Word of Salvation – Vol. 31 No. 02 – Jan 1986

 

The Enemy Of God’s People

 

Sermon by Rev. J. Haverland on Ephesians 6:10,12

Readings: Dan. 10:10-11:1

Singing: P.H. 484, 467, 358, 466.

 

Many of our hymns speak of the Christian life as a battle.
            "Stand up stand up for Jesus ye soldiers of the cross"
            "Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war"
            "Am I a soldier of the cross, a follower of the Lamb?"

These hymns describe the Christian life as a conflict, a warfare, a fight between two opposing armies.

It is a good picture because the Christian life is a battle.  Paul in these verses calls it a struggle.  The word actually means "to wrestle".  The implication is that each of us should be involved in a fight with the enemy.  Each of us should be engaged in hand to hand conflict with our spiritual opponents.

Now nothing is so important in warfare as knowing the enemy.  Anyone who has been involved in warfare will tell you this.  The greatest mistakes in battle have been made when people have not understood their opponents; when they have failed to take the time to evaluate their opposition.

This is true of the Christian warfare as well.  We need to know the enemy.  We need to know what he is like; we need to know his character, his strength, his weaknesses.  So today let's take a close look at the enemy we are fighting.

1.  THE NATURE OF THE ENEMY.

The first thing we need to look at is the nature of the enemy.  What exactly is he like?  Paul makes it clear that he is not flesh and blood.

"Our struggle is not against flesh and blood".

Flesh and blood means humans, people, living, physical beings that you can touch and hold and see.  Our fight is not against other people.  They are not the real enemy.

Now it is true that we do have to fight against the world.  That is, the whole system of evil in society today.

It is also true that we need to fight against the flesh.  Our own sinful desires.

But they aren't the ultimate enemy.  The ultimate enemy is not flesh and blood, it is spiritual.

The real fight is against spiritual powers; "against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places".  That is where the battle lies!

One of the greatest mistakes of modern man is his failure to realise this.  This is the mistake of communism, of humanism, of the evolutionary theory.

All these systems of thought think that the real world is the world that you can see – the material, physical world.  They think of the world as a closed system.  They have the idea that the world that you can touch and taste and see is the only real world.

But the Bible tells us otherwise.  The Bible tells us that there are spiritual forces at work in the world.  There are influences and powers in this world that you and I can't see, not with the physical eye at least.

This is clear from that 1^st phrase of vs.12 particularly.  "The spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places."  These forces are spiritual.  They are in the “heavenly places".  That word (heavenly places) is used in other places in this letter to the Ephesians.  In chapter 1 vs.3 it is used to describe the place where the believer is with Christ.  Now this doesn't mean that these powers of wickedness are right there with our Lord Jesus, but it does mean that they are there in the world of spiritual reality.  That is what the word means: The realm of spiritual things.

Paul mentions the same truth in 1Cor.10:4: "For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but are for divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses."

This is not just a physical battle.

Now this should be the experience of every Christian.  As you try to live the Christian life you must come face to face with this spiritual enemy!  That is why Paul begins this final section of Ephesians with this word "finally".

Finally, he says, let me tell you about the spiritual battle.

If you have followed everything I have said so far in this letter, Paul says, then you will find that you are part of a mighty conflict!  You will find that you are engaging spiritual forces!

Is that your experience?

Have you heard the call to battle.... the roll of drums?

Have you held a sword in your hand, or seen the whites of the eyes of the enemy?

If you haven't, you probably are not fighting.  You are probably sipping coffee in the canteen, or relaxing in the barracks.  You are letting the enemy go past you.  You are letting him over-run you.

But you must wake up!  Because this enemy is particularly dangerous!

2.  THE CHARACTER OF THE ENEMY.

And this brings us to the second thing we should note about the enemy.  We see that he is not only spiritual, but that his character is evil.

These are spiritual forces of wickedness!

We are fighting the world forces of this darkness!

We all know what sort of feeling darkness produces in us.  Children are often afraid of the dark.  Even adults will not walk in certain places at night.  In the dark all sorts of things can hide away unnoticed and unseen.  Darkness is the character of Satan.  This is where Satan is at home.

But darkness may not always appear as darkness.  This is part of the cleverness of Satan.  He can appear as an angel of light.

This is because he once was part of the realm of light.  He was once one of the highest angels of God.  He was one of the most powerful angels in the high command of God.  But the Bible tells us that he was lifted up with pride (1Tim.3:6).  This is why he was condemned, and then cast out of heaven (Rev.12).  Satan, it seems, tried to take over God's place.  He tried to do what he encouraged Eve to do – to be like God.  And so Satan fell.

And when he fell he drew with him a third of the stars we are told (Rev.12:4).

Now these are the forces against us.  This is the enemy.  Their character is evil.  They are against God.  They oppose God.  Together they form the kingdom of darkness.

3.  THE STRENGTH OF THE ENEMY.

As you face this spiritual, and this evil enemy, you need to be aware of his strength.  Every general in an army wants some idea of the strength of the forces against him.  So this is the third thing we should consider.

But we should note two initial things about the power of Satan:

a)         The first is that Satan is not as powerful as God.  We must remember that.  There is a world view called dualism, which is held by some religions.  It teaches that there are two equal and opposing forces in the universe.  These two forces are doing battle.  But they are equal powers, equally strong.  Now that is not the Christian view.  We do believe that there are two powers in the universe, two forces fighting each other, two opposing kingdoms.  But these two are not equal.  Satan is not as powerful as God.  He is essentially a defeated foe.

b)         The other thing to note is that Satan is not omnipresent.  That is, Satan cannot be everywhere at the same time.  God is omnipresent.  Our Lord Jesus is everywhere present through the Holy Spirit.  But Satan is limited to one place at one time.  We see this in the book of Job where Satan reported to God that he had been walking up and down on the earth.

But this does not mean that he is not powerful.  Satan is powerful.

He is strong and we should not underestimate his strength.  He was one of the highest of God's angels and although fallen he is still extremely strong.

Since he is not omnipresent, Satan has appointed his spirits to do his work in the world.  He exercises his influence through his demons.  It seems as though Satan has particular demons appointed over particular nations and empires.  This is why Paul calls them the "rulers", the "world forces" of this darkness.  You can see this this in Daniel ch.10.  Daniel is being addressed by one of the powerful forces in the Kingdom light.  There is some disagreement as to whether this is a powerful angel or whether it is the Lord Jesus Himself.  But whether an angel or the Lord, he is standing against the prince of Persia, and he receives help from Michael, who is one of the chief angels of God.  This prince of Persia is a spiritual power.  He is ruler, a spiritual demon whom Satan has appointed over the empire of Persia (vs.13).  You see the same thing again in vs.20 where a further spiritual conflict is described.  Michael and this person speaking to Daniel will fight against the powers of darkness which have been appointed by Satan over the empires of Persia and Greece.  In other words, Satan has appointed spirits to influence the empires of the world.  These spiritual forces of darkness are powerful enough to do battle with the forces of God, and even detain them!

You have other illustrations of the power and strength of these evil forces in other parts of the Bible.

Look up 2Peter 2:10-11 with me...!  This passage is talking about unrighteous people.  Peter comments that these people do not tremble when they revile angelic majesties.  These people have no idea of the strength of the powers they are meddling with!  They are fools!  He goes on to say that even the angels of God, who are greater in might and power don't revile these powers.  I wonder if you take these forces of darkness as seriously as the angels of God do.

Have a look also at Jude 8 and 9...!  This is a difficult passage but the point is the same.  Even Michael the archangel, one of the most powerful of God's angels did not play around with the devil!  He called upon the power of the Lord in that situation!

There are powerful warnings in these passages for us:

Never play around with the powers of darkness.

Never meddle in them.

Never tamper with them.

Don't underestimate their strength and power.

4.  RESISTANCE TO THE ENEMY

But then you might ask, what am I supposed to do against this sort of enemy?  How am I supposed to fight these powers?  Even the angels of God struggle against them.  What hope have I got?!

Well Paul is concerned to portray the power of the enemy so vividly so that we will prepare ourselves for the battle.  Too many of us are too casual about the Christian faith.

We treat it like a Sunday school picnic.

How seriously do you take the Christian life?

Are you busy with it?

Do you realise that there is a battle going on?

Are you equipping yourself for the conflict?

This is what you must be doing.  The enemy is strong.  And so it is essential that we resist him.

So Paul addresses the opening words of this section to every believer:
            "Finally, BE STRONG!"

Now that charge is addressed to you.
  The verb is imperative.  It is a command!  It is an order.
  It comes directly from the High Command of the Kingdom of Light!.  BE STRONG!

Don't think that you have nothing to do with the Battle.

Don't say, "Ah well, the battle will be won without me.  I don't have to be there.  Others are fighting.”

No, the battle depends on YOU.  YOU must be there.  YOU must be strong.

But notice that Paul adds something here.
  He says to us: be strong in the Lord!

Isn't this a mistake we often make?

We think we can fight the battle in our own strength.

We think we can handle it.

We convince ourselves that we can manage.

But this is to make a fatal error.  This is to underestimate the enemy.  These are spiritual foes, spiritual powers.

You must fight fire with fire, spiritual forces with spiritual forces.  This is why we are told: be strong in the LORD!

Who are we to take on the powers of darkness?

Who are we, flesh and blood, with our puny little minds
            to take on the world rulers of this darkness?!

But thankfully we don't have to fight the battle in our own strength.  A knowledge of the enemy should drive us back to our Lord Jesus – back to the captain of the Hosts!

For we follow our captain into battle!

We are strong in His strength!

We are mighty in His might!

And as we follow him into battle we have the assurance from the Scriptures that He is mighty.  That we can stand in the strength of His might.  He has overcome the forces of darkness.  He has disarmed the rulers and the authorities (Col.2:15) He has rendered powerless him who had the power of death (Hebs.2:14).  He has subjected angels and authorities to him (1Pet.3:22).

And so Paul can urge Timothy: “You therefore my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (2Tim.2:1), and he could say of himself, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" (Philip. 4:13).

Can you say that?

As you face our spiritual foes, are you standing strong in the Lord?

Do you depend on His might?

Are you relying on His victory?

Can you rejoice with the writer of that resurrection hymn:

            The strife is o'er, the battle done
            The victory of life is won
            the song of triumph has begun,
            Alleluia!

            He closed the Yawning gates of hell,
            the bars from heavens High portals fell,
            Let hymns of praise his triumphs tell!
            Alleluia.

With that assurance you can be conquerors!

No, you can be more than conquerors, through him who loved us!

Amen.