Any Kingdom Divided Against Itself Is Laid Waste

We're going to be continuing on in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 11. And we've come this morning to a passage that's terrifying. If we're honest, we've come to a passage of Scripture that's very scary. And there are a couple of other passages of Scripture that I don't even want to read because they're scary to me. One of them is in Philippians where Paul says to you, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. It doesn't really make sense to you, but one of the things when you look at your own life and you think, okay, where's the fear and trembling? I lack it. It's scary to me when I look around and go, there's something lacking. Or when Jesus returns and the men come to him and they say, Lord, Lord, look at all the stuff that we did in your name. And he says, I don't know you. And these people knew him. They claimed him. They professed him. And yet when they came to him at the final day, he said, I never knew you.

Or in Hebrews, where it tells us that if we continue sinning after coming to a knowledge of God, that there no longer remains a sacrifice for our sins. There are scary things in Scripture. And who are they written to? They're written to us. They're written to caution us, to warn us, to bring us to faith, to establish us in hope of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Because if that's not our hope, we have no other. And so our text this morning, for that reason, is scary to me. Our text this morning is entitled, or the sermon is, Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste. Now, it's a simple truth that when there's disunity within a body, whether that's a family or an army or a nation, that it turns in on itself and it destroys itself. If you're familiar with autoimmune diseases, that's how they work. What happens in an autoimmune disease generally? Well, what happens is, your immune system turns on your body and starts attacking it. And it's not the thing that actually kills you, but it makes you so weak that when you actually get sick with something else, your body is too weak to fight it off. And so the house collapses. The kingdom is laid waste. You die. And so it's a simple truth that a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand. And so the question that we're going to come to at the end of the sermon is, are you a hypocrite?

Because in our own lives, to be a hypocrite is to be divided. To live with a foot in the world and a foot in God's kingdom. To be turned against one another, yourself. And what we'll learn from this passage is that hypocrites can't stand before God. They will not have a place in his kingdom. And it's a very scary thing to be found in that position. Would you please stand for the reading of God's word from Luke chapter 11, verses 14 through 26. This is the word of the Lord, and it is eternally true. And he was casting out a demon, and it was mute. But when the demon had gone out, the mute man spoke, and the crowds were amazed. But some of them said, He casts out demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons. Others, to test him, were demanding of him a sign from heaven. But he knew their thoughts and said to them, Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste.

and a house divided against itself falls. If Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you say that I cast out demons by Beelzebul. And if I, Beelzebul, cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? So they will be your judges. But if I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house. His possessions are undisturbed. But when someone stronger than he attacks him and overpowers him, he has taken away from him all his armor on which he had relied and distributes his plunder. He who is not with me is against me, and he who is not gathered with me scatters. When the unclean spirit goes out of a man, it passes through waterless places seeking rest and not finding any. It says, I will return to my house from which I came. And when it comes, it finds it swept.

This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. So our text this morning, we have Jesus healing, miraculously, a man who's demon-possessed. And this demon that possesses him is mute. And so therefore, the man is mute. The man cannot speak. And we understand that this man was not born that way, but at some point became unable to speak. And everyone knew it. And no one questioned why this man was unable to speak. They all understood that he had a demon. And so when Jesus comes to him, what does Jesus do? Jesus removes the demon, casts him out as he was casting out a demon. The man is healed. He is changed. And he bears the fruit of that change. What does he do? Well, he talks.

It says the mute man spoke and the crowds were amazed. And so the first thing we learn from our text as we come to it is that Jesus changes men. He changes them from what they were to what they ought to be. He restores to them God's gifts to them. In this case, speech. And Jesus' miracles are miraculous. It's not a common thing. If the people would have been able to do this, they would have done it. Later on in our text, Jesus asked them, by what authority do your sons cast out demons? If we think for a second, do we not believe that this man would have been seen by them? And they weren't able to do it. And so when Jesus comes in and he heals this man and he casts out the demon, everyone's going, whoa, we're amazed. That's what it tells us. The crowds were amazed at what had gone on.

earlier in Jesus' ministry, the disciples are trying to do this. Jesus has given them authority to cast out demons, to heal people, to proclaim the word of God. And when he's up on the mount with his disciples at the transfiguration, what's he come back down to? He comes back down to dissension. To the disciples being unable to cast out a demon. And the people making fun of them and mocking them. And they go to him privately afterwards and they say, why couldn't we cast out that demon? And he says, these kind only come out through prayer. And so we recognize that when Jesus cast this demon out of this man, it's something miraculous and everyone recognized it. It was not ordinary. He changed this man. Time and again, the healings that are recorded in Scripture for us are there to demonstrate to us, just like they were to the people around at that time, Jesus' ability and his desire to save sinners, to change them, to remove their bondage.

This man was in bondage. He was unable to free himself. No one else was able to free him, and yet Jesus was able to free him, to change him, to make him new again. This is what Jesus does. He changes people. He regenerates them. The deaf, the dumb, the blind, even the dead, like Lazarus. Dead in the tomb to the point that his sister said, don't open the tomb because he'll stink. Jesus changes them. He makes them alive. And that's what we have Jesus doing in the midst of the crowds. And there's fruit to the work that Jesus does. It's apparent to people. And it's apparent here. It doesn't seem miraculous. You know, when Lazarus gets up and walks out of the tomb, it's miraculous. But when the guy talks, we go, well, that's normal. And we say, well, no, that wasn't normal for that man. He couldn't talk before. He's been changed. The mute man spoke. The crowds were amazed. That demon had complete control of this man.

And there was nothing that the man could do about it. He was unable to overcome his bondage and give him freedom. And this is our condition. Each one of us apart from Christ. We are entirely slaves of Satan. We're his slaves. We do his bidding. We carry out his will. Everything about us who are apart from Christ is sin. That's what we do. It's what we eat and breathe and live. is sin. We are in bondage. We have no will, no ability to do anything differently. And so when Jesus comes on the scene with this man, he changes that. He breaks this man's bondage. In 1 John 3, verse 8, it says, the Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. He came to set captives free. He came to take those who had no ability to save themselves, to do any good for themselves or anyone else, and he came to change them.

And the way that he changes them is by crushing Satan in his power. And that's what he does in this situation. He casts out the demon. And so the crowds were amazed, as we would be amazed if we saw that. If you were to see a man who was unable to speak, unable to see, unable to walk, do that very thing, you would be amazed. You'd say, glory to God, look what he did. But not all of the crowd was amazed. Some of the crowd was amazed. But others of them said, he, speaking of Jesus Christ, he cast out demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons. Others to test him were demanding of him a sign from heaven. And so what are these men accusing Jesus Christ of? What are they actually saying? They're saying to him, you are one of Satan's minions. And you're one of his highest ranking minions. Because what you're doing is you're coming in and you're displacing a lesser spirit. You're doing it by force. You've come in. This man is possessed by Satan. We know that. There's no question in our text that everyone knows that this man has a demon. He's ruled by Satan. And then Jesus comes in and Jesus casts out Satan's demon and they say, you must be a higher ranking official. He casts out demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons. Now, Jesus,

through now, through his church, but at this time, was at war with Satan. And his work was to destroy the works of Satan. That's what he came for. That's what 1 John tells us. And so there's a battle. Now I want to ask you for a second, because this is the case that Jesus makes. Would it be good strategy, war strategy, for Satan to do this? Would it be good strategy for him to send one of his higher ranking officials to take... from one of his lower ranking officials? The answer is no. That's not good strategy. Why is that not good strategy? Well, because you already possess it. And your lower official is able to maintain it. That's what he's been doing. This man is mute. And so they accuse Jesus of coming in, pulling rank, and taking the spoil away from the weaker spirit. Now does this happen? Is there division? Is there disunity?

within the ranks because that's what there's that's the only way we can make sense of this happening is that you're a higher authority and you're pulling rank so think of it like this think of there being a lion with its prey and it's eating okay and a bigger lion comes in what's the bigger lion do threatens scares off attacks the weaker lion get you know steals his prey right and and possesses it itself eats it himself is that what jesus does with this man does he take him and possess him with some worse No, he heals the man. So if we were thinking in terms of the lions, what happens is the bigger, stronger lion comes in, chases off the weaker lion, and then leaves the food to rot. And we think even the animals know that that doesn't make any sense. If you're going to take something, then use it. The worst kind of animals are the ones that kill just for the sake of killing. And don't even eat what they've killed. So Jesus does not consume this man.

He doesn't afflict him with a worse curse, a worse bondage than this previous spirit. Jesus instead restores this man and he leaves him alone. So consider, if you were Satan's strategist, would it ever make sense for you to send two of your officials to fight over something that you already possess with the purpose being that once the stronger one... beats the weaker one, they both abandon the territory. Does that make any sense in terms of war strategy? If you're trying to overcome, you're trying to gain ground, we come in, we fight amongst ourselves, and once we've established the winner, we both retreat and leave the ground for the opponent. That doesn't make any sense. In war, if you want to give up ground because you couldn't defend it, the wise thing to do would be to retreat before the battle.

To give up the ground so that you don't suffer loss in the war. You say, we can't defend this ground. This outpost is too far. We can't maintain it. We're going to give it up for now. We're going to retreat to preserve our strength. But what goes on here, what Jesus is being accused of, actually would weaken the strength of Satan's army. Because they lose the prey. They lose the ground. They lose the man. No one who has any sense about them would engage in a battle with the express intention of fighting and then losing. It makes no sense. But this is what the mockers are accusing Jesus of when they say that he's casting out demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons. But Jesus knew their thoughts, verse 17, and he says to them, any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste. He's saying, you guys, it doesn't make any sense. If I was what you said I am, It wouldn't make any sense for me to do what you're accusing me of. It's stupid. What I've done is tried to explain to you the idiocy of this accusation. Jesus knew their thoughts and he said to them, any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste. A house divided against itself falls. If Satan is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? And we all understand that when there's division, wherever it presents itself, if things that should be unified

fighting going on amongst the ranks, that family, that business, that army, that nation does not progress. It does not go on the offensive and take ground because all of its energy and resource are being spent fighting with one another. A house divided against itself falls. If Satan is divided against himself, how can his kingdom stand? but you say that I cast out demons by Beelzebul. And he says, well, fine, okay, I'll go along with you. If I cast out demons by Beelzebul, how do your sons do it? Do your sons do it by Beelzebul? Well, of course, the people are going to get offended and say, no, it's rhetorical. Of course not. That's not what our sons do. Our sons do it because they love God. They do it in service of God. They do it to glorify God. And he says, okay, well, if that's how they do it and a kingdom divided against itself can't stand, He says, then if I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. You have no place to accuse me. He answers the questions of their heart. Because they accuse him of being a demon instead of the son of God. And then he goes on to describe Satan and his possession of a man. He says, when a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, that is Satan guarding, protecting, defending his prey.

And his prey in this situation is that mute man. He defends it. When a strong man, fully armed, guards his house, his possessions are undisturbed. Because the man himself can't free himself. And so Satan has what he's stolen, what he's taken. Jesus says, but when someone stronger, speaking of himself, speaking of the power of God, when someone stronger than he attacks him and overpowers him, he takes away from him. Jesus takes away from Satan all his armor on which he had relied and he distributes his plunder. And so it only makes sense to us that Jesus is doing these miracles by the power of God. And for me to say that to you, that's no surprise, right? We're all going, that's right. Yeah, I get it. Satan's weaker than Jesus Christ. When Jesus wants something, he gets it. Satan can't keep him from having it. That's right. But you remember at the beginning of the sermon, I said, this is a really, really, this is a terrifying text to me. And it's not because of anything that's been said so far.

I can get all of us to go along as Christians and say there's warfare between Satan and the Lord Jesus Christ. And we, because we're made in God's image, we're a part of that warfare. We're on one side or we're on the other. Every single one of us. Young, old, man, woman, married, single, doesn't matter. Where you came from or where you're going. You are a part of this war. This war for your soul. And until Jesus comes, you're Satan's possession. You're his vessel of destruction. You do his will. And you can't do anything else. So when someone stronger comes in and attacks Satan and steals his plunder, that's us. And he changes us. Then we're still in the war, but we're on the other side now. Jesus came to earth to upset Satan's economy, his false economy of peace. The false peace that we maintain in our hearts and in our minds between us and God.

And you think, I don't do that. I don't know what you're talking about, Pastor. And I say, okay, I'm young. I'm not 60. But you know in the counseling sessions that I get into when I talk to people about sin, it doesn't matter most times what the sin is. You know the one thing that never gets questioned? If you're a men's group, I ask you this question. What's the one thing that never gets questioned when there's some sort of awful sin? Your salvation. Whether you're Christian or not. It never is questioned. No matter what happens, I'm a Christian. I'm a Christian. You don't have to worry about that. No matter what I did or what I said or what I didn't do, nothing could cause us to think, is this person a Christian? And we get offended if someone were to insinuate that we're not a Christian. And yet when you see someone sin, what do you question? You question their salvation. I don't know if they're regenerate. I don't know if they're...

And so can we just be honest and admit that all of us are thinking in these terms, but none of us have the faith to say it. I don't know if that man's a Christian. I don't know if she's a Christian because of the fruit of their life. You say, well, you can't say that. I can't say that about that person. I don't want to say that or wonder that about my children, but I'll fear it and not sleep and get all tied up in knots about it, but never deal honestly with the fact that Not everyone who says they're a Christian is a Christian. I've said to you that it would be a very bad strategy for Satan to lose ground, to have his presence removed from someone, and then for Jesus not to take it over. But would it be a good strategy for Satan to present himself as an angel of light and convince someone that they're a Christian and yet maintain his position in their heart?

That's very good strategy. And that's the seedbed of hypocrisy. Is that Satan convinces you that you've got nothing to worry about. And yet Jesus goes on and tells them, he says, you know, the one demon gets cast out and he goes around and he looks for a place to rest and he doesn't find any and he thinks, you know what I'll do? I'll go home. Even the prodigal son did this, right? He went out. He knew better. He went and did his own thing. And when things got bad, where did he want to go? He wanted to go home. All of us want to go home. And so the demon wants to go home. I will return my house from which I came. And when he comes, he finds that it's swept and that it's put in order, but vacant, right? Vacant. You have no indication in the condition of this man's heart that anyone occupies it. He comes and he finds it swept and put in order. There's a house for rent.

Here's a house for sale. It's on the market. There it is. It's clean and it's empty. It's prime for the taking. If you want it, you can have it. And so what does he do? Hey guys, I found a place. And it's all nice and prepared for us. Come on in. And what's the condition of that man? They go in and they live there. And the last state of that man becomes worse than the first. And so you have to live. The reason this passage is scary to me and ought to be to you, is because it's part of Satan's strategy to withdraw from a time and to confuse you and to lie to you. He's a liar and the father of lies. And he will lie to you. Does that mean you can't know the truth? No. That does not mean you can't know the truth. But you have to recognize your own propensity to believe lies about yourself and the people that you love. Because you won't do anyone any good, your own soul or theirs,

if you're complicit in believing the lies, that no matter what they do or say or how they behave or act, everything's fine. Everything's okay with them. Because what Jesus reveals here is Satan's strategy for destroying Christians. And we say, well, he can't, those that Jesus saves, there's no chance of them ever falling away or turning away. And I say, you have scriptures that say that, but you also have scriptures that warn us. To flee the wrath to come. To not be deceived. To not live as hypocrites. To not say one thing because that's what we're supposed to say and do something different because that's actually what's in our heart. How is it that you're supposed to work out your salvation with fear and trembling? Why would you ever fear? At men's group I asked this question. We were studying Proverbs and it says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. And I asked, why would you fear the Lord?

We had difficulty answering the question because none of us were willing to say the obvious answer that what we all wanted to say and what we've all rightly been taught is that God is our Father. And what I'm saying now today doesn't affect what I talked about last week, which is that God is our Father and He delights to give His Holy Spirit to those who ask and to make wretched, wicked sinners like us His children through faith. He delights to do that. But then what we do is we take that reality and we use it to gut the rest of Scripture and our lives of any fear of the Lord. We don't need to fear Him anymore. We don't need to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. And I say, well, then why did Paul tell us to? And what might you be afraid of? Perhaps you might be afraid of the thing that Paul was afraid of in 1 Thessalonians 3, what we read this morning. I fear that the tempter might come and tempt you and that you might believe it and that we might have labored in vain.

Truth isn't true because we believe it. Whether we believe something doesn't make it true or not. Truth comes from the mouth of God. And even unbelievers can say, that's true. It doesn't get publicized, but just as an example, think of homosexual marriage. What would you expect the universal position of homosexuals toward homosexual marriage, what would you expect it to be? You'd expect them to be in favor of it, right? and say, yes, this is a good thing. You know that they're not, all of them. The more honest ones say, you guys are lying and what are you doing? It's not marriage. They understand that marriage is between a man and a woman and that what you're doing is lying about the situation to try to get something. Whether that's equal standing before the law and the government or to try to fend off the shame that they feel. Some of them understand. Honest unbelievers say, It's not. We don't have anything to do with marriage. We're not monogamous. Can we just be honest? We aren't monogamous. The whole point of it is kind of not to be. And the honest, unbelieving homosexual will say that. And all they're doing is acknowledging something that is true. I got asked a question, I don't know, a couple of months ago, by my dad. He's not really my dad, but he's my dad. My father in the faith.

And he likes to tease me about when I became a Christian. He always says, when he introduces me to people who don't know me, he says, and this is Dave, he's a new Christian. Now, when did I become a Christian? Well, 11 years ago or so. I didn't grow up in a Christian home. I didn't grow up knowing or believing in Jesus Christ at all. Completely ignorant. And so he pokes fun at me and he teases me. And so most recently he introduced me to someone and he says, and this is Dave. And he's a new believer. Because for a long time it really pissed me off that he would say that. And so, you know, what does a good dad do when he knows he's gotten under his son's skin? Well, he pushes a little further. And so he said, and how long has it been, Dave? When did you become a Christian? And do you know what I said? None of you do because I didn't tell you.

What I said to him and to this stranger is I said, I'm not sure that I am yet. And I wasn't laughing and joking and making funny. All I was doing was acknowledging the reality of the sin in my heart and acknowledging that scripture says that he who perseveres to the end, he will be saved. Did I say it doubting God in his mercy? No. I could have said with confidence I'm not a Christian if I believed that to be the case and that there was no hope for me because I hated Jesus Christ, but that's not what I said. What I said to him was, there's still a lot wrong with me. And Satan is a tempter, and he is a deceiver, and he is a liar. And his aim is to destroy my soul. And one of the ways that he'll do that is by getting me to believe his lies. And all I'm going to do is acknowledge the fact to you that I'm a young man. And by faith, I want to serve Jesus Christ with all of my heart, soul, mind, and strength. I want to grow in my hatred of my sin. I want to grow in my victory over my sin.

And if that's to happen, I cannot rest in what happened 11 years ago and this thing that changed. Because Satan's a master strategist. And his goal is to get you to believe a lie. So am I saying, you're not a Christian and you should all go get wrapped around the axle of whether you're a Christian? No, not unless you need to. Do you know your heart? Do you know who you are and what you are? Are you a hypocrite? Are you a hypocrite? Or are you honest? Do you know what you want? Do you know what you love? Do you know who you serve? How far are you willing to go in service to him? What are you willing to lose? What are you willing to forsake? What are you willing to give up? These are the questions that we have to answer and we can't shy away from. Because if we do, we lie to ourselves and to the watching world about who Jesus Christ is. He came to save sinners. And it's a shame that this man,

His heart was empty. His heart was empty. Everything was swept and kept in order. And what happens when people become Christians and they come into the church? They learn how to talk and they learn how to act and they learn how to dress. They learn the form. But is there any substance to it? Does their heart cry out for Jesus Christ and for his mercy and for his help? Or are they just minding their P's and Q's and doing what they're supposed to do? Jesus doesn't have any regard for you doing what you're supposed to do. And Satan will fool you into thinking that doing what you're supposed to do will land you in heaven when it will not. You must love Jesus Christ with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And it ought to be scary to you how susceptible you are to believing the lies of Satan. How much you still believe them. How much tension and how much conflict there is in your heart and in your mind working itself out in your life.

Between what you say you want and what you say you believe and what you want to desire by faith and what you actually do when you're left to yourself. There's real tension there. The one who's honest about their allegiance to Satan doesn't live in that tension. And the one who loves Jesus Christ overcomes that tension in time. I don't want you to be deceived. I don't want you to be lied to. I don't want you to be led astray. Believing that past victories or past resistance to temptation, is going to confirm you to the end. Satan is a liar. And his aim is to destroy you. And if you live an unrighteous life, and you think that it's okay, you've believed Satan's lie, and I don't want you to live in that, because you'll be destroyed in the end. I don't want to believe that for myself. I don't want that to be the case for myself, my wife, my children, for you.

For my neighbors? I don't want them to live in the delusion of Satan. I don't want us to be hypocrites. Because a hypocrite is a house divided against itself. And you can do two things with what I'm saying. At least two. One of them is you can get completely depressed. Because I'm talking about you being a sinner and a really bad one. And a liar. And who can say when they're asked, are you a hypocrite? Who can say, no, I'm not. The only person who can say they're not a hypocrite is the outspoken unbeliever. They're the only one who can say, I'm not a hypocrite. They can say, yep, I hate God. I do exactly what I want and I don't care who hurts or what the consequence is. I am about me. They're the only ones who can rightfully say they don't struggle to be a hypocrite. Because the reality of our life in God's wisdom is that we would live in the tension

of the who we were being put to death and dying and the who we're becoming growing and gaining strength. And there being an ebb and flow in that battle. And so are you a hypocrite? The answer is yes, you're a hypocrite. You're not what you should be. That's why we confess our sins every week and not just here. We don't do what we should do. We don't say what we should say. We are not what God made us to be fully yet. We will be, but only if we fight. And when I talk to people and they say, you know, no matter what, but I'm a Christian, I say, you have given up the fight and your soul's in danger. Because any honest person could look at the situation and go, fire, run, danger. But Satan's convinced you that there's nothing to worry about. And that's a terrifying place for you to be. And someday you'll realize it. I read a quote this last week about young people and what they want in church. And what they want is,

to be encouraged and uplifted and strengthened. And they're never satisfied with church. And by young, I'd say, what's young? Well, less than 50. So, you know, I think most all of you are young. Not Jamie, who's smiling at me. So what do you want? Well, you want to be encouraged and strengthened and told that you're great and you're wonderful. And I say, you know who will tell you that? People who don't love you. That's who will tell you. You know who else will tell you that? Satan. He'll lie to you. You're wonderful. You're great. You have nothing to worry about. You're doing so well. Look how much you've already overcome. Wouldn't it be nice to rest? You know what the older people want? Why they come to church? What the quote said is they want to have their misery explained to them. They've lived life long enough. They realize that it's hard. They're not trying to lie about it anymore. And they want to know why are things so difficult and so hard and so not as they should be. And they have ears to hear this sort of thing because they've...

If they love God, they've realized the whole world lies. They feed you lies. They tell you to perpetuate a lie and they give you Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and Snapchat and all that crap to perpetuate it, but it's not true. You know, we on Facebook, we all put up, if you're on Facebook, we put up our nice Bible verses and they're encouraging and they're uplifting and they're all that stuff and we like them and we love them and we're encouraged by them. How come no one ever puts up the verses that call us to account and warn us? It's a fearful thing to fall in the hands of a living God, for our God is a consuming fire. When was the last time you saw that on Facebook with the proper background picture? Brothers and sisters, don't believe these lies. Satan's out to destroy you, and he will be out to destroy you until you die. And he will not stop. So you must fight.

You must live in the tension. And you must not believe the lie that everything's perfectly fine and okay with you. Am I saying you can lose your salvation? No, I'm not. I'm saying don't presume that salvation is such low-hanging fruit and so easy to obtain and hang on to that Satan will just retreat and go away. Jesus cast the demon out. What did he do? He came back. And so your expectation, if you're to serve God, is that Satan will return. And he will return with stronger temptations for you than you've ever faced before in your life. That's what you should expect. And in the same breath, you ought to expect that God will sustain you, that he will strengthen you, and that he will uphold you until the end. If you fight. If you love him. Fighting is how you demonstrate that you love God. Fighting against your sin. That's how you demonstrate it. You men, you like to fight, you like to wrestle, you like to do things that get you...

there's danger in it, then fight your sin. Fight your sin. Oh, I can't win that fight. And I say, well, then you need to give that sentiment the dignity that it deserves. If you have no strength in you and no desire in you to fight your sin, no seed, no glimmer of light inside of you that says no to your sin, then you should be terrified. Because he who loves the world and the things of the world It doesn't know the love of the Father. And that should scare you. When I asked our men's group, why does it mean to fear God? And they say, well, you're supposed to fear God like a father, you know, because you don't want to disappoint him. But you know that our Father would never kick us out of his house. And I say, you're right. A father would never kick his son out of his house, except for when he should. But what if you're not a son? What if everything about your life demonstrates that you are not a son?

Do you have anything to fear then? You do. And so the way you demonstrate that God's your father, the way you gain confidence that God's your father is through fighting by faith against the lies and schemes of Satan. That's how you gain strength. That is where God will meet you and where he will be your most intimate father in helping you and accepting you and forgiving you and strengthening you. and bearing with you. Don't believe Satan's lies. Don't believe that everything's okay with you. There's not a person in this room that everything's okay with. Not one. Every one of you is susceptible to falling away and making a false profession. Not persevering to the end. And I say that to you to say, fight that. Don't ignore that. There are many who have started well and have not finished well.

If you're going to run the race, run in such a way that you might win. Don't run in such a way as you barely get to the finish line. Because you know what? You won't. You won't. You'll get tired. You'll get frustrated. You'll get angry. What you'll get is honest about what you love. So if Jesus is able to cast out this demon, if he's able to raise Lazarus from the dead, if he's able to raise himself from the dead and crush Satan, Just as Adam was told, then your place is to believe that with all of your heart and to fight. Humbly fight against your sin and ask God to be merciful to you, a sinner, when you fail. He will receive you. He will accept you and he will forgive you if you fight. Let's pray. Father, would you give us zeal for your law and holiness? Would you help us to fight against the Satan?

Satan's lies. Father, before even that can happen, we ask that you help us to see, to discern, to understand Satan's plots and schemes against us. Help us to be wise, Father, mature, eating solid food, discerning through practice the difference between good and evil. Father, I pray that you would preserve us, that you would strengthen us, that you would add to our number daily those who are being saved. We ask, Father, that you would glorify yourself. through our lives by giving us your Holy Spirit to confirm the truth of your word, to confirm the love that you have for your children. Father, we ask for progress in our fight against sin, and we look forward to the day when there won't be any more fighting, when that will be over and that will be done, and we will be received into glory. Father, I pray that not one person here would hear on that day, depart from me.

You wicked ones, for I never knew you. I pray, Father, that you would be merciful to us because that's who you are and that's what your character requires. Help us, Father, to love because you first loved us. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen.