THE WARFARE IS ACCOMPLISHED

THE WARFARE IS ACCOMPLISHED 

Sunday, July 19, 2020, the Year of Our Lord 

Pastor Carolyn Sissom 

Every true minister of the gospel who speaks to the heart of the Church declares the name of the Lord unto the people, revealing the nature and victory of Christ Jesus through His shed Blood.    

 Our predetermined destiny is to be a people for His name 

Act 15:14: Simeon has declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. 

We, the Church, must refuse to emphasize the bad news about the Devil and his crowd.  With our eyes fixed on Jesus, we preach His Word. 

The warfare is “accomplished.”

 John 19:28:  …Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled… 

The war of the ages was fought and won 2,000 years ago.  We, the church, must acknowledge and appropriate the bounty of His victory.  To fight the good fight of faith is to arm ourselves with a settled conviction that the warfare is accomplished.  We cannot enter into spiritual warfare apart from the truth and shield of faith that our adversary is defeated. 

The weapons of our warfare are mighty… “through God.”  This is a larger faith than just “taking the land” in Joshua faith.  It is the higher ground of Ephesians which Christ took.  In Christ, we sit, walk, and stand postured from the throne of Christ with His victory.  

Messiah went forth and crushed the serpent’s head (Hab. 3:13).  The Lord is victorious over the king of darkness by stripping him from head to foot.   

1.       Jesus triumphed over principalities and powers (Col. 2;15).

2.      Jesus bound the strong man (Mt. 12:29).

3.      Jesus bound the dragon (Rev. 20:2).

4.      Jesus killed the giant. 

5.      Jesus judged the prince (Jn. 12:31).

6.      Jesus dismantled Satan’s kingdom (Col. 2:15).

7.      Jesus abolished death. 

8.      Jesus divided the spoils. 

Jesus didn’t go to hell to finish the victory.  He went there to announce it (Eph. 4: 9-10; 1 Pet. 3: 18-19).  The complete and total triumph of our Lord is best summed up in his own words:

Jn. 14:30, AMP: I will not talk with you much more, for the prince (evil genius, ruler) of the world is coming.  He has no claim on Me.  (He has nothing in common with Me; there is nothing in Me that belongs to him, and he has no power over Me.)

Col. 2:15, KJV:  And having spoiled principalities and powers, He made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.

Col. 2:15, NIV:  And having disarmed the power and authorities, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

Jesus “spoiled” our adversary at the Cross.  This word which carries the thought of becoming divested of clothing or armor, is used in Colossians 2:11 to describe the putting off of the old man.  Our Lord literally exhibited, or exposed, the enemy.  He has given us the same authority to expose the enemy.  Saturday while I was praying with Mary Bostrom’s prayer group, the Holy Spirit exposed internet wizards were trying to block the TXGOP delegates from being credentialed.  These internet wizards were exposed and called out.

Col. 1:13:  Who has delivered us from the power of darkness and has translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son.

We are delivered, rescued, and preserved by the finished work of Jesus Christ.  Our Lord has delivered us from the power or authority, of the kingdom of darkness and sin.  We have been translated or transferred, from darkness to light, changed and made able to stand in the righteousness of Christ.

Jesus bound the strong man:  Jer. 31:11, KJV:  For the Lord has redeemed Jacob, and ransomed him from the hand of him that was stronger than he.

Mt. 12:29, TLB: One cannot rob Satan’s kingdom without first binding Satan.  Only then can his demons be cast out!

On Calvary, the stronger Man prevailed.  Jesus bound the enemy and then began to seize and plunder his goods. 

Lk. 11:22, KJV: But when a stronger than he shall come upon him, and overcome him, he takes from him all his armor wherein he trusted…

The Conqueror stripped the devil of his weapons and carried off his belongings.  “Panoplia,” the Greek word for armor means “all armor, full armor; all weapons.”  The Cross took away the whole armor of Satan and made provision for the whole armor of God (Eph. 6: 11-13). 

“Wherein he trusted,” trusted is peitho the verb word for “faith.”  On Golgotha’s hill, the devil’s faith was destroyed and the faith of God was released (Heb. 12:2). Satan’s whole world caved in---around the father of insecurity and instability.

Jesus, the Rock of Ages, is stronger than the devil.  Everything about our King is superior.  During this time when the nations of the earth are being tried, the Lord wants His Church to arise in the One who is stronger than the devil.  Not even death was able to hold him down!  Jesus Christ is the resurrection and the life!

Acts. 2:24: TLB: …death could not keep this man within its grip.

Jesus slew the Dragon:  The battle of the ages is the battled for the seed.  Jesus Christ was the Seed of the woman, the Seed of Abraham, and the Seed of David.  Therein is revealed His pain, His promise, and His power as he relates to mankind racially, redemptively, and royally.

Gen. 3:15:  I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your seed and her Seed. He (the seed) shall bruise your head,
and you (Satan) shall bruise His heel.”

The serpent of Genesis who becomes the dragon of the Book of Revelation is predestined for Jesus and His Church to bruise and overwhelm the serpent’s head.  Our adversary operates his ministry by the spirit of fear.  His weapon is suggestion: “Has God said?” (Gen. 3:1) Fear is the power of COVID 19.  Fear is the power of the rioting, murders, stealing and burning.  Fear is the power of lawlessness.  Fear is the power of politics.

Every though (like seed) has its source in one of three spirits: God’s, man’s or the devil’s.  Man’s soul (psyche) or mind is like a womb, wherein conception of thoughts takes place.  When fiery darts come, we must not receive or meditate on them.  Faith comes by thinking upon the Word of God (Ro. 10:17).  Fear comes by contemplating the voice of the devil.  The birth canal for this fertilized seed is the mouth.  Every word we speak has its source in the realm of the spirit.  Let our words agree with the Father (Amos 3:3).

The adversary’s primary tactical purpose is abortion---to kill the son, the seed, the heir.  That seed is the living Word---what God says.  Doubt is the wedge o sin. The enemy encourages people to imagine things that are not real.  Satan wants to separate us from the Word and the source of that Word.

Gen 3;14:  The Lord God said to the serpent…upon your belly shall you go, and dust shall you eat all the days of your life.

Isa. 65:25: …and dust shall be the serpent’s meat…

1 Cor. 15:49, AMP: Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, so shall we and so let us also bear the image of the Man of heaven.

How did the serpent of Genesis 3 become the dragon of Revelation 12?  His influence has enlarged because men have ignorantly worshiped and magnified him with their words.  

Ancient Israel handed down the bronze serpent from generation to generation for over 700 years!  Finally, godly King Hezekiah destroyed the idol, knowing it to be “Nehushtan,” just a piece of brass (2 Kings 18:4).  May God’s leaders today do the same with undue emphasis on the devil.

The first man Adam was earth-minded, a man of dust.  The only place that Satan can live is in the carnal minds of men.  As our minds are renovated, we can put Satan under our feet.

Rom 16:20: The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.

Jesus the serpent-bruiser is also the dragon-slayer.

Isa. 27: 1-2:  In that day the Lord with His sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and He shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.

In that day, points to the day when the warfare is accomplished, the New Testament day.  The “sore and great and strong sword” is Jesus, the Word made flesh.  The sea is symbolic of the nations that are restless teeming masses of unregenerate humanity.  Jesus slew the sea monster. The sweet, lowly Savior was also the “sore” or “cruel, hard” secret weapon of the Father who punished the devil (Lk. 4: 1-14). 

That’s why Jesus came to this planet, to defeat the devil on his own territory.  He accomplished this by pouring out the “red-wine” of His precious blood.

Psa. 75:8: For in the hand of the LORD there is a cup, and the wine is red; it is full of mixture; and he pours out of the same: but the dregs thereof, all the wicked of the earth shall wring them out, and drink them.

The devil is called “leviathan” in Isaiah 27:1. Figuratively the constellation of the dragon is a symbol of Babylon.  Leviathan is the “twisted one” and is mentioned six times (the number of man) in the bible.  In Canaanite literature, Leviathan is the well-known mythological serpent Lotan that has seven heads (Rev. 12:3).  I preached a sermon on Leviathan in 2010 from Job 40-41.  It is on the website.  The myth of Lotan belongs to the forces of chaos personified by the sea and its monsters.

Leviathan speaks of Satan and all his ministers (seed, son of Satan, the antichrist).   Leviathan is the “piercing” serpent, literally.  “the serpent that flees or bolts suddenly.”  Jesus pierced him at the Cross.  Today when men submit to God and resist the devil, we pierce Satan.

Satan is called the “crooked” serpent.  Jesus wrestled him in Gethsemane and on the Cross.  The Messiah came to do the will of the Father, to “bind” the dragon.  Jesus broke the power of his demonic heads.

Ps. 74:13:  It was You who split open the sea by Your power.  You broke the heads of the monster in the waters.

Ps. 91:13:  You shall tread upon the lion and adder; the young lion and the dragon shall you trample under feet.

Leviathan, or the dragon is also connected with Pharaoh and the land of Egypt---a type of sin and bondage (Ez. 29:3).  Pharaoh, the god and prince of Egypt, typifies the one who is the god and prince of this world system.  Jesus has dealt with the old, ancient serpent wounding the dragon!  Jesus is the right hand and holy arm of the Father, the one who got the victory.

Isa 51:9 - Awake, awake, put on strength,
O arm of the LORD!
Awake as in the ancient days,
In the generations of old.
Are You not the arm that cut Rahab (sea dragon) apart,
And wounded the serpent?