Warring With The Light
I.
2 Thessalonians 2:1-6-You
need light to not be deceived, but you also have to war with that light
A. The purpose and goal of
deception is always destruction; The enemy deceives to destroy
1.
2-3-People
are trying to deceive God’s people and say Jesus has already came and you
missed it; That would cause a lot of destruction because what’s the point of
living right, living holy, of serving God if Jesus already came
B. The purpose of this
assault on the mind is to get these people to believe a lie (that they missed
Jesus’ coming) so that the enemy can bring destruction into their lives
1.
2-The attack of the enemy
is always on the mind (Shaken in mind, troubled in mind)
a. You can see the fiery
darts can come by spirits, these fiery darts are words spoken or written
2.
It’s
not true that Jesus had already came, but the enemy is trying to get them to
believe it is true and get them to believe wrong
a. You can see right now
this is a faith fight-1 Timothy 6:12
b. Satan wants you to
believe wrong and think it’s right
c. This deception is so dangerous because it operates through
the belief that I’m doing right, I’m believing right, but in reality and I’m
doing and believing wrong, and while I’m doing and believing wrong I think it’s
right
C. Let nobody deceive you;
You don’t have to be deceived, just like you don’t have be afraid; you can
resist deception
1.
If you are deceived you
let the enemy do it; He spoke a like and you yielded to it when you could have
resisted it and not let him deceive
2.
5-It
appears these people were deceived after hearing the truth; you can hear the
truth and choose not to believe it and be deceived
a. This very thing happened
to Eve; She had the truth, but choose to believe lies, thinking they were the
truth-Genesis 3
3.
What have you chosen to
believe instead of the truth?
a. Having the truth you can
be led astray from it and choose to believe something else
D. He tells them don’t let
anybody deceive you and then he gives them light/truth to fight against, to
stand against, to resist the deception
1.
You
need light and truth to overcome deception (Don’t let anybody deceive you about
this, here’s the light about, here’s the truth about it)
a. The light is that this
day won’t come until there is a great rebellion against God and the man of
lawlessness is revealed; The light is that he’s being held back so that he can
be revealed in his time and as soon as he’s revealed Jesus will destroy him
b. 6-Now you know; That
means they have light and truth
2.
When he gave them this
light, he gave them the might and the power to overcome the enemy
a. Proverbs 24:5-A man that
has light, has sight, has might
1)
A
wise man is strong (Prudent-Foreseeing
and avoiding evil; Caution or circumspection in selecting the most suitable
means and discerning what that is and what that is not); Strong-Might
2)
A
man that can see strengthens himself
a) Knowledge-Discernment, perception, To see
b) Strength-Might power
b. Psalm 27:1-The Lord is my
light, The Lord is my strength and therefore my light is my strength and my
strength is my light
c. Psalm 38:10-With no light
you’re weak; with no light you have no might
d. Proverbs 1:24-God calls
wisdom and light his hand (strength and power)
E. So now when the enemy
fires these lying arrows of deception they need to take this light, this truth
and fight back and war with it
1.
5-Apparenlty
they hadn’t been doing that because this is not the first time their getting
this light and truth; he’s told them before
II.
It’s imperative that we
understand what the enemy’s attack looks like so that we will recognize when we
are under attack
A. Genesis 3:1-6-She’s not
recognizing this serpent as her enemy and these words as arrows shot to deceive
and destroy; she doesn’t see the end
1.
She’s
not picking up on what’s happening here in verse 1 and you can tell because
she’s reasoning with him
a. There’s something in the
undertones of what he’s saying and she’s not picking up on what he’s trying to
do to her; The words sound innocent, but
in the undertones of what he is saying is darkness and death
2.
The
enemy said, “Did God say that you shall not of every tree of the Garden?”
a. That’s not what God said,
but it’s true; It’s true they can’t eat of every tree, but it’s not true that
that’s what God said – THIS IS SUBLTE
b. The insinuation is that
God is lying to you because he’s holding out on you and doesn’t what you to
have be like him and walk in all the benefits that would come from eating of
that tree; Now he didn’t come right out and say that, but that’s what he’s
getting at
c. He’s subtly working this
way of thinking into their thought pattern that; There’s something God doesn’t
want you to have;
3.
He
said the exact opposite of what God said, “You won’t die if you eat of it.”
a. When you begin to buy
into his deception is words will become more direct
4.
You need to ask yourself
two questions to renew your mind in this area when a negative thought comes:
What is it? Where did it come from?
B. Eve got in trouble and
yielded to deception because when he fired a dart, she was in a fight and not
warring with the light
1.
Every time the enemy
fires a dart and you don’t resist it you are getting closer and closer to
complete deception
a. What you didn’t resist you yielded to – There’s no
middle ground
b. When an arrow is fired at you, it either hits you or it
doesn’t – There’s no middle ground
c. 2 Corinthians 10:5, Ephesians 6:16-Every very dart needs to
be quenched every thought needs to be cast down
2.
Having
and knowing the truth she is now deceived (She knows what God said and she just
told him what said and yet she was deceived)
a. How does that happen?
When you have the light and the truth, but don’t war with it against the lies
of the devil you are on way to being deceived and believing something else
that’s not true-2 Thessalonians 2:1-6
3.
Rather than firing back
she’s considering what he’s saying, she’s rolling it over in her mind (Saw-See,
Look at, Consider, Gaze at)
C. She is deceived and
believing wrong (They’re eating of the tree because she believes it’s going to
help them)
1.
She
saw that it was good for food – lIs it good for
food? NO! – Anything you eat that’s going to kill you the same day is not
good for food
a. She is not seeing right
and she is deceived and believing a lie
b. She believes that if they
eat of this tree they are going to be wise; She believes wrong and the enemy
has gotten her to believe a lie
III.
2 Thessalonians 2:8-The
Lord consumes the enemy with his mouth and destroys him with the light; This
gives us insight into how we are going to overcome the evil one; You’re not
going to get victory some different way than Jesus got it and he got it with
his mouth and with light
A. With our mouth we swing
the sword of the spirit and slice Satan up-Revelation
19:15,21,12:9-11
1.
Consume-Devour, Annihilate,
Destroy be dissipating
2.
With
our words we annihilate, devour, and destroy the enemy
3.
The
Lord is devouring, destroying, annihilating a wicked SPIRIT with words
B. With light we render
Satan inoperative and do away with Him
1.
Destroy-Render Idle,
Inoperative, Inactive, Do away with
2.
Light
renders darkness idle, inoperative, inactive, does away with it; Darkness is in
operative, inactive, done away with the presence of light
3.
ERV-The Lord Jesus will
kill him with the breath that comes from his mouth. The Lord will come in a way that everyone will see, and that will be the
end of the man of evil. (People seeing is the end of the enemy)
C. Our faith in the light is
our defense against his attack-Ephesians 6:16