Word Keeper

These next few Sermons I post over the upcoming days are pretty late, and I’m sorry about that.

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The audio – The sermon starts at the 5:50-ish mark

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In the previous sermons, we learned about the devil, his demons, and some of his tactics for attacking us. Now we look at how to overcome his attacks.

1 John 4:4 – The context of this verse is about anti-Christs and false spirits. We, Christians, have already overcome the spiritual forces of evil through the power of Jesus. … You can live an overcoming life. You no longer have to live in sin. You don’t have to be afraid of Satan. You have (or can have) victory in Jesus! You can live a life joy because Jesus  is (or can be) in you and is greater than Satan. … Here’s 4 counter-strategies to overcoming the enemy.

1. Be filled with the Spirit … because you’re vulnerable to the enemy when your life is empty. The enemy comes into empty places. … Matthew 12:43-45 – Being empty is dangerous. An empty life is simply an invitation for the enemy to attack. It’s as if you live in a big city and you left your door open. Eventually someone will come in and rob or do something worse. An empty place will be filled with something. The best way to keep something bad from filling the empty space is to fill it with something good. Fill your life with the spirit!
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2. Put on the spiritual armor that God provides … Ephesians 6:10-18 – There is mighty power in the Lord and He lets us use it. The devil is always scheming against us so we should put on this armor for protection against the enemy’s attacks, because he will attack. These pieces of armor are for spiritual warfare because our battle is not against one another, but against the forces of evil. With this armor that God has provided with, we can make a stand, a firm stand, against Satan and his demons. Paul mentions six pieces of armor that a Roman soldier would likely have and gives them each a spiritual significance.
   1. The belt of Truth … This would hold the soldiers tunic in place and allow him to move more freely. In other words, “the Truth will set you free.”
   2. The breastplate of righteousness … This protects the vital organs. Satan will tell you that you’re no good and you haven’t changed, but this breastplate of righteousness, of Jesus’ righteousness, will protect you.
   3. The sandals of the Gospel of peace … These give the soldier good traction. By knowing the Gospel, we can better stay on course and not let the enemy derail us.
   4. The shield of Faith … Roman soldiers carried big, wooden sheilds with a leather front. When they attacked a city, the enemy would fire flaming arrows at them. The Roman soldiers would dip their shields in water and soak the leather. Then they would use the shields as a covering and the shields would extinguish the arrows as they hit. Faith is your shield against Satan’s fiery arrows.
   5. The helmet of salvation … The soldiers wore a helmet lined with sponge or felt to protect them. Satan will try to make you doubt your salvation, but the helmet of salvation will protect you so you will always know that you are saved.
   6. The Sword of the Spirit … The only offensive weapon we get to carry is the Bible, the Word of God. When Jesus was tempted by the devil, He quoted the Bible, and so it is our weapon.

   Then Paul adds that prayer defeats the enemy.
   This armor can be summed up in its essence as an awareness and understanding of salvation and the Word of God.

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3. Control your passions so that you don’t give the devil an opening into your life. … Yes, you have your armor on, but armor never fits perfectly. There will be some gaps in it that you must be weary of. … 1 Peter 5:8 – Look at the first part. We need to stay in control. Because when we get out of control, the devil has an opportunity to attack. But we don’t have to do this on our own; self-control is  fruit of the Spirit. If you’re filled with the Spirit, He will help you control yourself, but you must cooperate with the Spirit by also trying to exhibit self-control. … Here are three specific areas. -
   1. 1 Corinthians 7:5 – In this verse, Paul is talking to married couples. Apparemtly some of the marred couples at Corinth were moving toward a state of celibacy. They thought that maybe it was super-spiritual. … Paul says to tham to only stay away from your spouse to pray for a short time so the devil does not have an opening. … The point is that lust and sexual desires is one of those areas where we must have self-control.
   2. 2 Corinthians 2:10-11 – Bitterness is bad. Unforgiveness leads to bitterness. If you are bitter, it gives Satan an opening in your life that he can exploit.
   3. Ephesians 4:26-27 – Anger is another one of those areas that can be dagerous. Bad anger give the devil as foothold inyour life. 
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4. Resist the devil. … 1 Peter 5:9; James 4:7 – Satan’s a coward. If you resist him, he will flee. … Submit to God; resist the devil, but we often get it backwards. We too often resist God and submit to the devil, but if we submit to God and resist the devil, we can have better lives. … Matthew 4:11 – Jesus resisted the devil. The left Him. Angels came and attended to Him! I think it’d be pretty nice to have angels attend to me, to help me through life. The devil will come back again from another angle, but you don’t have to be under cointinous attack.  You can build resistance to the devil.

Jason religion, Series, Sunday Sermon, The Spiritual Forces of Evil

So Great

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The Audio

If you listen to the audio, the first part is a little about our church. This week and the following three weeks will probably have a little something about our church at the start of the sermon.

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Your enemy, the devil, wants to devour you (1 Peter 5:8). … Lions are big, powerful, strong, carnivorous hunters. They have no mercy on their prey. The devil is like that. … God has a will for your life, but do does your enemy, the devil. Just as in a football game, your coach’s will for you is to win, but your opponent’s coach’s will for you is to lose. One of them will win out over the other. … God’s plan for your life is to bless you. Satan’s plan for your life is to curse you. God’s plan for your life is to give you eternal life. Satan;s plan for your life is to give you eternal death. … The word “evil” is “live” spelled backwards. God wants you to live and avoid evil. Satan wants you to throw away your life and suffer in evil as a result. … The devil is a destroyer. He wants to destroy every aspect of your life. However, we don’t believe the devil can completely devour Christians, but he can eat around the edges of the life of a Christian. … Some people overestimate the enemy. These people are afraid of the devil and always worried the devil will get them. The Bible sys to fear God, not the devil. But probably more of us underestimate the devil. We don’t take it seriously enough. We’re not on guard like we should be. And as a result, we get viciously attacked when we’re not ready.

His primary weapons are sin and unbelief (Ephesians 2:1-2). … Sin brings death. If the devil can hold us in sin, we die. When you sinned that first time, you died spiritually. Then when you accept Jesus as Savior, you become spiritually alive again! … If Satan can keep you in sin and unbelieving in Christ, you will go to Hell and Satan would win a battle. … There is a spirit at work in people who are disobedient to God. It’s a very different spirit than the one at work in believers, the Holy Spirit. This spirit is called the Ruler of the Kingdom of the Air, and his dominion is Earth. This spirit even tries to work in believers after they accept Christ; he tries to make Christians useless tools of God. … This world is currently in rebellion against God and this spirit is leading the rebellion. … This spirit has unbelievers right where he wants them. If you’re not a Christin. you are going to Hell if you die before you accept Christ as savior.

The devil is a liar and he seeks to deceive you (John 8:44; 2 Corinthians 2:11). … In the passage from John, Jesus is talking to his enemies. … The devil doesn’t fight fair. He tricks us. He lies to us. He deceives all so he can get us to sin and. … He is a terrorist. He attacks without regard for the innocent. All he wants to do is destroy his enemies, which is everyone. … He will try to outwit us, so we need to be aware of his schemes.  … Here are four of the ways the devil tries to deceive you:

1. The devil tries to keep you away from the Word of God (Luke 8:5; 11-12). … There is no Truth in the devil who never speaks Truth. He is afraid of the Truth. God’s Word, the Bible,  is True. … In this parable, there is a farmer sowing seeds and some of the seeds fell on a rocky path. Plants don’t grow well on a rocky path. The seeds were even trampled upon and eaten by birds. What does it mean? The seed is the Word of  God. The devil doesn’t want us to hear the Word of God and he tries his hardest to make us not retain God’s Word. He will try to snatch it away from your heart immediately. He’ll distract us so we don’t meditate and focus on the Word of God. He’ll try to keep us from church so we don’t hear the Word  of God. … Some people don’t have trouble because they resist the devil and form a groove of consistency, but that sermon’s for next week.
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2. The devil plants hypocrites in the world to disillusion you (Matthew 13:24-26; 37-39). … Here’s another of Jesus’ parables. … In this one there is a man sowing wheat, and he sows good seeds. But then in the middle of the night, while everyone’s asleep, his enemy comes and sows weeds among the wheat. … The wheat and the weeds come up together. The blades of weeds  look the same as the blades of wheat until the time for harvest, and the heads come up. The heads look different from each other. What does it mean? Jesus sowed His Word, the good seeds, among all the Earth, the garden. Then the devil came as a coward in the middle of the night and sowed hypocrites, people who claim to be Christians, but really aren’t. Harvest time is judgment day. The harvesters are the angels … The devil counterfeits the real so you’ll believe the real is counterfeit. He makes it look as though there are no real Christians because there are so many fake Christians. … Not everyone who claims to be a Christian and sins is a hypocrite. We all mess up. We all sin from time to time.
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3. The devil sends people to give you bad advice (2 Corinthians 11:13-15; Matthew 16:21-23). … We’ve all probably seen a movie or TV show where a character has a demon on one shoulder and an angel on the other. Both are trying to persuade the character to either do wrong or to do right. … Often times we think the devil may only work in our heads. God works through people, so why shouldn’t the devil work the same way? He is  deceiver after all. He’s an imitator, a counterfeiter. … Satan masquerades as angel of light. Why, then, wouldn’t the people he has deceived masquerade of as apostles of Christ? They do. Sometimes they’re real good at keeping that mask on pretending to be a Christian. Sometimes their advice sounds really good. Sometimes what they teach sounds right. But if you check what they tell you against what the Bible says, you will find them to be wrong. (Always check what you hear or read to what the Bible says. Even check what your pastor tells you and what I type on here.) … Sometimes the people who give you bad advice  aren’t fakes. Sometimes it’s a genuine mistake. A family member probably wouldn’t give you bad advice on purpose, but nobody is perfect. Again, always check advice you get with what the Bible says.
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4. The devil seeks to distort your thinking about Christ (2 Corinthians 4:4). … Satan is referred to as the god of this age. There is only one God of Eternity, but right now Satan functions as the god as of this age. … Satan has some ability to distort how we see the Gospel. He has some power to put cataracts over our spiritual eyes so we don’t see the Truth for what it is. If we don’t know the Gospel, we can’t accept it. This is probably the primary reason why people don’t accept Christ as savior after hearing the Gospel.

The key to overcoming the devil is to know the Truth (John 8:32; 14:6). … If you know the Truth, you will be able to spot hypocrites; you will be able to filter out the bad advice. … The Truth will set you free. Jesus is the Truth!

A Mighty Fortress is our God … Wow!

Jason religion, Series, Sunday Sermon, The Spiritual Forces of Evil

Were it not for Grace

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The Audio

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The second sermon in  ”The Spiritual Forces of Evil” series.

The previous sermon was an overview of the devil and his demons. This sermon deals with nine occult practices, answering two questions about them: Are they real? And are they wrong?

Deuteronomy 18:9-13 lists nine occult practices which God said were forbidden to His people. These can be grouped into three categories:

1. Attempts to gain special knowledge … The first four fit in this category.
   1. Sacrificing another person
   2. Divination
   3. Sorcery
   4. Interpreting omens
   All of these are the wrong means for gaining special knowledge. Isaiah 47:13-14 shows that even though they may get a couple of things right, it is not wise to live by these practices. … If you desire to gain a special knowledge from God, there are ways that He communicates with us. We can pray to God. God answers prayer. Sometimes it’s not the answer we want or it’s a delayed answer, but God will answer in His time in His way. Another way we can receive insight from God is through reading the Bible. If you don’t read the Bible much, you may be surprised to find out that there are many great tidbits of advice in it.
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2. Attempts to influence people or events … The next two go in this category.
   5.  Witchcraft
   6. Casting spells
   To be frank, altering the world is ultimately up to God. God may use you or me or someone else, but either way, it’s God who’s really influencing people and events, not us.
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3. Attempts to contact spirits of the dead … The final two fall into this category.
   7. Mediums – this would include psychics
   8. Spiritists
   9. Consulting with the dead – such as a séance
   Conversing with spirits s dangerous! Spirits are real. There are good spirits and evil spirits. Don’t invite any evil spirit into your life. Don’t even leave a cracked window for it to seep through if you can avoid it.

Are these things real? The Bible gives two answers:

1. Most of these are lies or self-delusions (Ezekiel 13:6-7; Jeremiah 14:14). … There are still false prophets in this world. They claim to know about God and to receive instruction from God, but they are usually self-delusions. They want to believe they have more insight than you or I no matter what.
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2. Some of these are real and demonic (2 Thessalonians 2:9-10; 1 Corinthians 10:19-22). … The devil and his demons have the ability to commit miracle fraud. They can do some spectacular stuff, but none of it as good as God’s miracles. For example: when Moses was trying to get Pharaoh to let the Israelites be set free, his staff became a snake. Three Pharaoh’s magicians also turned their staffs into snakes. But Moses’ snake devoured the other three.

God offers a better alternative to occult practices. He will send a prophet (Deuteronomy 18:14-15). This promise is fulfilled in Jesus (John 1:21, 45; 5:46; 6:14). … So, God made a promise to the Israelites that He would send a great prophet. But He also told them that they have to say “no” to the occult practices so that they could say “yes” to the Prophet who would save them. Jesus is the Prophet with a capital “P.” … When people asked John the Baptist if was the Prophet, he said no. But other people proclaimed Jesus to be the Prophet, and Jesus himself claimed He was/is the Prophet that Moses spoke of in Deuteronomy.

Jason religion, Series, Sunday Sermon, The Spiritual Forces of Evil

It’s Not in Vain

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The Audio – recorded a week before Halloween

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This is the first in a series of sermons called “The Spiritual Forces of Evil.”

Genesis 1:1 says that God made everything. God is the only eternal being. There was no evil. Genesis 1:31 says that everything God made was good. … Then in Genesis 3:1-4, it looks like something may be going wrong. Right away, there is a force of evil trying to lead people astray, as the serpent talks to Eve. In Revelation12:9, the serpent is identified as the devil. … Where did the devil come from though?

The origin of the devil and his demons:

Demons are angels who sin against God (2 Peter 2:4; Jude 1:6). … God has given us and the angelic beings the capacity to love Him.As a result, we all have the capacity to not love God too. To love God, or to not love God is a choice. That choice is what makes love real. … Some angels have chosen not to love God. Because of their decision, they have been cast out of Heaven and are now demons. In fact, Satan, the devil himself, is one of those angels.

The defeat of the devil and his demons:

Jesus came to destroy the work of the devil (1 John 3:8) and set his captives free (Mark 3:22-27). Jesus defeated the devil by his death and resurrection (Hebrews 2:14-15; Colossians 2:15). … When Jesus defeated Satan, He also gave everyone of Satan’s slaves/captives the opportunity to be set free. Unfortunately, some chose not to go with Jesus. Some would rather remain captives.

The present activity of the devil and his demons:

Revelation 12:3-9 – A little background for the following notes. …And a good summary too.

The devil is filled with fury because he knows his time is short (Revelation 12:12). He makes war against God’s people on Earth (Revelation 12:17). … The devil and his demons are like angry hornets because they know their time is short. I think they know they’re going to lose the war. However, they continue to make war on Christians. … We should underestimate the power of the devil and his demons. If we overestimate them, we leave ourselves open to attack. But we also shouldn’t overestimate them. If we overestimate them, we live in fear and aren’t able to fully live.

The destiny of the devil and his demons:

The devil will be thrown into the lake of fire (Revelation 20:7-10). … God wins!

Jason religion, Series, Sunday Sermon, The Spiritual Forces of Evil