Because Your Enemy Has Said...
Pastor Scott Voss
New Life Christian Center
Rector, Arkansas
Ezekiel 36:1 Also, thou son of man, prophesy unto the mountains of Israel, and say, Ye mountains of Israel, hear the word of the LORD:
2 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Because the enemy hath said against you, Aha, even the ancient high places are ours in possession:
3 Therefore prophesy and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Because they have made you desolate, and swallowed you up on every side, that ye might be a possession unto the residue of the heathen, and ye are taken up in the lips of talkers, and are an infamy of the people:
Do you know what it means to talk trash?
Ball courts ie... You can’t shoot hoop etc. The purpose of such exchanges on the court is to try and cause your opponent to lose his concentration.
Let me assure you tonight that Satan is an expert at talking trash! He has refined the art of intimidation through talking.
Millions of lives are held in prisons that are fastened out of words and thoughts. Bound by evil imaginations, ideas, and suggestions, they are unable to escape from the torment of past failures. The chaos of yesterday has been used as an effective restraint today. Satan is constantly reminding them of their futile efforts to live for God. Reminding them that they are really just failures.
Although he is older than you and me, he has a very limited vocabulary. It consists of two thoughts:
1. you can’t
2. God won’t
Whatever he needs to add to fit the occasion is then added. You can’t live for God because you have an alcoholic daddy. Or God won’t help you because you did not live up to your last promise to pray 15 minutes every day.
He not only desires to bind individual lives to the point of despair, he desires to frustrate and reduce the ministries of the church. He seeks to intimidate the church of the living God out of the areas that God has prepared for them! He seeks to keep the youth of the church talked out of living for God. To convince them that times are just too hard for them to be able to make it.
We find such a scene in Ezekiel 36. the nations of Israel are scattered across the land. They are powerless as a nation. Basically they are a defeated, captive people. They have been made desolate and become a mockery among the nations.
But the enemies of Israel made a grave error in judgment. They failed to realize that when they began to boast against the people of God they were boasting against HIS POWER! They talked too much.
2 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Because the enemy hath said against you, Aha, even the ancient high places are ours in possession:
The ancient high places were the places of judgment.
They were taunting Israel...We decide who wins are fails. We own the courts and he who owns the courts wins! We will run things around here and we will govern you UNCHALLENGED!
But I want you to notice with me God’s words to Ezekiel. Because YOUR ENEMY has said these things...PROPHESY!
I believe that God was saying that just because the devil is talking does not mean that he is in charge. Let ME show you again that I am in control.
I believe that we are living in an era of time that is being bombarded by Satanic attacks. Attacks against the church, the home and the lives of individuals. Satan has been trying to intimidate churches. In the past and even now he has been spreading hi his lies that Revival will never come. You will never change, you will never get over this problem, you will never see your lost loved ones and friends saved. Your youth group will never grow. You are going to backslide, you might as well just give up, Rock and roll and party your life away. You are not going to make it anyway.
But I have come to this service tonight to be the Herald of the Spirit. The devil is a liar! He is the father of all lies- there is no truth in him.
He is constantly boasting that he is in control of the high places of judgment and that you can’t have this cannot be that or you cannot be what he does not allow.
Let me tell you tonight...GOD IS IN CONTROL! HIS AUTHORITY WILL NOT BE CHALLENGED!
For years Satan has been boasting of his control and power. He has said that I will destroy the churches of this section by sowing discord and division among them. I will get the youth to rebel and attract them to the things of the world.
But God has said that Because your enemy has said this.. I will unite them like never before. They are going to feel me in a fresh way. I will empower them and pull them together. I will show them that unity is as the anointing for the priesthood of the believers! I’ll lead them into more spiritual areas.
I will draw them unto myself and remind them that when ever two or three of them get together in my name then I will be there in the midst of them. I will introduce them to the Gifts of the Spirit. I will fulfill Joel 2:
28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:
Satan has declared that I will clamp down their altars so that no one will receive the Holy Ghost.
God said... We will just see about that. Upon this rock I will build my church and the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it! In Obadiah it is recorded that in Zion there shall be deliverance. As long as there is a church there will be deliverance. As long as there is a people called by His name, there shall be deliverance!
Satan said I’ll send them the worst I can find. I will send them the druggies, the prostitutes, etc. They won’t want them.
God said ...Send them on! I will set them free! I will make them a child of God! I will wash them in the blood of the lamb. Though their sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow!
Devil said, I will steal their praise and worship. I will take the joy out of their living for God. I will make church boring and dull. I will remind them of their failures and that God would never receive their praise!
God said...Because the devil said he was going to take MY worship away, I will receive the smallest amount of praise and inhabit it. I will dwell in a simple “I love you Jesus” I will anoint your hearts and minds and lead you into the depths of my presence and show that where my Spirit is there is liberty. I will show them that It is in praise that I am known. I will let them know that I love the gates of Zion more than all of the dwelling places of Jacob!
Whenever Satan reminds them of their badness I will be right there to remind them of my goodness. Whenever he tells them that they can’t worship me because of their failures, I want them to remember that they can worship me because of my success in delivering them!
In Mat. 22 Jesus was confronted by a bunch of followers of Herod and Pharisees. They were trying to force him into breaking the law through His words. Should we pay taxes, etc..
Jesus said Render to Caesar what is Caesars. But unto God what is God’s.
I believe that tonight we need to render to the devil what is his. Fear. Fear of the future and of Hell. That is the only thing that he has legal access to. We need to let him have it back. It is time for some young people to make up their minds tonight that there is absolutely nothing in this world that is worth going to hell for. Make up their minds that they are not going to be lost!
Its also time that we render to God what is God’s! Your mind.
Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. Be renewed in the Spirit of your mind.
If this mind is in you then there will not be a problem in surrendering your body to God! It belongs to Him before a teen age lover! It belongs to him before it belongs to some infidel!
I Corinthians tells us that we are Christ’s and Christ is God’s. That is simply saying that we are the possession of the Anointing of God. The anointing is what separates you from the rest of the world. Your mind, your body and your praise belong to God. Render it unto Him!
When Satan tries to convince you that he is in control you can remind him that you are not your own but that you have been bought with a great price! Jesus purchase your salvation. He is the owner of you r mind, your body, and your praise!
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego all faced the accuser. They are not bowing they need to burn. But right on time, God stepped in and delivered them from a fiery furnace! He will do the same for you if you will render to Him what is His!
When your enemy rejoices in the fact that he has you defeated - God says now hold on here just a minute. I am not through with you yet!
When Satan boasts that he has got everything set to destroy you God says...
For every areas Satan has said that he will destroy I will build it up. I will make it strong in advance of his attempts of destruction.
Everywhere he is planning on killing I will give life!
If there is an area of your life that Satan is boasting that he has control of, if there is a habit you can’t kick, Anywhere you have been defeated in the past, Get ready, get ready, get ready! God is about to restore what you have lost!
Isaiah 42:
14 I have long time holden my peace; I have been still, and refrained myself: now will I cry like a travailing woman; I will destroy and devour at once.
15 I will make waste mountains and hills, and dry up all their herbs; and I will make the rivers islands, and I will dry up the pools.
16 And I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them.
It appears from these verses that God held his peace as long as he could. I have a feeling that some of us here tonight feel like God is not moving quick enough, but I want to assure you that God is anxiously awaiting the moment He can step into your situation and bring you deliverance!
Psalm 68 Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered:
God is about to get up and go to battle for you!
Let me take you to a classic case of trash talking. 2 Chronicles 32:1 After these things, and the establishment thereof, Sennacherib king of Assyria came, and entered into Judah, and encamped against the fenced cities, and thought to win them for himself.
Sennacharib desired to have the cities of God. If you will read the last two verses of 2 Chron 31 you will find that Hezekiah was being blessed of God for doing what was good and true and right before the Lord.
Isn’t it amazing that after every victory Satan likes to try and make you think that now you have to deal with him.
Sennacharib boasted, I’ve wiped out every other nation and their Gods. You and your God are no different, V17 says that he wrote letters to defile the God of Israel, and to speak against him.
...The God of Hezekiah will not deliver his people from my hand. UH-Oh He talked too much!
God sent one angel. That one angel killed 185,000.
Let me ask you, does Satan have you besieged? Do you feel trapped, wrapped up and defeated? Listen closely, and mark his words. If he is telling you that God can’t or won’t deliver you, start looking up to the hills! Your help is on its way! God is about to retaliate against your enemy. God is about to confirm His promises to you!
God told Ezekiel Because your enemy has said, therefore prophesy
It is time that we start speaking to some things tonight. the power of Life and death reside in the tongue. It is time for us to allow the stronger man to come in and clean things up! Start confessing the power of God. Start prophesying to your lands and I promise you they will start to bring forth the fruit!
Get an intimate knowledge of God. For they that do know their God shall be strong and do exploits!
God has set in motion. When your adversary is through talking...God has been listening!
Job 5:12 He disappointeth the devices of the crafty, so that their hands cannot perform their enterprise.
He is watching you. He is looking at the paths ahead of you and he is watching for traps! If you will be sensitive to God HE will prove the Devil wrong!
Ezekiel 36 was the promise of the coming restoration of Israel. Restoration of lands, position, of the people, and judgment of the enemies.
To prove His point to Ezekeil he took him to what we know as Ezekiel 37. The valley of dry bones.
37:1 The hand of the LORD was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the LORD, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones,
2 And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.
3 And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord GOD, thou knowest.
4 Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the LORD.
5 Thus saith the Lord GOD unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live:
6 And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.
8 And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them.
9 Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.
10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army.
11 Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts.
12 Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.
13 And ye shall know that I am the LORD, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves,
14 And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the LORD have spoken it, and performed it, saith the LORD.
Listen God knows a thing or two about graveyards. Satan thinks that he has you wrapped up and that his judgment is sure and he alone is victorious.
But if he is talking you need to be listening. It is time to prophecy some life into your situations! Because your enemy has said! Prophecy!
