Once again coming to you in dependence
upon God for all needed help, I'd like you to turn with me
to Ephesians chapter 6 and the text you'll find in verse
12. For we wrestle not against flesh
and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers
of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness
in high places. Those of you who were here over
the last two weeks will notice that first of all we looked at
verse 10. about being strong in the Lord and in the power
of his might and that the strength of the Christian is not found
in himself. Should he be left to himself
he would fall immediately under the opposition of the enemy and
the temptations which are around about him. And often there are
times in the Christian's life when we feel the strength of
God waning in our life and it's like we are left to ourselves
for a moment and we are drawn into sin, drawn into unbelief
and anxiety and trouble. But then we know as God draws
us back to himself, we are given that strength to persevere. And often in times of trouble,
we've wondered as we looked back, how is it that I persevered through
that trial? How is it that I made it, as
it were, to the end? And we can only testify that
it is by the strength of God. Then we are told that we were
to put on the armour, verse 11, put on the whole armour of God
that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. And last week we looked at that
armour and the need for an armour. from that the armour is gauged
by the enemy or the type of warfare that we are in, even in the secular
military, the varying armours that they have to deal with specific
tasks they are granted or they use specific armour to combat
the threats that they have and so we saw that the armour that
the Christian has been given is ultimately Lord Jesus Christ. He is their strength, he is their
protector and they are to pick up that armour and to do battle
with their enemy that was once their their friend and now they
do battle with sin and satan and the world day by day and
that armour is to be put on by faith every day to enable us
to combat the wiles of the devil. The wiles of the devil are the
tricks of satan. You know that satan is a deceiver
He goes around, the Bible tells us, like a roaring lion, seeking
whom he may devour. And he uses tricks and deceit
and traps and lies to lure believers into leaving the Lord Jesus Christ. And so the armour that we are
given is to combat those tricks, but we are told in the scripture
to be wise to the deceits or to the lies of Satan. And so
we are to put on the whole armour of God that you may be able to
stand against the wiles or the tricks of Satan. And then we go on to verse 12.
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities,
against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world,
against the spiritual wickedness in high places. Some of us know by experience
that we were once people of the darkness. If we look back at
the time in our lives before we were converted, before we
were born again, we took our pleasure in doing things which
were contrary to the word of God, against the commands of
scripture and we took our pleasure in the delights that the world
has to offer us. We took our pleasure, our joy
and our satisfaction from the darkness of this world, the lust
of the flesh, the scripture tells us. And there was a time in our
life when we were born again. The Lord shone a light within
our hearts and we saw the error of our ways. We were brought
to repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and the scripture
tells us that in that time of unconverted state we were in
the darkness and those people who are still outside of Christ
are still in that dark well, that dark world which is ruled
by Satan, which is underneath his influence and his power and
when a believer is born again they are brought out from underneath
that power and brought underneath the power and authority of the
Lord Jesus Christ. In 2 Corinthians chapter 4 it
tells us there Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we
received mercy, we faint not. As we received mercy, we faint
not. But have renounced the hidden
things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the
word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth,
commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight
of God. But if our gospel be hid, It
is hid to them that are lost, in whom the God of this world
hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light
of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should
shine unto them. For we preach not ourselves,
but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus'
sake. for God who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. And so the apostle there writes
that the gospel is hid to them who are lost. to those who are
in the darkness that the god of this world has blinded their
minds and the god of this world is a small g god it is he is
satan not that he is a god but he is worshipped as a god and
he has blinded the minds of those people who walk under his authority
and his power. They walk as lambs, as it were,
led to the slaughter. They are blinded by his lies
and his deceit. They go on as though they are
living in pleasure without no tomorrow, yet they are just being
led in blindness by the God of this world. And the gospel of
the Lord Jesus Christ, which is to believe upon the Lord Jesus
Christ and to be saved is the light of the world. Jesus says,
I am the light, that he is the light of the world. The light
has come into the darkness, but the darkness did not comprehend
it. The darkness rejected the light
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And the gospel is declared as
a light shining into our hearts to give the knowledge and glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And so the world the unconverted
are held in darkness that they cannot see the light of the Lord
Jesus Christ and they're held in this ignorance and they're
held in misery and they are held in sin. And all the while they
are held in that darkness, they are separated from God and they
go around as blind moles, as it were, seeking for happiness
in the dirt of this world and it can never ever be found. Once
they find something that makes them happy, that thing doesn't
make them happy anymore until they have to go on to the next
thing, on to the next thing, on to the next thing, until they
die. They spend their whole life seeking
for happiness. and that happiness can never
be found except in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the only one who
can truly satisfy a longing soul. I was thinking yesterday about
the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ and everyone has, as it were,
a cross-shaped hole in their heart and they try and fill it
with everything they can. You know, to fill a cross-shaped
hole in your heart, you must have the cross of the Lord Jesus
Christ, his death and his resurrection, his finished work, his Holy Spirit. It is only then you can be satisfied. You've all done jigsaw puzzles,
and if you've got the wrong piece for the puzzle, the puzzle will
never, ever be finished. And people spend their whole
lives trying to put the wrong shaped puzzle piece into the
puzzle. and it never satisfies and their
life never gets finished. But it's only Christ. Christ
can satisfy the cross-shaped hole in our lives and he can
make a life complete and he can shine a light into a dark, dark
place. We read from Ephesians 2 and
there again it says, And you hath he quickened, you hath he
made alive. are dead in trespasses and sins,
wherein times past you walked according to the course of this
world, according to the prints of the power of the air, the
spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. And so that is the condition
of the world. They are dead. Spiritually dead. And they're walking in disobedience
to God according to the prince of the power of the air and the
spirit that now works in the children of disobedience. That
spirit is Satan. Satan and his army. Satan, the scripture tells us,
is a fallen angel. The book of Revelation tells
us that at the beginning of time Satan rebelled against God and
was cast out of heaven with a third of the angels. The scripture
tells us that God's angels are without number. They are ministering
spirits. And that Satan, when he was cast
out of God's presence, took with him the third of the angels of
God. And they are the influence, the
satanic influence upon this world, the spirits of darkness. they are part of the opposition
which the believer has to face. He says we wrestle not against
flesh and blood, against people, but against principalities, against
powers. against the rulers of the darkness
of this world. The principalities are the degrees of the angels. We know the angels of God are
in degrees. There are those who are the top. We have like Gabriel and those
spheres of angels that God has. Also in Satan's kingdom, he is
the leader, the prince of the power of the air. Plus you have
his demons which work under his authority. You have to read through
the New Testament and you see how those demons possessed different
people. The legion who had 2,000 demons
indwelling within him. And so the people of God are
under opposition, not by a physical army that they can see, but by
a spiritual army that they can't see, which is manifested in the
physical realm in which you and I live day by day. The first
time, as you all are aware, we read about Satan is in the Garden
of Eden. Satan has always been opposed
to God. seeking to destroy what God has
created, seeking to hold to himself so that people do not have light
to be able to see the gospel or to worship God. And we see
right there in the Garden of Eden that Satan came there to
destroy what God had created. Genesis 3. Now the serpent was
more subtle than any of the beasts of the field which the Lord our
God had made. In the book of Revelation we
read, Revelation 20 in verse 2 it tells us, and that serpent
the devil. And so we know that Satan himself
either took on the form of a serpent and spoke to Adam and Eve right
there in the garden of Eden. he said unto the woman yea hath
God said you shall not eat of every tree of the garden and
the woman said unto the serpent we may eat of the fruit the trees
of the garden but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst
of the garden God has said you shall not eat of it neither shall
you touch it lest you die and the serpent said unto the woman
you shall surely not you shall not surely die for God does know
in the day thereof then your eyes shall be opened and you
shall be as gods knowing good and evil And when the woman saw
that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the
eyes, and a tree to be desired, and to make one wise, she took
off the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband
with her, and they did eat. We see there that because of
their sin, the scripture goes on to tell us that all of their
descendants, every child that they had, and every child that
descended from Adam and Eve, would all be prone to sin. Every one of us who has ever
had any dealings with children will know you don't have to teach
them to be bad. Sin is ingrained into the mind
of every single person that is born into this world and we need
to be trained to do what is right. If you just leave a child he
will grow up to be a liar, he will grow up to be a thief, he
will grow up to be violent, he will grow up to be a deceiver.
And that is the seeds of sin which are naturally in our minds. You can only have one biscuit.
When your back is turned they take two. How many have you got? I've only got one. You don't
have to teach them to steal. You don't have to teach them
to lie. It is there. And the scripture
tells us it's for the job of parents to raise them in the
knowledge and the fear of the Lord. And so that's proof to
us that the scripture is true. That sin affected every single
human that has ever been born apart from the Lord Jesus Christ
and the serpent who is Satan used deceit and lies to trick
Eve into taking and disobeying God. John Bunyan in his book The Holy
War had a illustration there of a city. And into that city
was five gates. And two of the gates were named
Eye Gate and Ear Gate. And he says in his book that
Ear Gate is the quickest way into the heart of man. And he
uses this illustration here with Adam and Eve. You see Satan spoke
to Eve and that went straight into her heart and caused her
to immediately doubt and to reason and to rebel against God. And
as she heard those words, you will be as gods. She thought,
well, I want to be as God. I don't want to be lower than
God anymore. I want to be as God. And isn't
that the same sin that Satan, as we will see, was thrown out
of heaven for? He was not content with his lowest
state, but he wanted to overthrow the kingdom of God and was cast
out from God's presence. And so he says to him, you will
not die. You will be as gods knowing good
and evil. And so from that time Satan is
the accuser of the brethren. Satan is the prince of this world. He is the spirit that goes around
seeking whom he may devour. And he is a fallen angel. I know this may sound all a bit
far-fetched but what the scripture reveals to us as the truth and
those who are believers and have come from the darkness to light
can fully appreciate the power that Satan has and the hold that
he has over the world. Having lived in Africa for so
long I've seen the extent to which those who have a witchcraft
are able to harness the power of of Satan and the evil influences
that he has in those lands where Satan is worshipped so publicly. In Isaiah 14 it tells us there
another name of Satan. How art thou fallen from heaven,
O Lucifer, son of the morning? How art thou cut down to the
ground? which did weaken the nations.
For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven. I
will exalt my throne above the stars of God. I will sit also
upon the mountains of the congregation in the sides of the north. I
will ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like
the most high. Yet thou shalt be brought down
to hell, to the sides of the pit. They that see thee shall
narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, saying, It is
the man that made the earth tremble, that did shake kingdoms, that made the world as a wilderness,
and destroyed the cities thereof, that opened not the house of
his prisoners. all the kings of the nations,
even all of them that lie in glory, every one in his own house,
but thou art cast out of thy grave like an abominable branch.
And as the remnant of those that are slain thrust through the
sword that go down into the stones of the pit as a carcass trodden
under the feet. And so the scripture tells us
there that Satan, he was as the sun of the morning, the morning
star Yet he is cast down to the ground and he has weakened the
nations. And so he was once there in heaven,
in the presence of God, but sought to overthrow God. He was not content with where
he was, his position as an angel, but wanted to ascend up into
the clouds above God and to be the ruler of all the earth. And so as he tempts Eve, he says,
you will be as God. Don't be content with where you
are, but God is holding you back. Just disobey him and you will
be able to climb above him and become a God like him. And isn't that what we see today
all around about us? Nobody would tell me what to
do. I am the God. I am in control
of my life. I am in charge. And so we see
the influence of Satan, how it penetrates the mind of every
person until that person is born again of the Spirit of God and
they're given a new heart in Christ Jesus. And they're able
to see as Christ shines the torch, shines the light in their heart.
They're able to see how they have been walking. They're taken
from the darkness and they're brought into the light, the glorious
light of the gospel. There's quite a long reading
in Ezekiel 28 which if you wanted to read at home from verse 11
to 19. And it tells us there in that
passage of almost the position that Satan had in the kingdom
of God. At verse 13 it says, Thou hast
been in the garden of Eden. Every precious stone was thy
covering. It gives the list there of the
stones. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth. I have
set thee so. Thou wast upon the holy mountain
of God. Thou hast walked up and down
in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy
ways from the day that thou wast created till iniquity was found
in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise
they have filled the midst with the violence and thou hast sinned.
Therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of
God, and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst
of the stones of fire. Thine heart was lifted up because
of thy beauty. Thou hast corrupted thy wisdom
by reason of thy brightness. I will cast thee to the ground. I will lay thee before kings,
and they shall behold thee. And it continues to go on in
that manner that Satan, he was an angel of God in top position
and because of his sin he was cast out of the presence of God. He was cast down to the ground,
to this world. And it is said that he was almost
the chief musician in heaven. He has a top position and it
is said that's why the influence of music is so dangerous. It's satanic music or the music
that has been infiltrated by the influence of Satan. Obviously
music has multitudes of benefits but there is obviously some music
which is dangerous. And as we have said, music and
sound go straight into the heart. And that is why Satan has been
able to infiltrate so easily the pop music culture, the rock
music. And we'll look at that in a bit
later. But you see, that's where he
was. Because of his sin, disobedience
to God, his dissatisfaction with his position, wanting to be as
God, he was cast from the presence of God and caused to inhabit
this world. In the New Testament it tells
us or Jesus tells us that Satan is the father of lies. The scripture
tells us in the book of Revelation that all liars shall be cast
into the lake of fire. Satan was a liar from the beginning. He lied to Adam and he lied to
Eve and in doing so that lie plunged the whole world into
the effects of sin and the rebellion against God. the time when the Lord Jesus
Christ, after he was baptised, he was sent into the wilderness
to be tempted by who? The devil. Satan met with the
Lord Jesus Christ to tempt him and to test him whether he was
the Christ or not. And the scripture tells us he
was tried in all points and tempted as we are yet without sin. He
never fell, he never submitted to the temptations of Satan but
gained our victory over Satan. Satan left him and he was strengthened
by the angels of God. If you think of Judas Iscariot
at the Lord's Supper to him whom I give the piece
of bread, it is him. And Jesus gives him the bread
and the scripture tells us Satan entered into him and he says
go and do what you have to do. And so Satan entered into Judas. Judas goes and betrays the Lord
Jesus Christ and sells him to the Jews for those pieces of
silver. And ultimately the Lord Jesus
then is then captured and killed upon the cross. But God worked
his own purposes in that he brought about his own will through the
work of Satan, that Christ came to die in order to gain a victory
over Satan. The scripture tells us that the
seed of the woman, the Lord Jesus Christ, is going to bruise the
serpent's head. And we see at the cross at Calvary,
Satan was bruised. His power was limited now. And the redeemed of Christ have
been set free because their sins have been forgiven. And so Satan
is part of the enemy that we wrestle with, not flesh and blood,
but a spiritual enemy made of legions and of a hierarchy of
angels that are powerful. But the scripture tells us, greater
is he that is in you than he that is in the world. Christ
has all power and all authority. Satan is limited. And so Satan's agenda is being
played out in the world that we see. In the Old Testament there were those battles that
took place against the people of God. They were almost worked
out in a physical way. We saw the enemies of God who
had their own gods who they worshipped and they would attribute their
success to their god. They would worship their god. They would offer sacrifices to
their god. We think of the god of Baal and
how he held his hands out like this. and they would put their
children into his hands and burn their children and they would
say that they're appeasing their God. Behind that work of darkness
that we would say is evil is Satan, the prince and power of
the darkness of this world in Kings. Second Kings chapter 18. King Hezekiah was being invaded
by an army, the Syrian army and the Syrian general who is outside
of the city of Jerusalem begins to boast about his gods and he
says that Don't listen to King Hezekiah who will say, the Lord
will help you. Then he lists off a list. Where
are the gods, he says, of Hamath and Apad? Where are the gods
of Seraphim and Hena and Eva? Have they delivered Samaria out
of my hands. And so he lists the gods of the
other countries and how it was in those days that each country
had their own god that they worshipped, that they elevated and that they
sacrificed to. Who are they among all the gods
of the countries that have delivered their country out of my hand?
that the Lord, that is Jehovah, should deliver Jerusalem out
of my hand. But the people held their peace
and answered him not a word, for the king commanded, commandment
was saying, answer him not. And it goes on to verse, chapter
19 and verse 6. And Isaiah said unto them, thus
shalt thou say to your master, thus saith the Lord. Be not afraid
of the words which thou hast heard, and which the servant
of the king of Assyria has blasphemed me. Behold, I will send a blast
upon him, and he shall hear a rumour, and shall return to his own land,
and I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.
And we know that That took place, the Egyptian army invaded and
he runs back and later on he is killed by his own children. What I wanted to see is that
in the Old Testament it was quite obvious that Satan had complete
rule over the nations that were held in darkness because they
worshipped him. They publicly professed that this was their
god, they offered him their children and they accounted their victories,
they gave him their gods, their spoils of war and yet the true and living God, the
God of Israel, who is Jehovah. He is still having that ultimate
authority over the kingdom of darkness even in those days. Think of Job. When Job was succeeding
in his life, he was a perfect and an upright man. Satan comes
to the Lord. And God says to him, have you
considered my servant Job? There is none like him, perfect
and upright. Go and test him. And so Satan
was active even in the oldest book, one of the oldest books
in the Bible, in the book of Job. Satan was there seeking
to destroy and upset and to cause people to turn from God to the
himself. One is in Zechariah, the book
of Zechariah when he sees a vision, Zechariah chapter 3. And he showed
me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord
and Satan standing at his right hand to resist him. And the Lord
said unto Satan, The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan. Even the Lord
that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee. Is not this a brand plucked
out of the fire? Now Joshua was closed in filthy
garments and stood before the angel. And he answered and spoke
unto those that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy
garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold,
I have caused an iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe
thee with the change of raiment. And I said, Let them set a fair
mitre upon his head, So they set a fair mitre upon his head
and clothed him with garments and the angel of the Lord stood
by and the angel of the Lord protested unto Joshua saying
thus saith the Lord of hosts if they will walk in my ways
and will keep my charge then thou shall also judge my house
and shall also keep my courts and I'll give thee places to
walk among these that stand by. And so he sees Joshua the high
priest and he sees Satan at his right hand to resist him, to
accuse him. But God says, change his garments. I've cleansed him from sin. And so Satan is placed in scripture
as the accuser of the brethren. Look at them in their sin. There's
no way there can be any reconciliation. There's no way they can be brought
together with you. They are in filthy garments.
But the Lord says, be quiet, Satan. The Lord rebuke thee,
Satan. He's a brand plucked from the burning. We know that all
that sinned, all that sin must be punished by God and cast into
hell. But those that are saved are
taken from the burning. They're taken from that pile
and they are brought to God. And God cleanses them from their
sin through the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so Satan is there in the
Old Testament, Satan is there in the New Testament, causing
hindrances to the work of the Apostle Paul. He said, as he
was going on in his ministry, he says, but Satan hindered us.
He's not able to stop the work of God, but he's able to hinder,
to bring about disruption, to bring about anxiety, to bring
about stress, opposition. But ultimately, the gospel must
continue to go forward, and it can never, ever be hindered. Jesus says, I will build my church
and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And so though
we wrestle, we don't wrestle against flesh and blood. We wrestle
against the spiritual armies of Satan seeking to hinder the
progress of the gospel and the progress of the Christian walk. But we can see round about us
that influence of satan in the world in which we live is still very very active. In the chapter that we read Ephesians
2 it says in time past you walked according
to the course of this world according to the prince of the power of
the air the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience. And so the influence of Satan
that works in the children of disobedience is to hold them
in darkness and unbelief, in misery, and seeking to cause
them to continue to find satisfaction in this world and to be at enmity
against God. In other lands we see that the
way it is manifested is in through false religion and idol worship. but in our own world we see it
manifested through evil government laws and legislations where they
seek to suppress Christianity and Christian values and how
they then promote anti-Christian laws. Think of the destruction
of marriage, think of abortion, you think of the promotion of homosexuality
and pride. If you think of even the name
pride, why was Satan thrown out of heaven? Because he sought
to overthrow, he thought he was proud, he was lifted up and God
threw him to the earth. And so we see that there is even
in the governments that promotion of anti-Christian or the values
that God has instilled in the Word of God. The promotion of
evil. As I was looking this up yesterday
I came across a man called Alistair Crawley. in 1875 was born in on the south
coast but he schooled actually in Hastings. He then went to
college in Eastbourne and he travelled around a lot and died
in Hastings. He was known some of the people
who wrote against him as being the most evil man that ever lived. He was brought up in a Christian
family. He rebelled against his upbringing and went to delve
into the occult and paganism. He went to Egypt and tried to
be possessed with the ancient gods of Egypt with his wife. And he wrote a book while he
was there called the book of the law and in that book of the law he
had a commandment which is this. Do what thou wilt shall be the
whole of the law. Do what thou wilt shall be the
whole of the law. Which is completely anti the
law of God. The law of God is love God with
all of your heart, soul and mind and your neighbor as yourself.
Lose sight of self. But his was fulfill the desires
of the flesh and do whatever you want. There's no restraint,
no holding back. Just go and do whatever you want.
And if you read about this man and you read the influence that
this man has had throughout the generations, He started up a
religion of paganism. And that has infiltrated into
the music industry. And if you listen to lyrics of
so many songs, you would find that word summarised. Do what
you want. Be what you want. Go where you
want. Become what you want. And that
is the anthem of liberty. Do whatever you want because
whatever you want is going to make you happy. And that is the
hidden agenda of Satan to hold the people in darkness so that
they never come to the light of the truth because they see
God as binding, as they see Christianity as restrictive and there's no
freedom in Christ yet. The scripture tells us. It is
those who are still chained. There is only freedom found in
the Lord Jesus Christ. It is only when you're in the
light you're enabled to be able to see the errors of the darkness. And so this man who's said to
be the most evil man that ever lived, behind him and his thought
process is the kingdom of darkness. And he's seeking to delve into
the spiritual world and to be contacted by those demons that
were cast out of heaven. Do what thou wilt. And you will
be happy. What did Satan say to Eve? Has
God said? You'll be happy. Disobey God. You'll be happy. Do what you want. Live like there's
no God. And this is the world that the believers have to walk
through. Once we were part of that world, we can look back
at that time when we indulged ourselves in whatever the world
had to offer us. We took pleasure in its music,
we took pleasure in its films, we took pleasure in its parties
and its feasts and its conversations and its way of life and even
in its religions. But the time came when those
scales were removed from our eyes, that light of the gospel
shone in and we saw that we weren't happy. We saw that we were trying
to be happy but we never got to that happiness because the
world cannot satisfy. And we found that in Christ Jesus
there is satisfaction and joy. Yes there is much opposition
but there is that delight in that everlasting life has been
granted in our eternal destiny. It has been changed from the
pit of destruction to be with Christ which is far better and
as the apostle says yes we've been brought from the darkness
to the light but we still have to walk through this enemy territory
fighting against a spiritual enemy that wants to cause us
to be drawn back to the things of the world. So we walk through
a battleground. Those of you who watch the the Olympic ceremony would have
seen, or maybe you saw in the Christian news, would have seen
the mocking acting of the Last Supper in which Jesus was portrayed
as a woman with some halo thing on her head and the apostles
of Christ were portrayed as transsexual men and they were just mocking
the Lord Jesus Christ. But even behind that, why mock
Christ? Why mock God? because behind
them is the influence of darkness, the influence of Satan. Remember
when Jesus was going to be crucified, they mocked him. They spat on
him. They put a crown of thorns upon
his head and they put a robe round about him and they said,
hail king of the Jews. They mocked him. And they will
continue to mock him until he comes again the second time.
And only then will the mocking stop. And the Christians have
to walk through this world and endure mocking. We are told that
we are bigots. We are told we have the mindset
of a third world country. Nobody believes in God anymore.
We have educated ourselves out of the existence of God. And
so we endure mockings and persecutions. But Jesus says, they've done
it to me. they're going to do it to you. And so when we see
them mocking Christ, remember that they mocked him in the courthouse
in Rome, in Jerusalem. And remember that we must continue
walking and endure the mockings of the world, but ultimately
we will gain the victory. There's a hymn that says we wrestle
on toward heaven against storm and wind and tide. Although we're
not wrestling literally against flesh and blood, we are wrestling
against ourselves. We are wrestling against the
world. We are wrestling against the forces of darkness. We are
wrestling against mockery. But we persevere because we know
that beyond the grave is an eternal home for the Lord's people. Romans 8 gives us some encouragement. Romans 8 verse 31. It says, What shall we say then
to these things? If God be for us, who can be
against us? Ultimately, if God is for us,
everybody would be against us, but they can never hinder or
stop us, for we will persevere. He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? Who shall lay anything at the
charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. What
is Satan? Satan is the accuser of their brethren. What does
he want to do? Lay things at their feet and say, look, they've
sinned. Look, they've failed. Look, they
denied the Lord Jesus Christ. And the scripture says, who shall
lay anything at the charge of God's elect? Not even Satan.
God has justified them, made them without sin through the
finished work of his beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Who
is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather
that is risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who makes
intercession for us. For who shall separate us from
the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress
or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword? As it is written,
for thy sake we are killed all the day long. We are accounted
as sheep to the slaughter. Nay, in all of these things,
what, we are more than conquerors. through him that loved us. For
I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities,
nor powers, nor anything present, or things to come, nor height,
nor depth, or any other creature shall be able to separate us
from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. For we wrestle
not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against
powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against
spiritual wickedness in high places, but who shall separate
us from the love of God we are more than conquerors in Christ
Jesus wherefore because of this enemy take unto yourself the
whole armour of God. May the Lord give us the wisdom
and ability to persevere, to lay hold of the truths of Christ
when we are mocked and we are despised and rejected knowing
that the Lord Jesus Christ walked the same pathway and he has gone
before and he has made the salvation He has given us victory through
his finished work and he is at the right hand of God waiting
for his people to come or one day he will come to receive them
to himself. Amen. Our closing hymn for this morning's
service is hymn number 403 from Gadsby's, a song of praise to
Christ. Come every gracious heart that
love the Saviour's name. Your noblest powers exert to
celebrate his fame. Tell all who fear the Lord below
the debt of love to him you owe. Hymn number 403 to the tune 536. Every gracious heart that loves
a Saviour's name, your love bestows excellence. ? Tell all who fear the Lord, dear
Lord ? ? The debt of love to Him you owe ? ? He left his starry
crown and laid his hands aside ? and died. What an angel our Tom
can tell. And thence his mighty first glorious
triumphant, Out through the skies and on crown red, And written
by the Saviour God. His chariots will not stay, And
there our spirits hurl To realms of endless day. There shall we see His lovely
face, Almighty God, we thank Thee for
the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank Thee that through
His finished work we are able to be taken from the darkness
and brought into the light. And we ask that the Holy Spirit
may work in our hearts to bring us to see our need of Christ
and our need of being in the kingdom of light and on the narrow
way that leads to life. We pray, Lord, for those people
who mocked the Lord Jesus the other day. We pray like him,
Father, forgive them, for they don't know what they are doing.
We pray, Lord, that thou deal with them in mercy and not in
anger, that the light of the gospel may shine in their hearts,
that they may be brought from enemies of God unto children
of God. And we ask, Lord, that thou draw
them to thyself, we pray. We ask that thou dismiss us with
thy blessing and may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and
the love of God the Father, the fellowship and the communion
of the Holy Spirit to be with us now and forevermore. Amen.