Allen Jackson - Victory Over Darkness - Part 1
We’ve been doing a series talking about «Lions & Lambs». And in this session we’re going to talk specifically a bit about the victory over darkness that is ours. The notion of lions and lambs, there’s two principal lions presented to us in the New Testament. One, Peter tells us that Satan prowls the earth like a roaring lion looking for people to devour. And he gives us an assignment. He says we have to be sober and vigilant. We have to be aware, and we have to resist him. Not to avoid him, not to hide from him. We have to resist him. We’ve been called to the resistance movement. The other Lion we meet is perhaps more familiar.
In the book of Revelation we’re introduced to the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the one who is worthy to open the scroll. The one that’s worthy of all worship and honor and glory and power. We read those verses together. Two lions, very different characteristics, very different objectives, very different responses are the response we’re directed towards with response to the satanic roars that fill the earth is to resist them. The response we’re directed towards towards the Lion of the tribe of Judah is to worship him. And we’re engaged to do both. It’s not an either/or proposition. Well, I’ve been thinking about that, meditating on it, and I’ve been collecting passages with lions in and from all over the Bible for days. But I came across a bucket of quotes from Winston Churchill in the last few days, and Great Britain has often been represented by a lion.
Some of you may or may not know Churchill was the Prime Minister of Great Britain during World War 2. He followed Neville Chamberlain as the prime minister. Neville Chamberlain was a feckless politician, a coward of the first order. I mean, impeccable credentials, but he negotiated with Hitler and announced that «peace in our lifetime». And Winston Churchill was tagged to lead Britain through the war. Kind of a curmudgeon. When the war was over, they didn’t want him anymore. They weren’t particularly interested in him until they were in crisis. But God had a person for the right time.
I believe he still does that. But some of the quotes I thought were worthwhile in the context of these attitudes of lions. He said, «Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm». «Success is not final. Failure is not fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts». «For a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle». «Continuous effort, not strength or intelligence, is the key to unlocking our potential». «The price of greatness is responsibility». «This is not time for ease or comfort. It is time to dare and endure». «If we open a quarrel between past and present, we shall find we have lost the future».
It was quite an amazing list. I’ll spare you the rest of it or at least I’ll wait for another time. But I’d like to use the comparison between Chamberlain and Churchill for our own season and submit to you that it’s time for us to make the move from appeasement to advocacy for the truth. One is passive and one is assertive and I would submit to you the church predominantly has been passive for far too long. I believe we’re gonna have to follow the counsel of the New Testament and say no to ungodliness. Not welcome it in the door and try to explain to it the gospel. We’re gonna have to have the courage to say that ungodliness is wrong. And if we continue in it, no matter where you sit on the weekend, you will forfeit your place in the kingdom of God.
In our homes, our churches, our schools, our places of business, wherever the Lord provides us with the opportunity, we’re going to have to say no to ungodliness. If you’ll allow me, I would submit to you that the church has spent decades accommodating evil. We’ve even developed a culture and language of capitulation. «We don’t talk about faith in politics». Well, if you haven’t noticed, the politicians are talking about things that determine our faith and the ability to give expression to it. We better find our voices. «We’re to separate the church and the state». Only if you want to live under the authoritarian rule of cruelty. «We don’t want to offend unbelievers, we want to build bridges of understanding».
I agree we want to build bridges of understanding the gospel and the consequences of ignoring or being disobedient to God. We don’t have to do it in anger or hate or condemnation, but we have to tell the truth. Not wanting to tell the truth to an unbelieving world is very similar to a doctor who doesn’t want to give bad news to a patient. We would call that physician a quack. Accuse them appropriately of committing malpractice and suggest that their license be removed. And I’ll tell you this, if the church lacks the courage to tell the truth to our culture, the one who has put us on assignment will pull our license. It’s not optional. The goal isn’t to be judgmental. We’re all sinners, we’ve struggled with that, but the only way to change that behavior is to be confronted with the truth.
The awkwardness of this is that our cowardness combined with the little fear of God has resulted in a church that is anemic and far too often impotent. So there’s some questions that we ask. We hear them frequently. I’m asked them wherever, whenever I travel: Does our faith belong in the public square? Absolutely. If your faith doesn’t travel with you beyond the place where you worship, it’s not real. It’s a costume. We can’t compartmentalize our lives and segment our lives. We take our faith wherever we go. Should our faith affect how we do business? Uh-huh. Even how we select our leaders? Absolutely. Should we discuss our beliefs at work? Mhm. Should churches engage in discussions regarding current events? No, we should just study history.
You know, I would submit to you that that set of questions would have seemed absurd to the church throughout most of our history, including the book of Acts. It’s a relatively new set of expressions that reflect not the best season of our story, and I’m very grateful to say that there’s an awakening taking place. There’s an engagement taking place. We have truth being told by people that have been selected to lead us, many of whom have not really lived openly Christian lives. God is moving in the most remarkable way. So I’m gonna spend this session talking about victory over darkness and what that looks like in our lives and what’s foundational to that.
You see, the church without the power of God remains just a theoretical construct. We’re a theological discussion group, and I have no interest in that. I intend to be engaged with the power of God, with what God is doing in the earth, with making changes in the earth, understanding that that kind of forward movement, that kind of determination will bring with it, by definition, resistance. It’s the story of scripture. It’s the story of the church in the 21st century, and I pray it’s our story.
So we’ll start with this notion of standing our ground. It really is biblical. I gave you a verse from Ephesians 6, 6:13: «Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, » please note it doesn’t say «if». That’s not a negative confession. I’m not being pessimistic. It’s an acknowledgement that on your journey under the sun, you are going to have to grapple with evil. So since that’s a given, the counsel we’re given is it would be better to put on the full armor of God. With the objective that you will «be able to stand your ground, and after you’ve done everything, to stand».
Ultimately, God brings the victory. But our assignment is to stand. What did Peter say? Resist him. It’s not a battle we have to win. Jesus defeated Satan totally, irreversibly, for all eternity on the cross. But the full impact of that victory has not yet been played out. So you and I are called to put on the armor of God and to stand in resistance to the expressions of evil. In Habakkuk chapter 3 we get another component of what that posture would look like. He said, «The Sovereign Lord is my strength».
Where does our strength come from? From our self will, from our stubbornness, from our self-determination? Hardly. The Lord is our strength. There’s a strength beyond ourselves. You see that in the God assignments of your life. I think new moms display a strength that has to come from God. A very physically demanding time. Pregnancy and delivery is one of the most vulnerable times a human being can face. And moms are so excited. And you watch the moms who have been through it, when they see the new moms, their faces light up. They don’t look at them and go, «Oh my God, do you understand how dangerous this is»? No, there’s a time of joy, but I think there’s a strength that God gives for a part of the assignment that he brings to our life. «The Lord is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to go on the heights».
There’s a few deer that live around the campus and I get to see them. Like, they amaze me. They’re frail by my…I grew up around horses and cattle. They look a little more robust, but deer seem like they can fly. They come up to a fence that intimidates me and they hop over it like it’s about a 3-inch step. And the promise that God gave to the prophet was that God would make our feet like the feet of a deer, enabling us to go on the height. He gives us our strength and he makes us nimble. We live in a confusing, tumultuous, rapidly changing world. But we have God’s strength, and he makes us nimble. We have to be aware of the conflict that is within us. It’s easy to get focused on the conflict that’s beyond us and be discouraged. After all, we think, «Well, I don’t have that big of influence. I don’t have that much political power. I don’t have that much resource. Nobody cares about my opinion».
Folks, if Almighty God, the Creator of heaven and earth, is aware of you and he’s aware of when you sit or stand, when you come in or when you go out, you have enormous influence. One of the things we’ve got to stop doing is stop saying, «I don’t matter much». You matter to God and who else, who else matters? But the real battles of our life are not external. It’s not about what’s happening in the political arena or in the international arena. The real battles, the determiners of our future, are the ones that are within us. 1 Peter chapter 2 and verse 11: «Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul». He said, «I’m warning you, I’m cautioning you, you’re aliens here, you’re strangers here, you’re not in a… this isn’t your permanent residence. This present world order is not the ultimate set of values that is going to determine your future».
Do you understand how difficult that is to extricate yourself from that? I’ve had the privilege of traveling a bit and living in other places, living in other cultures, and they have habits that are just weird. You know, I lived in Israel for a while. I went to Hebrew University and they read from right to left. Their books are backwards. I mean, literally, you go to the back of the book and you open it and that’s the front. That’s not easy to get used to. I’ve lived in other places and their currency is not green. It’s red and purple. And it doesn’t have George Washington’s picture on it. And you look at it and you think, «Can I buy Boardwalk or Park Place? I want to put a hotel there».
And they don’t serve hamburgers, they eat weird food. I lived in the Philippines for a while. You can get a half a frog on a stick on the street. No, I’m good, thank you. Just, I’m all right. I understood that I wasn’t home. Nobody had to wake me up and go, «Psst, psst, you’re not home». Spend a few weeks in Israel, if you have to stop on the way home, you stop in New York, you’ll be looking for a place to get a sausage biscuit. I almost missed a flight one time. I told everybody that was traveling with me, «Just go get on the plane, I’ll bring you a sausage biscuit».
Almost missed my flight. But that plane smelled good all the way from New York to Nashville. And we have a fundamental challenge in the church. We’re almost indistinguishable from the people who think this is home, that the values of this age are the values they should adopt, that they define success the same way their secular friends do, that their ambitions for their children are defined by the conversations they have with their secular friends. Their attitudes for their goals for their grandchildren aren’t really distinguishable from what their ungodly friends are striving for. Folks, we can’t do that and imagine we’re Christ followers. Peter said, he urges us, it’s pretty strong language. He said, «You’re an alien, a stranger here, abstain». Don’t participate in, withdraw yourself, turn your back on, the sinful lust that wage against the souls of the pagans who don’t come to worship service.
See, that’s the Bible I would like. Because those people have problems. But Peter said that that’s a war against my soul. Your soul is your mind, your will, and your emotions. It’s in your thoughts, it’s how you feel. You see, if you read, it’s okay, every book I read isn’t a biblically based book or every program I happen to see, but you’ve got to be wise enough and careful enough, intentional enough, that if the ideas that you accept and the things that you watch, if they’re being presented to you by people who are ungodly, you don’t want that to frame your thoughts and your emotional patterns. Now, that takes time. It takes some intentionality, it takes some determination.
You know, in all the years I’ve been in ministry, we’ve never had to give a course on how to sin. Everybody that’s ever showed up at church already knew. Isn’t that weird? In fact, look at the person on your right. Say, «You look like you were a really good sinner». We have a sinful nature. Even as a Christ follower, even born again, a totally new creation, you’ve still got that old earthly nature, that adamic nature, that sinful nature. And Paul is writing to a church, he’s reminding them, he said, «The acts of the sinful nature, » he said, «this is obvious stuff. So it doesn’t require much definition: sexual immorality».
God designed sex for the context of marriage, between a man and a woman. It’s very clear. Before that, after that, and beyond that, it’s immoral. There are some other aspects defined, but that’s the essence of it. Impurity before God, debauchery, you know what that just means excess. That should get our attention. We live in the midst of excess everything. Idolatry, that isn’t so much about little statues or big statues carved from wood or stone or made from molten metal. Idolatry is about priorities. Anything that you put in a priority above God is an idol. You can make an idol out of your marriage, you can make an idol out of your children, you can make an idol out of your hobbies.
Please don’t carry that narrow definition and say, «Well, we don’t, you know, we don’t bow to some little statue». And I’m not really interested in your church answer but ask the Holy Spirit, «Is there any place in my life I’ve put something before you»? Witchcraft, not pointed hats and long noses with a wart on the end. Biblical definition of witchcraft has to do with manipulation, domination, and control. Spiritual forces to gain domination, to manipulate, and to control. Our world is filled with it. All sorts of occult practices. I encourage you not to be engaged with them. Don’t seek spiritual guidance from anything other than the Holy Spirit, not through your horoscope, not with the Ouija board. Not with Eastern religions, not with mysticism, seances, it’s a lengthy list. Hatred, discord.
Did you know that if you cause discord, if you stir up strife, you’re put in the same list with the people who practice sexual immorality? Jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, envy. If you look at what somebody else has, you go, «I need one of those. They got that something they did was unfair. They had an opportunity I didn’t have. Somebody, somehow, they got it faster. I want what they’ve got and somebody should give me one of those». We’ve institutionalized that. We have whole departments created to oversee envy in our universities. Drunkenness, orgies, and the like. This next sentence is the punch line.
Paul says, «I warn you, » now he’s writing to Christians. «I warn you, as I did before». I’ve told you this before, he said, I’m telling you again, «that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God». What’s he describing? He’s describing that inner struggle that Peter was referencing. We’re aliens and strangers in this culture. There’s a battle going on. So what do we do with that sinful nature, that old nature, that adamic nature, that part of me that says, «I want and I think, and I feel, I know what God says, but let me tell you what I think»? Oh, please do because I’m just waiting with bated breath. «You know, I mean, I know what the Bible says, but I feel, » hm.
In Colossians chapter 3 and verse 5 we’re given the cure for that. What’s the resolution to that old carnal nature? «Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature». And just in case we were confused, he’s using a lot of the same language in writing the Colossians that he did when he wrote to the Galatians: «Sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, greed, which is idolatry. Because of these, the wrath of God is coming». If you don’t put them to death, you will incur the wrath of God. «You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must rid yourself». He said you used to walk in these ways, but now you’ve made a profession of faith in Jesus, so they’re no longer a problem. That’s not what it says. He says, «But now you must rid yourselves».
See, I would have preferred it if he said, «But now God will deliver you from all of those things». No, we have to rid ourselves of all such things as these: «anger, rage, malice, slander, filthy language from your lips». It takes some determination, it takes some awareness, it takes some willingness. You have to have the intent of holiness. You know, the Bible, we don’t talk about holiness a lot. It seems unachievable. It’s kind of a word that’s not available to us, but the Bible says, I didn’t bring you all the verses, but it says without holiness, no one will see the Lord. So holiness isn’t optional. Holiness is mandatory. What’s it look like?
You say, «Well, we don’t earn our way to heaven». No, you’re right, we don’t. But the fact that you’re a new creature in Christ doesn’t absolve you of your responsibility to lead a godly life. You see, the value that you attach to a gift can be understood by how you care for it, how you respond to it. If you gave me a brand new Ferrari convertible, red, I’m just saying, I’d be very grateful. I would drive it home. And if you came to visit and I had filled it with topsoil and put tomato plants in it because I like fresh tomatoes in the summertime, what are the chances you’d give me a second Ferrari? Slim and none. Because I treated your gift very shabbily.
You see, our response to the grace of God is our expression of how we value it. And this isn’t really complicated. Young children, small children, have a hard time valuing gifts, right? They don’t have any sense of evaluation. They haven’t cultivated yet that awareness and when we’re new Christians and we’re beginning our journey, we in a similar way have a hard time valuing and understanding, but as the children mature and grow, you hope they learn with the responsibility of resources and how to manage them.
The sacrifices that have been made so that they can have the opportunities that are presented to them. Well, in a similar way as the people of faith, as we mature in the Lord, we understand the sacrifice that was made for us to have the incredible gift of grace that we have received. And so we make choices to put to death our old carnal nature as an expression of gratitude. If you’re living sloppy lives, not only are you putting in question the reality of your faith, you are giving a blatant expression of your childishness. We’re called to put to death those things.