is us brethren! We are going to fight him. We are going to fight him by letting Jesus Christ fight him in us. It is not something we can do ourselves. All we do is allow Him to work in us. Allow Him to bear fruit in us. Open our minds to His way of life. We are going to see this as we continue. This is an incredibly important thing to understand at this point because it looks to me like the rest of the Church has been pretty well defeated! We cannot allow ourselves to go down. I really do not want anyone in our group, here or in Australia or the few that we have here and yon to go down. We have a small enough number as it is. We need to help and encourage each and every one of us and help the rest of us stick it out to the end! Encourage one another to hang in there and help one another. Let us turn to Ephesians chapter 6, starting in verse 10: “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.” Here we are going to get the weaponry we need, the understanding we need right here, brethren. We read verse 12 already but let us read it again. “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Verse 13: “Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.” That is what we are called to do, brethren: stand. Verse 14: “Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end 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 make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in it I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak.” We need to pray for one another, pray for all the saints to get this weaponry together. These are our weapons: truth, righteousness, the gospel, faith, salvation, the sword (which is understanding the word of God) and prayer. We need to get this arsenal together and allow God to use it in His body. What do you do with your body? What do I do with my body. Just today, I worked. I produced something. I used my hands, my arms, my feet. I do not have to go through all the work that I did but I was using lumber and I was using bricks. I was using mortar. I was working. I was building something. I was working on a home. Christ works with His body. We are His hands, we are His feet, we are the mouth that spreads His gospel. That is what He is doing in us, collectively, the body of Christ. He is working in this body. He is also fighting with His body. Did you ever think of that? He is fighting through His body. He is giving us this armor to fight with. He says now let Me live in you and I will help you fight this fight, but you need Me. You cannot defeat Satan by yourself, but with Me you cannot lose! You cannot lose! Won’t you let Me fight with you? That is all we need to do, brethren. It seems so hard! We are overcome by so many things. You see we are fighting sin. If we do not put sin out, we are weaker. The more sin we put out, the more qualities of God we develop. The more mercy, compassion and love we develop within ourselves, the stronger we are! That is why Paul said when I am weak, I am strong. We will see that as we continue here. THE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT We need to focus on this armor and put it to use because this is what we use to fight with. These are the rules of engagement. Satan can use the four horsemen to tear us apart, and we use the armor of God to fight him. When we resist him with the armor of God, he must flee! He has no choice. He cannot defeat us. As he could not defeat Jesus Christ when He walked this Earth, he cannot defeat Jesus Christ’s body if we allow Christ to work in us. It is impossible. That is how important it is for us to learn to use Christ’s armor, His weaponry, to fight Satan. Turn now, if you would, to II Corinthians chapter 12, starting in verse 7: “And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me...” Paul is saying I have been given a thorn in the flesh so I do not boast that I was able to overcome. He goes on to say, “...a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’” Christ’s strength is made perfect in weakness, brethren. We do not have any spiritual strength of our own, but with Christ we have His strength. Continuing on in II Corinthians 12:9, last half: “Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” That is how we have to get to be, brethren. When we are weak, we are strong. When we are humble, we are strong. When we are kind, we are strong. When we love, we are strong. When we do not judge harshly, we are strong. This is what Christ is trying to tell us. Put on My armor. Speak the truth. Be humble, meek, kind and loving. Be compassionate and merciful and you will be unconquerable, for you are bearing My fruit in your body which you have allowed Me to use as part of My body. Therefore, we become His hands, His feet and His arms in order to fight Satan up to the very end. We can qualify to be part of that government and continue on judging and ruling forever because we have learned these Godly qualities now. As we see the Church get over run, I was getting very down and discouraged. I realized God is taking care of His Church. It will not be defeated, and He wants to get a few people. It is a lot easier to get a few dozen people cleaned up rather than 100,000. So we should not be afraid. The Church is probably stronger when it is weak because Christ can really live in it. Christ can really do something with the Church. This is the hope we must have. We must understand this and put it to use in our lives for then we can fight the good fight. Fight that good fight we must. Turn to I Timothy chapter 6, verse 12: “Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.” Fight the good fight of faith. Remember one of the pieces of armor of God is faith. With faith we extinguish the darts of Satan. Turn to II Timothy chapter 4, verse 7. Paul says, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” We want to be like Paul. Fight the good fight and keep the faith. Do not give up! Let Christ live in us. Remember the fight is in our minds, it is in our hearts. That is the warfare we fight just like Jesus Christ fought. It was a mind game. Let us go back and read another account of the temptation of Jesus Christ. Go to Matthew chapter 4, starting in verse 1. “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, ‘If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.’ But He answered and said, ‘It is written, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”’” Verse 5: “Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, ‘If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: “He shall give His angels charge over you,” and, “In their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash Your foot against a stone.”’” Verse 7: “Jesus said to him, ‘It is written again, “You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’” Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to Him, ‘All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.’ Then Jesus said to him, ‘Away with you, Satan! For it is written “You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.’” Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.” Jesus Christ resisted Satan in His mind and that is what we need to do. Ours is a spiritual war just like Jesus Christ’s was but it has physical manifestations in this world. It will help relieve this world of the oppression and release the people. It will release the captives and give them liberty, both physical and spiritual liberty. This can occur when we are done fighting the fight and the bride has cleaned itself up. The temple will have made itself ready so Jesus Christ can come to His temple, come to that bride and begin ruling with His government. We are very close, brethren. Like I said earlier, it is darkest just before the dawn. Turn to I Peter chapter 1. It confirms that this fight is in our mind. I Peter 1, starting in verse 3: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you...” That inheritance is reserved for us, brethren. “...who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” This is the power that is going to be revealed in the last time. This is the power that is going to be revealed that was mentioned in Romans 8. There are people with this power, people with the armor. They will be revealed. These are the ones who can fight with the beast. Verse 6: “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith - the salvation of your souls.” Verse 10 of I Peter 1: “Of this salvation the prophets have inquired and searched carefully, who prophesied of the grace that would come to you, searching what, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when He testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. To them it was revealed that, not to themselves, but to us they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven - things which angels desire to look into.” I think some of the things, brethren, that we are starting to learn now the angels have been waiting to see! Those things that are being understood in the final battle against Satan are things that no one has fully understood until now. There is probably a very good reason for that. That means Satan did not understand it either. God reserves certain things to fight with at the end time that Satan would have to react to because he did not have time to prepare either. But when he sees his time is short, he is in great wrath. Brethren, I think we are involved in the final battles here. We have to put on the armor of God and continue to fight with Jesus Christ. Allow Him to work in us. Let us continue on here in verse 13 of I Peter chapter 1: “Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ...” Put on and gird up the loins of your minds, brethren. It is in our minds that we are fighting this fight. “...as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance; but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, ‘Be holy, for I am holy.’” We need to be pure in all of our conduct. We need to be holy in our motives, trying desperately to please God and cleansing every morning and every evening and even mid-day if we can remember to do it. Ask God to clean us up constantly so that we are pure. He knows we still are going to fall, but He says repent. That is what He says to the Laodiceans. He says repent and I am there to forgive you. But you have to know you have sinned. You have to accept the fact that you are wrong then you can repent, then you can change. Then I can help you. I can give you this armor and you will be undefeatable! That is how we have to be, brethren. We have to realize these things and fight this good fight by girding up the loins of our mind and fighting off sin, for it is sin that corrupts and it is sin that defiles the temple of God. It is sin that puts the spots and the blemishes on the bride so that Jesus Christ cannot come back and marry it, which gives Satan more time to do more destructive acts. It is a vicious circle and we have to help Jesus Christ stop it! By letting Him live in us, we do so! There are many scriptures that I can point to. We will read a few about how we are to treat each other and how to treat our fellow man. By doing so, we are fighting the good fight. Turn, if you would, to James chapter 5, verse 7. These are ways to fight. “Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain. You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold, the Judge is standing at the door!” Do not judge harshly, we are told. Then He must judge us harshly. Verse 10: “My brethren, take the prophets, who spoke in the name of the Lord, as an example of suffering and patience. Indeed we count them blessed who endure.” We need to endure like they endured. Now go to James chapter 1. James chapter 1, starting in verse 12: “Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.” Blessed is the person who has been tempted and uses the armor to resist! That is our job. That is how we receive a reward. This is how we grow in character. Continuing in verse 13: “Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am tempted by God;’ for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth so sin; and sin when it is full-grown, brings forth death.” That is what Satan wants! He wants to destroy us! When we resist and we let Jesus Christ and His fruits be borne in us, (those fruits come to fruition, you might say within us) we cannot be defeated. We cannot be defeated. So when we resist sin, we are fighting the spiritual warfare, and we are fighting the beast! We are fighting Satan! Continuing in verse 16 of James 1: “Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures. So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God.” Bring every thought, every emotion into captivity because remember that is one of the horses that Satan uses to destroy us and put sinful attitudes (sinful emotions) into our thinking. He gets us to produce sin. Sinning repeatedly without repenting will bring about death. That is what Satan wants to do. Continuing in verse 21: “Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.” Continuing in James 1, verse 26: “If anyone among you thinks he is religious, and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this one’s religion is useless.” If we do not bring every thought into captivity, use our tongues wisely and grow in mercy and compassion our religion is useless! God cannot fight with us. He cannot use His body to fight. He allows that person to be deceived. He allows that person to go to sleep, as it were, and He will fight with whom He can fight with. He is down to precious few, brethren! So let us continue to allow Jesus Christ to live in us and to cleanse us so that He can fight with what He has left here. He will win! I think truly the Church is at its strongest when it is weak because we can be unified. We can love each other the way we should. We will not have the divisions in our little group that they have in the bigger groups. We will be indivisible. We will be united. That makes us strong. This is what we need to have at this time because the whole Church has been over run. II Timothy chapter 2, verse 1: “You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier. And also if anyone competes in athletics, he is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules.” Brethren, we have looked at the rules of engagement and we have to compete by these rules. We have agreed when we were baptized to allow Christ to live in us, which means we agreed to allow Him to use our body to fight Satan. Also we agreed to bear fruit to get ready to be part of that government. We have to keep our end of the agreement and allow Him to work and live in us. Verse 6: “The hardworking farmer must be first to partake of the crops. Consider what I say, and may the Lord give you understanding in all things. Remember that Jesus Christ, of the seed of David, was raised from the dead according to my gospel, for which I suffer trouble as an evildoer, even to the point of chains; but the word of God is not chained. Therefore I endure all things for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.” Verse 11: “This is a faithful saying: For if we died with Him, we shall also live with Him. If we endure, we shall also reign with Him. If we deny Him, he also will deny us. If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself. Remind them of these things, charging them before the Lord not to strive about words to no profit, to the ruin of the hearers. Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” That means be very careful not to push false or wrong doctrine. We need to rightly divide the word of truth. Verse 16: “But shun profane and idle babblings, for they will increase to more ungodliness. And their message will spread like cancer. Hymenaeus and Philetus are of this sort, who have strayed concerning the truth, saying that the resurrection is already past; and they overthrow the faith of some. Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, having this seal: ‘The Lord knows those who are His,’ and, ‘Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity.’” That is our job. That is how we fight - by departing from iniquity. Verse 20: “But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honor and some for dishonor. Therefore if anyone cleanses himself from the latter, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful for the Master, prepared for every good work.” That is what we want to achieve. We want to be useful for the Master. Allow Him to live and work in us to fight with His body and help liberate this world from the tyranny of Satan. Verse 22 of II Timothy 2: “Flee also youthful lusts; but pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart. But avoid foolish and ignorant disputes, knowing that they generate strife. And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth,. and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.” The world is captive and a lot of the brethren have gone back into captivity! We do them a great service if we hang in there. Eventually some of them are going to find their way back. Some of us have to hold fast. Allow Jesus Christ to live and work in us. I Thessalonians chapter 4, starting in verse 1: “Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus. For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified.” Verse 7: “For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness. Therefore he who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who has also given us His Holy Spirit. But concerning brotherly love you have no need that I should write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another; and indeed you do so toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren, that you increase more and more...” That is very important for us in this day and age. Learn to grow in proper love for the brethren more and more. “...that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with our own hands, as we commanded you, that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and that you may lack nothing.” We need to be an example also to the people outside of the faith. When they look at us, they must be able to see because of our love for one another that we must be the Church. They should see through our diligent work in supporting our families, taking care of one another and providing for the work of God, that it would be obvious to them who the Church is when God opens their minds. We will be able to then help and teach them. Verse 13 of I Thessalonians chapter 4: “But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep.” We will be reunited with those who have died in Christ in the past at the resurrection. There are members of the government who have lived before. We understand that. We are just a final composition of the government. We are the last act! We are the ones who have to be put in to finally finish the temple, the body of Christ, so that He can come and marry this bride. The Church is such a mess. We have delayed things long enough! We need to get busy about this job and get it done. Continuing in verse 15 of I Thessalonians chapter 4: “For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.” We are waiting for that time, and it is coming quickly! So we have to continue to bear fruit and fight this fight with all of the time that we have remaining. Colossians chapter 3, starting in verse 1: “If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.” Let us not get caught up in all the sins we can get caught up in: blasphemy, filthy language, sexual sins, disobedience, idolatry. Let us not get caught up in them. We need to get rid of all of that stuff and put our minds on the things that are above. Learn to walk in unity and love as the bride of Christ. Get this last Church era over with so that Christ can return and this groaning world can finally have peace. Finally we will get rid of these attitudes that these four horsemen bring to the world. The war, the famine, the disease, the pain, the suffering, the deceptions are a result of them. We need to assist God in being part of the solution here and not part of the problem. For if the hope of the world were to all get conquered and die, what hope would there be left? Christ must come to a temple, and He must come to a bride. We just need to avail ourselves of Him. Let Him work in His body so that He can fight this fight right up until He comes back and marries His bride. Then the government will finally get installed and depose the government of Satan. Let us read James 4, starting in verse 7 once again. We read this a little earlier. “Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.” That is it! Resist the devil and he will flee. As Jesus Christ beat Satan with the mind game, Jesus Christ gives His body now the strength. He gives us the armor of God to wage the war and defeat Satan at the mind game. When we do that, we get rid of the spots and the blemishes, we cleanse and we get the bride ready. We are then assisting the world and the brethren who are struggling right now, and we are assisting Jesus Christ in bringing His government back. When we are ready, the Father will determine that and send Jesus Christ back. The world will have that beautiful Millennium that we have all been waiting for. We are engaging a horrible enemy! He is vicious beyond our understanding, but we have far greater strength than he has. We have far greater authority because we have the authority of Jesus Christ living within us. Turn for the last scripture to II Corinthians 10, starting in verse 1. Paul writes something very interesting here. “Now I, Paul, myself am pleading with you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ - who in presence am lowly among you, but being absent am bold toward you. But I beg you that when I am present I may not be bold with that confidence by which I intend to be bold against some, who think of us as if we walked according to the flesh. For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh.” He says I will be bold with people who think I war in the flesh because that is not the fight I am fighting. I am fighting a spiritual war. Verse 4: “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds...” Now what are those strongholds? Those are the strongholds of Satan. What are those beasts and what are those horsemen? We are going to help pull them down! We are going to help pull down the mountains of Satan, as we have learned before, and replace them with the mountain of God. God is going to do that using His body. Verse 5: “...casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.” We bring every thought into captivity. We fight the mind game. We win the war! Then we eventually will be given rulership with Jesus Christ to judge angels and judge the world when our obedience is fulfilled. Brethren, like I said, we have come down to the last act. It is the last act of the play, and we have to get it right! We just have a few players left on the field, a few left standing. We must not go down! We must encourage one another to hang in there. We must love each other properly, encourage each other, be there for one another and help us all to make it. God will be there. He promises that He will never leave or forsake us. That is the truth, but we have to allow Him to live in us. When we do so, we will help pull down these strongholds that have held mankind captive for 6,000 years! To that end, brethren, let us work and pray together always.