The Weapons of Our Warfare, Part 7

This is kind of a curious situation. We had never really sat down to talk about spiritual weapons before starting this series. Now here we are at part 7 and the list keeps growing. It seems we had not previously realized how extensive the armory of spiritual weapons really is. It seems there are different weapons for just about anyone who has a heart for the fight. For those of you who like to be loud and boisterous in facing down the enemy, there are shouting and singing and clapping weapons. If, on the other hand, you tend to be the more quiet, reserved personality type, you can hide in your closet and whisper your prayers. Since the battle is being fought by the angelic hosts of God, it really does not much matter which of the weapons we are using, the results are the same.

Prayer is kind of a tricky weapon to describe in very much detail in a limited space. This could end up being Part 7A, 7B, etc. In order for that not to happen, we are going to limit ourselves to the essence of prayer--what it is, how we use it, and what we can expect it to accomplish. That seems simple enough.


Prayer is communication with God. Oh, and of course the "with" there means both ways, to and from God. Most Christians know all about praying to God, but come up a little short on hearing from God. At least they know how to talk to God. At least they know how to talk? We love the old saying that God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason. Seriously, prayer is simply communicating with God. That should take care of number one above--what prayer is.


How we use prayer largely depends on the situation we are facing. As we have mentioned before, God has no boundaries. Therefore, when we pray to Him, our prayers have no boundaries. We are asking him to do something that we could not do. The reasons for our impotence in the situation are irrelevant. It could be that we are facing an enemy stronger than we are. Maybe the battle is at a distance from us and we cannot participate in person. Perhaps we simply do not know what else to do. Prayer is not a default, it is a good option when we are uncertain about what it is we should be doing.


Let us do a brief teaching that many have found extremely beneficial. By looking at just a few verses in the Bible we can be assured that our prayers are answered. The first thing we need to settle is this blog is intended for people who have made Jesus Lord of their lives and have been born again. We are then grafted into and abide in the one true vine. (John 15:1-8) Once we have done that, "...all the promises of God are Yes in Him [Jesus]..." (2 Corinthians 1:20, brackets added) Since all the promises are yes in Jesus, all we need do is find the promises that apply to answered prayer. We know they are good. The answer is yes in Jesus.


The first verses we want to look at promise that God hears and answers our prayers. After we explain that, we will validate it with another verse. Warning, do not succumb to the temptation to say, "I tried it and it does not work so I do not believe it." What we are about to tell you is so good and so powerful, the religious spirit has already convinced most of the church it is too good to be true. We invite anyone who doubts what we are going to teach here to study it out for yourself. If you come to a different conclusion, post a comment or send us a personal email. The email, in case you do not know how this works is, thechurchinsantamariaca@gmail.com


"Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him." (1 John 5:14-15) Briefly, for the sake of space, this verse says if we ask, He hears us and if He hears us we have what we asked of Him. You have most likely heard these verses taught to say God's hearing and answering only applies if what we ask is what is in God's will. The Greek text does not support that conclusion. His will in these verses is that we pray. It does not refer to what we pray. You may have to meditate on that statement. The verses are telling us that God calls us to pray. He does not tell us what to pray. The validation verse we mentioned above is John 14:14, "If you ask anything in My name, I will do it." We have no idea how Jesus could have been more clear than that.


The point of this post, in case you missed it, is that prayer is a powerful, spiritual weapon which is effective because Jesus has promised to do what we ask Him to do. The more specific we can be with those requests, the easier it will be for us to see the answers to them. He is literally waiting to hear us ask Him for what we want. He is trying to teach us to partner with Him in building His kingdom. With regard to this spiritual warfare, making our needs known to Him in prayer moves Him to direct the appropriate response. Try prayer. You will like the results.

A Time Before Time Began

In 1985 we were busily and more or less happily pastoring the Foursquare Church in Davis, California. We say "more or less" because a day job was still a necessity with four young children to feed and clothe and a small congregation of mostly college students. We had started that church from scratch in the latter half of 1980. And ok, so the title of this post is a little misleading, but it seems like another lifetime ago, and it was before the time this blog has recorded heretofore.

That little church was Foursquare in every sense of the word. We had been licensed to preach the Foursquare Gospel in Davis and were diligent about that business. We believed and taught that Jesus is the healer of our bodies, the savior of our souls, the baptizer with the Holy Spirit and our soon coming King. We still believe He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. (Hebrews 13:8) We think we even believed all that in our spirits, but somewhere in there a switch had not been thrown or something.

We saw people being born again and beginning their new life journeys. We baptized new believers in water several times a year. There had been a smattering of physical healings, but nothing on a regular basis. Then as He sometimes does, God began to work sovereignly, behind the scenes, to rock our world in a very positive way.

We had made arrangements to attend the annual Foursquare convention in Los Angeles. It would be good to get away and to see some people we had not seen in some time. We could also stay with relatives so the cost would not be prohibitive and it would be good to see them as well. We do not recall if we knew who the keynote speaker for the convention was before we registered, nor does it really matter. It was John Wimber--at that time a man at the pinnacle of a career which included leading the Vineyard churches, teaching at Fuller Seminary, writing, and actively involving himself in what he called "power evangelism". Power evangelism, as we understand it, is the demonstration of the Kingdom of God, on earth, in signs and wonders, for the purpose of bringing people to Jesus.

John Wimber delivered an excellent teaching on physical healing and it's availability to The Church today. Well that was 24 years ago, but if Hebrews 13:8 is still good, the time would not seem to be relevant. At the end of his message, he called for anyone who wanted to participate in a healing time to come to the platform. I was in the first balcony in Angelus Temple, toward the front. The exit is in the back. I believe I was the second or third person to reach the platform. I was excited to be part of that ministry. John then called for anyone who needed a physical healing to come to the platform. He then told us to wait until the Holy Spirit showed us who to minister to in prayer. The end result of that is that I prayed for and watched as a woman, with tears in her eyes, stood erect for the first time in a long time. She was healed from a spinal condition that had kept her slightly bent forward.

Just a few weeks after we returned from the convention, we received an unsolicited invitation in the mail to have dinner at a restaurant fifty miles or so from Davis. The invitation came from a group calling themselves, "Friends of Deliverance". They were providing a complimentary dinner to introduce pastors and other interested people to the need for deliverance within The Church. Some note on the invitation linked the group with a Foursquare pastor we knew in the town where the meeting was being held. We made a telephone call to be sure this was not some kind of weird group and were assured by the pastor these were good people who simply wanted to expose more people to the deliverance ministry. Besides, they were buying dinner so we felt we had nothing to lose by joining them. We found what they had to say very interesting, encouraging, and even inspiring. Our sole, previous experience with a demon had not ended well. By the time we left that meeting we had a better handle on the deliverance ministry. I remarked to Judi on the trip home that I was pretty sure the Lord would not have been teaching us about healing and deliverance if He did not plan to have us doing something in that area.

Within the next several months we actually led our first successful deliverance session. We saw virtually everyone in the church who had physical problems receive their healings. Time and space, and the Holy Spirit, will not allow us to go into any further detail about all those things.


Sometime, I am going to have to rehearse for you, my call to the ministry. Until then, let me just tell you it came via a word from the Holy Spirit to my spirit from Luke 4:18-19. Verse 19 says, "to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." Without a detailed teaching on this verse, let us say for now we are talking about a time when God is pouring out His favor on His people. This is not necessarily a literal 365 day year. I am writing this post, on this day, to tell anyone who will listen, you can have the Lord's favor on your life right now. All you have to do to appropriate it for yourself is to do as Jesus said. "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you." (Matthew 7:7) It is time. If you need help with that feel free to give us a call or send us an email. You can even post a comment and perhaps help others too. God bless.

The Weapons of Our Warfare, Part 6

We are not entirely sure how blogger works, and it really does not matter all that much. The way we hope and pray this blog works is that we hear what the Holy Spirit is saying, write it down, and it becomes some kind of semi-permanent record on the internet. We mention that only to say, this post, we think, is going to show it was published on a Saturday. In reality it is barely Saturday by the clock. We are morning people, but this can hardly be considered morning at all.

Watchman Nee, who is one of our heroes in the faith, said every day was a spiritual battle while he was writing his classic The Spiritual Man. I was talking about that with my neighbor across the fence just yesterday. When we look back at the dates of these posts, we note we were publishing much more frequently when we started. Then something happened. The warfare became a little more intense. Trust me when I tell you this whole, past week was one distraction after another.

For most of the past twenty years, as we have alluded to previously, we have been unsure of what we were called to Santa Maria to do. We are embarassed to say most of that time we spent in ignorance can be directly related to spiritual deception. Not only were we unable to see what we were supposed to be doing, we thought we were doing what we should be. We know, that sounds sort of cryptic, but that is how spiritual deception works. One wrong turn, one false piece of information, one lie that we believe can send us down the path toward deception.

At this time, however, we can tell you, we are doing what we are supposed to be doing. In the past three months, more or less, we have moved out of that period of ignorance and deception, into a period of apathy, where we did not really care what happened, to peace. We now understand, with more than head knowledge, God is at work in us to will and to do for His good pleasure. (Philippians 2:13) Looking back over our lives, we see sometimes very clearly, sometimes less how God was bringing us to this time and place.

In the beginning, this blog was as effortless as anything ever has been in my life. Of course, most of the early posts were simply personal history so the most difficult part of writing them was remembering that far back with a brain that may have passed it's prime. It has become more difficult recently. We are aware of Satan's schemes. We also understand a little something about how God works in our spirits.

This is a real time update. I just learned what I am about to share, and I do mean "just" as in moments ago. It is also one of those "duh" moments as in, how have I been missing that? Let me explain what "just" happened. The Holy Spirit dropped a word into my spirit. The word is "schemes". I knew it was in the Bible, but I get a little fuzzy on addresses sometimes. I almost always blog with another tab open to http://www.crosswalk.com/. What a blessing that site is to The Church. Anyway, as we said very early on, we always quote from the New King James Version of the Bible unless otherwise noted. So we search in that translation. Nothing came up. Maybe it was in the Authorized Version, a.k.a The King James Version. Not there either. Sometimes we do use the New International Version. Might as well try that. There it is, two times. The word "schemes" appears in 2 Corinthians 2:11 and Ephesians 6:11. Both times the scheme of Satan being talked about is division amongst God's people. For your information, the other two versions mentioned use the word "devices" instead of schemes.

We neglected to mention earlier the Lord has been working overtime dealing with us about our love walk. In fact, our pastor sent an email just yesterday reminding us that loving one another is one of the life principles of our church. That also came up in the conversation with the neighbor yesterday. He is a Christian man. We briefly noted that some people are just easier to love than others.

There is no way to over-emphasize the importance of loving one another. The Bible is God's love story to mankind. From Genesis 1:1 where God began His work of creation to provide a perfect place for man to live to Revelation 22:20 where He wishes us the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Bible is the expression of a Father's love for his children. Jesus prayed, "...that they may all be one...that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me." (John 17:22-23) We truly will show God to the world by loving one another as He has loved us.
I started writing this over an hour ago because I felt led to write. At that time I did not know what weapon I would be writing about. By now it should be obvious. The weapon is unity and it works by love. It seems I remember some historical figure saying, "United we stand, divided we fall." or was that just a song lyric performed by Sonny and Cher? (We do hope you recognize our sardonic comments that appear in this space from time to time.)

Now I had better get back to bed. Our grandson is here for the weekend and we would hate to miss any time with him. He is, after all, the cutest little boy in the world.

Work on your love walk and we will be "perfect in one".

The Weapons of Our Warfare, Part 5

It is as impossible to prioritize spiritual weapons by effectiveness as it is to do so with physical weapons. Sometimes a .50 caliber sniper rifle is the correct weapon to employ in conventional warfare and sometimes a .45 caliber handgun is the right one. In spiritual warfare there are times to use one weapon and times to use another. In this post we would like to discuss worship, praise, and music.


We said in a previous post, the word of God is the most effective spiritual weapon because it is the very essence of God and brings all His power to bear in any given situation. It works every time it is employed. We also noted it is employed by speaking it out loud. When we add music to our speaking of the word, we move into a different dimension in our use of the word of God. Music opens our spirits to the Spirit of God. We make the distinction between speaking and singing the word of God understanding that we will not always be quoting scripture in our singing. Music can, in and of itself, be a spiritual weapon or it can add power to the weapons of praise, worship, and prayer.

Music was created by God. Theologians and preachers like to point to Lucifer, who before challenging God's authority, was the worship leader in heaven. They say he was a being uniquely created to lead worship because he was created for that purpose. As far as we can tell, this is probably true. He is only mentioned twice by name in the Bible, but there are other references that are generally believed to refer to him. He is also generally believed to be Satan since the time of his fall from grace in heaven.


Ezekiel chapter 28 is almost universally considered to refer to Lucifer. Verse 13 says, "...The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes was prepared for you on the day you were created." He had timbrels and pipes! What an amazing being he must have been! It is true Lucifer was uniquely created. Such is the nature of angels. They were each uniquely created. None of them is like another. We are going to let you in on a little secret. You have timbrels and pipes. It is true. A timbrel is a simple, percussion instrument. Clap your hands together. You just made the sound of a timbrel, more or less. There is a tube that runs from your nose to your lungs. It is generally referred to as a wind pipe. We have timbrels and pipes. We can worship. We can make music. Granted that some of us make music and some of us just make noise, but God still receives it as praise or worship. I, for one am glad of that. I have four children who sing like angels. They did not get that ability from me.

Music elevates and empowers our words and moves our speaking of the word of God to a higher plane. Music inspires the angels who fight on our side and confuses the demonic hordes who fight against us. By way of real life illustration, consider your personal reaction to different types of music. I am not a huge fan of opera in most cases. I feel less enthusiastic about rap music. I have been known to leave the room if someone is listening to rap--or change the station in the mission van. (Were I preaching this message, I would add something like, "Angels cannot fight to the accompaniment of rap music because they have to put down their swords to cover their ears.")


As mentioned earlier, we will not always be quoting scripture when we are singing. Although scripture is the best thing to speak or sing, God receives praise and worship from our lips whether accompanied by music or not. He delights to hear what is in our hearts. He knows it is good for us to hear it too. That is why He encourages us throughout scripture to speak or sing.

We discussed a little on the difference between praise and worship in an earlier post, More on Spirit vs. Soul, 6/28/09. We do not intend to reprise that here. However, it is important to understand that praise and worship are two different activities. Someone has summarized the primary difference well in saying that praise is thanking God for what He has done while worship is thanking God for who He is.

Praise is a two-part activity. While our spirit is supposed to always be active, it is not necessary for it to be when we praise. We make a decision to praise (soul) and tell our body to do so. That can involve using the pipe and timbrels and doing anything else with our bodies that seems right. There are some in almost any church who think it undignified to dance or lift hands or objects to to the Lord during praise. Unfortunately for them, God does not agree with that perspective. The Bible is replete with examples of various physical activities associated with praise. Granted most of those things are in the Old Testament. For those who believe Jesus did away with the Old Testament celebrations and such, we would strongly encourage you to re-read your Bible.

Worship is a three-part activity. Worship may look like praise to the outside observer. The difference is that in worship, the worshipper is one on one with God. Many "worship" leaders make a fundamental mistake in leading people to worship. They do not get out of the way so the individuals in the group they are leading can get one on one with God. The job of a worship leader is to lead in praise so the people turn their souls and open their spirits to God. When this is accomplished, they are ready individually to enter into the presence of God. It is only when our spirit touches His that worship happens. Most people do not understand this concept, but now you do.

Jesus told the Samaritan woman, in slightly different words that it does not matter where we worship. God is simply looking for those who will worship Him in spirit and in truth. (John 4:23-24) Where we worship, how we worship, with whom we worship is unimportant. What is important is that we worship the one true God in spirit and in truth. Those are the kind of worshippers God prizes. We would challenge you to be one of us.

The Weapons of Our Warfare, Part 4

One would think after attending church regularly for the best part of fifty years it would be obvious there is some spiritual benefit to the practice. Pastors say that all the time. So does my wife. Yet, I am still surprised when the Holy Spirit actually speaks or clarifies something to my spirit during a Sunday morning service. That happened today. Tom Demaree of Pentecost Walk fame was our guest speaker. We missed much of the actual worship time because we were handing out bulletins and greeting at the door. Nonetheless, my mind, as it is apt to do, ran to this blog during the service. It was one of those flash things that sometimes happen. I flashed on how difficult it seemed to be to write this post. The problem was that I had not been writing this post at all--I had been writing the next one. The next post is about the place of praise, worship, and music as spiritual weapons. This one is about the name of Jesus. Psalm 138:2 says, "...for you have exalted above all things your name and your word." (NIV) We previously discussed the word of God, but not the name. Logically, since those two things are placed together in the Bible, we should put them together too.


"...God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord..." (Philippians 2:9-11) These verses show us that the name of Jesus is the name above every other name. Everyone with a different name, a lesser name, is going to bow down at the name of Jesus. That is everyone everywhere, heaven, earth, under the earth, everywhere. The name of Jesus incorporates every other name of God because Jesus is the completion of God's plan to bring many sons and daughters to Himself. Jesus is the name we are given to use in addressing God. It is the name above all other names.


The forces of hell cannot resist the authority in the name of Jesus. When we speak that name they have to bow. They are included in the verses above. They already know Jesus Christ is Lord. He is not their Lord. They do not follow Him. He is still Lord, the Christ, the Messiah, the second part of the Trinity that is God. As such He has all authority over everything that has been created. He created all things. All things were created through Him. (John 1:1) We have been given His authority because we have accepted His lordship over our lives. We are entitled to use his name. It has the same authority on our lips as He does in person.


We recently learned that the county Sheriff--any county Sheriff--has absolute authority within his county. He is unique amongst law enforcement officers. No other law enforcement agency trumps his jurisdiction in his county. In fact, they all have to yield to him. The deputy Sheriffs in the county carry the same authority within the county. Jesus has deputized us. We have all the authority He has when we use His name.

The encouragement here would be to invoke the name of Jesus in any situation that involves a demonic, spiritual force. Even in times when the spirits are unidentified, the name of Jesus can be used to beneficial affect. When something does not seem right, but we can not put our finger on the problem, we can still speak the name of Jesus and see things change. We have seen physical and soulical healings take place as a result of the name of Jesus being spoken over the problems. Try it. You will like the results.

The Weapons of Our Warfare, Part 3

As mentioned in the previous post, many people think the word of God is our only offensive weapon. Also as mentioned, it is not. It is, however, the most effective. To understand why we have to understand what the word of God really is; facts that are not often understood or taught.


The primary Greek word for "word" is logos. Logos means everything that can be known about a given subject. It is used to refer to both Jesus and the Bible. Jesus and the Bible are each full and complete revelations of everything God has revealed about Himself to mankind. We cannot know anything about God aside from His word. Jesus is His living example of the life we are to live on earth. If we were able to do everything Jesus did, we would fulfill God's will for us. Similarly, if we were able to do all that is written in the Bible, we would be perfect before God. He did not leave anything out that we need to know.


Hebrews 4:12 tells us, "The word of God is living and powerful...piercing even to the division of soul and spirit..." The Bible works on us every time we read it. It shows us the difference between what is spirit and what is soul in us. Additionally, we can put it to work by speaking it out loud. In doing so we are imitating the acts of God in creation and the works of Jesus in restoring life and health to mankind as He did throughout His ministry.


When we talk about speaking the word of God out loud, the less frequently used Greek word, rhema, comes into play. Rhema is defined as "the spoken word". It is a part of the logos. It is the word Paul used in telling us to take up the "sword" of the Spirit. (Ephesians 6:17) The word spoken from our mouths becomes an offensive weapon. The spoken word carries power to change things in the spiritual realm. It cuts through spiritual darkness and deception bringing light and understanding. Romans 10:17 tells us the spoken word is the thing that produces faith in us.


As we will find in continuing our discussion on the weapons of our warfare, we use all three parts of our being simultaneously when we wield the weapons. God speaks into our spirit what He wants us to do. We process His instructions in our soul according to what we think of them and how we feel about them. We then use our will to decide what to do. If our decision is to fight, we engage our bodies to fight. Of course we can also engage our bodies to flight, but that is not what we are about here.

The word of God has intrinsic power. When simply spoken it changes things. The word of God changed the dark and formless void that was earth into a world teeming with all kinds of plant and animal life as He spoke it. (Genesis 1) Psalm 107:20 says God sent His word and healed them. Although the word in this verse for word is in the Hebrew language, it is equivalent to rhema in Greek. He spoke the word and people were healed. What he said is not even important. The word of God has intrinsic power. (I read that somewhere recently.) The same Hebrew word is used in Isaiah 55:11 where God assures us His word will never return without accomplishing what He sends it forth to do.


Let us jump into something that can be extremely controversial within The Church today. There are segments of The Church that believe we can have anything we desire if we can find it in the Bible. This group teaches that any portion of scripture can be used as seed which, when properly planted and cared for will produce a crop yielding fruit after it's own kind. Pastor Bill Winston from the Chicago, IL area tells a story about a pastor who was visiting his church from Africa. As Pastor Winston relates the story, the pastor stopped practically in mid-sentence and said, "Pastor Winston. Your airplane is in Ecclesiastes chapter ten." He then resumed preaching his sermon. Pastor Winston looked through that chapter and found the phrase, "a bird of the air may carry your voice" in verse 20. In context, this phrase has nothing to do with an airplane, but the word of God has intrinsic power. When Pastor Winston used that phrase as seed and planted it into the spiritual realm with his voice, his airplane was on the way. Believe it or do not. Believing is harder, but so very much worth the effort.

Perhaps, aside from this spiritual battle we are discussing, you have problems that need to be dealt with spiritually. May we encourage you to put the word of God on your lips continually and see what God will do in response. At the very least it is good training for using the word of God in spiritual warfare. That can never be a bad thing.

The Weapons of Our Warfare, Part 2

"For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ." (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)

There is a common misconception amongst many who teach on spiritual warfare that we have only one offensive weapon, the Word of God. Without doubt this misconception comes from Paul's teaching in Ephesians 6 about the armor of God. In that passage (Ephesians 6:10-18) "the sword of the spirit which is the Word of God" is the only offensive weapon mentioned. Some of the other offensive weapons are, the Name of Jesus, prayer, praise, worship, and commands. Before we look at some of them in detail, let us first look at what we are trying to accomplish with them according to the verses above.

A spiritual battle is fought with spiritual weapons. Those weapons are effective for pulling down the strongholds of the enemy. They are able to silence arguments against the works of God, or even arguments against the very existence of God. These weapons bring down everything that attempts to put itself in the place of God. We sometimes miss the fact the thoughts being brought into obedience at the end of these verses are not ours, but those of the enemy we are fighting. Our thoughts should have already been brought into obedience. However, if they are not, we need to stop and make sure they are before we join the battle. This is not really as difficult as it looks at first glance. We simply need to be sure the idols we talked about in a recent post (The Idols in Our Hearts; 7/6/09) have been removed and we are constantly striving to follow Jesus to the best of our ability. He will do the rest. We are to "...work out (y)our own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you (us)..." (Philippians 2:12-13, parentheses mine).

Salvation is not really a topic of this post, but we need to remind ourselves that being born again is only the first step in our salvation. Salvation actually means to be made whole and complete in every way, spirit, soul and body. The new birth saves us from the guilt of sin. The new birth is an essential prerequisite to being able to participate in spiritual warfare. As we walk out our salvation, we are progressively saved from the power of sin in our lives. No soldier would go into battle unless he understood his weapons and how to use them. We usually do not go to war at all or we go to war in the flesh or the soul as mentioned in Part 1. We have had no need of spiritual weapons because we have not discerned the spiritual battle. We hope to change that with this blog. There is a spiritual battle going on right here in the Santa Maria valley. Actually it is more like an occupation. A religious spirit has been occupying the area and we, The Church have allowed it to happen and to continue. If anyone else is fighting it, please make your presence and activities known to us so we can join forces.

We have a friend who was among the first people we introduced to this blog. He asked us to leave him out of this. He did give me a compliment. He said, "You are either a prophet or you are crazy." (Incidentally he is not the first person to say either one of those things--the latter being the more common statement.) Then he said, "I am a man of peace and I am called to live at peace and walk in love toward everyone." If you are reading this, we also have been called to walk in love toward everyone. We have also found what it is we are supposed to be doing and we are doing it with all our heart. The two are not contradictory. Let us be clear. We are not saying he is doing anything wrong by not fighting alongside us. Everyone is not called to the battle. May that also be an encouragement to those of you who are interested and supportive of what we are doing, but do not feel called to take up arms against the religious spirit that is blinding the hearts and minds of people across the Santa Maria valley. We heard a report the same spirit has also been identified in the Santa Ynez valley. That, we think, is interesting.

When we returned in 1987 from an extended time away from Santa Maria, we met some Christians who were amazed at the spiritual battle they thought we must have faced. They were familiar with the Davis, CA area and its spiritual dullness and deception. When we left we had the upper hand in the spiritual battle. The community hospital that had previously done abortions, but no live births was changing that policy. Planned Parenthood was involved in legal issues that would eventuate in their closing up shop. A Christian based, crisis pregnancy center had been established. Even the church of Scientology had left town due to lack of finances. We are not saying we were the reason for those things happening, only that we were a part of it. We chuckled at the notion the spiritual warfare was any more intense in Davis than it was in Santa Maria. Coming into town, we knew there was spiritual warfare going on. We had not identified the enemy as a religious spirit at that time. The saints of God here thought they were winning the spiritual battle. It is almost twenty-two years later and perhaps the battle is just now beginning in earnest.

Obviously there will be at least three parts to this series on the Weapons of Our Warfare. We will discuss the various weapons and how they are used in Part 3.

We need to solicit your prayer covering. It is already becoming more difficult to write this blog. The spiritual interference is beginning to be felt. Please pray the forces of the enemy will be dealt with so we can pursue this writing and this battle.

The Weapons of Our Warfare, Part 1

"For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ." (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)

We may be biting off a little more than we can chew with all three of these verses at once, but if it gets to be too long we will just go to a part two. There is a lot of information in these verses about how we do battle as opposed to how the world does it. We know worldly warfare. We are so accustomed to how battle is waged in the physical world that to think otherwise is baffling. We have fists, feet, elbows, knives, guns, artillery, bombs, etc. to inflict damage on our enemies in the world. Did I mention I qualified "expert" with an M1 Garand? Of course that was forty years ago. Who even knows what an M1 Garand is anymore? The M1 Garand is a very outdated weapon for worldly warfare now, but it is totally useless in spiritual warfare.

There is a second, huge problem we deal with in spiritual warfare. We cannot see the enemy casualties unless we can see into the spiritual realm. Back to the M1 Garand for a minute if we may. Sergeant James F. Baxter, a World War II and Korea Marine and a good friend of mine reportedly fired at a North Korean soldier at a distance estimated to be 1,500 yards. At that distance, in those days, both the distance and aim were guesses. Shortly after he squeezed off the round, he and those with him watched the enemy soldier tumble down the hill he had been sitting on. That does not happen in spiritual warfare. We often do not even know whether we are winning or losing until the battle is over and we sense a release from the Holy Spirit that we no longer need to fight. There are equally potent spiritual weapons. We must learn what they are and how to use them if we are to be effective against demonic spirits. Now I'm sure we have bitten off more than we can chew so I am going to re-title this Part 1.

Even though we live in flesh and blood, we do not do battle as flesh and blood beings. We do battle as spiritual beings. That is what we are. That is also where the real battle is going on. Spiritual battle calls for spiritual weaponry. We have to get our minds around this concept of spiritual warfare using spiritual weapons if we are to be effective in this battle.

Let us not forget we are tripartite beings. Not only must we overcome the temptation to wage warfare in the flesh, we must also not use our souls. Our natural inclination is to think that if we are not physically fighting we are using spiritual weapons. It is hard to imagine anything being further from the truth. When we are making a persuasive argument or verbally putting someone in his place we are fighting in the soul. As one who can make great arguments on almost any subject, I have had more than my share of frustrations in making those arguments and not seeing any results. Frequently this happens because we are not discerning the battle as being spiritual so we fight it soulically, with our soul. We think we can convince a spiritually dead, blind or deceived person simply with the power of eloquent words and cogent points. That never works. They have been blinded, scripture says, by the god of this age. (2 Corinthians 4:4) The religious spirit we have set ourselves to defeat works for the god of this age. His work is blinding and deceiving people so the light of the Gospel is hidden from them.

This blog is not hurting the religious spirit at all. It has the potential to do some damage if it is motivating someone to action. That is, of course, the goal, but we are not quite there as a group yet. We do think we hear the demonic laughter subsiding a bit as they realize we are serious about this battle, but they are not ducking for cover just yet. Once we understand how to pursue this battle, that will change.

The Workings of a Religious Spirit, Part 6

"But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days; and behold, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, for I had been left alone there with the kings of Persia." (Daniel 10:13)


This verse, in the middle of chapter ten of Daniel explains why our prayers are sometimes not answered immediately. It also shows us yet another way a religious spirit retains control over a geographical area. A message was revealed to Daniel in a vision. He did not totally understand what was being shown him so he set himself to fast and pray for understanding. Twenty-one days later, an angel appeared to him while he was going about his business. Most scholars believe this to be the angel Gabriel who is understood to be God's primary messenger. The angel told Daniel he had been dispatched three weeks earlier when Daniel had begun to pray. He apparently had to literally fight his way through spiritual interference to bring Daniel his message. The battle was so intense that he was not able to beat back the demonic forces in the heavens by himself. It was only when Michael, the archangel arrived to reinforce him that we was able to continue on his way and fulfill his mission to talk to Daniel.

We are trying to understand what factors might affect our ability to see clearly into the spiritual realm. While some things from the Old Testament do not exactly equate with the New Testament, there are many, valuable lessons we can learn from what is recorded there.

There was and is spiritual interference between us and God. In the previous post we discussed why we must be careful not to allow anything to become more important to us than God is. When we do that, we do not know how we should be praying and we may not be able to understand His answers to our prayers. If you pay attention here, we may be explaining much of the mystery of unanswered prayer. Had Daniel quit praying after two weeks, Gabriel might still be battling the Prince of Persia and Daniel might have passed from this life never having received his answer.

Jesus taught us that we must keep praying and we will receive our answers. (Luke 18:1) In this case He made His point with the parable of the unjust judge. Interestingly, this is one of the two parables Jesus used to say what the kingdom of God is not like. The other one is the parable of the midnight visitor in Luke 11:5-8. He follows that parable with the very familiar "So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you." (Luke 11:9) What most people miss in that statement is the present tense. We miss the literal meaning because we do not really think in literal terms. We think of the present tense being, for example, "I ask." That is actually the participle , for any of you who might be interested. The present tense is "I am asking." In the present tense things are happening right now. Jesus is really saying, be asking, be seeking, and be knocking. When we have the attitude of continuously doing those things, we will see results.

A religious spirit wants to throw up barriers to our being able to hear from God. Anything will do. Prayerlessness is good. Perhaps unanswered prayers are better. They foster discouragement and contribute to a lack of faith. Bad theology or bad doctrine will keep us from praying in faith. We have all heard that God answers prayer in three ways, yes, no, and wait. Let us make this very simple and very scriptural. "For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us." (2 Corinthians 1:20) Where do you see no or wait in that verse? We will try one more verse just for emphasis. In John 16:23, Jesus tells us, "...Most assuredly, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in My name He will give you." Perhaps we missed it, but there does not appear to be a no or a wait in there either. We could go on, but we see no reason. How can it be that easy? Hint: there are no theologians involved here to confuse things. Call this "simply scripture". We have often said the newest Christians have the best theology because the church (the lack of capital letters there is intentional) has not had a chance to mess them up yet. God is waiting to answer prayer. He is not looking for reasons to not answer prayer. However, a religious spirit would like to convince us He is.

We have one other ploy of a religious spirit to expose here. A lack of love inhibits our ability to minister to the Lord and to others. It is,in fact, sin. Sin blocks our vision of what God is saying and doing. Jesus told us the greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God and the second is like it, love our neighbor. (Matthew 22:37-39) Simply walk in love toward everyone. I run a substance abuse recovery program. I work with drug addicts and criminals. This is a great group of guys. How can I say that. Love covers all sins. (Proverbs 10:12) I simply choose to walk in love toward them. That is not to say I do not get aggravated on a regular basis and have to correct them. I even love them enough to make them follow the rules. I looked in the mirror a few times today and discovered I am still human. Walking in love is a decision we can all make. Let us encourage you all to make that decision today.

The Idols In Our Hearts

Now some of the elders of Israel came to me and sat before me. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying, "Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their hearts, and put before them that which causes them to stumble into iniquity. Should I let Myself be inquired of at all by them? Therefore speak to them, and say to them, 'Thus says the Lord God: "Everyone of the house of Israel who sets up his idols in his heart, and puts before him what causes him to stumble into iniquity, and then comes to the prophet, I the Lord will answer him who comes, according to the multitude of his idols."'" (Ezekiel 14:1-4)

This is a scary passage of scripture when you understand what God is saying here. Ezekiel was the voice of God to the nation of Israel at this time in history. The elders (government officials) came to him to find out what God was saying to them. Before they could say anything, God told Ezekiel these men had set up idols in their hearts. They had caused themselves to stumble into sin by doing so. Then God asked a rhetorical question. He asked if He should let them inquire of Him at all when they have done that. Then He told Ezekiel what to say to the elders. He said to tell them, "Everyone...who sets up idols in his heart, and puts before him what causes him to stumble into iniquity, and then comes to the prophet, I the Lord will answer him...according to the multitude of his idols." God is going to answer him as his idols would. That is scary.

Generally when we think of idols, the first things that come to mind are physical things or fleshly desires. Many people think first of money or things money can buy. Some people have made education or position idols that God must not touch. We even sometimes prize relationships with other humans above our relationship with God. These could all be idols, but idols in our hearts are often much more insidious than we have thought.

My pastor recently wrote to me in an email reminding me that our hearts are deceptively wicked. (Jeremiah 17:9) His reminder goes right along with this passage. God is saying that if we come to Him looking for the answer we want, He will answer us according to our desires. To say it another way, if we have put something between us and Him when we come to ask Him anything, He will tell us what we already want to hear. That being the case, we would be in jeopardy of not knowing whether an answer we receive in prayer is what God wants us to hear or what we want to hear. How then would we know if anything we hear from God is really what he wants us to hear and not the product of our own desires?

Thankfully and graciously, we have two things the elders of Israel did not have at the time of Ezekiel. We have the completed cannon of scripture, the Bible, and we have the Holy Spirit. Jesus said of the Holy Spirit, that he would lead us into all truth. (John 16:13) Unfortunately, that does not make us error proof. It should, but we often operate in our souls rather than in our spirits. You remember the soul, our mind, emotions, and will. The soul is, in fact, the greatest idol most of us have to deal with when coming to God regardless of whether we are born again or not.

Some people think whatever God says to them has to make sense. Let us go by the numbers. Sense is the domain of the mind. The mind is part of the soul. When we say what God tells us has to make sense, we have made our mind an idol. It is something that we value more than God. God will answer us according to what makes sense to us. We could tell story after story of God directing something that did not make sense until we saw the final result. Then we understand why He directed it. These are not only our stories, but are corroborated by many people who have passed through our lives. God's will does not always make sense initially, but it will always make sense ultimately.

Perhaps you are one who has to feel something passionately to overcome inertia and get started with it. Feelings are emotions and are, once again, the domain of the soul. We probably do not need to go into any more detail on that. If it feels good do it would not be the guiding rule here.

Of course, we also have our will to deal with when God tells us to do something. Yes, soul again. We may actually know beyond all reason or feeling what it is God wants us to do and the will can still veto any action on our part.

The idols in our hearts can keep us from hearing from God. We are hesitant to give concrete examples of things we have seen because to do so might offend some readers now or in the future. However, throwing caution to the wind in this case for the sake of illustration, let us tell of the pastor who stood in front of his church on a Sunday morning and, mistaking a move of the Holy Spirit for emotionalism, quenched the Spirit that day. It is a mystery as to what he was thinking. We might also tell of the pastor who for fear of financial difficulty spent eighteen months preparing the sale of a portion of the church property only to find out when the transaction was completed, there was not enough land left to build the facilities the church needed. Another example that comes quickly to mind is the pastor whose church was floundering due to his own lack of spiritual perception. He blamed another for the problem on what he thought was good evidence. As of this writing there has been no perceptible change.

Whenever we operate in the soul rather than the spirit we have placed an idol between us and God. He will answer us according to what we think, how we feel or what we have determined beforehand we want to do. The result will be the best we can do, far less than what God would do were we able to stay out of his way.

We are not sure our will would have allowed us to take on the task of exposing and fighting the religious spirit over Santa Maria had we considered our feelings or thought twice about it. Sometimes it works to fly by the seat of one's pants. God uses all kinds of people. Let him use you. You will find the peace beginning to rule in your heart as you find your place in His kingdom. God bless you.

The Workings of a Religious Spirit, Part 5

"Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you...Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God." (2 Thessalonians 2:1-4)

I have taught this message at least a few times over the years, but writing it this time, it has hit me especially hard just how serious this situation is. I had to stop in the middle of the post to come back and add this paragraph so you would not take it too lightly. Let him who has ears hear what the Holy Spirit is saying.

Our view of the inspiration of the Bible is that known as verbal plenary. That means we believe the very words of scripture are God breathed. They are exactly as God intended them to be. That means every word, every phrase is important to our understanding of theology.

The few verses above seem to hide in the middle of the epistles of Paul. Undoubtedly, there have been hundreds and thousands of sermons preached on this passage since they were penned by Paul. There is a factor in these verses that has rarely been mentioned. It is in regard to the timing of the events described.

Paul begins by telling his readers any report they have received that indicated he thought they had missed the return of Jesus was not from him. He says two things must happen before Jesus comes back. There must be a falling away, and the man of sin must be revealed. The two things could occur together. The falling away of many people from the faith might allow the revealing of the man of sin, or his being revealed might cause the falling away of many people. (I had to read that sentence twice so do not feel badly if you do.) In either event, Paul says these things are going to happen. They have not happened yet. They will happen in the future.

The word "revealed" in the verses above is a very specific term. The Greek word is often translated "manifest". To reveal or to manifest something means it is already there but we cannot see it. When it is revealed, it becomes visible. That does not change the fact it was there. We did not know it was there until it was revealed. The man of sin is going to be revealed before Jesus comes back. That has to happen.

Notice the tense change from the future, "that Day will" to the present, "who opposes". This is the point most people miss. The day has not come. We know that because the man of sin has not been revealed. Again, he is already here, but has not been revealed. Paul then tells us what he is doing presently--before he is revealed. He is opposing and exalting himself above God and he sits in the temple of God pretending to be God. (You might want to read that sentence again too.) This is happening right now. We have not understood this concept so we have not taught it. The result has been that he continues to get away with it. Worse yet, he is doing it in our church buildings. You read correctly.

Right now, the man of sin is working in churches everywhere to oppose God and steal the worship that is rightly due Him. That is an incredible statement, we know. At this point we have to ask you to trust that we know what we are talking about. We could go here and there throughout scripture proving this point, but that is not really the purpose of this blog. However, if you stick it out awhile longer, it will become apparent to you that the man of sin is at work. That is assuming you have not already come to that opinion from reading the volume of anecdotal evidence in the first few posts of this blog.

By way of giving you a direction to head should you want to study this subject, note Paul did not say the man of sin is in The Church. He is in the temple, the physical building. His is opposing God and seeking worship. Perhaps we could give but one example of his work. Have you ever been in a church that did not walk in love toward everyone? That is an ouchie. Okay, let us rephrase. Have you ever been in a church that did walk in love toward everyone? That did not help. Well then, grab your own picture of a perfect fellowship of believers and measure any given church against it. Give yourself permission to be wrong at any point because you may not know any more about the perfect church than they do. Jesus said everyone would know we are His disciples because we have love for one another. (John 13:35)

I am very well aware that most people relegate this passage of scripture to events occurring contemporaneously with the rapture of the church. Traditional teaching is that there will be a very powerful man, a world leader, who will one day reveal himself to be the antichrist. It is fine to believe that is all Paul is saying here, but, and this is a big but, one still has to deal with the present tense. That was no accident. Paul or his scribe were not having a bad day. The man of sin is already at work. Do not believe me? Explain Ephesians 2:2. Even if you think the man is a real, flesh and blood man, it is the spirit behind his actions that causes the problem. That spirit is at work every Sunday in many churches. The next post will explain how that is even possible. Stay tuned and God bless.

Where Are Those Who Weep Over Santa Maria

As promised, another title in the form of a question. It is also the last one of the titles I heard during worship last Sunday. That could be a good thing since it is already Saturday evening and who knows what might come up tomorrow. Of course the Lord does speak at other times than during the worship time on Sunday mornings, but that is a good time to hear Him if you are listening. We would suggest that if you are having difficulty at that time, you might try reading some scripture before you go to church. At those times when I have had the most difficulty hearing from God, I have found that reading even a few verses before church seems to open me up just a bit more to whatever the Lord has for me there. It seems to even work better to read a few verses just before bed Saturday night then a few more Sunday morning before church.

"Now as He drew near, He saw the city and wept over it, saying, 'If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For days will come upon you when your enemies will...surround you and close you in on every side...because you did not know the time of your visitation.'" (Luke 19:41-44)

Jesus wept over the city of Jerusalem. He was not just weeping over a city though. Jerusalem was the capital of a nation, the nation of Israel. Depending on who you think is right, He was either the first or second person to fill the office of prophet in the New Testament. Some think John the Baptist was the first New Testament prophet. Others would argue that he ended the line of Old Testament prophets. (There is no extra charge here for that information.) Our position is that it really does not matter. John came as a prophet to prepare the way for Jesus. Jesus came as prophet, priest, and king. As such, He changed all the rules of spiritual life between God and man.

Jesus wept over Jerusalem and Luke is very specific as to why He did that. He was weeping because they had no spiritual insight. They did not recognize the Messiah, the promised One. Throughout the Bible, beginning with the protevangelium in Genesis 3:15, God had promised to provide a Savior for the sins of mankind. The leaders in Israel had failed to recognize Jesus even though they knew the scriptures from the inside out, forward and backward.

The nation of Israel was in distress. They were under the iron fist of the Roman Empire. They were free to exercise their religion only as long as the Romans allowed it. The Romans recognized Herod as the legitimate head of Israel. That is another teaching all together. The Jewish ruling body, the Sanhedrin, was the group that ran the Jewish religion. They were the ones who decided Jesus should die for the good of the nation. We have discussed their reasons for that in a previous post. With the possible exception of Herod, all Israel was awaiting the revelation of the Messiah on earth. They expected a king to come and throw off the yoke of Roman bondage. When Jesus came, humbly, riding on a donkey (Matthew 21:5) He did not fit the picture they had. God was building a spiritual kingdom from the ground up as He had from the time He called Abram out of Ur of the Chaldees. The Jews were looking for a physical kingdom to come on earth. They missed God, missed what He was doing in their midst because they erred in their theology. Let us not make the same mistake.

Where are the people who are weeping over the Santa Maria valley as Jesus wept over Jerusalem? Where are you? We know a few of you. God is seeing your tears and hearing your prayers. It took us over twenty years to get to this place. No doubt some of you have been praying a good portion of the time, possibly even prior to that. We know God called us to this city and to this valley for such a time as this. Although it took twenty years to figure out exactly why He issued that call, at least we can now say we know. These are exciting times in Santa Maria. Let us not miss what God is doing. He is at work in ways we do not yet see to demolish the strongholds of the enemy wherever they exist. We will tell you the first place to look for those strongholds in the next post.

Where Are The 7,000

Yes, of course, I am aware it is not strictly appropriate in English prose to use a question as a title. The next post is also going to have a question as a title. Deal with it. We are looking for some people. It is starting to get interesting now. The Lord has given us a couple of His weapons to start the battle. You will notice within the next week or so these posts becoming more specific as to how we are going to fight this battle rather than containing so much general information and teaching. We are not saying there will not be some of that, but the emphasis will be more on how we engage the battle.

Jesus battled the devil throughout the approximately three and a half years of His ministry. At one point, He asked the disciples who they thought He was. Peter gave him the correct answer when he said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God." (Matthew 16:16) Jesus commended him for that answer and told Peter, "And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it." (Matthew 16:18) We are not going to do a teaching on that verse at this time. The reason for that quotation is to point out the gates guarding the entrance to Hades, the domain of the devil will not prove sufficient to keep The Church from breaking through them to, "... release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage." (Hebrews 2:15) Well shoot, I know some of you are missing the point because you have never had any real teaching on this verse either.

Now I am in a quandary. I cannot possibly teach those verses and keep this post from becoming unwieldy. I received a comment just last night at dinner about the individual posts being too long. I am already thinking on that. Now, I have not even gotten into what I want to say here and, oh well, what to do? Someone remind me that you do not understand exactly what these verses are saying and we will deal with them at another time. Maybe, going forward, we will devote one or two posts a week to just Bible teaching and the others to pursuing the battle.

What we are really trying to do with this post is to find the answer to the question, "Where are the 7,000 men who have never bowed their knees to Baal? We are not talking about literally 7,000 men--and we would be including women since we are living in a dispensation of common grace. The number is relatively unimportant. What is important is that we have the perfect number, as determined by God, to fight this battle. In the days of Elijah, in Israel, that number was 7,000. Today, in the battle for the Santa Maria, it may be 7,000, or 700, or only 7. We do not know. We are pretty sure there are already more than 7. There are almost that many reading the posts we print out at the mission. That reminds me, if anyone knows how to post this blog to a larger audience please explain it to me in English. That is yet another thing on the list. I know it can be done. I read the instructions, but it does not seem to be working.

As we recall the story from 1 Kings 19, Elijah had just embarrassed King Ahab with the whole fire from heaven episode. He then led the slaughter of all Ahab's false prophets. Then he ran for his life. He was hiding in a cave. God showed up and ruined the whole pity party. They had a heart to heart. Elijah was whining about being the only person in Israel who stood for God. If we are being honest, some of us have felt that way on our worst days. Okay, I will go first. I was there immediately before God called me to this battle. I sat in my pastor's office and cried because I was very disappointed and could not see what God was doing. I felt hopeless. God told Elijah, "Yet I have reserved seven thousand in Israel, all whose knees have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him." (1 Kings 19:18

Baal, in it's essence is the god of power. Keeping in mind our understanding of spirit, soul, and body, we understand Baal is no god at all, but rather a demonic spirit posing as a god. Although a spirit, he does his work in the souls of men, blinding them to the spiritual realm wherever possible. More on that in a future post.

Baal was already in the land of Canaan when Abraham led God's people there. Offerings, including children, were often sacrificed to Baal. He was revered as the god who controlled nature and therefore caused the rain to come and water the land. Without rain, there were no crops and famine ensued. Ahab's embarrassment by Elijah was multiplied because it came at the end of a years long drought. That drought ended when Elijah prayed and God sent a heavy rain. This was Elijah becoming more than a conqueror (Romans 8:37). First he called down fire from heaven to win the battle with the prophets then called down the rain to show God's power was greater than that of Baal.

God told Elijah there were yet 7,000 men in Israel who had not worshipped Baal. They were the people who had been faithful to God regardless of what had come against them. They were the ones who were qualified to fight God's battles. Their qualifications were not that they were necessarily the most competent or experienced in battle. They came because they knew who their leader was. In their case it was the God of Israel. Now, Jesus leads the battle. The sole qualification for fighting in this battle is to have one's sins washed away by the blood of the lamb.

As I said in the previous post, so far three men have said they are with me. They will follow me through the gates of hades. At least they say they will. I did not ask them. They volunteered. I am sure they will. I know there are others. In this case it does not really matter if we know now, or if we ever know who is fighting alongside us. What matters is that Jesus is leading the charge and in the end we will see the victory. We have been flailing at the darkness for over twenty years already. Finally a crack of light has shown us the real battle. Now we are out to pursue it until the light overcomes the darkness. God bless.