Robert McLaughlin Bible Ministries |
Florida Conference 2009. Part 4. Sit, Walk, STAND.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Inculcating us with the fruit of your hard work in studying.
Unconditional love, the problem solving devices.
Handing rejection from self and reaching spiritual self-esteem.
Handling rejection from others and reaching spiritual autonomy.
Handling rejection (hostility) from Satan and reaching spiritual maturity.
Growth means going FROM something TO something.
God turns up the heat, but only after He has endowed you with the HEAT SHIELD!
Rejection is a ploy by the kingdom of darkness to try to rob you of the victory of mental serenity that is rightfully yours, won for you by Jesus Christ at the cross.
EXO 1:12 But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and the more they spread out, so that they were in dread of the sons of Israel.
He would die so He would multiply.
Affliction is necessary for growth.
Dying to the things that are dead –
In order to live in what is truly alive.
The cross of standing is undeserved suffering, and the ultimate is evidence testing.
The thing about the three stages of spiritual growth is that they are accompanied by undeserved suffering that is the accelerator pedal of that growth.
The LORD stands when He is ready to DO BATTLE!
Zech 14:3-4
When Stephen the first martyr was about to die, our Lord Jesus Christ who had been sitting, sitting at the Right Hand of the Father, stood up, ACT 7:55-56.
A person stands to give a speech, to say something important, to say something which will be opposed.
The disciples standing before kings is a picture of the stand that the mature believer takes against the prince of the power of the air, ACT 27:24.
A true friend stands by you in your trials. When you take your stand, remember that the Lord stands with you, and it is HE that fights for you on the evil day while you keep silent, 2TI 4:17.
EPH 6:10-18, our main passage on the Christian stand, mentions our adversary the devil, various items of military equipment, powerful enemies lined up in battle formation, and an intense struggle.
The Christian stand, then, is the mature believer’s opposition to the kingdom of darkness – the enemy of the Christian – in spiritual warfare.
The cross was a battlefield!
When the Lord Jesus Christ was paying the price for the sins of the world, His human body on the cross was in the standing position: not sitting, not walking, but standing.
Christ’s work on the cross accomplished the strategic victory in the angelic conflict.
If you are a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, you have already been enlisted in the ranks of an army!
The believer’s salvation and regeneration (born again) have enlisted him permanently in the ranks of the royal regiment of the family of God.
This invisible warfare is called the angelic conflict. The angelic conflict is the invisible spiritual warfare between the forces of Satan and the forces of God.
Our Lord Jesus Christ won the strategic victory in the angelic conflict by His substitutionary death on the cross.
HEB 1:13, which is a quotation from PSA 110:1, was the announcement that the strategic victory had been achieved.
To Satan and his demons, the cross was their place of strategic defeat.
1JO 3:8 The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.
To the believer, the cross means a share of the spoils of victory.
When Jesus Christ was judged on Calvary for the sins of the entire world, He provided not only eternal redemption for all mankind, but also the most advantageous tactical position for defeating the believer’s greatest enemies.
You have the privilege, in this great angelic war, of having your very own enemies to do combat against and vanquish.
The flesh
GAL 5:17 For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please.
The flesh in context is another name for the old sin nature.
We have this built in system called the old sin nature that is anti-God. And when God shows up in force this guy goes on the warpath.
The world
Our enemy, the world is a power system, a force, a system of thinking.
It is the organized antagonism to the things of the Lord, the systematic opposition to Bible doctrine.
The world system consists of all the movements and activities that attempt to destroy the authorities that God has placed in human organizations.
And the devil.
The enemy of God, Christ, the Jews, and the Church-age believer.
What is the cross of our Christian stand?
The cross is a frighteningly effective instrument of death.
What was the secret weapon that our Lord used to defeat Satan?
His spiritual death.
What weapon of Satan’s did Christ destroy at the cross?
The answer is the same – death.
What were we before Christ died to defeat death?
When we participate in Christ’s victory by believing in Him, where are we placed first?
We are placed into a death.
JOH 10:10 “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”
Dying to the things that are dead –
In order to live in what is really alive.