14. Total Victory

This is the contention, the battle. If God fulfills His word only in heaven, Satan has won and God is defeated. The word God speaks must be fulfilled in the place into which He speaks it. If God spoke a word into this earth and into this age of human folly, then that word must be fulfilled in this age and in this earth before it can return to the Father fulfilled. And in order to be fulfilled, it must find faith.

© Daniel Yordy 2009

So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.  Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, “Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down.” And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. Revelation 12:9-11

They overcame him.  Central to our understanding of the goal of the believer, that we should be conformed to the image of His Son, is this word, “overcome.” 

Jesus is a warrior, engaged in a great battle. We need to understand what that battle is and what are the issues of this great war.  If we do not understand the issues of this battle, we will not be effective in the overcoming of Jesus.

They overcame him, this serpent of old, is referring directly to that original serpent in the Garden of Eden who deceives the whole world. John calls him “the accuser of the brethren.” First, we look at the original serpent.  Second, this is the one who deceives the whole world.  And third, he is the accuser of the brethren.

Genesis 3 shows us the original challenge against God. The first words God spoke were, Let there be light.  Then the first four words the serpent spoke are Has God indeed said?

Yea hath God said? — Did God really say that?

The history of God speaking His word into the universe includes the history of an echo that comes every time God speaks. Did God really say that? 

David said in Psalms 138:2, You have magnified Your word above all Your name. The word God speaks is more important to God than anything else. God places His word above Himself, as more important to Him than any other part of His person. He makes Himself subject to His Word.  

We know from John 1 that the word God speaks is Jesus. We know that in the beginning of the creation of God, God spoke forth His Son as the pattern, the creating force of that creation. In John 1:1 John says, In the beginning was the word – God said, Let there be light. We are talking about Jesus. 

In Him was life and the life was the light of men. And the light shined in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. John 1:4-5

God speaks His word into darkness and emptiness.  God speaks His word into vanity, and He expects that word to come back to Him fulfilling the purpose for which it was sent. God said through Isaiah 55, My word does not come back to me until it performs the purpose for which I sent it.

God is a risk taker. He speaks into darkness, then He waits for His word to come back to Him having accomplished the purpose for which it was sent. God sent His Son into the world as light; the world did not know Him or receive Him. 

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.  John 1:12

As we receive that word from God, we have the right to be conformed to the image of His Son. It is our right.

The point of this weakness is the point of the warfare. The serpent is not at war with God; he cannot challenge God, there is no contest there. Satan attempts to defeat the word God speaks, but he cannot defeat that word in a frontal attack.  He cannot attack Jesus. 

God has placed this reality into the universe. The Word cannot return to God having fulfilled its purpose unless it is received by faith. Christ, before He can accomplish what He was sent to perform, must find residence inside of hearts living in darkness. The Word must be received in the darkness and believed and embraced before it can accomplish the purpose for which God sent it.

God is waiting for His Word to return to Him fulfilled. Jesus must first find faith. Only in faith can the Word find its fulfillment and therefore return to the Father having accomplished the purpose for which He was sent.

Jesus asked the question, When the Son of man returns, will He find faith in the earth? We know that He will.  Paul says that when all things are made subject to the Son, when He has sought and found and restored all that was lost, then He will turn and Himself be subject to the Father, that God might be all in all. Jesus will win.

Here is the contest, the overcoming, the privilege God offers you and me. To those who overcome now God has offered a wonderful future of responsibility and joy with Jesus.

Let’s look at the challenge. God said, Let there be light. Satan said, “Ain’t so.”  God said, He that believes in Jesus, out of his belly will flow rivers of living water.  Satan says, “Ain’t so.  Did God really say that?” He doesn’t say it in those words every time.  But often he comes out with “Come on, being filled with all the fullness of God? Don’t be ridiculous. You’ll end up in a padded cell. That’s all for heaven. It may happen in heaven somewhere, but certainly not here.”

This is the contention, the battle. If God fulfills His word only in heaven, Satan has won and God is defeated.  The word God speaks must be fulfilled in the place into which He speaks it. If God spoke a word into this earth and into this age of human folly, then that word must be fulfilled in this age and in this earth before it can return to the Father fulfilled. And in order to be fulfilled, it must find faith.

They overcame the one who says “Did God really say that?” “Did God really say, ‘You will be just like Jesus’? Did God really say, ‘Be perfect as I am perfect, be holy as I am holy, love as I love, walk as I walk, overcome as I overcame’? Did God really say that? He didn’t mean it quite like that. Because all of that stuff is for when you go to heaven. He didn’t mean it for here, He didn’t mean it for now, He didn’t mean it for you.”

“Yea hath God said?”  This is the contention. Will Jesus find faith in the earth?  Yes, He will; He is the faith He must find inside of us.

Now, the second point of overcoming is that the serpent deceives the whole world.  In 1 John 5:19, the apostle John says, We know we are of God and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.

Who deceives the whole world.

Those who imagine that anything about this world system is true or solid do not believe what God says. When we truly understand this world we will know that the stories taught about this world are primarily fiction. Scattered facts woven together into a lie. We live inside a matrix of deception all built on lies.

The whole world is deceived. The thinking of the world and all its systems are built on foundations of nonsense, on things that are not true. The extent to which people, including Christians, believe things that are not true is overwhelming.

Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? …For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence. 1 Corinthians 1

You see the big names that parade across the news of this world. God has chosen very few of these.

To bring to nothing the things that are. One of God’s purposes in calling you and me is that He intends to bring to shame and nothingness the big names of this world.  The presidents, the celebrities, the professors, the sports heroes, the generals, all of the great ones of this world. God has chosen you and me to bring them to nothing.

Now why would we participate in exalting and following these people when in fact God has chosen us who are weak and have no place in this world system? The great ones of this world are deceived and deceivers. Satan deceives the whole world.

The Beast of Revelation 13 stands fully open upon the earth, modern human government. The image of the beast is in full operation.The wound of the one head out of seven is the h-.  It is the most powerful psychological weapon the world has ever known by which one small group of people keeps control over billions. Most of the world worships that wound, including most Christians. 

Christians today are among the world’s biggest supporters of this head who was wounded unto death and now lives. They get their information from the image of the beast, television news, believing what the image of the beast tells them.  They are even willing to set aside the testimony of their own eyes and the laws of physics to believe whatever the image of the beast tells them is true.

We are fully in the day of the final moments of the book of Revelation.  

Let me give you just one point on which Satan deceives the whole world. In America, there is this worship of America as if it were God.  “God bless America.”  In this worship of America, there is a patron saint: Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln was an atheist who sought guidance from the dead in séances conducted in the White House! He was a wealthy lawyer who spent his days in politics removing money from the pockets of the people and putting it into the pockets of his big business friends. When he wasn’t in politics, he worked as the highest paid corporate lawyer in America, defending those same big business friends. 

The first bill passed when Lincoln became president turned a stream of tax money to his big business friends. They used that money to become the controlling families of the country.  He used Scriptures like a politician because he knew that Christians would fall head over heels if he quoted Scriptures.  He had no interest in African Americans; he despised them. He did not want them to remain in America; he wanted to ship them out, as did most northerners of his day. 

Lincoln built the foundation of the rise of the beast in this world and is used as an example by Marxists, by Fascists, by the exaltation of centralized government, the State, answering all needs, fixing all problems. The sole source of who we are as a people on this earth: the modern state, the Beast.

The whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one. That includes the United States. Who deceives the whole world. We have been deceived.  

I am saying these things not to bring confusion but to bring a sword to separate us from the kingdoms of this world.  We are not a part of the kingdoms of this world. We are part of a kingdom that is greater, a kingdom that will bring down every other kingdom before this thing is over with.

The kingdoms of Satan in this world are at war with the kingdom of God. This is part of the battle we are in. Our allegiance is to our own country, the kingdom of God, not to the kingdoms of this world. This truth will become an issue over the next few years that will divide and separate between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan. God said two things that let us know it is so.

In Hebrews 12 God says that everything that can be shaken will be shaken.  What happened in your heart when I said, “Abraham Lincoln was an atheist who used the verses of the Bible to manipulate people into supporting his false agenda”?  Did that shake you?  Did you think, “Oh, that can’t be true”? 

Can it be shaken? It must be shaken!

He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Revelation 13:16-17

God has drawn a line in the sand. God will make it impossible for us to live in both kingdoms and to mix and merge the two as if they are one. 

This dividing line is coming, just as with Elijah. If God be God then serve Him, but if Satan’s kingdoms be god, then serve them, but let us not call ourselves by the name of Jesus and by the name of the kingdoms of this world, trying to believe that the two can be agreed together.

They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives unto the death.

It will come to that.  Is our physical life in this world worth more to us than the Lord Jesus Christ?  It will come to that, sooner than we think. 

The accuser of the brethren is cast down.  And they overcame him.

The accusation of Satan before God takes place in our hearts and minds every day. The primary work of the demonic in our lives is to accuse.  You wake up in the middle of the night feeling awful about yourself. You think, “My God, I’ve really blown it. God surely doesn’t care for me. Why would God be interested in me?  Why would God use me for anything?” That is the accusation.

For many believers the accusation of Satan is all mixed up inside of Christian teaching and Bible verses, especially those Christians who misuse the Old Testament. The purpose of the Old Covenant was to expose sin; the purpose of the New Covenant is to lift up Christ. The Old Covenant revealed the exceeding sinfulness of sin and the impossibility of man ever to do anything about it. The New Covenant exalts the work and the place of Jesus Christ inside of us. 

Jesus said, If I be lifted up, I will draw all men unto me. We do not win over sin by fighting against sin. We win against sin by exalting the Lord Jesus Christ and our life in Him and His life in us. The Old Covenant came to an end in the cross; the New Covenant was birthed out of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Those dear believers who live under the accusation of the Old Covenant are missing the present knowledge of Christ.

Even in the New Covenant, Satan has convinced so many that their problem is themselves. “You are flesh, you are bad, you’re heart is deceitful.” And so many of God’s people see their enemy inside themselves. As long as Satan has you fighting against yourself as if you yourself are your enemy, he doesn’t have to join in the battle. He just stands outside the walls and laughs.

Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world. — Christ lives in our hearts by faith. — If God be for us, who can be against us?” 

The battle rages in the heart and in the mind. Satan wants to convince us that we are our own problem. He is the accuser of the brethren; he accuses us before God in our own hearts.  

I do not choose between Jesus and me. If I choose Christ, I choose me; if I choose me, I choose Christ. He is in me. I don’t have to choose Him because He and I are one spirit. What I do is believe Him. He chose me. Jesus lives in me.  I believe Him, and then turn and release His river to those around me.

Now if I believe that I am the problem, how can I ever release that river to others? Here is the battle. We have looked at the challenge of Satan against the word God speaks; we have looked at the dividing line between the kingdoms of this world and the kingdom of God. But the real battle is the voice of the accuser.That voice will come to us without fail, and it is our privilege to cast it down.

God likes me. God not only loves me, He likes me, and the way I am is the way He made me. Jesus lives in me, and it is God’s intention that Jesus be revealed through every part of my weak humanity.

I deny myself.  I deny that there is any “self” separate from Jesus, and I turn with Him, secure that I am standing by His side as I turn to face my enemy who is on the outside of me.  Jesus is in me; Satan is outside of me.  Jesus is in me, with me, through me, as me; I am his glove, I am his suit, I am the outward form of His work, as He defeats Satan, the accuser, through me.

And the God of peace will crush Satan under your feet. Romans 16:20

God will not defeat Satan apart from His people. The superhero does not do superhero deeds without putting his superhero suit on. God will defeat Satan in all three of his assaults through us. It is not we defeating him; it is God defeating him. We don’t have to have strength; we are weak. We provide the humanity, the human weakness. We provide the feet, and God crushes Satan under our feet.

First we root all of Satan’s accusations out of our heart and our mind.

Paul said in Romans that we are justified. The word “justified” does not mean “just as if I never sinned”; it means that when the death of Christ is applied to me, from that moment on, I didn’t do it. There is no evidence whatsoever that I did any of it. I am pure as the snow; I am clean. 

And should my outer frame of weakness cause me to err, then I pick myself up, ask God to forgive me, the blood of Jesus cleanses me, and on I go. That is all there is to it. But at no point do I see myself as separated from God. And I am quick and ready to turn from mistakes, to remember God, and to believe in the blood of Jesus at all times.

Here is the point of jeopardy in which we stand. We are partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence firm until the end. Those see the enemy on the inside, who imagine that they are “in the flesh” separated from God, have lost the beginning of their confidence, they are indeed in jeopardy, because the walls are breached, there is a civil war inside, and there is only ruin ahead.

Let us turn around, Christ is within, the enemy is without. Let us hold our confidence high and firm all the way through.  When you wake in the middle of the night, and that voice of accusation is there, “You’re no good.  God doesn’t like you.” Cast it down. Hold your confidence high. Hold it high! I am in Christ; Christ is my life, I have no other life. Christ is all there is in me. And God likes me; He likes the human me.

That’s not so hard is it?  And yet on that point, the dividing moment of the ages stands. When a people refuse the accusation of Satan in their hearts, when they do not give it place, we just read, Now is come, now, at that moment, salvation and strength and the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ. At that point, we win; Jesus wins in us.

To him who overcomes, I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, just as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. Revelation 3

Conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. This is the gospel, the word of salvation, this is the calling of God upon our lives. This is our goal, our future. 

This is Our Path Home: the Journey’s End. Home as it really is. Believe it!