WAR, WHAT IS IT GOD FOR? #3
Enemies, Enmity and Eternity
2 Corinthians 10:4
"4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 We demolish arguments and every IMAGINATION that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. 6 And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete.
When covid broke out, there was a hilarious moment where a whole bunch of celebrities got together and sung this song from John Lennon.
"Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us, only sky
Imagine all the people
Livin' for today
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too
Imagine all the people
Livin' life in peace
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one”
Dumbest song ever. Hilarious that a song about “Imagine no possessions” Was sung by millionaires from their million dollar homes to people who comparatively have so little and had just lost their jobs. Even further than that is the problems with the song even without that ridiculous application. People truly are at enmity with God.
EMNITY
Romans 8:5-8
For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. James 4:4 4 Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? 2 You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. 3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. 4 Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”?
6 But He gives more grace. Therefore He says:
“God resists the proud,
But gives grace to the humble.”
Humility Cures Worldliness
7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
ENEMIES
Romans 5:6-11
6 For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. 10 For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. 11 And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.
Now that we’re reconciled….
Matthew 5:43-4643 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’44 But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
LOVE your enemies. Treat others as you wish to be treated? Treat others as better than yourself
The heart. Are you looking for rewards? Or are you being obedient? Marriage is what God has given us to teach us about the relationship between Christ and His church. One important marriage dynamic is seen with the crazy divorce statistics in our world today. For the majority of couples who go into therapy before they divorce, this issue comes up as a CORE problem. Giving to get. Not getting to give. Cleaning for sex dynamic. Don’t do that! The solution, get before God. I recently was having a tough time, I was dealing with a Heavy heart. I got up at 4am and went for big prayer walk. Epic help.
Car Tax fraud. In TN, when you buy and sell a used car privately you will find that it’s the norm to leave the sales price section blank for the buyer to fill out. This is so the buyer can under-report the sales price. This is tax fraud. If you’re living by the Spirit of Truth, you’d fill that thing out accurately NO MATTER THE CONSEQUENCES.
This aint Easy!
1 Corinthians 9:24
24 Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it. 25 And everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown. 26 Therefore I run thus: not with uncertainty. Thus I fight: not as one who beats the air. 27 But I pummel my flesh and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified.
Hebrews 12: God Chastises those He loves.
Encouragement to our church.
Remember Yousef! “This is where love is” Muslims often seen as enemies. This is what the church is to be known for. KEY TO VICTORY: PRIASE IS OUR WEAPON.
As Christians, WE PRAISE!
Psalm 149:6-9
May the praise of God be in their mouths
and a double-edged sword in their hands,
7 to inflict vengeance on the nations
and punishment on the peoples,
8 to bind their kings with fetters,
their nobles with shackles of iron,
9 to carry out the sentence written against them—
this is the glory of all his faithful people.
Praise the Lord.
Dealing with physically violent enemies
Now, What do we do with actual violent enemies?
Romans 13 - God has given nations the authority to operate with military power. Some use, some misuse, but it’s not a sin to serve your nation In the military. There is differentiation between enemies of the state and enemies of God.
ETERNITY
Eternal Life is this: To Know God. John 17:33 And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.
• Pray for God’s will to be done on earth as in heaven, but that don’t mean earth will be heaven. This earth passes away.
God "poetically sends satan to hell" comment. Lol.
The promises to the churches Revelation 1-3
Revelation Promises.
1. Revelation 2:7 To the one who is victorious,I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.
2. Revelation 2:11 The one who is victorious will not be hurt at all by the second death.
3. Revelation 2:17 To the one who is victorious,I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it.
4. Revelation 2:26 To the one who is victorious and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations—27 that one ‘will rule them with an iron scepter and will dash them to pieces like pottery’[b]—just as I have received authority from my Father. 28 I will also give that one the morning star.
5. Revelation 3:5 The one who is victorious will be dressed in white. I will never blot out the name of that person from the book of life, but will acknowledge that name before my Father and his angels.
6. Revelation 3:12 The one who is victorious I will make a pillar in the temple of my God. Never again will they leave it. I will write on them the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven from my God; and I will also write on them my new name.
7. Revelation 3:21 To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne.
Summary:
• Citizenship of paradise
• Immortality
• Granted Forgiveness
• Given Authority over nations
• We get Irrevocable inclusion
• We will be established and given security clearance (know God’s secrets)
• We are given the right to sit on the throne of the king of universe
Revelation 21:23 The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light. 24 And the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor into it. 25 Its gates shall not be shut at all by day (there shall be no night there). 26 And they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it. 27 But there shall by no means enter it anything that defiles, or causes an abomination or a lie, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
Revelation 22:2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.
BID.
Receive the Gift of God! He died for you while you were His enemy, so that you could call Him friend.