Revelation 12:1-5, 7-8, 17
We’re at War!
January 12, 2020
We are living in very precarious times! You could even say these are crazy days! What should make sense - - doesn’t make sense. We hear stories on the news that for most of us really don’t make sense. Let me give you some couple of examples.
Now, let me tell you, I will show you some as headlines from the news. Please understand, I’m not making fun of them. They just don’t really compute in my brain. And this is a symptom of a larger problem that we’re going to talk about. I don’t think most of us are aware of all that goes on, it’s important to see how badly this world is changing. And how anti-Christian some of it is as well.
These are not jokes. These are not spoofs. This is real life.
The first slide is a shoe with a cross on it. There’s a shoe company in Turkey and Iraq, making shoes with a cross on the bottom. Why? So that every time the owner of the shoes takes a step, they are crushing the cross!
The 2nd slide is a headline I guess I understand, but don’t understand. It’s a matter of our changing world. The ACLU wants there to be menstrual products in men’s bathrooms. That doesn’t compute for me.
The 3rd slide is about a transgender employee at Nike was suing Nike because their coworkers didn’t refer to her as they/them.
This lawsuit was filed by a former Nike contractor making $130,000 per year, who identifies as "transmasculine" and prefers the pronouns "they/them/their," sued Nike for $1.1 million, claiming she was repeatedly "misgendered" by coworkers and that management failed to implement strict policies ensuring the use of her preferred gender pronouns in the workplace.
Now, I wouldn’t want people calling me she or her. I get that. But I don’t understand wanting to be referred to in the 3rd person plural.
4th, this is a headline from Pope Francis. Here is a quote from his speech --
In front of an unbeliever the last thing I have to do is try to convince him. Never. The last thing I have to do is speak. I have to live consistent with my faith. And it will be my testimony to awaken the curiosity of the other who says: "But why do you do this?" And yes, I can speak then. But listen: Never, never bring the gospel by proselytizing. If someone says they are a disciple of Jesus and comes to you with proselytism, they are not a disciple of Jesus.
I get his point! Live the right life and people will ask you why you live that way! On the one hand, that makes sense, but if you evangelize? You are not a disciple of Jesus? Our testimony should speak about our faith, but we often need to initiate the conversation, knowing our life shows Christ is real and present.
Lastly, I will read to you this twitter account about a couple from England.
A transgender man gave birth to non-binary partner's baby with female sperm donor.
I’ll let you figure this one out. For my mind, none of this computes. And I’m staying away from politics for other reasons. I can go on and on about what’s going on in our world. Whether you agree or disagree, there are consequences to subverting, mocking, disparaging and rejecting the word of God.
But . . . that’s really part of the plan. That’s what our enemy wants us to buy into. Our enemy wants us to believe that there are multiple ways to gain eternity - - - OR There is no eternity, so either way you can do and be whatever you want.
We’re in a beginning of the year series which is ultimately going to focus on who God is calling us to be. But to get there, we must know that we’re under attack.
There’s a problem, though - - because this isn’t a war we’re going to fight in the physical world. We may think that, but that’s part of the delusion. It’s a war unlike any we’ve ever seen, a war unlike any we’ve been part of. Actually, it’s a war we’ve already experienced, but maybe haven’t realized.
It’s actually the longest unrecorded war in human history. You see, our battle is not with one another, as much as we might look at one another with disdain, mistrust and enmity. Paul puts it best . . .
12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. - Ephesians 6:12
Do you understand what Paul is saying?
You see, our battle isn’t against one another, our battle is against forces of evil which is putting those temptations, thoughts, desires and addictions right in front of us, leading us to commit sins, even though we know it is wrong.
Our battle is against the forces of evil - - not against flesh and blood, but as Paul says, it’s against the rulers, authorities, the powers of this dark world. He’s talking about satan, the devil, the evil one, lucifer . . . or whatever you want to call him.
But you see we don’t take this topic seriously, do we? We don’t want to talk about evil. It’s either too scary or we laugh it off. We like to joke about the devil as the one wearing a silly red cape who is totally harmless.
We’re led to believe we can act like there are no consequences about anything in life. Then when we’re caught, we blame someone else. It’s a daily battle and if we’re not equipped and ready for war, then we will lose the battle.
Last week we were talking about dreams and hopes. You ever wonder why we can’t reach our dreams? Even though God has given us God sized dreams and hopes, it seems too often our dreams get squelched. Why is it?
There are too many defeated Christians. Christ followers who have given up. Folks who don’t believe they can achieve what they’ve hoped for. Maybe we’ve been told by others that we’re no good, that we can’t do what we’ve always wanted to do . . . and maybe we need a reality check, but too often we give up.
Why? Because we’ve bought into the lies. This is what Jesus tells us in John 8:44-
44 He (satan) was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. - John 8:44
We buy into those lies. There is nothing good in him. He wants us to believe that there is nothing good within us. And we believe those lies.
This is why Peter tells us –
8 Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. - 1 Peter 5:8
Let me tell you satan enjoys nothing more than a defeated Christian, because a defeated Christian is a powerless Christian. They have no spiritual power to defend themselves from his attacks. They just wilt and succumb to arrow after arrow, insult after insult, abuse after abuse, until they become exactly what satan wants, a nothing.
You see, I’ve got good news and bad news, all in the same news . . .
We’re at war. It’s not the type of war you think about, we’re in a spiritual war. And we know who our enemy is — satan; and he will do all he can to defeat us.
Let’s look at this scripture from Revelation 12 and understand that satan is real and seeks to destroy us. We’ll also see why he seeks to defeat us. Let’s look at a passage which should rock your socks off -
1 A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head.
2 She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth.
3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads.
4 His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth.
The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment it was born.
5 She gave birth to a Son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to His throne.
7 And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back.
8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven.
9 The great dragon was hurled down — that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray.
He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. – Revelation 12
Now . . . before we get too far into this, let me say this ~ People have a lot of different views for who the woman is, she’s not Mary, most scholars view the woman as a symbol for the nation of Israel. The child is Christ, the red dragon is satan.
According to this passage, satan sought to destroy Jesus. Verse 4 tells us as the woman was ready to give birth, satan was ready to devour her Child as soon as He was born.
In verse 7 ~ war broke out between satan and his angels against archangel Michael and his angels. Satan lost and was kicked out of heaven along with his angels. Verse 9 tells us satan deceived the whole world. Paul reminds us in 2 Corinthians 11:14, satan “masquerades as an angel of light.” He’s a deceiver.
Now we come to the key verse, Revelation 12:17 —
17 Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to make war against the rest of her offspring — those who obey God’s commandments and hold to the testimony of Jesus. - Revelation 12
Did you hear that sentence from the Apostle John? satan lost and was kicked out of heaven and he’s fuming mad. He wants to do anything he can to get back at the one who defeated him. He knows the One with all of the power is God. So, satan resolved that he would now make war. But whom is he going to make war against? Against any person who believes Jesus Christ is the Messiah.
Let me make this real clear, if you believe in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you’re under spiritual attack. You’re in a war, and you may not know it. And this is exactly what satan wants. Because . . . and now catch this, it’s really, really important to know - - - -
If you don’t know you’re at war, then you can’t fight! And if you can’t or won’t fight in your own war, then how can you be victorious, you’re losing the battle.
Ain’t this fun today?! Glad you came to worship? I hope so, because this is really important. We need to see how important this is.
You see, satan will attack us on all fronts. He hits us where we’re weak, he hits us when we think we’ve got it made. He hits us with surprise attacks when we’re not ready. He hits us from the front when we’re expecting an attack from our rear. He comes straight at us, and dares us to fight back. He’s good at what he does. He’s a master deceiver.
He’ll tell you things like ~
• I don’t need to go to church, I’m saved!
I don’t like the music, the sermons are too long, and I can’t bring coffee into the sanctuary.
• I don’t need Sunday School or Wednesday night Bible Study!
I know what I need to know.
• Give money . . . no way. That’s mine. I worked for it.
• Forgiveness, it’ll be a cold day before that happens!
• Serving others and God, what’d they do for me?
• I can cheat, everyone else is doing it.
• I can drink and smoke, mom and dad will never know.
• So, what’s a little puff, who’s it going to hurt.
• I’ll sleep it off.
• Nobody at work will know what I took.
• The devil, he’s got no power. He’s just a silly figure in a red cape with a pitchfork.
We should be living the life, we should be experiencing the joy and presence and power of Christ, but it seems like such a struggle. Too often, we’ve bought into satan’s lies -
Why is it that we don’t hit our dreams, which I believe are really to be great? Because we’ve bought into satan’s lies that we’re not that good to begin with. We don’t believe our heart is really all that good. We have some fair moments, but for the most part, we don’t believe in ourselves. We don’t really love ourselves as God desires us to love ourselves, we’re not happy.
God calls us to be fully alive in Him. But remember that passage from Jesus --
10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. - John 10:10
This is an interesting statement from Jesus. Why would He join these 2 diametrically opposed statements together? He’s showing us what satan offers and what He offers.
God’s intention for you is fullness of life, but right now that life is opposed. God’s plan is abundant life, but we must deal with an enemy who has a different agenda.
The world in which we live is a combat zone, a violent clash of kingdoms, a bitter struggle against evil forces who are determined to keep us from experiencing life. We’re at war.
satan’s goal is to utterly destroy, decimate, demolish, ravage, obliterate; wholly, completely, utterly destroy you and lead you to cause someone else to be destroyed.
William Gurnall was a pastor in the 1600's, he wrote, “the devil has more temptations than an actor has costumes for the stage. And one of his all time favorite disguises is that of a lying spirit, to abuse your tender heart with the worst news he can deliver — that you do not really love Jesus Christ and that you are only pretending, you are only deceiving yourself.
? We should have fullness of peace and joy.
? To be fully alive is to be filled with an awesome awareness of how much God loves us.
? It is to believe God’s intention towards us is always good, not evil.
? To be fully alive is to be strengthened by God’s indwelling power.
? To be fully alive is to be totally free from our sinful past and all of its guilt.
? To be fully alive is to be trust in plan and purpose for our future.
? To be fully alive is to demonstrate God’s wonder and awe.
? it is to inspire others to become men and women of faith.
? To be fully alive is to be fully accessible to God - His power, His purpose and His plan.
