View Resource Online
The Weapon Satan Fears The Most
There are various mental concepts of what spiritual warfare is.
Growing up when I used to think of spiritual warfare or when I heard people talking about a war between God and Satan, I used to imagine that God was up in heaven and there was a long heavy rope and Satan was down in Hell on the other end pulling. Sometimes God would pull and have the edge and then at other times Satan had the advantage and this tug of war had been going on for years. This was my early baby Christian concept of spiritual warfare. Then I remember reading that after Jesus had accomplished his mission by coming and dying on the cross for you and I and taking our punishment and then being resurrected, the Bible says that he went back up into heaven and he sat down in the place of authority or the right hand. And of Jesus the Bible says that he is our great high priest and a priest could not sit down until he had finished or accomplished his priestly responsibilities. Jesus sat down because he had defeated death, hell, & the grave, and even Satan on the Mount of Temptation. So knowing this we see that it is really not a tug of war between God and Satan because God has already won!
A second concept of spiritual warfare is that there is a supernatural war going on between God’s angels and the devil & his angels with powers and principalities and wickedness in high places. You may wonder if this is true and it is absolutely true. One of the greatest examples of this is the battle between an angel of God and a prince evil angel in the book of Daniel chapter 10. Daniel’s answer to prayer was being carried by a angel of God & hindered by this prince angel for 21 days. We see in the book of Revelation a great battle that is going to take place between the host of heaven and the angels who have fallen and the bible tells us there that God will when that battle.
Warfare passages
2 Cor 10:3 For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh:
4(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)
James 4:1 From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?
2 Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.
1 Peter 2:11…abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;
1 Tim 1:18 This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before on thee, that thou by them mightest war a good warfare;
Of course if you have been here on Wednesday nights we have illuminated the Roman armor mentioned to us by the Apostle Paul in Ephesians chapter 6. The helmet of salvation, the belt of truth, the shield of faith, the sword of the spirit, the gospel shoes of peace, and even though Paul didn’t mention it by name we found out that every Roman soldier carried 2 Javelins.
But even outside of the spiritual armament mentioned by the apostle Paul, there are so many weapons afforded to the child of God to fight spiritual battles. When combined w/ what Paul taught you have a mighty spiritual arsenal. One might begin to ask ourselves…with all of this armor and weaponry what might be the greatest weapon that Satan fears the most, that a Christian soldier has at his disposal.
FAITH?
First of all many people believe that the greatest weapon that we have to fight any adversary spiritually is simply our faith because…
Heb 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please God:
As we taught on Wednesday night…. There are 5 levels of faith in Scripture..
a. There is no faith (Mark 4:40)
b. There is little faith (Matthew 8:26)
c. There is weak faith (Romans 4:19)
d. There is strong faith (Romans 4:20)
e. There is great faith (Matthew 8:10
Faith is powerful!!
· Palsy was healed by faith – Matt 9:2
· Blood problem was healed by faith – Matt 9:23
· Blindness was removed by faith – Matt 9:29
· Faith the size of a mustard seed is recorded to remove a mountain – Matt 17:20
· Faith established churches – Acts 16:5
· There’s a Household of Faith – Gal 6:10
· There’s Confidence by faith – Eph 3:12
· There’s One Lord, One Faith, One baptism – Eph 4:5
So we see that faith is absolutely necessary for every spiritual blessing you receive.
But however… we see in…
James 2:19 Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.
· We see here that Satan has a belief in God… He has faith….That’s right Satan has faith. In fact Satan believing in One God gives him more faith than most of the Christian world… So we see that faith is a WEAPON. BUT I’M HERE TO TELL YOU THAT IT IS NOT THE WEAPON SATAN FEARS THE MOST…
· Well then surely brother Wimberley you must be referring to PRAYER…
PRAYER
· All throughout the Scriptures from cover to cover of your Bible, you can see the powerfulness of the weapon of PRAYER.
Matt 18:19 Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.
Matt 7:7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:
James 5:16..The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
· Certain demons & hindering spirits flee because of prayer – Matt 17:21
· Zacharias prayer was heard, wife gave birth to John the Baptist – Luke 11:13
· Cornelius prayer was heard, salvation open to the Gentiles – Acts 10:31
· The church prayed & God sent an angel to get Peter out of prison – Acts 12:5
· Peter backslid but Jesus prayed for his conversion & he later gave the plan of salvation on the Day of Pentecost – Luke 22:32, Acts 2:38.
· There are countless other places in scripture which validate the awesome power of praying and the results it brings… So surely pastor… prayer is the greatest weapon against Satan.. It is a powerful weapon… we don’t use it enough…We don’t underestimate it’s results… However Matt 8:31 & Mark 5:10 says that there was a man full of demon spirits that…
Mark 5:10 And he besought him much that he would not send them away out of the country.
11 Now there was there nigh unto the mountains a great herd of swine feeding.
12 And all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them.
· I don’t know if any of you ever realized it or not but this was a prayer that demons prayed.. THAT JESUS ANSWERED!! That’s heavy… The Bible says these demons besought Jesus… or requested of Jesus… Now let me ask you.. What is prayer? It is a request…. It’s a petition a vow or a request… And here are spirits saying..”Please don’t let us leave the country…send us into the pigs…” If you read on you will see that Jesus did exactly what the demons prayed for! So if Jesus will answer the prayer of the devil how much more will He answer you!
· So yes Prayer is a powerful weapon… but Satan already knows how to use it! This does not mean that God always answers his prayer… but Satan knows how to use it… Did not Satan go to God and ASK to afflict Job? So demons understand petitioning, they understand requests…. Prayer is a weapon… Prayer is Awesome.
· But PRAYER is not the weapon that Satan fears the most!
PRAISE?
Well Bro. Wimberley I know what it is… Psalm 149..
Ps 149:6 Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a twoedged sword in their hand;
7 To execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people;
8 To bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron;
Praising God… That’s it… That’s got to be the most powerful weapon!!
· We know that praise confused the enemy… 2 Chron 20:22
· Israel sent out there praise and worship team into the battle first and it set up an ambush for the enemy.
· We also know that Paul & Silas in the book Acts 16 start praying & singing praises and God whom the heavens are his throne and the earth his footstool… Started patting his foot to the praises of God and when God patted his foot his footstool the earth started shaking and Paul and Silas were freed from prison because of their Praise
But if you look in Ezekiel…
Ezek 28:13 Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created.
14 Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.
· This Scripture as you may well know is speaking of Lucifer or Satan and the position that he had in heaven before his fall. The bible says that he was created with the ability to make music… He was an anointed cherub w/ distinction in that he was made w/ music as apart of his nature since his creation. My point here is simple…
Satan understands the power of praise and Worship…
· I read an article not to long ago that talked about how that music has the ability to open up every function of the human brain. The entire brain is functioning and operating when some form of music is played…. Now that explains why the enemy knows of the power of what we call Rock N’ Roll music.. That kind of music has the ability to stir the emotions and produce illicit behavior in people…
· Anointed praise and worship music has the same power… When David would play his harp and sing to Saul.. the Bible says that the evil spirit would depart out of him and Saul would be refreshed in the Lord. So there’s something about the power of music that Lucifer understands… But here is the point I want to make here…
· In Mark, ch. 5, the man of Gaddara with the greatest known biblical recorded possession of devils ever mentioned when Jesus came to the shore it says…
Mark 5:6 But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped him,
· Now mind you this was before he was clothed and in his right mind… The devils came and worshipped the Lord! Satan knows that worship is powerful…
· Worship as we read in Psalms 149 will break chains of iron and fetters.. and I believe it led to this mans’ deliverance… But even the devil knows the power of worship..
· It is a powerful, powerful weapon… BUT IT IS NOT THE WEAPON THAT SATAN FEARS THE MOST!!
· So by now you are saying.. COME PASTOR.. JUST HURRY UP AND TELL ME WHAT THIS WEAPON IS THAT SATAN FEARS THE MOST!!!
· Well all of these we mentioned are important and essential… but there has got to be a weapon that makes Satan say… “HOLD ON NOW”.. “I DIDN’T KNOW YOU WERE GONNA DO THAT”… “WAIT A MINUTE..I AM NOT PREPARED FOR THAT” … What is this weapon… Well now I’m ready to tell you…
OBEDIENCE!
Now when I give this to you… You’re gonna look at this and say.. “Man, that’s so simple..” “I should have known that.” In fact the greatest weapon that Satan fears the most is so simple that if you aren’t careful when I start preaching it… You’ll hear it and it will just pass right over your head… But w/ the help of God I can make my point and you will understand why this is the weapon that Satan fears the most…
Now here’s what happens… Samuel was a young boy 12 years of age that God raised up to be a prophet in a time that Israel was corrupt and there was no open vision… And when Samuel began to mature in his office he came across a young man of whom the bible says was head and shoulders above all the men of his tribe which was the tribe of Benjamin. His name was Saul the son of Kish, and the bible says that God told Samuel you go take this young man Saul and anoint him to be the king of Israel. Early on Saul was very tender toward God, he obeyed God, he did everything his pastor and God told him to do… men’s hearts were turned toward him and he found favor in God’s sight.
Now there was a historical moment that happened in Israel’s past that was going to forever haunt Saul… The Bible says that when Moses led the children of Israel out of Egyptian bondage.. on the way to the Promise Land there was a shortcut they could have taken through the land of Amalek… or what was known as the area of the Amalekites. And according to the word of God when Moses went up to ask them if they could have safe passage they denied them the shortcut thru their territory…And in Deut 25:17-19 it tells us that not only did Amalek not give them safe passage but later he snuck up behind them and attacked the weak and the older people of Israel… Now these people were obviously in the back of the massive caravan because they were more feeble and weak and older and could not lead so instead of hinder they followed from behind…. And Amalek snuck up an attacked the weak and feeble…
And God became so angry… Angry that Amalek would attack old people and weak people and prey upon the innocents that God says.. alright Moses right this down in a book and rehearse this before the children of Israel…
Ex 17:14 And the LORD said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven.
· Well hundreds of years went by and nothing happened… but that doesn’t mean that God forgot… The time came for the Word to be fulfilled… And God says’ to Saul thru Samuel…
1 Sam 15:2 Thus saith the LORD of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way, when he came up from Egypt.
3 Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.
· So the command was very clear… UTTERLY DESTROY THEM… But look…
1 Sam 15:7 And Saul smote the Amalekites from Havilah until thou comest to Shur, that is over against Egypt.
8 And he took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.
9 But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them: but every thing that was vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly.
· So Saul did not do exactly as he was supposed to do.. He did not obey the Lord.
· Samuel appears and says this to him…
1 Sam 15:22 And Samuel said, Hath the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.
23 For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king.
· Did you catch that…. Samuel starts teaching a new doctrine to Israel.. God demanding blood sacrifices.. but Samuel is saying to obey is more powerful to God than blood on an altar…OBEDIENCE IS THE KEY…
· Obedience is FAITH in Action!!
James 2:20 But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?
· Faith w/ out action is dead… OBEDIENCE IS THE KEY…
Jesus Demanded Obedience First
· Jesus would many times ask people to DO SOMETHING FIRST, before He ever answered there prayer…
Matt 12:13 – Man w/ withered hand “Stretch forth thine hand” You do something, then I’ll do something…
Matt 9:6 – “Take up your bed and walk”….Jesus says this to them while their still paraplegic…He’s says this to them while there still lying there w/ their legs twisted…. He’s saying “You make the effort to do something first… Then I’ll do something for you”
John 9:7 – Jesus tells a blind man “Go wash in the pool of Siloam” – He can’t see but Jesus wants him to find a pool and go wash… Jesus sends him off blind.. but his obedience to wash in that pool… brought a miracle.
Luke 17:14 – A bunch of lepers were told… “Go show yourselves to the priest” They weren’t supposed to come in contact w/ anyone.. but Jesus is telling them go up to Jerusalem and show yourselves to the priest… and the Bible says “As they went” Their obedience activated the miraculous!
· Noah – The Flood that destroyed the rest of the world would surely have destroyed Noah and his family, but that one man obeyed God. Noah “being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house” (Hebrews 11:7). In respect to the ark, God was particular, demanding that the structure be made of gopher wood, that it have three levels and that it have one door. Any tampering with the plan would have brought certain disaster to Noah and his family.
· Abraham – When tested by God, Abraham was given no reason for the command. He was simply told, “Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of” (Genesis 22:2). Abraham, who had struggled for the promise of a son, now faced the terrible probability that Isaac would be slain by his own hand.
A lesser man might have postponed any action, but Genesis 22:3 states, “Abraham rose up early in the morning . . . and went unto the place of which
God had told him.” The obedience of the man was remarkable because his faith was remarkable. Against reason, Abraham accounted “that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead; from whence also he received him in a figure” (Hebrews11:19). It is plain from the Scriptures that Abraham’s faith was fully developed only when he obeyed the command of God. (See James 2:21-22.)
ACTIVE FAITH TO GET JESUS ATTENTION
· Often times people would act out there faith to get the attention of Jesus…
Mark 2:5 – They removed a roof off and lowered a man into a house where Jesus was at… and the bible says “Jesus SAW their faith”…Their ACTION was what He saw!
Mark 10 – Blind Bartimeus was crying out to Jesus “Son of David have mercy on me” … His ACTION caught the attention of God!
SATAN DOES NOT WANT YOU TO SUBMIT AND OBEY GOD!!
Job 36:11 If they obey and serve him, they shall spend their days in prosperity, and their years in pleasures.
12 But if they obey not, they shall perish by the sword, and they shall die without knowledge.
Jer 7:23 But this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people: and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you
SATAN FEARS OBEDIENCE!!!
James 4:7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
IMPORTANT VERSE!!!!!!!!
Rom 6:16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?
17 But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.
18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.
1 Peter 4:17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?
18 And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?
Acts 2:37 Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do?
38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
· If we could ever learn how to obey… Satan does not want us to be saved…
· But if we obey God… We will never become Satan’s servant…
