Text: 1 John 3:8, Title: An Army of One, Date/Place: NRBC, 12/16/07, AM
A. Opening illustration: Historian Philip Schaff described the overwhelming influence which Jesus had on subsequent history and culture of the world: “This Jesus of Nazareth, without money and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander, Caesar, Mohammed, and Napoleon; without science…he shed more light on things human and divine than all philosophers and scholars combined; without the eloquence of schools, he spoke such words of life as were never spoken before or since, and produced effects which lie beyond the reach of orator or poet; without writing a single line, he set more pens in motion and furnished themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, learned volumes, works of art, and songs of praise than the whole army of great men of ancient and modern times.”
B. Background to passage: The book of 1 John is written to a congregation that is in the middle of a split. Part of the split is a power struggle, but the more serious reason is heresy. The ones that left John’s Ephesian congregation were teaching falsehood about the person of Jesus, that was leading people to sin and damnation. Therefore John wrote the book, not only to help the true church survive, but to help all the congregation know the truth and discern if they are really “in the truth.” And our passage today deals with the differences between genuine children of God (believers) and children of Satan (non-believers). And it makes a passing reference to another reason that Christ came to earth, and that’s what we are going to talk about today. Even though our text doesn’t thoroughly elaborate on it,
C. Main thought: we are going to look at nine ways that Jesus destroys the work of the devil.
A. 1. Opens blinded eyes
1. In 2 Cor 4:3-4, it tells us that unbelievers minds are blinded by the god of this age, lest the light of the gospel would shine through. It is Jesus Christ that brings us from darkness to light. This is the indication of our text in v. 7-9.
2. Acts 26:18,
3. Illustration: tell about Craig Foster’s hitchhiking ride that led him to Jesus,
4. Jesus destroys the work of Satan when He bursts through our darkness and blindness and lets us see a great Light. If you are saved today, this is what happened. If this has never happened, you are not saved. This is probably the most glorious work that Christ destroys, and the one from which all others flow.
B. 2. Breaks bondage of sin
1. One of the things that Satan does to unbelievers is that he keeps them bound to sin. Unbelievers have natural minds that cannot understand the things of the Spirit because they are bound in sin. But when Christ comes in he breaks the hold that sin has over us completely in reality. He gives us a new nature, new desires, new heart, and a right spirit.
2. John 8:34,
3. Illustration: third verse of And Can It Be,
4. Therefore, only a genuine believer has the choice of whether or not to sin. Lost people only sin. And Christ is the only thing that will break it. Addictions, compulsions, temptations, habits, etc. are only a symptom of the problem which lies at the heart. This is why you must be saved to change, not change to be saved.
C. 3. Empowers us to defeat sin
1. Another of Satan’s work is to tempt you and cause you to fall even after you are saved. But Christ deals with that too. He gave us the Holy Spirit. He gave us the Word. He gave us the church. And he promised to always be with us wherever we go.
2. 1 Cor 10:13,
3. Illustration: Terrified, the four jumped out, each grabbed a corner of the jeep, physically lifted it up, turned the vehicle 180o and raced to safety. When they got back to their base they bragged about what they had done to their buddies but nobody believed them. So they said, "Well, come outside and we’ll show you we can do it." But when they tried to do it a second time they could not lift the jeep one inch off the ground.
4. Satan tempts, but Jesus empowers. We can use the sword of the Spirit empowered by the Spirit himself to beat down sin in our life. You can overcome addictions, compulsions, weaknesses, pride, self-centeredness, homosexuality, anger, hatred, etc, by Jesus Christ. You must kill a defeated foe.
D. 4. Intercedes and defends believers
1. One of the other translations of the name of Satan in Hebrew is “the accuser.” But we have an advocate who will always be on our side. Christ always defends believers with His blood that is a sufficient payment for anything that they have done.
2. 1 John 2:1,
3. Illustration: picture a courtroom setting with Satan as the prosecutor and just after an eternally long list of wrongs is read, Christ lays down the trump card of His precious blood
4. He is like that friend that will always be therefore you, always taking your side, getting your back. Warn again against presumptuous sin, because a true believer doesn’t want that.
E. 5. Fills mind with good promptings
1. John 13:2 says that Satan put it in the heart of Judas to betray Christ. Satan inspired a third of the angels to rebel against God. He incited Eve to rebellion. Satan is behind every betrayal from the beginning, and his favorite labor is to prompt us and tempt us to sin. That is the essence of the text we are looking at today. But Christ fills our minds with good things to do. The Spirit within us acts with the mind of Christ
2. 2 Cor 10:5,
3. Illustration: Satan’s schemes are kinda like: When Steve Tran of Westminster, California, closed the door after activating twenty-five bug bombs, he thought he had seen the last of the cockroaches that shared his apartment. When the spray reached the pilot light of the stove, it ignited, blasting his screen door across the street, breaking all his windows, and setting his furniture ablaze. "I really wanted to kill all of them," he said. "I thought if I used a lot more, it would last longer." According to the label, just two canisters of the fumigant would have solved Tran’s roach problem. The blast caused over $10,000 damage to his apartment building. And the cockroaches? Tran reported, "By Sunday, I saw them walking around." Don’t blow your screen door off trying to deal with a cockroach irritation in life. And Christ operates like those Allstate commercials where the grizzly bear is sitting in the mini-van eating the donuts, and it goes in reverse…
4. And if we walk in the Spirit, walk in the Light (v. 7) we will be filled with good things, thoughts, and promptings counteracting what Satan throws out. If we continue in the Spirit rebellions and all the evil things will be silenced in our minds.
F. 6. Bears witness to truth
1. Satan is a liar, a deceiver, and the father of all liars. Jesus came to bear witness to the truth, because He is the truth. Every word He spoke, thought He had, was absolute truth. You can always trust Him, and His Word.
2. Titus 1:2
3. Illustration: tell about the man who trained his children to discern truth from error by watching TV and saying, “That’s a lie,”
4. Satan and his children teach many lies. But it is impossible for God to lie or deceive or mislead. Any truth that is opposite of the teachings of Jesus is falsehood. Jesus came to destroy the lies that you have been told about God, about yourself, about the universe, and about eternity.
G. 7. Advances the kingdom
1. Another of Satan’s works is to hinder the kingdom agenda. He does this through immorality in certain situations, apathy in some, compromise in some, heresy in some. Anything that he can pull of to slow, stop, hinder, hold back, delay, impede, thwart, deter, or obstruct he will. But the fact is that he knows the end of the book, but his goal is to take as many as he can out with him.
2. 1 Thess 2:18,
3. Illustration: “When you fully comprehend that there is more to life than just here and now, and you realize that life is just preparation for eternity, you will begin to live differently. You will start living in light of eternity, and that will color how you handle every relationship, task, and circumstance. Suddenly many activities, goals, and even problems that seemed so important will appear trivial, petty, and unworthy of your attention. The closer you live to God, the smaller everything else appears.When you live in the light of eternity, your values change. You use your time and money more wisely. You place a higher premium on relationships and character instead of fame or wealth or achievements or even fun. Your priorities are reordered. Keeping up with trends, fashions, and popular values just doesn’t matter as much anymore.”
4. So when your alarm doesn’t go off on a Sunday, or you have a family fight right before church, or a business meeting drags on and on and on, or LMCO is spent somewhere else and missionaries are not appointed, or when the world turns the attention of studying missionaries or pastors, or when those who have made commitments break them, all these are the work of Satan. But Jesus works in our lives to direct them with a kingdom agenda.
H. 8. Restores, gives life, and rebuilds
1. Jesus tells us that the job description of the minions of Satan is to “steal, kill, and destroy.” And we see Jesus doing the opposite. We see Him restoring health, which we know that Satan is proximately responsible for. We see Jesus giving life, where death (spiritual and physical) has come. We see Jesus rebuilding lives, like Mary Magdalene, Zaccheus, Matthew, Simon, Paul, etc. that were ravaged with immorality, hate, greed, and apathy.
2. Illustration: tragedy like what happened this week in CO, is nothing but a huge opportunity for God to restore what it seems the devil has messed up, but God is doing much more through it than through its absence,
3. Jesus came to undo what the fall did, what Satan continues to do in the lives of lost humanity. And he does. Wish we could simultaneously listen to all the testimony of people in this room of what Jesus has restored to their lives. Of the things that Jesus has saved them from. Of the spiritual death that they have been revived from. Of the rebuilding of marriages, relationships, etc. Jesus is the ultimate Life-Giver!
I. 9. Gives us victory over death, hell, & the grave
1. Again scripture tells us that Satan is the proximate cause of death, even though it is simply God who ordains or allows it. Jesus made a mockery of all the sin and evil against us on the cross. And after He earned our victory, He rose victorious from the grave, and because He did, we will.
2. Col 2:15, Heb 2:14,
3. Illustration: "All the disciples of Christ despise death; they take the offense against it and, instead of fearing it, by the sign of the cross and by faith in Christ trample on it as on something dead. But now that that the Savior has raised His body, death is no longer terrible, but all those who believe in Christ tread it underfoot as nothing, and prefer to die rather than to deny their faith in Christ, knowing full well that when they die they do not perish, but live indeed, and become incorruptible through the resurrection. Even children hasten thus to die, and not men only, but women train themselves by bodily discipline to meet it. So weak has death become that even women, who used to be taken in by it, mock it now as a dead thing robbed of all its strength. Death has become like a tyrant who has been completely conquered by the legitimate monarch; bound hand and foot as he now is, the passers-by jeer at him, hitting him and abusing him, no longer afraid of his cruelty and rage, because of the king who has conquered him. So has death been conquered and branded for what it is by the Savior on the cross. It is bound hand and foot, all who are in Christ trample it as they pass and witness to Him deride it, scoffing and saying, ’O Death, where is thy victory? O Grave, where is thy sting’” -Athanasius
4. We are promised that death for the Christian is just a shadow, a door, a transition. And it is not permanent, even for our bodies as one day in awesome power God will raise up those bodies to newness of life in a glorified form. And one day ultimate victory over these things will be ours as death and hell themselves are cast into the lake of fire.
A. Closing illustration: Tradition tells us that around the time when Jesus was a teenager, there was a rebellion near where he lived. The Roman army crushed the rebellion but they didn’t want it to happen again, so they crucified an Israelite every 10 meters along the road for a distance of 16 kilometers. The sight of some 1,700 people, dead or dying in agony, on crosses spaced every 30 feet for 10 miles must have made an incredible impression on the mind of a teenager, but He still stomped on the head of Satan in the garden, and steadfastly embraced the cross for us, so that the work of Satan would be defeated.
B. Rom 16:20,
C. Invitation to commitment
Additional Notes
• Is Christ Exalted, Magnified, Honored, and Glorified?
