Powers and Principalities

 This morning is the beginning of the end, of sorts, for our study in the doctrine of worship. Before I can end this series, I have one last question that I need to answer. We’ve talked about the meaning, the purpose, and the act of worship, but we also need to know what the end goal of worship is. Or, put another way, where is worship taking us? Over the next five weeks, I want to study what theologians call “Eschatology” (the study of the last things), but I want to do so through the lens of worship. We are going to consider the battle that is going on (even now) in the spiritual realm, the ways that we are involved in that battle, the weapons with which we fight that battle, the final judgment of the wicked, and the final reward of the righteous.

This morning, we begin by looking at the world, not as we see it through our physical eyes, but through our spirit. To do that, let’s begin by reading Eph. 6:10-12 together. I want to focus on verse 12 today, but we will come back to this passage for the next three weeks as we break down the different aspects of this battle. There are two points that I want you to see from this passage: The War and The Warriors.

First, let’s consider the war that is raging, even right now, in the heavenly places. Paul says, in verse 12, that the battle that Christians fight is not a battle of flesh and blood but one set against “spiritual forces.” In this statement, Paul describes what this fight is not and what this fight is. Notice, first, that Paul describes what this fight is not by saying that our battle is not against flesh and blood. In other words, the war that Christians are called to fight is not against other humans.  This is such an important point for us to understand in our day and time. This may be a hard concept to grasp, but the terrorists who flew the airplanes into the World Trade Center on 9/11 are not our real enemy. The Taliban, as cruel as they are, are not the real enemy. The liberals in our own country who laugh and celebrate at the murder of unborn children are not the real enemy. The LGBTQ movement that revels in the redefinition of marriage and the “re-education” of our youth is not the real enemy. In Ephesians 2:2, Paul tells us that those who are outside of Christ are under the influence of Satan. In Eph. 5:8, he says that we were once in darkness before we came to Christ. Since the fall of Adam and Eve, mankind has been trapped in slavery to sin and the Devil. Understand, brothers and sisters, your unbelieving neighbor is not your enemy, he is a lost soul for whom Jesus died. That atheist that is so hostile to you is a life that God created for his glory. That liberal with whom you argue about abortion is made in the image of God and valuable to him.

So who is it that we are supposed to battle? Who are the warriors that we fight? Paul answers that by saying that we wrestle with “rulers, authorities, cosmic powers, and spiritual forces.” Some theologians have gotten very technical with the different categories that Paul gives here by claiming that these different titles designate different levels of spiritual beings, but I think instead that Paul is giving us different attributes of the same beings against whom we fight. To understand what is going on here, we have to open our eyes to see what is hidden in plain sight throughout the Bible. First of all, because of the influence of Greek philosophy in our culture, we tend to draw a sharp distinction between the spiritual realm and the physical. We think that God is off in heaven somewhere, the demons are down in hell, and we are in a totally separate place here on earth. But that is not how the Bible depicts the world. Instead, the heavenly and earthly realms exist over the top of each other. So, when God creates the world in Genesis 1, he creates both “Heaven and earth”. When he establishes the Garden of Eden in Genesis 2, the garden is both a dwelling place for man and a temple where God reigns. In Gen. 28, when Jacob has a vision of the stairway to heaven, it is a picture of God’s heavenly temple sitting over the earth. So, the spiritual realm is not some distant place. It is right here with us, right now.

Second, God is the one true God over the universe, but that does not mean that he is alone in the spiritual realm, or that he rules the universe all by himself. When God created the world, he established spiritual rulers to govern his world. Job 1:6 tells us that these spiritual beings (and even Satan himself) report to God like regional rulers would report to a king. In Daniel 10:13 we find that there is an evil spiritual being who rules over the land of Persia. God has even delegated the authority to rule over nations to demons who keep those nations in darkness.

Third, Rev. 12 tells us of a great heavenly battle that took place at some unknown point, in which Satan led a third of the heavenly host against God. Satan was defeated and “thrown down” (or cast out) along with his minions, and since that time they have been bringing havoc on the world. We find that from the very beginning of Genesis, as Satan tempts Adam and Eve, the king and queen of earth, and through their sin he gains control over the entire human race. We find it in the people before the flood, as Genesis 6 tells us that the “sons of God” influenced the men and women of that time so that they were given to great violence. We find it when Satan destroyed all that Job had so that he would curse God. We find it in the demonic worship of the pagan nations and the persecution of Israel and the church.

We also find it today. There are three ways that these evil spiritual beings influence our world today. First, they accept worship in the place of God. 1 Cor. 10:20 says, “what the pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God.” The first priority of Satan and his demons is to steal the glory of God, and they do that by enticing men to worship them over God.

Second, evil spirits blind men from the truth of the Gospel. 2 Cor. 4:4 says, “In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.” Your unbelieving friend isn’t stupid or flawed in some way that you were not. He doesn’t believe because he has been blinded.

Third, Satan seeks to make the church ineffective through false teaching. 2 Cor. 11:13 says that false teachers follow the pattern of Satan, who disguises himself as an angel of light. Over the centuries, the church has been tempted to deny the divinity of Christ, to reject salvation in Jesus by saying that one could be saved by works, and to focus on worldly concerns like politics and culture rather than the Gospel and the age to come. Satan has reveled in the fracturing of the Church through denominational disagreement and the splitting of individual churches over the smallest of differences. He has raised up liars and charlatans within the church who can talk a good game and lead many astray, and he has established false religions that give people a sense of hope all while making them two-fold members of hell.

Friend, if you have never trusted in Jesus Christ, you are a slave to sin and the devil. You are not free to do whatever you want with your life. In fact, you are pretty predictable in what you will choose. You will choose selfish desires that will ultimately kill you and condemn you to hell. Your heart and mind are darkened by the spiritual powers at work in this world, and the only way that you can be set free from them is to turn to faith in Christ. Jesus Christ defeated the powers of sin and the devil through his death and resurrection. His death paid the full penalty for your sins, so Satan has no claim over you when you turn to Jesus in faith. And, Jesus proved himself to be the ruler over all of creation through his resurrection from the dead. So, those who trust in him will have eternal life. Won’t you turn to Christ today.

Brothers and sisters, our battle is not with flesh and blood. That means that we cannot use the weapons of this world to fight a spiritual war. We cannot use money or fame or power or politics to defeat Satan. Instead, we must turn to the weapons that God has given us. And we cannot see our fellow humans as enemies in this war against Satan. Instead, we must see them as captives in need of rescue. We must not hate them, but instead hate the power that blinds them. We must not shun them, but pray against the spirits that keep them in darkness. My hope is that we will see this life as more than just a physical world of trees and cars and cities, that we will open our eyes to see the spiritual battle that rages around us, and that we will seek the power of God to fight it.