The Battle Is The Lord’s!
Part 2

     What do we want in this life? What we want doesn’t even compare with what God wants for us, His best! God wants us to have things and people in our lives that we can enjoy, but first we have to have the capacity to enjoy them. We need to have the thinking of Christ. If we have our minds on things and people without using divine viewpoint, it’s too easy to walk in darkness. Our enemies are in the darkness. If we choose to walk in the darkness, we will be with our enemies. Not very cozy! If we choose to walk in the Light, we will be walking with God. Remember, God has given to Church-age believers spiritual tools. They make available to us the benefits that flow from the essence of God. When we use the benefits from God’s essence, it is the same as God’s glory being in our lives. God wants us to experience His glory! Isn’t that amazing? God is our Leader in our spiritual battle. The battle is the Lord’s!  

Omnipotence: Church-age believer has 100% availability of divine power.  Ephesians 1:18-20

Omnipresence: Church-age believer sits at the right hand of God with Christ. Eph. 2:6

Omniscience: Church-age believer is given the full revelation of God’s message to mankind.  1 Corinthians 1:12,24;  Romans 15:14

Righteousness: Church-age believer possesses the very righteousness of God.  Romans 4:5

Justice:  Church-age believer is justified before God forever. Romans 3:24

Love:  Church-age believer can love with the same love from God.  John 13:34

Eternal Life: Church-age believer possesses the eternal life of God.  John 5:24

Veracity: Church-age believer is given the full revelation of the truth.  John 16:13

Sovereignty: Church-age believer can be a ruler with Christ in the Millennial reign. Rev. 2:26-28

Immutability: Church-age believer is in union with Christ.  His position and his resurrection body in heaven will never change.  John 8:35, 1John 2:17

Proverbs 11:28 He who trusts in his riches will fall, but the righteous will flourish like the green leaf.

      Adam and Eve lost the glory of God when they fell. They lost the Light. The glory that is restored to the Church-age believer at salvation is the full glory that was lost at the fall. Israel could only be given a part of this glory. This was because the cross of Christ was still in the future. The old testament believers learned God’s plan through ritual. It was slowly revealed to them. They were waiting for more information. The plan for the new testament believer is the reality. We have everything we need in the Bible! We’re not waiting for more information! So, learning, believing, and using the Word of God is how we get to know God, how we get His glory, how we regain the Light!

2 Corinthians 3:18 But we all , with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror [the Word of God] the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory [Jesus Christ] to glory [His glory in us], just as from the Lord, the Spirit.
 

     We’ll be marching along in our battle with the Lord and come to times when we’ve made good progress in our spiritual lives. We are enjoying the gifts that God has given us. This is when we have to be careful not to think too highly of ourselves and forget how we got to this point! Spiritual growth is a gift from God. He gave us everything that we need to grow in the spiritual life. It is not because of our smarts or cleverness that we advance. God supplies us with the armor and leads us all the way. The battle is the Lord’s!

Deuteronomy 6:12 Then watch yourself, that you do not forget the Lord Who brought you from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

      In times of failure or adversity, we have to recall the doctrines of our position in Christ and then relax! At salvation, each believer is given a new nature which has +R, God’s righteousness. In that new nature we are totally O.K. with God because He is looking at His +R. He has made us O.K.! Isn’t that cool? Sometimes we walk in our old sin natures. However, once we tell God the Father our sins, He forgets them and wants us to do the same! We are not to condemn ourselves, but we are to walk in the Spirit in the freedom God has given us! We are to walk in the Light, the glory of God! The battle is the Lord’s!

Romans 7:24-25 Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

Romans 8:1-2 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.

     In our spiritual battle, we have to know our enemy. We actually have three dangerous enemies that are sources of darkness. Their job is to put darkness where God’s glory should be, in our souls! Meet our first enemy, Satan. He works hard to darken our hearts so that we don’t have God’s thinking. Satan wants to replace the glory of God with his thinking. He doesn’t want us to pray because he knows how helpful prayer is, so he distracts us while we are praying. He doesn’t want us to forgive each other because he doesn’t want people to get along. Satan wants the Royal Family to argue. If we allow his thinking to rule us, we will live in darkness rather than in the glory that God has freely given to us. Our light will be knocked out.

 

Acts 26:11 And as I [Paul] punished them [Christians] often in all the synagogues, I tried to force them to blaspheme; and being furiously enraged at them, I kept pursuing them even to foreign cities.

Acts 26:18 [God was going to send Paul] To open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from dominion of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith in Me.

      Meet our second enemy, the cosmic system, run by the kingdom of darkness! That kingdom is an organized army of fallen angels commanded by Satan. They have a program to make our lives dark! This means to make us unable to see God’s glory, His light! They will attack us where we are unprepared! To defeat this enemy we need to stand firm and put on the full armor of God.
We need to pick up and put on the four spiritual mechanics:

                        1. the filling of the Holy Spirit, 

                        2. perception, metabolization, and application of Bible doctrine,

                        3. living in the predesigned plan of God,

                        4. using the ten problem-solving devices.
If we don’t do this, then we will be living under the influence of the world forces of darkness. God has given us all of the tools to become winners in the spiritual life! He has given us everything that we need to walk in the Light!
The battle is the Lord’s!
 

Ephesians 6:10-12 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places [the fallen angels].

      Introducing our third enemy, the old sin nature. This one is right inside of us! Sometimes we call it the old man in comparison to the new man which we receive at salvation. The old sin nature wants to control each one’s soul! Its purpose is to prevent us from being under the filling of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit’s job is to fight the battle against the old sin nature. The old sin nature doesn’t want the Holy Spirit to fight and protect us from it. It desires to put us in darkness! It is so important for us to take in Bible doctrine daily. We need Christ’s thinking so that we will have the light and see how wrong the thoughts are that come from our old man. We each need to live in our new man! Down with the old man and up with the new man! Down with darkness and up with the Light! The battle is the Lord’s.

1 John 1:5-7 This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood [spiritual separation from God on the cross] of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.
 

      We can be covered in the darkness of our enemies if we fail to follow the four spiritual mechanics*. However, when we let one of our enemies get to us, we just have to rebound, and “click”, we’re back in God’s light again. We are filled with the Holy Spirit again. Then we need to learn, believe, and apply the word of God. We learn about the glory of God through His word. As our hearts or minds are changed, we will have more and more of God’s glory in our souls. We will be benefiting from more of His attributes! So, let’s make good use of our four spiritual mechanics!

*1. Filling of the Holy Spirit,  2. Perception, metabolization, and application of Bible doctrine,  3. Living in the predesigned plan of God,  4.  Using the ten problem-solving devices.
 

2 Corinthians 6:14 Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness?
 

     There will be times in the predesigned plan of God that we will feel very alone. This is good! God wants us to be alone with Him. He wants us to get our eyes off people and to focus on Him. What matters is what God thinks about us, not what people think about us! To be left alone with God is the only true way of arriving at an accurate knowledge of ourselves and our ways. Through Bible doctrine, He will change us! I’m not saying that this will be fun. Admitting to and throwing away some of our behavior will be difficult, but we have the power of God the Holy Spirit. In being left alone with God, what better company could we have? He is our faithful Friend. He is love, justice, righteous, sovereign, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, immutable, and eternal! “If God is for us, who can be against us?” Let’s walk with God; let’s walk in His light or glory!

Jeremiah 12:3 But Thou knowest me, O Lord; Thou seest me; And Thou dost examine my heart’s attitude toward Thee. 
 

      We have a choice here on earth to have God’s glory exist in our hearts. We have the choice to say “NO” to our enemies: Satan, the kingdom of darkness, and our old sin natures. To help us, we have the precious gifts of the filling of the Holy Spirit, Bible doctrine, predesigned plans for our lives, and ten problem solving devices. Therefore, the Word of God is not veiled to us; we have all that we need to grow in God’s grace and knowledge. Everyday we can have God’s glory, His light, in our lives! Let’s get cracking!

Proverbs 19:8 He who gets wisdom loves his own soul; He who keeps understanding will find good.
 

The Battle Is the Lord’s
       Part 2

References used:

                    Robert R.McLaughlin Bible Ministries   www.gbible.org                   
                   
                    Lessons:   6-16-05, 11-14-07, 11-18-07, 11-28-07, 11-29-07,
                                     11-  30-07, 12-19-07