Know Thine Enemy II
Sermon Review
02 July 2000

Last time I spoke on the topic of spiritual warfare I mentioned the 3 domains (or fronts) on which the battle is fought: flesh, the world, devil. We looked at flesh last time (if you didn’t hear it or get a copy at the time - it’s on the church website: or ask Louise to download it for you)

Refresher

Galatians 5:(17-21) …for the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to each other,

Romans 7: So you see how it is: my new life tells me to do right, but the old nature that is still inside me loves to sin. Oh what a terrible predicament I am in. Who will free me from my slavery to this deadly lower nature?

That’s capital S, capital W, Spiritual Warfare: The Battle Within - Immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissension, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing and things like these,

We are looking this time at...

The World

(Next time we’ll look at Satan: see Anderson ch 6, Bubeck: the devil made me do it etc…)

So today we are dealing with warfare with the world. The Christian vs the world. It’s rather like David vs Goliath with the amplitude turned up. Now the main Greek word used to refer to "world" is Kosmos. And it happens to be a tough word to nail down…it is the world of John 3:16 - for God so loved the world….but it is also the world of 1 John 2:15… Stop loving this evil world. So it’s a word that depends on context. Sometimes it may mean the earth or all the physical world. Sometimes it may mean the world of human beings. Sometimes it might be the whole collaboration of people and environment (perhaps collaboration is a bit generous!). More often, kosmos means the world order…that is, all the ideas and purposes and activities that humanity is engaged with. And it this meaning that is particularly common in scripture, because this is the context in which we find Satan and the powers of evil. It is the context in which we find sin. And of course this is the context that particularly shows the evidence of humanity’s Godless behaviour.

And this is the world of Ephesians 6:12 – (You really should read the context of the verse: the armour of God )…There’s a lot of theology embedded in this verse - and theological argument for that matter too - but the meaning is really not too hard to grasp. Christians are at war with the world. Not with the people of the world, but with the evil forces influencing the people…the forces of Satan.

But hang on a minute - there seems to be a contradiction here:

Ps. 24:1 the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof (i.e. everything in it). Yet the world seems also to be Satan’s domain: Jesus himself (John 12:31 and elsewhere) refers to Satan as the prince of this world. So whose world is it? Well of course the Psalmist is right. The earth and its contents belong to God. He is its creator and sustainer. He brought us into being. He provides our life-support systems and so on. And he will ultimately claim what is His. His authority vastly exceeds Satan’s and He will win the day. But for the present, Satan has been given power over the earth - limited power in fact, but he’s not quick to let on about that. For the present, the earth is Satan’s domain - that is why we are at war with it.

Now this is a big topic. But I only plan to cover two areas today:

(1) Loving what the world offers

(2) The distraction of the world’s philosophies

(1) Loving what the world offers.

This must be quite an issue in God’s eyes. There is so much in Scripture about this topic. Take 1 John 2:16 for example: Stop loving this evil world and all it offers you, for when you love the world, you show that you do not have the love of the Father. For the world only offers lust for physical pleasure, and lust for everything we see, and pride in our possessions…

It’s amazing really, how quickly we’ve become a lifestyle-oriented culture – sucked along by the gospel of prosperity and happiness: sucked along by the promises of perfect complexions and lustrous hair and wonderful holidays and designer icecream. Now there’s an amazing reversal here - in their early years the baby boomers invented flower power and collectivism and unkempt hair and peace and love and anti-materialism and skinnydipping and Bob Dylan (and the scary thing is I’m old enough to remember it – though not to fully participate). But now in their later years these same boomers are spawning a young generation of me-focussed, wealth-oriented, self-oriented, product-hungry, e-connected, greed-is-good stock market junkies.

And it seems to me that we are all sucked along by a market driven, self-oriented culture where me and my needs are paramount. And look at the marketing words they are using: I’m revitalised…it refreshes my spirit…listen to your heart…create a new reality…my spirit awakens to a splash (a little gem from Elizabeth Arden). All these quasi-religious terms. This must be all right – isn’t it? Surely this isn’t cold hard commercialism - this sounds like heartwarming spirit-healing stuff. It makes me feel good about myself - regardless of the price.

Economics Professor Jeremy Rifkin puts it this way: The advertisers and market leaders have become the gatekeepers of human experience. They alone can tell us where happiness, spirituality and hope may be found – at free market prices!! And in doing so, the market has stolen even some of our religious words - WWJD - who owns the rights to that phrase? Hallmark does – the card company. They copyrighted that phrase and made a packet!

I’m not suggesting we should be careless with money – or disregard our financial responsibilities. I’m not suggesting we shouldn’t buy things and I’m not suggesting we shun opportunities to earn income (well, honest opportunities)… but the issue here is a matter of the heart and a matter of discernment. If the purpose of seeking to accumulate wealth is to buy endless "product" (I think that somewhere down the track it would be good to hear a sermon on this topic); if the purpose is to make ourselves independent and free; if the purpose is for power and influence and self aggrandisement; if the purpose is simply to satiate one’s happiness – if our purpose is to somehow appease our spirit… then we’ve got the wrong plot: we’ve got the world’s plot, not God’s. And we are losing the battle.

I think this is the core of matter: being in the world but not of it. This is a tough call…being in the world but working to God’s agenda. It’s a battle. And it’s a battle we need to take seriously. Just as we wrestle with ourselves, with the flesh (as Paul did: I don’t do what I want to do, and I do what I don’t…), so we also wrestle with this world thing. We ultimately want the real experience - the real spiritual encounter with God, but the substitutes from the world seem so immediate and so appealing and sometimes so necessary. Ah my spirit awakens to a splash. Oh what a feeling.

The world promises so much, but it so often returns so little. In fact it sometimes backfires in your face.

Tess Dasey: Two men tried to pull the front off an ATM in Adelaide's Henley Street by running a chain from the machine to the bumper of their trusty Toyota Landcruiser, but instead of pulling the front panel off the Machine they pulled the bumper off their 4WD. Scared, and attracting attention from oncoming traffic, they left the scene and drove home, leaving the chain still attached to the ATM, their bumper still attached to the chain, and the Toyota's number plate still attached to the bumper.

Pleasures of the world eh!!!, But even if they had got away with the money - how much pleasure would it really bring…a few more beers? Maybe a new Toyota?? Yeah what a feeling!

The amazing thing though is the shallowness of what the world offers - the lack of substance. How many people have won big lottery prizes, only to end up worse-off than before? How many people have bought this or that to express themselves, or redecorated their home to suit their new image, or gone on an expensive holiday to refresh their spirit…or done any of a thousand things promoted by the lifestyle shows and magazines and these days even talk-back radio… only to find that the satisfaction is short lived? There’s no long-term substance. There’s no real meeting of needs. And this is the so-called new reality we are being sucked into.

(to repeat John’s words): Stop loving this evil world and all it offers you, for when you love the world, you show that you do not have the love of the Father. For the world only offers lust for physical pleasure, and lust for everything we see, and pride in our possessions…..

Try for a broader spin on the ME thing: self-expression, self-determination….

(2) The distraction of the world’s philosophies

One of the things that really does disturb me is the world’s newfound interest in worldly spirituality and philosophy. In some ways this is an exciting opportunity for evangelism, but again, the forces of evil are at work here to try and thwart the influence of the Gospel of Christ.

There’s basically two strands here: one is the rise of mysticism. This has many forms, whether it be occult practices and psychic powers or the consciousness movement or whatever. I presume we can all recognise the first two as being direct expressions of satanic powers Consciousness is a hard one - it’s from the so-called new age movement, but it’s origins are in Hinduism. Its premise is that the most important thing is the mind. Thought is more important than matter. And the scary thing is that it isn’t just softheaded philosophers, the yoga fans and eastern meditationists getting into this. Many hard-nosed scientists have moved into the consciousness sphere.

Max Planck: I regard consciousness as fundamental and matter as derivative of consciousness…

And what is the problem with consciousness? Well it elevates the human mind to the status of God. It says that everything we experience is created by the mind - so the mind usurps God. Perhaps you think I’m overstating the case here, but this stuff is getting very fashionable.

The other strand is the rise of what I call self-ness. Selfness is a doctrine of self-fulfilment. Self is fundamental. Everyone should develop to his or her full potential. And there are books and books on self-expression and self-determination and self-actualisation and self-assertiveness and self-gratification. And the problem here is that there are basically no boundaries. No one has the right to tell others how they should conduct themselves. No one can impose values or restrictions on others. We all basically become our own "god" in charge of our own destiny.

I’ll recount to you a story from America, where this stuff is a bit more advanced than in Australia): You might remember the shooting a girl in a Michigan school by another student…

Let's see, I think it started when Madeline Murray O'Hare complained she didn't want any prayer in our schools, and we said OK.
Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school, the Bible that says thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbour as you love yourself. And we said, OK.
Then someone said teachers and principals better not discipline our children when they misbehave. And the school administrators said no faculty member in this school better touch a student when they misbehave because we don't want any bad publicity, and we surely don't want to be sued. And we accepted their reasoning.
Then someone said, let's let our daughters have abortions if they want, and they won't even have to tell their parents. And we said, that's a grand idea.
Then some wise school board member said, since boys will be boys and they're going to do it anyway, let's give them all the condoms they want, so they can have all the fun they desire, and we won't have to tell their parents they got them at school. And we said, that's another great idea.
Then some of our top elected officials said it doesn't matter what we do in private, as long as we do our jobs. And agreeing with them, we said it doesn't matter to me what anyone, including the President, does in private, as long as I have a job and the economy is good.
And then someone said let's print magazines with pictures of nude women and call it wholesome down-to-earth appreciation for the beauty of the female body. And we said, we have no problem with that....
And someone else took that appreciation a step further and published pictures of children and then stepped further still by making them available on the Internet. And we said they're entitled to their free speech.
And the entertainment industry said, let's make TV shows and movies that promote profanity, violence, and illicit sex.
And let's record music that encourages rape, drugs, murder, suicide and satanic themes. And we said it's just entertainment, it has no adverse effect, and nobody takes it seriously anyway, so go right ahead.
Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, or their classmates or even themselves.

Dear God,
Why didn't you save the little girl in Michigan?
Sincerely,
Concerned Student

AND THE REPLY...

Dear Concerned Student,
I am not allowed in schools.
God

I can’t tell you how vital it is for the Christians in Australia/this town to keep supporting and championing the work of the Scripture teachers in our schools. And that includes at least three people from this church. Presenting not only the Gospel, but Christian attitudes and values to our school kids really is important.

Both mysticism and self-ness strike at the very core of the Gospel. They both oppose the Lordship of Jesus. They are both tools of warfare that Satan is using to beguile people for his own purposes.

Look there’s so many other facets of this spiritual battle with the world - but we must wrap up with what to do about it:

  1. Learn to recognise the world’s attempts to press us into its mould with its pressure to:
  • gain treasure and self gratification
  • gain power and position (…what does it profit if we gain the whole world…)
  • be ashamed of Jesus and His Gospel..
  • conform to the world’s standards and values (recurrent theme in Peretti’s books This Present Darkness etc…) - and it’s one that I often come across - where people try to drag you down to their level - that way they don’t feel so threatened by their own sin…
  1. Admit that it really is a spiritual battle and pray for protection

It’s a battle between a contrived and arbitrary spiritual experience vs the enduring spiritual reality of salvation through the power of God in Jesus.

  1. Recognise that worldliness is a matter of the heart

Mum used to think people worldly if they went off to dances or went shopping on Sundays - she had a whole list of things that were "worldly" - she probably had playing electric guitars on the list too. But you could refrain from all the things on her checklist and still be worldly - it isn’t just external actions - it’s a matter of the heart - it’s a matter of whether we’re focussed on God’s will and purposes or someone else’s.

  1. Learn to fight the battle…

…not with feelings and emotions - but with a sound understanding of the word of God.. ie truth of the word. That’s what the Armour of God passage is about - be sure to revise it (Ephesians 6). Each item of armour is a cornerstone of truth. We need to be careful with feelings-oriented people and feelings-oriented doctrine…they sometimes leave themselves open to attacks. And remember that Satan’s worldly guises usually appeal to the emotional and feelings part of us.

  1. Claim the victory.

Have a look at Romans 6:6. Your sinful nature was crucified with Christ. Really grasp this please: Jesus died not just to pay the debt that your sin deserved - his death also renders powerless our sinful nature… so we are no longer held in its grasp.. no longer a slave to sin.

  1. Look Who’s praying for you

Have a look at the wonderful prayer that that Jesus prayed for his disciples (John 17:15 ff: My prayer is not that you take them out of this world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world even as I am not. Sanctify them by the truth: your Word is truth. As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified. (And the next verse should be special for every one of you) My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message.

Our place is in the world. Jesus has sent us into the world. Jesus is praying that you will have victory over the world. He’s given you all the armour – all the protection – all the equipment you need. Don’t let him down.

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Your Spiritual Warfare Stratagem

In His Service

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