Northside Church - Sydney
Modern Family // Week 5: Spiritual Warfare
I'm listening to another great message from Northside Community Church. Last week I was chatting about saving private Ryan Tom Hanks and I thought if you're on a good thing then stick with it. You'll recall the first scene. He and a whole bunch of other men had crammed himself into one of those little landing boats off the main ship as they prepare for the Battle of Normandy and as they head ever closer to Omaha Beach, the outside of this metal open plan type boat is stung with bullets and all sorts of explosives that are going off in and around them, men are starting to be hitting the head. Guys are going down before they've even landed on the beach and the reality seems to sink in. You can see the fear in their eyes as they know what they're about to embark on as that landing door goes down upon that beach is really a battle of survival. Here we get to chapter 6 of Ephesians and Paul pretty much paints exactly the same picture. He says finally, finally be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power put on the full armor of God. He uses a military example to take us back up to the lofty heights that Paul seems to operate in so well, right? If you recall with chapter 1 he was talking all the reasons why God was bringing all of the church together that he was forming a new humanity, the modern family, that through Jesus he was bringing people of all different backgrounds together forming them into the church. And because of that why chapter 1 to 3 he was giving us the how, chapter 4, 5 and 6, that the Christian is to live. And here he says finally, he's getting ready to go. His time could be up in the prison, our time's up in this series as we approach our last message for this six week series in Ephesians. He says finally be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes for our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms, therefore put on the full armor of God so that when the day of evil comes you may be able to stand your ground and after you've done everything to stand. I stop there because we can't get through all of that passage tonight when we talk about the topic of spiritual warfare, really it's a topic that could last for six weeks in and of itself and I'm conscious when we look at this approach to evil, when we look at this approach to spiritual warfare on one hand you can have those that take the casual approach and say well there's no such thing, what are you talking about it's all in your head. And then on the other end of the spectrum you can have people that seem just absolutely obsessed with the devil and everything demonic and everything within his realm you know and C.S. Lewis said in his Screw Tape Letters book the general public first to either ignore the forces of evil together or are taken by an unhealthy interest in everything demonic which can be just as bad in the long run and I don't know where you sit in that spectrum tonight but the first thing we learn and the example that Paul paints for us and first and foremost is that Christianity is a battle and the first question we ask and that is why is it a battle, take a look at verse 12 it says for our struggle, our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. So struggles not against flesh and blood. In the majority of cultures right, Asia, Latin America, Africa, the existence and the problem of evil is an everyday thing. I mean I was watching Ross Kemp, he was an actor in the show East Enders and Ross Kemp does all these crazy crazy documentaries I don't know if you've ever seen him but he's still in a new series at the moment called Ross Kemp Extreme World and in this documentary I struggled to watch all of it, I just had to flick through in 30 second increments. In this documentary he goes into the very heart of what they call the sorcery belt in East Africa and he goes in there and he's looking at a battle that is going on, a battle between the general population and gangs of people that go around trying to kill other sorts of people that are known as witches or sorcerers and these witches and these sorcerers go around and Kemp's following around all these various stories, various albino Africans are having parts of their body parts cut off while they're alive so these sorcerers can use them and mix them up into various potions. And he's saying part of the solution this problem could be the police on one hand but they're doing nothing about it and then he takes it to a scene where you see a whole bunch of people in the forest and he says this could be the solution and it was a church service and then he goes on to interview someone who had been a witch doctor, someone who had cut the body parts off someone and someone who were now sitting next to their pastor declared that the power of Jesus Christ had saved them from something wicked and something evil. And in flicking through this documentary I couldn't help but think that on the same Sunday there could be a pastor there this week sitting in a forest like that with a bunch of people that were once witch doctors and then there could be me sitting here tonight and now it shows a little church and we read phrases like this battle is not against flesh and blood but schemes of evil. And I look at the difference and you sort of say well how can we read the same passage and for one church this is the lifeblood of their existence and for another church it's a point of interest I think it's because there's a level of spiritual blindedness to the things of evil in the western world. I mean you've got to ask any I'm seeing people here anyone who's been on a missionary trip into these various cultures know the way in which the majority of the world see the problem and the existence of evil. And so there's a blindedness in our culture the blindedness to this existence of evil and more importantly a blindedness to the reason and the causality of evil into some aspects of human behaviour like I don't know about you can you ever recall that shocking story about those two British kids one day decided to get up out of bed walk to a shopping mall find a little toddler lure him out to a set of train tracks to all sorts of unspeakable acts to him ways head down on the side of the track and wait till the train comes along. When you read up on the story of 93 of Thompson and Venables if that's how you pronounce his name the line say that the real issue in this case here the real issue was how to sentence young offenders that was the issue and of course from a legal perspective yes that's the issue but is that the real issue the the real issue is how do we deal with evil in the human soul where does it start where does it begin and this is why the Bible is a as a remarkable document it's not simplistic it's realistic in a Bible if you read to all the passages says they say that from a biblical perspective the problem of evil is that there are embers there are embers that burn away on the inside of everyone that there are embers that if the winds of opportunity and the winds of intention happen across blow across it that just the right time that a fire will erupt from within them of frightening proportions that the Bible says there are embers of the soul there were embers of the soul in people like Hitler and his Holocaust there were embers of the soul in people like pole pot and the Khmer Rouge that systematically destroyed 25 percent of their population the very people that they were supposed to care for and then our late Dallas Willard who passed away this week a great hero of mine in the faith said that this is the illusion of our age the holy grail of modernity a pleasant dream in the sleep of secularism that the monstrous evils we deplore are in fact the strict causal consequences of the spirit and behavior of the normal human beings following generally acceptable patterns of life see what Dallas is saying there's a there's a golf there's a golf opening up that our society can't deal with there's a golf opening up between the problem of evil and our ability to even cope with it our ability to reason with it a problem that the west has with evil is is not only its existence but the insufficiency of the rationalizations around this topic the insufficiency that says that it's pathology of physical body or it's social sociology your relationships whether it's family or friends or your psychology or mine somehow are good enough excuses deep down that are good enough reasons for the horror that we see in the world around us what do we do what do we do with that modern research will tell you that if if but if something has a power over you the largest part of its power over you is in the in your denial that you're under its power I mean the first step out from under that power is to admit that you're not in control I mean that's the first step of AA right the first step of AA is that we admit that we were powerless over alcohol that our lives have become unmanageable step two that we came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity you see what I'm getting at friends unless you understand that there is an evil beyond and besides the human condition you'll be forever under its power the Bible's not simplistic it's realistic and so it says therefore you better understand the devil now someone's saying you just you just say what I thought you say you seriously saying that you believe in in the devil well does Roger Federer believe in Rafael Nadal I'm a pastor I understand my opposition all too well at where Christians and we need to understand our opposition all too well and so if you go look if you say look I'm a modern person how can you be thinking about it you're talking about a devil your supreme evil power look a couple of quick litmus test questions for you do first of all look do you believe in a good God if you saw the person says I believe in God but I don't believe in the devil do you believe in a good God if you believe in a personal powerful force for good then why couldn't you believe in a personal powerful force for evil or the other question you could ask yourself is do you believe in Jesus Jesus says in Luke 10 18 he says I saw Satan fall from heaven like lightning and Jesus said I saw Satan I saw this devil I saw this evil power as a follower of Jesus do you believe in him but you don't believe in this evil power how on what basis can you pick and choose about what words of Jesus you're going to believe or or more importantly you could be a person who's not a Christian and you're a modern you're educated and you're saying this is crazy this is narrow this is one-sided look my question to you is are you really being open-minded yourself Asia Latin America Africa vast majority that whether with a minority in the West the vast majority of the world's cultures believe in what Paul calls the powers and the principalities of us majority of the world's cultures believe in some form of evil spiritual power can you yeah does fit or unknown to dial look that's the question it's not only why are we fighting but a tool we fighting verse 12 against his for our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers against the authorities against the powers you know president Obama before he was president Obama in the speech that many tout as these speech which put him on the map it was his 2004 address to the at the democratic national convention he says this when we send our young men and women in the harm's way we have solemn obligation not to fudge the numbers or to shade the truth about why they are going to care for their families while they're gone to tender the soldiers upon their return and to never ever go to war without enough troops to win the war secure the peace and earn a little respect of the world you see he's principal it's the same principle that Paul's talking about and Paul could have given the address the 2004 DNC Paul saying simply if we know that christianity is a battle if you know that christianity christianity is a fight then Obama's right you've got to know your enemy you have to know who you're fighting and so we see the bible causing the devil when it comes to this enemy the first thing we see is his scope the scope of the devil is it's both pervasive and it's also personal that's how big it is on one hand it's pervasive and it's personal look at this look at the words but against rulers authorities powers there's such big words Paul big words I'm big he's trying to paint vivid picture for us here what Paul is getting at is that the scope the scope of the devil's power is so large that the bible calls him in 2 Corinthians the god of this world in Ephesians he's called the prince of the air and the prince of darkness the scriptures teaching us really that there's only two kingdoms of world there's a kingdom of darkness and there's a kingdom of light and for example you know john chapter eight you remember Jesus is talking to the Pharisees and they don't believe in him and he says in verse 42 to 44 he says if God were your father you'd love me for I've come here not I've come here from God I've not come here on my own God sent me why is my language not clear to you here's why because you're unable to hear what I say you belong to your father the devil and you want to carry out your father's desires can you see how Jesus breaks it down real simple the scope there's either the kingdom of the darkness or this kingdom of light and in that sense there's only two different humanities there is a race of people that are under the kingdom of darkness and there's a race of people who are under the kingdom of light there is the mighty prince Jesus and there's a mighty prince the devil and the bible is saying that in these two kingdoms there's only two types of DNAs of spiritual DNA implanted into the soul of a human there's only a DNA that if in a in a billion years from now when the bible says you're stole soul still exists there is a DNA within you that is either that is either growing you into something that in a billion years from now if you saw it today you'd be tempted to fall down and worship because it's so beautiful and it's so wonderful or the bible says there's a DNA that deep within your soul that if a billion years from now it's growing units it's something that if you saw it today would be so horrific and not the wind out of you the scope's easy kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light that's how big it is but it's also personal Jesus dealt with the devil personally now when the poor users are word like authorities he's trying to say there's this supernatural force is not an impersonal thing it's a it's a personal thing it's not impersonal the devil is personal and he's a ruler he was cast out of heaven he has this whole host of followers and their persons of angelic nature you know what are angels people saying oh great we're going to talk about angels no no that's a whole other subject but what we do know is that God created persons he created rational persons that could speak and could think and could create and there were two orders of them and there were humans and there were angels and they still exist today if you do your bible study and the interesting spot like i said before in in Luke 10 verse 18 Jesus says I saw Satan fall from heaven like lightning it's because he sent his disciples out they've come back they said Lord even the demons submit to your name and Peter then Jesus says I know I saw Satan I've seen what went down in two Peter chapter two verse four it says that Satan was thrown out of heaven with a whole bunch of angels and why we're not told much but we're told in the Old Testament that it comes from Satan the statements like this it's Satan said I will ascend I will be the most high I want to be the top you see the sin of Satan in heaven was was the one to be number one was want to ascend to the position of God on his throne and he was cast out of heaven and there was a whole host of followers that were with him and that's where we get this demonic realm that we hear about read about in the bible talk about in the Christian realm but here's here's the point Satan's not just pervasive his personal his personal if his personal it means he's got a character just as Jesus had a character what's that character it's diabolical and he's thinking oh he was a naughty kid as well and that's why my parents always called me your behavior's diabolical that's where we get the word the word Satan is is a translation of the Greek word diabolos and that literally means that he's an accuser he's a slanderer he's a liar it says the chief weapon the WMD of Satan himself is the lie that's the enemy that we face his scope is is pervasive it's personal and ultimately we see just by virtue of his name that Satan's a liar now how does this work we've looked at why do we fight now we're going to look at who we're fighting now now we're looking at how does he work how does he fight now look some of you think and look you know you're not fighting the devil until there's spinning heads and green projectile vomiting and you know what got me when i read this passage i went through and i i don't know about you if you've seen the title is coming up i thought wow we're going to preach on spiritual warfare and i went this is kind of boring i was expecting it to be a little bit more sensational i'd say yeah i was i stick it off when we think this hollywood approach to fighting Satan it would either be spinning heads there'd be all sorts of crazy faces it looked like something out of american halloween movie but it's that's look if you understand the slanderer and the accuser and the deceitful one and the liar that the projectile vomiting is way too obvious way too obvious you know let's use the military example again you know what what what are some of the great when have some of the great military battles been won not not when not when you come stemming in with all the rockets but when you have this incredible band of of fighters called the special air service or the sas and what do the sas do they go behind enemy lines they're they're sneaky they're quiet they're careful they're calculated the devil is the great sas combatant in this battle that is happening for your soul tonight that's what paul says you see it's far less sensational i'll show you what it is in a second but that's what makes him so effective the devil's not an idiot the devil's not stupid he's a great ruler verse 11 it says put on the full armor of god that so you can take your stand against the devil's schemes you know that word there the great word methodia is where we get the word method from it said he's scheming he has methods in other words that the devil works in strategic schemes in sas schemes behind enemy lines another way to put it is that the devil injects poisoned perceptions of the world of god and of your own life he injects these poisoned perceptions into your mind now i'll get to i call this the honky tonk principle on honky tonk pianos i don't know if you've ever seen them they're like out of a movie in new Orleans i'm thinking of that one of those real junky old pianos one's at a you've gone to your grandma's place and you want to play the piano and the things been sitting there for 60 years and you try and belt out a good rendition of chopsticks and and you're going and you know it just clunks because there's no string left in the piano it's broke 15 years ago and so you then as a kid have to go back to the keyboard and start going dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong and you work out that there are some strings missing now here's what i'm getting at the devil's clever devil devil the devil always works with what he's got with you what you struggle with might be off the radar for someone else that the devil plays you like a honky tonk piano he works with the very strings that you've got in the very depths of your soul and he like a mischievous little child goes through nothing there i won't bother about that dong and and he keeps playing his schemes there's method to all of this and so here's here's what he does and this is why the projectile vomiting thing doesn't work for me when i read the biblical understanding of what spiritual warfare is all about the the funny thing is it's it's not about you and i've heard people say if someone thinks that they went and fell over a stone and stub their toe and it started bleeding or they break it they go oh the devil that wasn't the devil you just didn't know how to walk properly this morning all right some commentators if you think that way in christian life come on don't don't don't think you're such a big target get over yourself the devil's got some bigger battles to be fighting out there but he's he's there's schemes and the steps here's here's what he fights the you know what the devil fights the devil fights the only thing that is of power on our side of heaven you know what he fights he fights the gospel he fights the gospel he for what is the gospel the gospel is is as luther said symbol used as et pecetera the gospel is this that you are more evil than you dared imagine and exactly the same time you're more loved and accepted than you dared believe that that is the incredible scope of the balance of the christian life i mean you have to have the power of the holy spirit and god to believe a statement like that but that that is the reality of what the bible says the gospel is that your symbol used as et pecetera that you're more evil than you dared imagine but you're more loved and accepted than you dared believe and so the devil tries to get in and he tries to muck with these strategies and so here's here are the strategies here's two different strategies that he uses read it throughout the bible just to temptation and accusation in temptation he attacks the first part of the gospel you are more evil than you dared imagine he says no you're not you're not he reduces your sin and he emphasizes god's mercy he over emphasizes god's mercy he says come on you're not you're not that bad look what everyone else is doing come on little whispers sas and then on the other side of an accusation he tries to take out the other half of the gospel and he says you take the tax the second part which says you're more loved than you dared believe and he says no you're not he tries to reduce god's mercy and he tries to overemphasize his sin it's right i don't know i don't know if you've been there right at that moment we try and take in that wonder of the gospel and he says do you remember what you did last week see how it works temptation or accusation and often often the two of them they're a one two punch you know the first punch is the left hand punch it's just it's it's a little it's a little weaker than the first it tries to tempt you a bit and then and then the other one the accusation he comes in he knocks you out now what am i talking about let let me get it here brooks a Puritan commentator had had something like 36 different examples of how the devil can use temptation and he might have been the sort of person tonight that thought look we're just going to spend 20 minutes 30 minutes on just all the different strategies of temptation but can you see why we need to see the bigger picture here we need to see why we're fighting we need to who we're fighting now let's have a look briefly at how he fights us here's some examples you might need a pen right now if you haven't got it back of your car that you haven't tilled in yet i'm cheeky because i'm going to belt through these here's how the devil works with temptation he shows you the bait but he hides the hook he shows you the short term gain of your sin but he hides the long-term consequences of it here's the other one he he rationalizes sin he makes you rationalize your sin i'm not greedy i'm just thrifty i'm not manipulative or controlling i'm just very concerned here's the other one he does number three he overstates the mercy of god makes you overstate the mercy of god oh come on you know god will forgive you just do it he has to forgive you number four he makes you bitter over suffering he makes you bitter over suffering no one knows how much i've had to go through no one knows what i've had to go through you know i deserve just a little bit of indulgence what are we up to five number five oh this is a great one the devil shows christians how much fun the rest of the world is having no i might as well do it it did look look at where being a christian has got me look at where being a christian has got me with my relational life look at where being a christian has got me with my financial life here's the sixth one it makes you compare one part of your life to the other i'm really good over here so as long as i've got most of this stuff happening here then all of that doesn't matter that's the mafia approach yeah i kill people but i'm good to my mama that's some of the temptation examples here's here's quickly the accusation examples this is this is what the devil does to you with his weapon of accusation this is this is real this is the real knockout punch three of them here briefly let's look at this number one the devil causes you to look more at your sin than your savior how many times are people saying that kids have got to constantly be receiving compliments you know Graham talked about it this morning you know just one bad word can set you off for a lifetime and people say that that that the for every sin we need to look at our savior five times more here's the second way that he accuses you he he he helps you obsess with past sins that you can do nothing about the third one he he makes you think that the troubles that you are going through right now must be punishment i must have been doing something wrong if i'm going through this level of suffering and he gets in the ear and he says you know if god really loved you wouldn't be going through this can you see how he works he's sneaky he's sneaky but most of all do you recognize any of these you know what he's doing don't don't don't don't he's playing you four out of seven might have meant nothing to you already drifting off into a sleep and then one of them struck to the very heart of you are you know what he's doing he's playing you he's playing you like a honky tonky piano and we have to understand that that the great deceiver satan that lies can be the very root of the battle for your soul the lies told to you from friends the lies told to you from family the lies told to you from your peers the lies told to you from the culture around you the lies told around you there that's what he'll work with every time we accept one of these lies we just string up another string in the piano for him the devil and his methadilla he's honky tonky piano he plays us he plays us you and i both so finally how do we fight back how do we get him verse 13 says therefore put on the full armor of god so that so that when the day of evil comes you may be able to stand your ground you know what it's saying it's saying so that when the day that that guy comes in and starts tweaking your strings so that here's here's what Paul's saying you see here it is you're supposed to put on the armor before the battle not during the battle you're not you're not supposed to put it on when arrows are flying and other warriors have broken through the breach and they're hurtling their broads swords at you and and you say that that's that's not the time to say excuse me while I slip into something more appropriate why do you why do you think Paul's using a military example to finish off this wonderful book of Ephesians yeah because why does he say that being a Christian is like being a soldier you know it's not because he's trying to glorify the military it's not so Sam could use another saving private Ryan example tonight it's because he's saying do you seriously understand the peril that you could be in do you seriously realize that if you were lasing about using the Bible in your life do you realize that if you're not diligent in developing a consistent and a constant prayer life do you not know that if you allow undelt with sin to continue to fester in your life if you don't know that if you if you're not willing to put on the armor of God that you'll be killed and you'll be spiritually knocked out and you'll find yourself tortured and tormented and enslaved and some of you thinking well how does that work because I'm saved and I know that nothing can separate me from the love of Christ and I you know we Sam when you get into the bit where we're supposed to have victory in Christ and and all that sort of stuff and the positive stuff in spiritual warfare look Charles Spurgeon Charles Spurgeon once said when it comes to your salvation and you fight with the devil he says you can't fall off the boat to heaven but you can fall onto it break every break every bone in your body and have one painful time in getting there and here's what he's getting out the devil may be mighty and he is mighty we must not underestimate the enemy that we're up against the devil might may be mighty but he's defeated and the problem is you can be mighty before you've officially been defeated I just ask anyone that's seen a dirty soccer or a dirty AFL team certainly not a dirty rugby team because there is no dirtiness in that wonderful game but you know you know what an enemy's like you know what it is there's three minutes left to go and the score is 50 now and they know they got no hope of winning this and what do they do they just start playing the man they start playing the person you know the devil is like he's like he's like a mischievous frustrated little opposition that is absolutely relentless and absolutely ruthless in his pursuit to stuff up your final moments of your boat ride to heaven between now and the time in which Jesus Christ puts his whole thing to bed he's relentless he's defeated as big as the power is there's no long-term possibility for his victory the score is five billion to kneel and this is how Colossians 2 verse 13 Paul says when you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh in your old way of life is what he's saying there God made you alive with Christ isn't that Ephesians 2 now I'm not the only one that's unoriginal in their preparation and Paul's Paul's using a little bit of his lines from both Colossians and Ephesians that's he's saving a private right approach having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness which stood against us and condemned us he has taken it away nailing it to the cross and here it is this this slots right in this this is this is your nuclear fuel rod for this verse here from Ephesians 6 Colossians 2 15 and having disarmed the powers and the authorities you made a public spectacle of them triumphing over them by the cross I call that the twins principle Danny DeVito Arnold Schwarzenegger 1988 all right DeVito is this really just creepy little the crepit man really is a petty criminal and Arnold Schwarzenegger was this scientific experiment that would just cheer human perfection picks the size of dinner plates they didn't realize they're both part of an experiment and they'd been separated at birth and DeVito was just the thrown away trash and and Schwarzenegger was the perfect example of what they intended to be to create the most perfect human being and and and Schwarzenegger rose himself off this Fiji and Ireland somewhere in the Pacific and turns up in a smoky and dirty Los Angeles finds this funny little Jewish looking guy DeVito with a ball head and a ponytail stealing a few cars and he manages to get there right at the right time as DeVito is about to get made a mess of by the people that he owes some money to and these guys are thrown DeVito all through the foil of his office these two big gangsters are over him they're going to break his arms with baseball bats and and at the very last minute zero about to throttle him in the head this massive guy with pecs the size of plates crawls over the top of them grabs them by the neck and throws them against the wall knocks them clean out and DeVito having never met him walks up to these gangsters realizes you know who this big guy is and he stands over the top of them and he says you know what you mess with me you mess with my whole family he disarmed the powers in the authorities Christ there's spiritual pecs the size of plates if you get what i'm saying you know just just at the moment when we felt that we were going to get throttled by the schemes of a more powerful enemy a brother who we never really met before the perfect one the one who lived a life the way it was meant to be grabbed a miter head threw him against the wall and knocked him out that's what that passage is saying that's a gospel according to twins and so in that way we have won the match but your opposition will always want to injure you and stuff you around friends that's how we fight back we put on the full armor of god we do business with the gospel it's a bit boring isn't it i thought there'd be some other wonderful hocus pocus incantation that we could do to go fight the devil no basically it's back to first principles yet again that your bible and your prayer life and your community life together are the ways in which we all to fight they've defeat this frustrating enemy and so i'll leave you with this tonight friends where do you need to do business with god and this area of spiritual warfare i think first and foremost do you understand that we are in a battle i think from i think from my own perspective what this passage has done for me has brought it to the forefront and made it ever more real that we are in a battle here guys that every single one of us individually has a responsibility for our own holiness and our own obedience to god that that this s s s s trooper that is the devil wolf what he won't come in here and burn north side community church down is his main scheme now the way he's going to do it in those hours of darkness and of loneliness and dong dong dong dong he's he's going to play each and every one of us and it's different for each and every one of us he's going to take the things that hurt you the most and he's going to keep strum in that string so you could warp the the wonderful and the beautiful and the life giving gospel that makes this church grow friends do you do you have that perspective i guess secondly do you understand who we're fighting have you come to a realization that there is a ruler and there is an evil power in this world that we fight and he is our opposition as a Christian but most importantly do we know how we fight back do we understand who we are do you understand that if he wants to mess with me he messes with my whole family but the ultimate brother in Jesus Christ has smashed the powers and the principalities against the marble wall of an LA office block and there'd need be no fear for us that we'd be thrown around or thrust around by the great deceiver friends there is a battle going on for your soul this week and might i encourage you that as we head to this ministry time tonight there there is no greater weapon than prayer there is no greater weapon than confession to god that if there are things in our lives tonight myself included that the devil has been strung in strumming in your life you may want to come and confess that in prayer tonight with a ministry team who can hold that in confidence we want to pray of you like that friends corporately even if you don't come up the back tonight we need to be praying because there's no point talking all of this modern family stuff there's no point talking spiritual gifts and spiritual growth and all the wonderful fluffy stuff if we don't come to the realization that nor say community churches smack bang in the middle of a spiritual and eternal battle so friends what what what do you need to do how do you need to fight tonight i'll leave it with you