Epistle Of James
Yielding & Fighting | Standing Firm In Faith 10
[Music] Please turn your Bible to 1 Corinthians chapter 16. Remember again that we are talking about how to stand firm in your faith, and that's the overall title. We are dealing with a lot of things relating to standing firm. And there are a lot of things that we need to know. And, you know, I just think if there is something that we need to get good at, is having done all to stand, stand. Learning to do that. Amen. So, let's begin first of all in our foundation scripture in 1 Corinthians chapter 16, verse 13. Again, remember the Apostle Paul says, "Watch." The new Divine Standard Version says, "Keep alert." He says, "Stand fast or stand firm in your faith. Be brave." The other version says, "Be courageous." And both versions say, "Be strong." Amen. And we really need to be strong. We need to be brave. We need to be courageous. It saddens me. I feel like Christians come into the, you know, people come into the kingdom. And I don't know why they just wimp out. I think we get so used to surrendering to God, we surrender to everything. And God doesn't, and this is really what we're talking about right now. We are to submit to God, but resist the devil. Submission is surrendering. Resisting is fighting. We really need to put up a fight. Somebody made the statement regarding something else, but, you know, it just, it struck home. You know, he says, you know, when you're in a fight, do you even put up a struggle? I mean, do you, do you do anything? You know? And I think a lot of people just kind of don't. And it comes from this mistaken belief that God is in charge of everything. And we have to be so careful. And, you know, you can use a lot of scriptures to back that up. But there is still this problem of if he is in charge of everything, things are not going so well. The only time he was really in charge of everything was before man fell. When he created this, you know, this perfect paradise. And I really love, you know, what we really didn't see what was meant to happen. It's very sad because he put, he created man in his own image and likeness. And when we say man, male and female, both, okay, and he gave them dominion. And he gave them Eden and said, this is the place you begin. You know, when it says to subdue, he meant that we were meant to discover all the sciences and all the mats and all of that stuff, we were meant to move forward and we were meant to take the place that he gave us and expand it to become an entire planet where God is welcomed and worshiped wherever you go. It was meant to be the temple of God wherever you go, not just Eden everywhere. That's what the mandate was. And then the fall takes place and everything spins downward. And Jesus Christ had to go to the cross to pay for everything to go back to a place where even though we're living in a fallen world, we still have regained an authority, so to speak. God has reinstated us back and because he couldn't put us back to where we started because mankind bowed his knee to the devil, listened to him, rebelled against God. You know, any disobedience is rebellion? God said, don't eat one tree, one, one. You know, he said, every other tree you can have, what is it about us? You know, it's like they kill the child. Do whatever you want. Just don't touch that. You know what? They'll leave everything else and go touch that. And it goes all the way back to it, but it's a thing, isn't it? You always want to do the thing you're not allowed to do. And you know, it's just really sad that when that happened and you know, we fell and then everything went into turmoil and, you know, again, Jesus Christ couldn't put us back to that place. So that's why, you know, we really need to understand what happened when Christ died on the cross, God had to take us from the position he had us in because now that position was under the devil and put us in a place, the only place that was above the devil. Do you know what that is? Ephesians tells us seated in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Wow. See, only way we could get over him now. So you need to understand now that there's God, there's heaven, there's the highest position. Sadly, man was meant to be after that and then the devil. But now it's switched and you need to understand the switch because now there's God, then the devil, then man, we understand now that man is under the devil and why we need to be saved and redeemed so that we can be placed above him, seated in heavenly places, in a place of authority. And that's the only place that is above the devil. So we can't say that everything is going to go well for somebody that doesn't know God. Because of Adam's sin, they are now under him. Are you all with me? So we need to not only learn our position, but we need to learn to take a stand, okay, in that position. And we need to learn to fight and we need to learn to do all the things that we need to do in the right way. What I mean by that is stop submitting to the devil and resisting God. It says the exact opposite, it says submit to God and resist the devil. Oh yeah, brother, I'm doing really, really okay. So here comes temptation. Most of the time people don't even put up a fight, they're just gone. There's no resistance there at all. They just submit to it and then they come with, you know, especially man, I don't know what I was doing. Oh yeah, you knew. Hello, how do you know I'm a man, me and there, okay, you know, we live and learn, all right. And what do you mean by resist God? Well, he tells us to do something, God, I don't know, I don't feel like doing that. Be kind, be generous, you know, give this or do that. I have to pray about that someone, who else are you going to pray? It's me, when you pray, you come to me, I'm telling you do this, there's nowhere else to go. It's my opinion. There's the father, the son, the Holy Ghost, there's nobody else, you know what I'm trying to say? And they're all agreed. So you're not going to get a different verdict of it anyway. You all see what I'm trying to say. So you know, we really need to learn how to flip this. So this is what we're doing right now. My job is to help you navigate your way through this so that we are not destroyed for lack of knowledge. That's Isaiah 4, 6. God says, my people, my people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge. You know, it's one thing for just people to be destroyed for a lack of knowledge. It's a whole nothing for God to say, my people, people who should know better, people who should not be destroyed are being destroyed. That's a tragedy. Tragedy. And the sad thing is God gets a black eye because people go, well, why did God let that happen to his kids? Okay, maybe the kids didn't do something. Let's see what the kids need to do. All right. So that's my introduction. Why do I have left? Five minutes? No. Okay. Let's just keep going. Sorry. Sorry. All right. I really need to get ahold of this. Amen? So we were looking at a couple of things last week in looking at James 4/7. So let's go there really quickly. I've been quoting it to you. But remember, James says, therefore submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. All right. Now we looked at the fact that, you know, we, one of the things that we need to do, let me just, let me just read something here. I went and modified my notes a little bit, so let me give you my modifications. This means that we not only recognize our need for God and honor him, but that we also rely on his strength, his wisdom, his leading and direction, his grace, and so on without letting our pride get in the way. That's what gets in the way, our pride, no God, we can do it ourselves. And we really need to learn to rely on him. Now remember, I said there is a submission on one side and a resisting on the other. There is a fight, just make sure it's aimed in the right direction. And we must not lose that ability to fight. Did you all get that? You know, it's really sad. People sort of say, you know, this is kind of what happens, and let me just kind of give you a little scenario. It's kind of like, you know, you see those old Pentecostal type, okay, things, meetings and stuff, and then they come in and they submit, submit, and they're like, okay, okay, you got to give it all up, submit, and they're like, submit, submit, submit. And after a while, they're just giving up, you know, anything that comes along, they just give up. Well, I'm just giving up and letting God. Well, God needs you to do a couple of things, no, no, I'm surrendering. Yeah, to God, not the devil, are you all here? So we really need to learn to do this in the right way. Throw your hands up in worship to God, but don't throw your hands up when the devil comes. I really like, it's like Nehemiah, you know, when they're building the wall and, you know, it's kind of like, if I could picture it, it's kind of like this, they had one up in the air praising God and the other hand on the sword. With the one eye on God and one eye on God, they were actually doing that, they were actually building, you know, with their weapons by their side. Now they could have said, well, God will take care of everything. God will let you know what's happening. You need to do something. You need to be strong in the Lord and the power of His might, not a wimp. Amen? So we really need to kind of do that. We really need to keep one eye on God and one eye out here. And as God speaking to you, be able to take that instruction and see what to do with it down here. Submit, fight. Don't submit down here and fight up there. Every, you know, it's kind of like every decision has to go through a committee. You're dead because the devil doesn't believe in committees unless he's sitting on it. Anyway, all right, so remember James 4, 6, therefore God says, God resists the proud, it says, but gives grace to the humble. You know, I didn't spend any time on that, but let me just take a moment with that. He gives grace to the humble. He gives grace. That's the ability. That's when you can't manage something. That's when it's beyond you. He gives you grace to do something. You know, there mean times when you go through something, you look back and think, wow, how did I get through that? He gives grace, amen? You know, we're looking for God to come out here and do some amazing things and the bush was burning and, you know, you're like Moses and you go no way and God says, Yahweh. You know, okay, it's just, all right, you know, it's happening, that's just, am I looking for stuff like that to happen all the time? Just like that, anyway, you know, and it's this, we need to realize something. That God will sometimes strengthen you on the inside. He'll give you grace, he'll give you strength, he'll give you insights and wisdom. And we really need to stop blaming everything else when things don't work out. If things aren't working out, can I just say, get in front of a mirror, that's your problem. You're looking at it. Fix it. You know, one of the things that happened to me, there was a time in my life, confessions of a pastor, okay, there was a time in my life that I wasn't very bright, okay, really I wasn't, I really wasn't, okay, and God did a miracle. But anyway, you know, there was just this time in my life where, how can I put this? I used to look to everything else to blame except myself when things went wrong. It was this or it was that or, you know, we can pick on our, you know, we came from a bad background or family members didn't believe in me or, you know, I was, this happened to me at this age and that person did this bad thing to me and we can do all of that stuff and God standing there, tapping his foot and saying, but it's all under the blood. You are a brand new creation. All things have passed away. Why are you not letting it pass away? Why are you hanging on to things, blaming everything on that and not doing what I'm asking you to do, which will cause you to succeed. And I think so much of the time, it's easier to blame everything else around us than stand firm. Amen, then fight and, you know, get to the place and that's what God said to me. You know, He said to me, no more excuses. He said, you don't have any, you've got me, there are no more excuses. He said, if something is going wrong, check yourself. If you know, if Daniel and Joseph from minority races get taken as slaves and rise up to second only to the highest, don't tell me that you're a little minority and everybody's looking down and everything is going wrong because, you know, that's how it is. Well, for you, that's how it is and it will stay that way while you see that, while you accept that. So you have to accept it. I just, at once, you know, that's what I was thinking at one time in my life and then I decided that's enough. I am no longer a Sri Lankan. I am a child of God. My home is heaven. The Bible tells us that our citizenship is there. So I don't go to God as a little Sri Lankan boy, having all these difficulties because people are, okay, I go to God as his child, as his son. Now, you need to go in as your daughter, I'm going as his son. We all have the son living in us. So we're all the sons of God. You know, in God's eyes, there's no daughters of God because the son lives in all of us. We all have equal authority, amen. Some people out there need that revelation anyway. So when we go to God, he sees his son. He doesn't see male or female. Galatian tells us that we are all one in Christ. There's no male. There's no female. There's no gentile. There's no slave. There's no free. We're all one. We walk in and he sees Christ coming in. So you better not go in your name, amen? You go in his name and you'll be welcomed into the courts of heaven and God will deal with you as he does his only begotten son. Hallelujah. Ooh, that's a good place to be. We still need to get there, don't we? So that's grace. Is that okay? I'm just taking a few extra minutes here because I feel like we need to. It's not how far we get, it's how much we learn and how much we grow. And my job is to grow you up, not to give you a good Bible study lesson. Amen? There's plenty of those on YouTube. Here I'm growing you up and I'm praying that this stuff gets in there and it begins to make a difference in you. That's the reason why I look for change. I don't look for growth in your brain, I look for change in your life, I look for transformation. And I pray this word is transforming because it has the power to transform. Hallelujah. Okay. No. Let's move forward. Let me go and read something to you. We concluded at this point in our information last week, we have learned new things this week. Okay. All right. But let me go and pick up as a part of standing firm in our faith. I said to you before that there are powers at work far greater than us and without God, we will surely be at the mercy of the thief who Jesus said again comes to steal to kill and to destroy. Okay. So if we are to successfully fight the good fight of faith and stand our ground firm in faith, James 4 7 says that the first thing we must do again is submit to God. So in his commentary, Simon J. Kistemacher said again, when James says submit, he actually means obey. Did I give this to you last week or we need an internship? No? Okay. Let me pretend you haven't heard it. Okay. Okay. So James says submit, he actually means obey. The wording submit yourselves describes a voluntary act of placing oneself under the authority of someone else to show him respect and obedience. I think I covered this. All right. Yeah. Respect and obedience. So that's really what we're doing to God. We don't do that to the devil. It's really sad when I listen to certain, you know, denominational Christians that they're just, oh, the devil, oh, we have to be so careful, oh, you know, and they have this fear of him. Don't lose respect for what he is, but don't submit to him. Understand that this thing has been around for millennia. He knows how to manipulate. He knows how to get people to do things that he wants to do. He knows that if you're without God, your dinner, you're done, amen? And that's the reason why we need to know that we have the wisdom of God, that God will show us, God will speak to us, God will, you know, God will reveal things to us. Whatever the devil, I just love in the Old Testament, you know, there was this prophet that every time the, this king of an opposing army would try to invade this prophet would tell the king, his king, what's going to happen. And the king of this other side, this is Elisha, right? And this other king says, all right, who's, you know, who's blabbing on us? Every time we got to do something, they're not there or they're prepared for us. What's going on? And they said, oh, this is prophet, he knows everything. See, this is how God works. He'll let you know what's going on. And you need to be plugged into him. You need to be submitted to him in order to hear all of that. You know, the submission is to, is really, as I read to you before, understanding that you need God. You won't submit to God if you don't realize you need him. So you really need to realize that you need him. And then you will submit to him because you realize that in not submitting to him, you are placing yourselves automatically in the hands of the enemy. There is no middle ground. I told you before, if there was no devil, then there might be. But there is, there's only light and dark. There's no grey. Are you all here at night? If you switch a light on, there's not half the room lit. And the other half is going, well, it's re-resisting the light. It can't. You know, when the Bible talks about, you know, the light had no defense. I mean, the darkness had no defense against the light. When it came on, the light never has a problem. When it comes on, it just comes on. That's who lives in you. That's who needs to direct your paths. That's who lights your way. Are you all with me? Now, I was on to something else, but let me just say all those things and get back to this. We are to place ourselves under the lordship of God Almighty and commit to obey him and follow his leadership in all things. And that's why, you know, when we looked at those verses scripture before in James chapter verse 15, we had said, instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills, wants us to, we shall live and do this or that. When we talk about trusting God with all our heart, all right, and we're going to look at that in the next week or two weeks, whenever I get to it, okay, that's coming up, all right? We'll understand what that means, right? But for now, notice again that James says here, submit to God, resist the devil, he will flee from you accordingly. Listen, in his, listen, careful, this is important, okay, get this. In his commentary, Douglas J. Moore writes, placing ourselves under God's authority means negatively that we firmly refuse to bow down to the devil's authority. Did you get that? See, this is a flip side of it. As much as we are to submit to God, the negative to that, and it's not a negative, it's a positive, but you understand what I mean by negative, it's the other side of the coin, okay? The other side of the coin is that we firmly refuse to bow down to the devil's authority. We just don't let that happen. As to how we have to do this, Arkan Hughes writes, resist is a military metaphor which means to stand against as in combat. I told you we're in a fight, we are in a fight family. The devil is attacking our thoughts and our mind constantly. And if we really don't, if we don't learn to switch that off, if we don't learn how to resist that correctly, amen, if we don't submit to God, see, you can't just resist with an empty, you know, brain, an empty head, okay, there needs to be something there in order to resist. And in resisting, you need to know that you're resisting because there's something better. It's not just not doing something, it's doing something else instead of that. Do you all get what I just said? This is so important because sometimes people are trying to give up something and they give it up and there's a hole. They didn't replace it with something. And so you know what happens? They wait around and they kind of tap their fingers and kind of go, you know, I really miss that thing because nothing is filling the gap. And so they just fall back into it. What happens if you get so caught up in something else that you don't have time for that? It's like the guy that, you know, he was trying to give up smoking, right? And oh, he tried. He said how he'd throw his cigarettes out the car window and he'd be driving, then he'd drive back and go pick him up and, you know, and he was just going, God, and he said, there's nothing to replace it with. He said, he just led him to a series of meetings and, you know, he went to the, there was all these sort of like a camp meeting going on. He said, go there. So he said, oh, okay. And my gosh, he was having a ball, he was just, God was speaking and the annoying thing was there and he spent a whole week there. And he gets back in his car and he's wondering, what is this, you know, in his visor and he's going, what is this? He pulls it down and these cigarettes all fall out and he hadn't missed them at all. Person who needed a cigarette every single day was in the presence of God for a week. And he said, that thing had lost. Let's grip on him. He said, I didn't give them up. They gave me up. That's how it works. Amen. That's the way we do this. So remember again, according to 2 Peter 1, 3, I want to possibly mention this last week and I thought, oh, I just didn't get to it. It was in my notes. No, no, it was great. It was great. Peter says his divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness. Do you know what the difference is? Life is everything in this natural life. Godliness is everything to do with our spiritual life. So God has given us everything that we need for both our natural life and our spiritual life. We shouldn't go and warn for anything. Amen. And notice again, it says, he's given to us all things. There's nothing missing in that, meaning that this is where the fight is, to resist the lies and the tactics of the devil. Anything that contradicts God's word and God's promises toward us. That's the fight, all right? That's what the apostle Paul brings out in Saint Corinthians chapter 10. Let's go there. This is three through five, he says, for though we walk in the flesh and notice we do walk in the flesh, okay, we don't float. I am so spiritual, I'm just floating through life, you're weird. We don't need any of that in the kingdom, okay? We need people with boots on the ground, okay? We do walk in the flesh, watch, watch. He says, though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. Ah, so see, now the fight isn't here, okay? I love verse four, I'm reading from the King James Version because it says it the best. He says, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, they're not natural. He says, but mighty through God, mighty through God, they're not mighty on their own. They're mighty through God, okay, watch. To the pulling down of strongholds, what are strongholds? Those are the things that are built up in your mind that the enemy uses to take you down. Those are the things that you can blame all your failures on, those strongholds. Those are the things that, you know, the apostle Paul is saying, we need to pull them down. We can't let them continue in our life. We can't allow that kind of thinking to keep going. Are you with me? They are strongholds. They are identified as something that is a problem. This isn't just in your imagination. You know, I really love that story about, you know, the elephant. You know, when they're little, they chain them to this post. And when they, and it's a sad story, I hate this story, but, you know, it makes a point. You know, and when they're little, they're trying to break away. And they try and they try and they try and they fail because the chain is just too strong for them. But do you know what happens? That's a stronghold that's built in their mind now. As they grow up, that stronghold keeps them chained. Because everybody knows when they're big, they can just walk off if they want to. Their chain isn't going to hold them anymore, that pig in the ground will not hold them anymore. They can just wander off. But you know what holds them? Not the chains there, the chains here. That's why when an elephant goes crazy, you're in trouble. When a Christian goes crazy, the devil's in trouble. We need some crazy Christians. We need to break out of all the chains and the strongholds and everything else. We need to break out and go do what God tells us to do, as He tells us to do it, not in our time, as much as we want to. And that's where patience comes in. 30 years, never mind. Okay, so, you know, it has to be in God's time. See, we don't know what's going on, we don't know what's happening, and that's all I'm going to say. All right, God knows. And God is directing us and sometimes on purpose, He would just keep things quiet, because, you know, He's got His aces up His sleeve. And the devil goes, "What do you got?" He goes, "I'm not telling." And we need to shut up about it, okay? Which I have difficulty sometimes. Let's continue on. I've got to finish this. He says here, "Mighty, through God, to the pulling down of strongholds." So we need to do that. Watch now, verse 5, it says, "Casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God." See where this is happening? It's in knowledge. It's in thinking. It's in what's going on up here. You know, if the right thing is going on up here, then the right thing will go on out here. As a man thinks in his heart, women as well, so is he. Proverbs tells us that. How you think determines how you live. That's why, you know, the apostle Paul says in Romans 12 to, you know, that we have to renew our minds, because that's the only way that we'll ever discover what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. It's through the reading of our minds, because we will start to change the way we think, and as we change, the word transformation is actually the word used of a caterpillar turning into a butterfly. I don't have time to go into that right now, but it's a massive change. That word transform actually means that it was the same word that was used when Jesus went up on the mountain. Remember Peter, James and John? And he was transfigured, and everything began to shine, and they got a glimpse of what he was really like. And then Moses and Elijah talking, it's like, wow, all of heaven doesn't happen. But this is where we, this is the battle that we're in. This is how we stand firm. We cast down imaginations. We don't allow them to travel around in our brain and become strongholds. We need to learn to put them down. If you can't put the thought down, then you won't have any problems later on with some kind of habit that you've got to get over. Because you never let the thought take root. Amen? Those seeds can only grow if they're allowed to be allowed to grow. I can say more on that, but I ran out of time. So notice again, he says, casting down imaginations, every hiding that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. Notice you are to do something. You are to bring it into captivity to the obedience of Christ, to the obedience of the Word of God, to the obedience of the will of God. If something happens and it's outside God's will, don't just say, thank you. I'll finish now. Don't just say, well, you know, okay, Sarah, well, maybe God wants this to happen. That's why he says, resist the devil, submit to God, resist the devil, don't submit to the devil. Don't let him get away with anything in your life that is not God's will, but isn't God all powerful? Are we not reading the same verse? It amazes me how these verses exist, and people just don't get it. They don't get that they are not to submit to everything and think all of its God's will, because it tells us, submit to God, and then you need to do something else. You need to cast down these imaginations. You need to resist things, anything that exalts itself above the knowledge of God. Things like, well, now you can't help being this way because dot, dot, dot, and it takes you down a little garden path of your past and everything else. You need to say, no, no, no, that person died. Your life is now hidden with God, with Christ in God. That's Colossians 3, 3. Something has happened. You are new creation. You're a brand new creature. Your past now is God in heaven. The lineage is that way. Yes, we recognize down here what's going on, but we don't let that thing exalt itself above the knowledge of God. Did you get that? No more excuses. That's how you stand firm. That's how we heard about it. We'll come back and pick it up here next time. Father, we thank you today for your word, and we thank you, Father, that as we learn, as we grow in these things, that you are giving us precious pearls. One thought at a time, and Father, we just take these on. This is not just another sermon that tickles our ears, and we kind of go, that was good. Let's go home and forget about it. We thank you, Lord, that we take this. We allow it to grow on the inside of us, that in time it will produce fruit. The fruit of truly submitting to you. The fruit of truly existing the devil. The fruit of casting down imaginations, bringing everything to the obedience of Christ, Father, that we get to the place where you can look down on us and smile. As we learn to follow after your will for our life and resist everything that the enemy tries to do to get in the way of that. We thank you for that. We thank you for your grace, for your strength. Thank you for that grace that you do give us. Some days, God, it's just one set of footprints in the sand, and it's you carrying us, because you never leave us, you never forsake us. Some days we just need that, but we're not going to live our life that way. We want to do as the Apostle James says. We want to grow in the things of God. We want to be those mature sons and daughters that you are looking for. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. [Music] (gentle music)