Five kings were keeping God’s people from entering the Promised Land. Joshua and his army chased them, so they hid in a cave. Joshua had some of his men block the entrance to the cave, trapping the kings inside while the rest of his army slaughtered the kings’ forces. Once the battle was over, Joshua told the soldiers guarding the entrance to the cave to bring the five kings to him. Here’s what happened next: “And it came to pass, when they brought out those kings unto Joshua, that Joshua called for all the men of Israel, and said unto the captains of the men of war which went with him, Come near, put your feet upon the necks of these kings. And they came near, and put their feet upon the necks of them. And Joshua said unto them, Fear not, nor be dismayed, be strong and of good courage: for thus shall the Lord do to all your enemies against
whom ye fight. And afterward Joshua smote them, and slew them, and hanged them on five trees” (Josh. 10:24 – 26 KJV). This King James Version of the story uses a word that we don’t
use that much: dismayed. Its most literal translation is “to be made unable.” So Joshua was saying to his men, “Don’t be made unable. Don’t fall apart. Don’t freak out. Even though you’re facing impossibility, a great opposition, don’t be afraid. Your God is able, but first you have to get victory over these five kings.” God is still able, but first you have to kill five kings, and I like to think of those kings as our five senses. If you’re going to win the battle of faith, if you’re going to see your family blessed, see your life blessed, see God’s favour then you have to overcome these five kings. Your five senses what you can smell, what you can feel, what you can see, what you can hear, and what you can taste are powerful evangelists of unbelief. If you allow them to, your five senses can talk you out of what God’s Word has promised you. You have to learn to put your foot on the necks of your five senses. You have to subdue them and say, “You’re not going to steal from me what I know God’s Word has promised me.”
1. The Smell of Truth
In Daniel 3, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were thrown into the fiery furnace. When God brought them out, not a hair on their heads was burned. Scripture makes an interesting distinction: “there was no smell of fire on them” (emphasis mine). In other words, they went through a fiery situation where they should have been burned, but they came through without even the smell of smoke. God doesn’t want you to go through fiery trials and smell like them for the rest of your life. Sometimes I meet people who have been through a fiery trial, and every time I’m around them, that’s all they can talk about. Maybe you were burned in a relationship. Maybe you were burned in a business deal. Maybe you were burned at a church because some preacher was a hypocrite or somebody hurt you. Perhaps now you judge everybody the same way. If you’re going to win your faith fight, first you have to gain victory over what you smell.
I don’t want to smell like everything I’ve been through. Ministry has taken me through a lot of stuff. People in ministry can take home the smell of their work. We deal with problems and lots of
messy issues, but I don’t want to take that smell home to my kids. Just imagine how those Old Testament priests must have smelled: the blood, the gore, the burning of sacrifices. That’s why the priests had to burn incense. God said, “To kill the smell of ministry, burn incense.” Worship is a type of burning incense. Worshiping helps grant us victory over smell. In John 11, Lazarus had been dead for four days when Jesus told them to take the stone away from the front of his grave. When Martha said, “Lord, by this time he stinketh,” that was a statement of unbelief. Jesus
had already told them they were going to see God’s glory. Jesus didn’t care what condition Lazarus was in. Jesus was suggesting to them, “Even if it stinks, still believe.” Maybe your marriage stinks, but still believe. Maybe your finances stink right now, but still believe. Maybe your children are going through a season in which it seems like they just can’t get their act
together and you feel like giving up. In spite of what you smell, in spite of what you feel, in spite of what you see, in spite of what you hear, in spite of what you taste, you have to realize that our God is able. If you’re going to conquer, you have to get your foot on your sense of smell. I heard a story about some children who played a trick on their grandpa. He had one of those long handlebar mustaches. He was taking a nap, and these little brats snuck in and rubbed some limburger cheese on his moustache. When he woke up, he said, “Whew! This bedroom stinks.” He went to the kitchen and still smelled it, so he said, “Wow, this kitchen stinks too.” Then he stepped outside into his back yard and said, “Man, the whole world stinks!” If you’re not careful, if you get burned by enough people, you might start going around with an old stinky attitude and old stinky words. Even though you’ve been through the fire, you don’t have to smell like it. Burn some incense of praise and thank God you still have a future.
2. Feel Free
The second king we have to get our foot on is the sense of what we feel. If you don’t master your feelings, you’ll start to trust them more than your faith. Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things.” Your feelings are a true enemy of your faith. Isaac had gone blind in his old age and was on his deathbed when his son Jacob came to him covered with goat hair with the intent to deceive him. Jacob’s brother, Esau, was a hairy man, and Jacob had come to steal his birthright. His blind daddy asked, “Who is it?” Jacob said, “It’s me, Dad. It’s your oldest son, Esau. I’ve come for my blessing from you.” Scripture tells us that the old man reached up and started feeling his arm, trying to determine whether it was his oldest, hairy boy. Isaac said, “You sound like Jacob, but you feel like Esau.” Isaac decided to go with his feelings, rather than with what he was hearing. As a consequence, he gave his blessing to the wrong son. If we
go by what we feel instead of what we hear from God’s Word, we will miss the truth every time. We have to get past our feelings. Your feelings are fickle. Sometimes in church you get your feelings hurt. Sometimes in ministry you get your feelings hurt. Sometimes in marriage you absolutely will get your feelings hurt. We have to learn how to subdue our feelings. We have to put our foot on the neck of our feelings and say, “I can’t let my feelings stop me. Just because I didn’t get the solo on the praise team, I’m not going to quit
3. Make Covenant with Your Eyes
The Old Testament tells us in 2 Kings 6 a really interesting story about Elisha the prophet and his servant. The king of Aram was at war with Israel, and he had it in for Elisha because God kept telling Elisha the king’s plans in advance. So at one point, Elisha and his servant were in a city surrounded by enemy soldiers. Elisha sent his servant out to assess the situation. When he realized they were surrounded, Elisha’s servant returned, almost in a panic. He said, “Oh,
my lord, what shall we do?” Elisha told him, “Don’t be afraid,” and he prayed over him, “Lord, open his eyes so he may see.” When his servant went back out, he didn’t just see ground level anymore. Now he could see the armies of God, “the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.” Our problem is the same as Elisha’s servant: when we get in a battle, all we see is ground level. But as believers, we’re supposed to lift up our eyes to the hills, where our help comes from. Our help comes from the Lord, Maker of heaven and earth (Ps. 121:1 – 2). When you get a bad report, when you get a bad X-ray, when something happens in your family that pits you against an impossibility, when you’re facing a difficulty that seems too big for you to overcome, you see to talk you out of what God has promised you. Ultimately, God has promised you victory in your life. Paul says in Philippians 1:21, “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Even in death, we can be victorious. I don’t know what you’re seeing. You may see only your enemy. Then you should pray. If you’ll look through faith, you won’t see just the enemy; you can see angels. You don’t have to see only problems; you can see promises. You have to choose: what are you going to focus on? Are you going to focus on the problem? Or are you going to focus on the promise? What are you looking at? What are you seeing? What are you focusing on? God’s Word is just as real as the bad report. I heard about a chicken yard with a big hen house, where a rooster had all of his hens laying eggs. One day, two little boys were next
door playing football, with a brand new white football. One of them accidentally kicked the football over the fence, and it rolled into the chicken yard. The rooster walked around and around the football, examining it carefully. Finally, he called out to all of his hens, “Come on out here, ladies!” When they had all gathered around, he said, “Now, girls, I don’t mean to be negative, but here’s the kind of eggs they’re producing next door. You need to step up your efforts.” We can easily look with our eyes at someone else’s life, someone else’s success, and envy what they have. What we should be doing instead is focusing on the blessings that God has already given us. Get your foot on what you see and say, “Lord, I believe what you said is true.” Don’t let circumstances talk you out of your miracle. A couple of years ago, God gave my ministry, an opportunity to run a Youth Mission in Sydney Australia. I preached for two weeks and 11 young people gave their lives to Jesus. However, on the morning of baptism, 8 of them pull out of been baptise. I was pretty discouraged. I had to start fighting that king of what I could see. We didn’t
feel that God was moving the heart of the parent to allow their kids to declare their love for Jesus in a public ceremony. I had to constantly put my foot on the neck of what I could see, and on the neck of what I could feel. I can’t go by what I see. I have to do what God tells me to do. After a year, almost thirty youth were coming regularly. God is faithful. He’s able.
4. Do You Hear What I Hear?
Be careful what you listen to. In Mark 4:24 (KJV), Jesus said, “Take heed what ye hear.” Be careful what you allow to cross that bridge of your ear into your spirit, because it can contaminate your faith. In the Old Testament, there’s a story about Elijah where everybody is saying recession, everybody’s saying poverty, everybody’s saying famine, everybody’s saying layoffs, and everybody’s saying how bad things are. And on top of that, you’re probably going to
catch swine flu too. “You’re going to lose your job, you’re going to get swine flu, you’re going to lose everything, you’re not going to make it.” Right in the middle of all those bad reports the prophet Elijah said, “I hear the sound of an abundance of rain” (see 1 Kings 18:41). I’m of course talking about faith. Many believers will just join in with the negative spirit of the world. That can’t be us. We have to put our foot on what hear, even when we keep hearing it every day. Elijah could hear something different than everybody else. He was tuned in to a different frequency. It’s not mind over matter; it’s faith over unbelief. Believe God’s Word and what he says over what
everybody else says. Stop caring what everybody else says. Listen really closely, until you can hear the sound of an abundance of rain. In 2 Samuel 5:22 – 24, David was about to go into battle against the Philistines. When he inquired of the Lord about what he should do, God answered him, “As soon as you hear the sound of marching in the tops of the balsam trees, move quickly, because that will mean the Lord has gone out in front of you to strike the Philistine army.”
David listened, and he was victorious. I don’t know what you’re hearing, but I hear a sound like marching in the tops of the trees. I hear the sound of victory coming. I hear the sound of blessing coming. I hear the sound of favour coming. I hear the sound of healing coming. I hear the sound of
blessed children rising up, serving Christ. People may say things to me like, “Your kids are just going to be rebellious. That’s the reality of the world we live in today.” I won’t listen to that. I will believe God’s report. As believers, we’re not to allow our enemy to overtake us with his words. We must not succumb to his lies. When we get victory over our hearing, we tune in to the Lord’s
report. We choose to believe what he says. Some might say, “Well, you don’t know what kind of bad news I have.” It doesn’t matter. Our God is able, in spite of what you hear.
5. The Taste of Victory
There’s a story in the Old Testament, in 2 Kings 4:38 – 42, about a pot of stew during a famine. As the men in the story began to eat it, they discovered that it had accidentally been poisoned. Elisha told them to put flour, or meal, into the pot, and it saved them. I believe that this meal represents the bread of life, which is the Word of God. Whatever is poison in your life, put some Word in it. Is your marriage poisoned? Put some meal in the stew. Are your children making poor choices? Start praying back to God the things that God has already promised you in his Word. Faith places no limitations on God, and God places no limitations on faith. Take the bread of God’s Word, the meal, and put it into your poison. Instead of getting up every day and saying, “I don’t know why I’m even going to work today. I know I’m not going to sell anything anyway,” put some Scriptures into your poisonous situation. Get victory over your sense of taste.
As Jesus was hanging on the cross, some of the people there attempted to give him a sponge dipped in vinegar and gall. Vinegar and gall has an extreme, bitter taste. I believe this symbolizes for us that they wanted Jesus to become bitter because of what they were doing to him. But Scripture says that Jesus refused to drink the bitter sponge they were offering him. At that moment, Jesus got victory over the fifth king. Although they had hurt him, had wronged him,
had inflicted incredible pain on him, he knew he was innocent. His actions essentially said, “I refuse to become bitter.” You may have been wronged. You may have been hurt. To live
victoriously in this life, you need to put your foot on that situation. Satan intends it to make you bitter, to make you angry, to make you upset, tense, messed up, and angry. But put your foot on its neck. Tell the king of the sense of taste, “I refuse to take in bitterness. The power of Christ lives in me, so I can forgive. I can love my enemies. I can do good to those who have wronged me.” That’s the power of a life filled with faith.
Conclusion
Do More Than Overcome
A guy came to my church once and preached a message on David and Goliath. As you might imagine, I’ve heard some great sermons on David and Goliath. But this guy focused on why David picked up five stones. He proved biblically that Goliath had four brothers. He suggested that it was David’s intention to wipe out Goliath’s whole family. The five stones were David saying, “I’m not just going to kill Goliath, but if his brothers want to pick a fight, bring ’em on.” Makes sense to me. I heard another man preach on the five stones, and he said, “The five stones represent the letters in the name of him who would bring deliverance from the Goliath of sin: J-E-S-U-S.”
Do you know why I think David picked up four more stones than he needed? I think it was because he was afraid he might miss. It doesn’t take a lot of faith; it only takes faith the size of a mustard seed — just a little faith. You don’t have to have great faith, just a little faith. One day as I read about David picking up five stones, I felt like the Lord was speaking to me, saying, “Son, always remember: I’ll never send you into battle against a great, gigantic problem where I’ll give you only enough to defeat him. I’ll give you more than enough. One stone would be enough, but I’ll give you more than enough.”
God is able, but first you have to kill those five kings that are keeping you out of the Promised Land. He’s already given you more than enough to defeat them.
