Lesson 2

Eddie Smith Good afternoon, my name is Eddie Smith, and I'm in Houston, Texas and that's my dog in the background. Excuse me. I'm in Houston, Texas and my wife and I have the US Prayer Center in Houston, Texas, you can find us the usprayercenter.org. We also have a year long school of prayer, found at Teachmetopray.com and by the way, if you're a prayer leader, you might find it interesting because it's a year long weekly lessons. But also when you sign up immediately, you'll get an email 138 ways to mobilize prayer. So that's something that's a bit of a curiosity to people, and we hope it'll be a blessing to you and encourage you. And then our our materials are at prayerbookstore.com. So it's usprayercenter.org., teachmetopray.com and prayerbookstore.com. There we go.    Well, in lesson one, or in the first edition of this lesson, we talked about the issues of our authority. We'll talk more about that today, too. We talked about the issues of our authority, we talked about some of the dangers involved in spiritual warfare, which people don't necessarily take into consideration. And the reason the dangers exist is not because God doesn't want to protect us. It's because we get out of his order. When we get out of his order, we get in trouble.  I see that in so many cases. There's a lot of well meaning people that just get confused and and some don't have training and some are trained wrong. They've been trained but they've been trained wrong.    I remember one of the prayer meetings that I was in and helping lead at Houston Baptist University here in Houston. There was a prayer meeting and a young man stood and he said, God, I'm just praying that that you'll save every man, woman, boy and girl in Houston, Texas and until you do God, I'm neither going to eat nor sleep until every man, woman, boy and girl in Houston comes to know. He meant well, but after the service, I went to him told him I said, you know, what you said is not even possible. Because Jesus Himself said, concerning salvation, it's a narrow way. The broad way leads to death and the narrow way leads to life. But Jesus said, through there, be that find it.    So the idea that every man, woman and boy and girl in Houston is going to find life is just not biblical. So and besides that, you'd be hungry, and you'd be sleepless for a long time if you're going to wait for that answer. So there are things we should be praying for, and then expect, but there are things that we shouldn't be praying for, because they're not biblical. It's like a lady that came to another one of the prayer meetings here in Houston. And she said, God, I'm just asking you right now to give every homosexual age. Well, that's not how God deals with people.    God extends His love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Some of us get the idea that when we get saved, God starts loving us, oh, God loved us when we were his enemies. We benefit from his love, even as his enemies. So we need to understand the position that God takes on these things. So let's move on now to the next point, where did the devil get his authority, we clearly see that he has authority because all of us have friends and family that that suffer from cancer and many of us have lost friends and family from cancer and other thing, car wrecks and other things. Just today, I've had several reports from friends that are having horrible things happen to them. Or did they never get the authority? Well, God did not give him the authority, God gave the authority of dominion over the earth to man in Genesis, he gave it to Adam and Eve.    By the way, he gave them dominion over the earth, not over people. So it's not godly, to be in dominion over people. God came to set people free. But we do have a dominion over the earth, which also requires responsibility for the earth. And the way Satan, God has authority was by deceiving Adam and Eve. He deceived them both. And now, when you're taking back, that's what spiritual warfare is about, it's about taking back what Adam and Eve gave the enemy. And so that's, that's really the point of spiritual warfare, is to take back dominion over the earth, excuse me, and the role that God put us here for.    Now, our authority comes to us in several ways. One is, we receive it, when we're born again, a born again, Christian has a level of authority, no doubt about that. And particularly the authority over his own or her own nature, and her own thoughts and actions and activities. But that authority is very minimal and it grows over time. We earn it basically. David killed bears and lions and then he killed giants and then he conquered cities. So we see His authority growing over time.    Desert Storm, you remember Desert Storm and General Norman Schwarzkopf. General Norman Schwarzkopf led Desert Storm, and he did something quite unusual for warfare. He said that the ground war will not begin until the air war is finished. And he sent in his bombers, and they decimated the enemy. So much so, that after just a few days of air war, he declared the air war complete and began the ground war and there was no ground war, the enemy gave up.    So the opposite is true in spiritual warfare, which is often true about spiritual things. They're the opposite of earthly things. That is this, we can't be effective in the heavenlies until we have settled things on the earth. Our earthly wars must be completed. For instance, God's called us to be ministers of reconciliation. Well, if I'm not reconciled to you, I'm not in a position to tell this person to be reconciled to God.    So, we do have responsibilities and they are important responsibilities and there are rules relating to them. It's a clash of kingdoms spiritual warfare is it's an ancient conflict. By the way, God and Satan are not equals. They've never been equals. Many call Satan, a fallen Ark Angel, there's no reference in Scripture to him being an archangel, there are references to him being an angel of some sort. But the truth is, God and Satan are not equals. And they're not even close to being equals.   Satan is not omnipresent. And I say that out of concern, because in many of the prayer meetings that I've had, that I'm in, and by the way, for eight years, I conducted weekly prayer meetings, not weekly, about bi weekly, three to four times a month prayer meetings, in cities across the country, all day long prayer meetings. That's true. And that meant over 250 of those in those eight years. So I've heard a lot of praying. I've heard a lot more praying than I've done praying, in fact, but in those prayer meetings, I would hear things that caused me concern. They would address Satan as if he's in the room. Well, he's not in the room. He's not in this room, at least.    The truth is, Satan is not everywhere. So the idea that we can address him anytime we want to, wherever we are, in any way we want to, it's just not biblical. Jesus was confronted by Satan, and he did address him. But those were very specific times and very important times. And Satan is no more on the prison today than he was then. He isn't omnipresent. He's not omniscient. Alice and I had been doing deliverance ministry, where people are delivered from demons since 1972, and one that I recall kind of relates to this point, the demons and this woman said, if you don't shut up, I'm going to tell everybody in this team. Well, I had a team of about six women that were helping me minister to his demonized woman, and the demon and in a male voice said, if you don't shut up, I'm going to tell these women all the sins of your youth, said, Well, if you can find them, tell them well, they can't find them because God's already cleansed me and forgotten them. He said, I'll never remember them again. Interesting, isn't it that a God who knows everything can forget anything?    So another way to say that is there are some things God doesn't know. He doesn't know my past sins because he chose to forget them. So Satan is not omnipresent. He's not omniscient, and he's certainly not omnipotent. It might have even been that same deliverance session or one similar. When the demon in the person said, if you don't shut up, I'm going to kill you. And I said, Okay, well touch me and they said, I'll get away get away. I can't. So they're liars. And and you need not fear them in that sense. But as long as you're leaving for Christ, and doing what you're supposed to do, God is your protection.    The battles are carried out on three work three fronts, there's the world which is our external enemy. That would be our society. We know that don't we? We've got strip clubs and all kinds of horrible things. We've got transvestites now teaching our children in libraries, which is insane. The in fact here near Houston, a church actually had a transvestite, teaching children one morning on Sunday. The world is our external enemy. The flesh is our internal enemy. And the devil and the kingdom of darkness is our infernal enemy. So what are the enemy's goals? What's Satan's goal?    A lady called me one day and she said, My daughter is a Satanist and she needs help. I think maybe she's willing to get it would would you be able to help her? I say well bring her down to the church. She says she can't come to the church. And I said, put her on the phone. So she did. And I said, Mary, I said, come down to the church, my office here, and I'll help you and bye By the way, I know Satan told you he would kill you think I'm at the church, but he's a liar. He will not kill you. You're totally protected here. So come on down. Well, a few minutes later, she did walk in. And when she walked in, she was trembling all over. And she sat down in the chair. And I said, Mary, do you realize what you brought in here? Her demons came along with her.    Do you realize and by the way, the temperature in the office, this is not an exaggeration, people that do deliverance will tell you this is true. The temperature in the office dropped about 10 degrees. And she shivering. I said, Do you realize what you brought in here? And she said, I said, Do you mind if I get rid of them? And she looked at me like, you can do that? I said, every one of you get out of here now. And it was like the tide rolled out. They were gone. And she was at peace. So much at peace. I thought she was going to fall asleep sitting there, not shaking, not shivering, just at peace. I said, that's good, isn't it, Mary? And she said, Yes. And I said, Let me tell you what that is. That's the Holy Spirit. And he not only can come on you as he is, but he can come and live inside you. You see, demons afflict and oppress, and the Holy Spirit comforts.   So back to the point, what is Satan's goal? Well, I told her, I said, as anyone ever told you what your God calls my God? And she said, No. I said, Read this. And I picked up my Bible, I turned Isaiah 1413 and 14, which you can do. And it says, I said, read that to me, and she read it. I shall be like, the most High. I shall be like the most High, Mary, why would you want to serve a want to be God? When you can serve the Most High, the actual God, the Creator God, that even created Satan as an angel. So Satan wants to be worshiped. He wants to rule nations, and he wants to rule people. What are the enemy's weapons? Well, in one sense, he was disarmed at Calvary. And the only weapons he has left are lies and deception.    By the way, a whole, a whole truth. A half truth is a whole lie. And he uses half truth sometimes to deceive us, and sometimes just flat out lies. So we have to be careful because there are many half truths and many lies in the books we read. And sometimes the sermons we hear, and sometimes the sermons we preach. So lies and deception are how the enemy gets his foot holds. His deception is to tempt, us to trap us. He couldn't trap Joseph. You remember Joseph, served in conifer sounds? He couldn't tempt Joseph, when Potter's first wife made advances toward Joseph, but he did trap him and Joseph went to prison. So we must be careful. We must walk circumspectly. That verse literally means to walk looking circumference to spectacles, do a walk, looking around, be careful.    That's the way we walk in military life. I was to sing in a large conference in Kansas City years and years ago, centuries ago. I got to the lobby of the hotel where I was to stay and there was a an attractive older woman, old enough to be my mother actually checking out. A friend of ours came over and she said that's Dr. So and so's wife. Would you be willing, because I was young at the time I was 27 and Bill boys were all moving around and they'd gone upstairs and she said, Would you be willing to carry her bags up to her room? I thought, well, it's not my job, but I want to be servant hearted. So I said, Sure. So I carried the lady's bags up to the room, on the elevator with her and when we got off, I took them over and set her down by her door. I started walking back toward the elevator and she said, Oh, young man, would you please carry them inside my room? I said ma'am, I'd rather not do that. It'll be easy for you to drag them. Oh, please, please, please. Against my better judgment, I picked up the bags. I took him inside the room. When I turned around to leave, she had slammed the door and she was taking off her blouse and fortunately, I was able to push past her get the door open and leave.    But that's how easily we can be trapped and deceived. That's what Satan's goal is, to lie to us, to deceive us, and to become worshipped by us. I'm surprised that people that worship him in church even. Yeah, I was there as a pastor. I was at the church one morning and a man came up to me before the service and he said, Pastor, did you hear what happened to me this week? I said, No. He said, Well, on Thursday, my boss came in and terminated me. I mean, he fired me. By the time I got home, my wife told me that our oldest son had been kicked out of school for three days on probation, because he messed up.    And then the next morning, my wife's transmission went out. I mean, Satan has been all over us this week. And I said, Joe, he said, Yes. I said, if those things had happened to me, I would not be declaring them. He said, why? I said, Well, the way we worship is we declare the works of God. So we learned that in Psalms declare His works in the sanctuary. And I said, here you are declaring the works of the devils I wouldn't, I would just recognize that happened to me. If I if you can help me, oh, I'll tell you what happened. But if you can't help me, then I'll just keep it to myself in prayer, and trust the Lord and thank Him for what hasn't happened bad this week. I thought he got the message.    But I was wrong. Because when I left the church that day, I got to my car in the parking lot and opened the door. I heard him talking to a woman two cars over about how he lost his job and how his son got kicked out of school and his wife's transmission went out, Satan's been all over him this week. Giving glory to Satan and giving honor to Satan and his deeds. You see, I want to be like Muhammad Ali, actually Cassius Clay. Remember Cassius when he was young, when a boxer would hit him as hard as they could, he would grin through that tooth, whatever you call those tooth protectors, he would grin  at his enemy and do this Ollie shuffle with his white boots. And I'm sure his enemy thought, Oh, now what am I gonna do?    So no matter what the enemy throws at me, I don't want him to ever get the idea that he's successful. So his goal is to be glorified. For his kingdom to excuse me, his goal is to become like the most High. He wants to displace our Father. What are our goals? Our goals are to glorify the Name of God, to extend his kingdom, to see the earth filled with the knowledge of His glory. To see the Father's house filled with children. As First Timothy 2:2 says, to live quiet, peaceable lives, for His glory. That deal about the knowledge of His glory in Scripture says, the earth shall be filled with a knowledge of the glory of God.    You see, the glory of God is here. We know that from Isaiah six, when the angels that are flying around the king, Isaiah saw them and heard them. And they said, The whole earth is filled with His glory. The earth is filled with His glory right now, the trouble is, not everyone can ask knowledge of the glory. You see, knowledge in the Bible doesn't mean head knowledge, it means experience. It's like a husband and wife and intercourse, it means we've not engaged with His glory. But the whole earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God. So what are our weapons of war? What do we fight with? Well, of course, righteousness, and we received that at the new birth, freedom. Without it, there's no integrity. Obedience. Obedience comes as we submit to authority. Matthew eight verses five through 10 talks about that. Faith and faithfulness. In the church today, there are some civilians who've never been born again. They're really not in the army they just attend.    There are some AWOL and AWOL, absent without leave. It is a soldier that has gone off duty and nobody knows where he is. We've got people like that in the church, raw recruits, maybe Christians, basically, prisoners of war. We've got people who've been saved 50 years, and they may as well be prisoners of war in terms of the spiritual warfare, because they are so entrapped in things that God's not in. And then there are some who need R&R in the military is called R&R, rest and restoration.    They're exhausted, they're injured, and they're sickly. Some of the things that we see as weapons in this warfare are intimacy with God, a hatred for evil, reconciliation with others. You see, you can't reconcile people to God if you're not reconciled to someone else. So reconciliation is a major key, restitution and forgiveness is a major key. Matthew 18, Jesus tells us if we don't forgive God, the Father, our Father will put us in prison and release the tormentors on us. That's in Matthew 18.   The king forgave the guy a big debt. And he did not forgive the guy, a little debt and God was so upset. Jesus said, The King, it was just a story we think, the king had the man put in prison and release the tormentors on him. And Jesus said, and so will the father do to you if you don't forgive? So anybody you're withholding forgiveness from, you're actually hurting yourself. You're hurting no one else.    The gospel, the gospel is one of our weapons, and it has the power unto salvation. Faithful prayer, the gifts of the Spirit, the fruit of the Spirit, the Word of God, the blood of Christ, the name of Christ. You know, I told you a story earlier. Or it might have been in the first lesson I forget which where I said, oh, when Mary that the Satan worshiper was in my office. I said to those demons that came in with her, get out of here, and they did. Sometimes when I tell a story like that, somebody will raise their hand. And I'll say, Yes, ma'am. And she'll say, didn't you say in the name of Jesus get out of here?    Well, in many cases, perhaps most cases I do. But you see, they know who they are, and they know who I am. By the way, the same is true of you if you know him, they know who I am. I was born again when I was five and a half years old, which means these are God's lips. Christ lives in here. He sees what I see. He hears what I hear, he smells what I smell.   And He says, what I say, these are His lips. If we knew that it would correct our communication. Christ is our life, Paul said. It's not just saying the name of Jesus, that is power.   It's representing his name, doing what he would do, using the power of attorney that He's given us, and of all things and it comes as a shock to some people and angers others. The tithe is also a weapon in the war. God said if we will bring the tide, he will rebuke the devourer for our sake. Well shoot I would give 10% of my income to see the devil rebuked any day. So I don't see that as a big deal. Tithing is not a big deal to me. Some people say, well, it's not New Testament. Well, you can deal with that however you want to. I choose to tithe because I believe it is New Testament. But I would tithe there were not, no financial benefits. If it was just seeing the enemy get rebuked, I would do it.    What about your armor? You hear a lot of sermons and a lot of teachers say you need to pray on the armor every day. I don't pray on the armor every day. I put on the helmet of salvation when I was five and a half years old. The breastplate of righteousness was placed on me. I didn't put it on. I didn't pray at all. God gave me the righteousness of Christ. Christ and I exchange lives will teach on that Sunday. You grow into it.    I was nine years old when I came home from school one day on my bicycle and walked past my dad in the kitchen weeping and went upstairs and fell across my bed and he came up to find out what was wrong. And I told him I said, I went downtown to tell Mr. Koh Sankey, how to be saved because you said to mom that he's not saved, and I don't want to see him go to Hell. But when I got to his store, I didn't have the courage to go in daddy.   And I'm concerned about him. And my dad told me it would be all right. He said, Son, you went on for the afternoon, but I couldn't handle it. I got in my car, went down to Koh Sankeys store. I told him, I said, Jim, come out, I want to talk to you. Get in the car, I'm gonna show you something. I drove him around that city square.    You know, Texas cities have a courthouse in the middle and you just drive around with him until I had shared the gospel with him and he received Christ. He's in heaven, not because I want him to Christ. But because I stirred my Father to win him to Christ. You see? We need the armor of God. I'll talk to you next. I'll tell you in the next lesson. Why I don't have an armor bearer. And don't plan him on. That may be a shock to that. Come back to the next lesson we'll talk about I'll talk to you later.