Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / May 12, 2024 | Deuteronomy - You’ve Already Won

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May 12, 2024 | Deuteronomy - You’ve Already Won · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  unknown: Morning.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_01: Happy Mother's Day.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: Also, fitting when to announce Hannah and I are expecting number two.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: Really excited about that.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: Lord has blessed us more than we deserve.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: We're continuing in our Deuteronomy series this morning.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: And if you've been walking with us, you know, for the last couple months, you were kind of getting to the end of the book, but if if you know you're playing along at home, like we were only in chapter 18 last week.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so I could see it in your eyes.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: Some of you are like, this pace, we've still got almost half the book to go.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, what ends up happening in Deuteronomy is basically chapters 20 through 30 are really a restatement of things that either were already covered in Deuteronomy, or really it's sort of Moses walking back through the specifics of the law.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's a significant chunk of that that we're just gonna sort of skip over.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: Not because it's not important, but we've covered it in actually the last couple years.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: So we will have this morning, we're in Deuteronomy chapter 20, and then uh we have two weeks left in this series, and we'll be kind of looking at Jim and I.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we're splitting those Sundays, and we'll be looking at the very end of Deuteronomy and sort of looking forward, anticipating, right?
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: Because Moses passes away at the end of Deuteronomy.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: What does that mean?
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_01: Sort of what's the future of Israel?
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Joshua's coming onto the scene, all those kinds of stuff.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: So, anyhow, we are in Deuteronomy 20 today, and as we've gone through Deuteronomy, you've also probably noticed that not all of the passages are super easy to apply to our daily lives.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes the application is like God, you know, is deserving of the glory, or, you know, God is powerful and majestic, or God is holy, or many of these things that are good to know, like core to us being Christians and understanding who God is, but it's not always like four steps to success, right?
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: So this morning I think is gonna be uh a treat for those of you who are sort of desiring that.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a super applicable passage that takes us directly into sort of the battles that we're facing today.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: And as we're in Deuteronomy chapter 20, um, for as much as Israel fights in the Old Testament, there actually aren't that many passages that detail how Israel is supposed to fight.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, as an activity, as a necessity for their lives, um, there aren't that many places where God says, sort of, this is how you're to do it.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: Deuteronomy 20 is one of those places, one of the very few.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: And most of them are all in uh this book.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: And in Deuteronomy 20, it covers a number of different topics, right?
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: You've got um how to prepare for war, how to muster troops, how to um like offer treaties to cities.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, it says if you're laying siege to a city, you're not supposed to cut down its fruit trees.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: We're not covering that today, okay?
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: We're staying in the first four verses of chapter 20, which I think uh it's going to just discuss basically the human element of war, which is these young Israelite warriors who were untested and in many ways are untested in the sense that they didn't have many battles underneath their belt, um, uh, and yet they were being asked to go against these huge armies, these giants, those with way more advanced equipment.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: What was it like for them to go in and to take part in God's battles, God's wars, knowing that they had victory assured, but yet not feeling like that was the case?
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of what we're talking about today, and we'll see as we get to the end, what does it mean for us where we are actually all fighting battles today that often feel like they're overwhelming and can make us not feel confident either.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: So in Deuteronomy chapter 20 is where we'll begin, like I said, verse 1 says, When you go out to war against your enemies and see horses, chariots, and an army larger than yours, do not be afraid of them.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_01: For the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, is with you.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: When you're about to engage in battle, the priest is to come forward and address the army.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: He is to say to them, Listen, Israel, today you are about to engage in battle with your enemies.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: Do not be cowardly, do not be afraid, alarmed, or terrified because of them.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: For the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: That's the passage in Deuteronomy, right?
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_01: Now, we have to like immediate context.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: Moses is speaking to the nation of Israel, and they're anticipating going into the promised land and having a bunch of wars.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, the next book in the Bible, Joshua, details most of that, right?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so they're anticipating, they've got a sort of a military campaign ahead of them to take over the promised land.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: But actually, the context extends further into that, and what Moses is saying is even once you're in the promised land, like you've got it locked down, it's yours by God's will, you will still be in battle frequently.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, you will always and forever have people and nations who are trying to destroy you.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's this sort of air of the future and then the distant future.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: There's like, I mean, immediately you're gonna fight the Canaanites.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: Immediately, those are who you're going to go into battle against.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: And they are mightier than you, but also this will always be the case for Israel.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: But let's talk about them being mightier because Moses brings up a couple things that to the average Israelite warrior would be terrifying.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: You go out to war against your enemies and you see horses, chariots, and an army larger than yours, right?
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: What he's talking about here is that not only is Israel smaller in terms of their military, well, and just the people, but their military is smaller than basically any nation that they're facing.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: Not only are they physically smaller than the, like in terms of their stature, uh, I would probably be a giant to them.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a giant to most people, but I would probably be a giant to Israel.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: But they were tinier, but then on top of that, they did not have the same kind of military technology that their enemies did.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, many of them had these horses in these chariots.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so, like, a great example which gets brought up here is Egypt.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_01: Egypt, the mightiest nation in the world at that time, chased them out of slavery.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: Basically, like after the tenth plague, Pharaoh says, like, go, get out of here.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: And Moses leads them, heading to the promised land, first to Mount Sinai, and then Pharaoh changes his mind and sends his army against Israel.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's this image in their head, right?
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: Of um, and there's in Exodus, there's kind of like this uh chase sequence where they're heading and they end up getting to the Red Sea, and they can they can see the dust of Pharaoh's army chasing after them as the chariots and the horses are kicking this up, the sand rather, and as they do it, they're backed up against the Red Sea.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: They are um they are slaves, former slaves.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: They have no martial training at all, they have no weapons to speak of.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: They basically just have the cloaks around their bodies and their sandals on, and they've got women and children around them, right?
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: And they're getting backed up against this water with this mighty army coming towards them.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: And you probably know what happens, right?
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: God opens up the Red Sea for them.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_01: They're able to pass through, and then once they get to the other side, they see God send the seas back and crashing against Pharaoh's army, destroying them and drowning them all.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's this element here where, like a lot of things in Deuteronomy, part of their instruction is remembering what came before.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: Part of their instruction is remember like you are about to face horses and chariots, and kind of in that is, you know, everybody that is better at fighting than you, but remember what happened the last time that occurred.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_01: God was with you, he did not leave you, he walked you through all of these things.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: And so, from every normal perspective, Israel should be intimidated, they should be terrified and nervous about the conquest in the land, right?
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: But instead, they are reminded that they aren't normal, in fact, that they are God's chosen people, and that over and over again he has been with them and has proven faithful to give them not just victory, but victory in contrast to um what the world would think should happen when two nations are going against each other.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: If they were playing risk, everybody else has Australia, okay?
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody plays risk.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's fine.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: So that's fine, it's fine.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's a big deal to have Australia.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: So the first lesson that we see here is God is in control.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: Don't be afraid, fight with confidence, right?
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you are going to be afraid.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: Like just as a human sort of emotion.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: You are going to see these armies, they're going to be huge, they're stronger than you, they're bigger than you, all of these things.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: But don't be afraid.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: Don't be nervous because God is with you, He is in control.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: Every situation that you've walked through, He has prov not only provided, right, but He has lifted you up in a way that it can only be described as miraculous.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: Against all of these other nations, you have proven victorious over and over again.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: But uh imagine for a second that you are an Israelite soldier, okay?
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um your age varies, but most of you are going to be in your early 20s and 30s.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: You're probably quite young.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: And you have had some battle experience.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: You've uh been a part of the group that defeated King Sihon and King Og, the Amorite kings.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: Okay?
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_01: So you have been a part of that group.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: You've seen victory, but nothing, nothing compares to what is ahead of you.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: Keep in mind, your parents died in the wilderness because they were so terrified of going to fight these people that you're about to fight.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: They sent spies into the land, ten of them came back saying, No, we're like grasshoppers to them.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: They're huge, gigantic, we can't take them on.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_01: And then there were two, Caleb and Joshua, the guy who's about to be your leader, who said, We can do this.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: But the nation trembled and they said, We can't.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: And then, this is the detail that's sometimes missed on top of that.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: You might remember last spring when we were talking about numbers, remember, God says, okay, like I will take this land for you.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: You just I will give you victory.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: They say, No, thank you.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: And he says, Okay, well, then you're gonna wander, and they say, let's rethink this.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_01: Changed our mind.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: We are gonna go back, we are gonna fight, and they get crushed.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: There's no way that they can beat these people on their own power.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's your context as an Israelite warrior, and you're going up to battle.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you are confident, right?
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: At this point, you're like, man, God has been with us.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: Like, all of our victories that I've been a part of have been huge successes.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: And yes, how great it sounds to say, God, you know, is in this, he's in control.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: And as you're walking, you're going to battle, and you sort of crest a high hill.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: And imagine that you see the forces of those, your enemies, against you in the valley below.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: And they're bigger than you, and they've got the horses and the chariots, and they've got everything that you don't have.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: They have weapons you don't have.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, the the people who are fighting here, first of all, the army is of a magnitude greater than yours.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: You've got a tiny fighting force, they're huge, they as far as the eye can see.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then on top of that, there are these people, they're not shepherds like you are.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: Okay?
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: You like your day job is herding sheep.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: Their day job is fighting.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: All of the nations in the promised land are skilled in this way.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden, those things that you know in your head, they don't make it down into your heart, right?
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: You know that God is in control.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know that He can beat them.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: In many ways, you've seen it happen.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: But yet for some reason, fear comes about, right?
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: And we say for some reason, but really it's expected.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: Again, outside of the power and grace of God, if you just went toe-to-toe with these folks, you're done.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so it does.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: It not only draws us back, but oftentimes we can be scared.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh like a little child, right?
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: That comes to you during the nighttime and says there are monsters under the bed.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: And you can tell them the facts, right?
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: You can say, There's no monsters under your bed, go back to your room, look under your bed, there's nothing, and nothing's gonna be there, right?
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: But that doesn't that doesn't fix the problem.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: You need to go back, you need to be with them, you need to go and look under the bed, and then they will understand and feel secure, right?
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: There's a difference between our head knowledge and our heart knowledge, what we feel, even though we know it to be true.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so this is at this point in time, again, you're the Israelite warrior, right?
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: The priest comes up, puts his back to the armies that you're looking at, and addresses all of you in a way that sounds more like William Wallace from Braveheart than it does something that a priest would most likely say.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: And what he says is do not be afraid, alarmed, or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: That's what Deuteronomy 20 says.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: So the priest gets up, and it's not just God is in control, but it's that actually as you move forward physically as an army, your God is with you in that space.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: There are passages in Deuteronomy and elsewhere that we don't have time to get into where, like, one of the army's roles, and part of the reason is that priests walk with them, that one of the army's roles is to maintain a clean camp, and in sort of that Old Testament sense of clean, um, about uh what is holy and what is profane, because God walks with them in the camp, and if they are expected to have God be with them in battle, that they must keep a clean camp.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so this idea that God is with them in their battles is not just sort of like an idea, but it's something that they will witness and experience that as they walk forward, God will fight those battles with them.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: So this brings us to the second point, though it ends the same.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: It is not just God is in control, but God fights for you.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: The same expectation because of these things, don't be afraid, fight with confidence, even though that is sort of like the last thing that you want to do right now.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: God is in control, he is with you.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: And when we say that God fights for you, too, it is not even just the sort of amazing idea that God is with them in the camp and he's there in the midst of this battle.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: But also the idea that comes about with this is because the language switches back and forth.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: It's like God uh fights for you uh to bring you victory, but yet Israel is going to battle because God has told them.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so there's this conjoining between the two that Israel is really a vessel for God's will to be carried out in the land.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so when they are going to war, they're fighting against, the Bible tells us, God's enemies.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_01: And this is where we've talked before about the strong language that is used when Israel goes to war.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_01: It can shock us sometimes the first time we read it about the destruction that they're supposed to bring.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: But remember the answer to those things, the very, very short answer, is that we don't just look at sort of nation versus nation or just people versus people, but we sort of take this step back and you go, yes, what's happening here though is happening truly on a cosmic, on a spiritual level.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: It is not Israel going, I'll take care of your problems if you worship me.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: But really, God is fighting this spiritual battle, and in this moment, Israel is the one who is carrying out his will and is a vessel for his judgment against the idolatrous and the fallen nations, right?
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yes, Israel, you will find victory, but really what's behind all of this is God is victorious over his enemies.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: And so Israel is supposed to, though, still play a part in that battle, right?
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's not, I mean, if you're the soldier, you'd be like, hey God, the valley below is ripe for some fireballs from heaven.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I would love it if we did not need to go in and, you know, clash sword to sword.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: It would be great if you just sort of took care of this one.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: Send some hailstones that you like to do and just destroy everybody.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: You can.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: But we see, and this is kind of where we begin to move into us today, is we see that the relationship between God and his people and fighting against the forces of evil is one that happens in lockstep.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: As Israel takes a step forward, God is with them.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: As Israel takes a step forward, God is with them.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: And they know and have the expectation, or should, that God will always be with them, but they need to take steps forward to realize that.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: Do you do you understand what I'm saying?
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: God sometimes does work in these sort of unnatural ways, but what's happening here is he is empowering this army to go forward, and it still requires Israel to sort of buck up and go into battle.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: So the question becomes then um, how does this translate to our day?
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: Because um, as far as I'm aware, none of us are fighting Canaanites, okay?
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um, if you are, I don't know if that's your battle to fight.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: So none of us are fighting Canaanites, but yet every single one of us is in battle.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: And this is something that the Bible continues to tell us.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: We're not fighting in the same way that Israel fought its enemies, but we are still fighting today.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: And you say, well, then who is the enemy?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: The answer is that the enemy is actually the same.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: Again, it's not Canaanites, but remember, it was never really about the Canaanites or the Philistines or the Amorites or the Jebusites or the Hivites, or I mean any of those.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: It was not really about them, but the spiritual forces behind them.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, the demonic forces headlined by Satan that were sort of uh going against God in that land.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so as we look to that today, the forms aren't the same, but the forces are.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: It is still Satan and the demonic realm and everything that is evil over and against the good of God that we are fighting against.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: But the form changes.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so the forms look different, right?
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_01: We are not looking for Canaanites, but rather we are looking for battles now where we are still up and against the forces of evil and Satan, and what takes some effort and a bit of discernment is recognizing the ways that these battles are forming themselves in our lives.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so, I mean, there's there's sort of the obvious nature of when we are struggling with sin and temptation, right?
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: For uh, you know, it's greed, it's sex, it's comfort, it's success, it's power, it's all of the things that the world, you know, Satan would say, hey, like, look at this shiny thing that's in front of you.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: Don't you want that?
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's that's an aspect of it.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_01: But frankly, most of the time, when it's very clear that we shouldn't be doing something according to God's word, uh, that's an easier battle to spot.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: But what about like a marriage, right?
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: When it becomes hard work to sort of uh continue to abide by that covenant and it's not as easy as it once was, or we have the addiction that we've been hiding from people and nobody else knows about, or we have a schedule that makes it nearly impossible for us to actually commit to the things that are most important in life, like our relationship with God.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, these are the kinds of things that as you sort of cast your vision further afield, it goes beyond just sin and temptation into what are the things that are drawing me away from God and preventing me from being not only being close to him in the sense of uh sort of walking in his will on his path, but what are just the things that are taking me away from him?
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_01: And ironically, it's those things that exist on the fringes, right?
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: Like how much time we spend on the screen and our phones each day, and the uh, man, I would tell you, some of the average screen times of some of the high schoolers in our youth group, right?
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: You can't tell me that that is not a battle that needs to be fought.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: And what's hard though to see, and I think where some people trip up, where I trip up, is the form itself is not the demonic thing, right?
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: Phones are not bad in and of themselves, right?
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_01: Let's say somebody is addicted to alcohol, right?
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: Alcohol in and of itself is not bad, right?
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus' first miracle is turning water into wine, okay?
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_01: But the abuse of those things and the way that they can pervade our lives, right, and just twist until it gets us further and further away from God.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: That is the battle that we are fighting.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: So it is not the form, but rather the forces.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: So this is the way that the New Testament begins to talk about our battles, right?
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: This is what listen to what Paul says in Ephesians.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: It says, Finally be strengthened by the Lord.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: And by his vast strength.
• 22:02
  SPEAKER_01: Put on the full armor of God so that you can stand against the schemes of the devil.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this darkness, against evil spiritual forces in the heavens.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: For this reason, take up the full armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and, having prepared everything, to take your stand.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: So, right, what this tells us is that we are still in battle today.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: But what Paul is doing is he's moving it from the physical and into the spiritual.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: Of course there are physical battles today, but in the way that we think about them, our military, the way that it's constructed, while we are, I mean, thankful for the service of those who fight, it's not the same as being a warrior in Israel.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the same kind of thing.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so the battles that we see today is not necessarily being veterans of physical combat, but rather veterans of spiritual battles.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: And frankly, though, for those who have experienced true combat in that sense, they might be the best to be able to understand why the Bible uses language of perpetual warfare to describe our lives.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so as we do that, though, notice here in Ephesians, all right, Paul is not saying, I mean, again, same thing to Israel.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like, this is not God goes out and smites everything that is troubling you or sends hailstones against everything that annoys you or afflicts you, right?
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: But rather that you are empowered by God.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: You have the strength.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's God's strength.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: That's the very beginning here.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: Be strengthened by the Lord and by his vast strength.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's not your strength, it's his strength.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_01: But as you put on the full armor of God that he equips you with, then, end of the passage, you are able to take your stand, right?
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: You're able to endure these things.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: But it also reminds us that Satan is scheming.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: He has strategies and plans.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_01: And here's something that we should also be aware of.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_01: Again, like Israel, under normal circumstances, they should have been terrified against who they were fighting.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: They should have been boot shaking.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: They wouldn't win.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: Us today, we should be terrified of the schemes of Satan absent the grace and power of Jesus Christ.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: He is far smarter than we give him credit for, oftentimes.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: Like Satan is not sort of the like jokey figure on your shoulder that's got the pitchfork, right?
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: He is God's enemy.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: And ultimately, though it is not an equal battle, he is still powerful.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that he is actually the ruler of this world, even though God is the ruler over all, that he has nothing to be trifled with.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so the idea that he is scheming to afflict you and to ultimately really have one of two goals.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: The first being to draw as many people away from Christ as possible.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: This would be like the parable of the sower, where it says that seed, the seed of the gospel, falls onto ground, but a bird, which exemplifies Satan, comes and takes the seed away before it can sort of be rooted down.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: Like this is his primary goal is to draw people away from the gospel and not allow it to take root, okay?
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: But the second thing is for those who have trusted in Christ, his greatest goal for us who cannot be taken away from the Father's hand, is that he would make our lives in Jesus as ineffectual, as wearisome, as filled with shame and guilt and doubt as possible.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: He wants to make the weakest bunch of Christians that have ever existed.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so, just like Israel, we should anticipate that we are battling because Satan is still fighting this battle.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: He is waging this war.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: But for some of us, right, we are we don't acknowledge that this is happening.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, we are at times overconfident in our strength.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: Instead, we need to recognize that we are, under normal circumstances, smoked.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: But with the grace and power of God, we have victory.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's a very clear sort of recognition.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_01: So as we do that, right, the question becomes what are basically if Satan has schemes, what is our strategy?
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so there are a couple things here that I think are really valuable.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: They all actually come from our Deuteronomy passage.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: But what does it look like for us to be prepared for war?
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the first thing is that we're aware.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you might say, well, that's kind of a given.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: But this is a huge idea.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: Because, see, when Israel, anytime God talked about war in Deuteronomy, he uses the word when.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't use the word if.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: He says, when you go to war, when you go to war, when you go to war, you are going to experience war.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like you you are drawn into it, whether you recognize that or not.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: You will be going to war, Israel.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, even when later on you're in the land and you you think you're sort of secure, you will continue to go to war because the nations around you will always be attacking you.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so the first step for us is becoming people who are aware that Satan is scheming, that he is powerful, and that we need to take on the full armor of God to be able to fight against him.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: When we do fight against him, which we'll get to in a second, like we know that we can have victory, but nevertheless, if we don't even know what battle is happening, then we can't fight it.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so part of this is using a level of discernment to recognize what are the battles that are being fought in my life, um, sort of in my environment, in my context, those I love, like what are these battles that are taking place?
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: Because they are.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: It is not that we have no battles, it is just where they are and how many.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: The second thing is that we need to be proactive.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: We're proactive people.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: So the language in the context of Deuteronomy chapter 20 is that Israel is going out to war.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_01: At no point are they the nation that allows another nation to lay siege to their cities.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: They are never going to be one that is just sort of waiting for the enemy to come, but rather instead they hear of a nation against them and they go out and fight that battle proactively.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: It is a, you could say a preemptive strike, but in reality, when the nation is coming no matter what, it is just a matter of going as far upstream as possible.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: And so when it comes to our lives, when we're talking about these battles, there's also an element here where the sooner that we see them, the sooner that we recognize them and can begin to fight them, the better off.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: Not necessarily our chances are, but the sort of um the effects of the destruction in our lives can be lessened.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, there are times where we recognize that we are fighting a spiritual battle and it's already on our doorstep.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's already come, it's here.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, maybe it is wreaking havoc in our lives.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's hurt us, it's hurt those we love, it's hurt the people around us.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: And at that time, it's still a battle to be fought.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: We still need to be aware of it, and there's not necessarily a whole lot of use in saying, well, we should have seen it coming, but as we anticipate future battles, we recognize that there is something to be done about preparing for them and fighting them ahead of time before they already get here.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_01: But whether we fight them ahead of time or they're already here, we need to be confident.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: This was the problem that Israel had.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: And this is also the problem that we have, even though the expectation that we would be afraid or nervous or unconfident, right, those are uh, I would say natural because of who we are and our expectations.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_01: We we see and understand uh that the forces of evil are powerful.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_01: And we understand for many of us what it is like to be in a battle where victory doesn't feel assured, where victory and and sort of uh the confidence that God wants us to have, they're not in our heart.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's only something that we understand.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: And so what we need to do as we're fighting these battles, and this is kind of where we'll actually finish, because I think there's some really great hope in Scripture, but nevertheless, we have to understand that it's that lockstep relationship with God, right?
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: We are walking forward, knowing that he is already going to be there to meet us.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: And as we do, we understand not only just who God is, but his activity in our lives that is present and real.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: It is, remember, it is not just he is in control, but he fights with you.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_01: And so, assuming that you are fighting a battle that is worthy to be fought, assuming that you are fighting a battle, like this is not just, God, I need a promotion.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_01: Why is this not happening?
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: But this is, God, I can't stop looking at these things on the computer.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I need to fight this battle.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_01: You can have confidence that as you are walking forward and a long enough time horizon, you will have victory because God is fighting your battle for you.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: It is not you, it is his strength that you're relying upon.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: Because if we're relying on your strength, on my strength, we're done for.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: But because it is his battle now, he is the one that is fighting for us.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_01: We can have confidence in that.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: Fourth and finally, we're actually fighting, though.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_01: Quick example.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: Might be familiar with the story of David and Goliath, right?
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: The story of David and Goliath is not that David was the underdog, okay?
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_01: That is normally the way that it is sort of treated.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: But if you are reading the Bible and get to the story of David and Goliath, what you should understand and be expecting is that the name the Philistines that they're fighting against, and in fact the great sort of warrior uh Goliath, that is this literal giant from Gath, that he is causing terror to be felt by the nation of Israel, that there is every reason to expect that if somebody would go to battle against him, that they would be victorious.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_01: It is basically Deuteronomy 20 being played out in story form, right?
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: Israel is tinier, they're smaller.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_01: Look at David.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_01: Tiny, small.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this guy, he's the last of his brothers, all the stuff that kind of made him God's choice to be king.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_01: And yet David is the one who has the courage to go and fight against Goliath.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_01: Well, if you're a betting person, like Draft Kings is going to take Goliath as the favorite ten times out of ten.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_01: He's huge.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: He does not have a sling to fight with.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_01: He has a like 40-pound bronze spear.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: But instead, what David does is he goes to battle.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: And so, really, part of that lesson of David and Goliath is Saul is not the one who is fighting.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact, this ends up being one of the things that sort of flips uh favor towards David is he is the one that trusted and had confidence, even though you can imagine him being scared, that God would prove victorious in this battle.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: It didn't matter where he was coming from, didn't matter the odds, but rather that God was the one fighting.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: And so all it took was him to take up those river stones and sink them into Goliath's set.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_01: So when it comes to our battles, right, there is always going to be a temptation to just say, like, God, will you take care of this?
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know, God, like, just handle this for me.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_01: Or, here's what also happens is you're fighting a battle and you're not fighting very hard, and then you get mad that God hasn't done 99% of the work for you.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_01: When we go into battle, right, it is always his strength, it is always his armor, it is always his ability, it is always his victory, but he still needs somebody to wear the armor and go to battle.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so Israel is still fighting these battles because it is a sign of God's deliverance.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_01: And for us today, too, we can have victory.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_01: But to just sort of throw up our hands and, you know, get frustrated with the Lord because he hasn't handled everything for us, we're missing the message that we are the ones, we are the agents who are supposed to be carrying all of these things forward.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: Like in our time right now, we are all in battles and we are supposed to be the ones fighting them with the power of God behind us.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so that applies to everything that we're dealing with, to be honest with you.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_01: In the podcast this week, I'll get really specific.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'll apply this to maybe some more examples.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to take it to parents who are working through social media stuff with their kids right now.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but these four things, they're general in a sense, but they apply to every single one of our battles.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_01: You need to be aware that it's happening.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_01: You need to be proactive as much as you can to seek it out before it comes to your city gates, right?
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_01: You need to be confident that you are going to be victorious because you are wearing the armor of God and you are strengthened by his power.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_01: And he has told you that you can stand against these things.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_01: And finally, that we are fighting ourselves.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_01: We're not just waiting for it to come, but rather we are taking actionable steps to sort of make the situation better.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_01: But there's one final passage that I want to share with you this morning that I think really uh gives us great hope, right?
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because like I said, there are probably many of you, and I've walked through this too, where you're fighting a battle that feels like it is not going the way that it should.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_01: It feels like the tides are sort of turning the other direction.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_01: Where is God in this moment?
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_01: What is what's going on here?
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_01: What's happening?
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_01: When we go to the end of the Bible, uh, there is a lot that God has to say about the final battle that happens between the forces of heaven and the forces of evil, right?
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_01: And as they're doing that, uh there's some very specific language that's used.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_01: So we're going to look briefly at Revelation chapter 20 here.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I want you to just this is a description of the very end.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_01: When the thousand years are completed, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: Their number is like the sand of the sea.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: They come up, they come up across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the encampment of the saints, the beloved city.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_01: Then fire came down from heaven and consumed them.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_01: The devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet are, and they will be tormented day and night, forever and ever.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_01: If you're watching a movie, this is the end of the movie.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_01: Okay?
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: And uh this is it's gonna get kind of weird for a second, but uh from God's perspective, right, the way that he views things is the way that we different than the way that we view things, from God's perspective, this has already happened.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: In the heavenly realms, Satan is already defeated.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_01: From our perspective, which is on a timeline, we are in the middle of the movie.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: We are not yet at the end of the movie.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: We did some rewinding, okay?
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: And in any action movie, you know that sometimes it goes back and forth a little bit.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_01: But uh on a long enough time horizon, God is always the victor.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_01: And God is not just the victor over the small things, but rather God is victor over things like death and disease and pain and sadness.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because eventually he puts Satan under his feet.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_01: Right now, Satan is allowed for just a time to sort of cause some destruction, but on a long enough time horizon, every single battle in Christ is victorious.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so, what that means for you is there's not a single thing that afflicts you right now.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_01: There's not a single battle that you're fighting, there's not a single war that's waging where victory is not ultimately assured for you.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_01: The question is just what's happening sort of in the middle of the movie here.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_01: And so the confidence that we can have through this, right, is it means that we are fighting a battle that God has already won.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_01: The battle that you are facing, the battles, the wars that are raging in your life, the sins and the temptations and all the afflictions that you are going against, not only do you have the power to fight them, but rather the end and the conclusion of that fight has already been determined.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_01: And so what happens is there are some things, some things that we don't see victory in in this life.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the good examples that Scripture gives us is death.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_01: Death is an effect of our sin.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_01: It is one of the curses that we could not overcome by ourselves.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_01: But even death, when we look to the very future, is something that is conquered by the blood of Christ.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_01: And so even the thing which none of us can escape is conquered by Christ, ultimately, so that we are living in eternity with Him and we get new bodies and all of those wonderful things.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_01: So the point behind this is that there's really two things that we should keep in mind from the text.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_01: The first is, like I've already said, you're fighting a battle that is already won.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_01: The outcome is guaranteed.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_01: Okay?
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_01: There's confidence that you should have in that.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_01: There is a desire to fight.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_01: Because what is also true is that the same power that God has given you to fight this battle, it's not just that victory is guaranteed in the future, but because of the Holy Spirit that lives within you now, you can have victory here.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_01: There's not a single addiction that afflicts you that is not possible to be overcome in this lifetime.
• 40:25
  unknown: Right?
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_01: There's not a single sin that you are dealing with or temptation that you are struggling with that cannot be overcome in this lifetime.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_01: So it is not just, well, in the end things will be fine, but it's also in the now you can fight and you have the power of God to do these things.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's just you have the confidence that they're possible because in the end victory is assured.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_01: But the other thing, and this is the thing that should sort of keep us alert, is that Satan recognizes that he is defeated.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_01: Satan knows that he's lost the battle.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so what you have in our middle of the movie is him just thrashing about and causing all manner of destruction and pain and hardship.
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_01: And all of the sad and brutal things of this world that we see are because of him.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_01: And so as we do that, it should keep our minds alert and sharp to be aware of these battles, to be proactive, right, to be confident and to fight them.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_01: Because uh victory is assured, but that doesn't mean we're not still called to fight right now.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: As we close here, um we have a special song that Jeremiah is uh going to sing um for us.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: And you are welcome to worship in whatever way that you like, but I would invite you to stay seated and to uh just in take this as a time of reflection, of worship uh and prayer as you think about uh the fact that God has fought a battle that has already been won, and that you can have confidence in whatever battle that you are fighting, He is fighting it for you.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_01: Let's pray.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: Heavenly Father, we come before you today, and Lord, we thank you for your word.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_01: We thank you for your truth.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: Lord, we thank you for the promises that you have given to us about the battles that we face.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_01: God, we ask that in whatever wars we're raging in our lives right now, Lord, that we would be confident in the victory that you have already assured.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_01: Lord, that we would be secure and take heart in knowing, God, that you have overcome every single thing, even the things we have fought with for our entire lives.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_01: Lord, eventually we'll have victory.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_01: But God, also that you have given us the power to fight today.
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_01: And that there's not a single thing that afflicts us that can't be overcome by your power, because it is not based on our strength, but on yours, Lord.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: God, I pray that you would help us to fight these battles.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: And Lord, for anybody who doesn't know Christ as their Savior, that they would recognize how lost and truly hopeless their case is, absent the blood of Jesus.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: But Lord, by trusting in Him, they can take on the armor of God and fight these battles too.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_01: Lord, we love you and we thank you.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's in Jesus' name we pray.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_00: That Jesus Christ has won.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I can face tomorrow for tomorrow.
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_00: Just like you're for and when it's gone, I know you are you are my hope.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_00: When seas ready your spirit is my home.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_00: You fix my eyes on Jesus Christ.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'll say that it is for coming.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_00: Have a great week.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_00: See you next time.