Frankie Mazzapica - Spiritual Warfare - Part 2
The title of today’s message is «Spiritual Warfare Part Two.» Last week was Part One, and next week will be Part Three. Here’s what I hope we can walk away with today: We are 100% aware that every morning we wake up, there are demons attacking us. Every single morning, I talked about this last Sunday. My eyes were still closed; I hadn’t even opened them yet, and I was having all these discouraging and depressing thoughts. I thought to myself, «Devil, can you just wait until I get a cup of coffee at least?» I want you to know that you’re not fighting against flesh and blood. If you have somebody at work named Eddie who’s driving you crazy—if your name is Eddie, it’s just an example—let me change his name. If you have someone at work who’s driving you crazy, I want to let you know that it’s not Eddie that you’re fighting; you’re in the middle of a warfare. The enemy will whisper into that person’s ear to torment you.
My oldest daughter is on the front row. She’s typically away at college, but she’s home for a couple of weeks during the holiday season. When she was in high school, she came back home and said, «There’s this one person insulting me with an insecurity that I have never told anyone.» For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out how they figured it out. Then it dawned on me: the only way they could ever know is if the devil told them. The devil will whisper into someone’s ear and tell them exactly what will hurt the most. So we look at people and we wonder, «What is going on right now?» I want you to know that every single temptation, every single moment of depression, and every time you think you are stuck in a season that you will never get out of—that’s the devil. If there is a recurring sin in your life that you just can’t stop, it’s the devil.
I want you to hear me say this: not everything is the devil, but more things are the devil than you realize. For example, if the light is red, I can’t tell you it’s the devil. If you’re late for work, the devil wasn’t in your alarm clock; you forgot to set it. Are you with me? Say yes.
So I’m going to talk about two things that are involved in spiritual warfare. The first thing is prayer; the second thing is anointing. If you have 79 tattoos, you might as well make it 80. I want you to get this tattoo: Psalms 56:9, the Living Bible. If you are not going to ever write down a scripture in this church, I want you to write this one down. If I could tattoo it, I would. If I could come into your house and put a magnet on your refrigerator, or if I could put a bumper sticker on your car, it would be Psalms 56:9 in the Living Bible. It says, «Every time I pray, the tide of the battle turns.» Every time I pray! If your children are fighting something and you’re going, «I don’t know what’s going on,» I want you to know every time you pray, the tide of the battle turns.
Sometimes you’ll meet somebody who seems to be in perpetual devastation. I know people who, every time I talk to them, they’re going through something that is perpetual devastation. If that person would just pray with passion—now, let me give you an example. When waffles from IHOP come to your table and you go, «Thank you, Jesus, for this food,» that’s a passionate prayer, and that’s about right here. You don’t want to do more than that at IHOP; they’ll ask you to leave. But there’s another level of passion that you go to when you’re in the middle of a battle. It’s like it’s coming from down here. It has nothing to do with how eloquent you are. When I pray passionately, I say, «I love you, I love you, I love you.» It comes from my heart.
If you only pray for a battle to shift one time, you really don’t want that battle to shift. These are prayers that you are relentless over. Psalms 56:3 says this: «Every time I wake up, I’m going to be back at it again, laying the pieces of my life on Your altar, waiting for the fire to fall.» Every single time I wake up—that’s the attitude: every time you pray, the tide of the battle turns.
I’ve got a friend named Matt over here. Not all of you know who he is, so he doesn’t have to feel like the whole church is looking at him, but his name is Matt and I don’t think he’ll mind me saying this; if he does, he’ll definitely let me know later on. He was addicted to, I think, every drug—was that about right? He was pawning everything to get more—gifts, anything of value—pawning it. Then he went to a rehabilitation center, and someone there who was a Christian sat down and prayed with Matt. When he left that rehabilitation center, he walked out as a completely different person.
Now he’s on the third row over here, worshiping God. He used to cash in things to get drugs; now he’s one of the most generous people I’ve ever met. I have an 11-year-old daughter who said, «Mr. Matt is very generous to people, but he’s also very generous to himself. He likes to buy himself presents.» But how in the world can somebody go from a pawn shop to the house of God? He’s fighting demons that most people have no clue about. I had someone tell me, «Frankie, you don’t know what it’s like to be addicted to crack or cocaine.» The best way I can describe it is if I put a trash bag over your face and you can’t breathe, and it’s sucking into your mouth, and you can’t breathe. Then somebody comes and pokes a hole in the trash bag, and that’s the only hole you have. That’s how you live when you’re wanting the next drug.
How does a person get from here to there? Somebody was praying. The tide of the battle shifts. He’s probably brought more church people to church than half of the people in the church. How does that happen? The tide of the battle changes when you’ve got demons, like a pack of wolves, coming after you. And make no mistake, that’s how they are. There are certain demons that are assigned to you. But I can walk by a mountain of cocaine and just kick it over—that’s zero temptation for me. That demon is not assigned to me. Now, the demons of depression and anxiety have been assigned to me. I remember being five years old, going into a panic attack. Those are assigned to me.
I’m anointed to preach this, but I have to live it just like everybody else. I have to remind myself of Psalms 56:9: «Every time I pray, the tide of the battle turns.» I’m sharing this with you, but I have to use that weapon too. I’m in warfare just like you; but I’m also winning. You are winning. You are winning. I’m winning. You might say, «No, no, no, I’m not winning.» Where are you right now, at this moment? Right now, I’m not talking about yesterday; I’m not talking about last week or last night. Where are you right now, at this moment? You are in the house of the God of the Most High. You are in His presence. Did somebody grab you by the ear and bring you here? No. You’re a grown man; you’re a grown woman. You decided, «I’m going to go ahead and go to the house of God.»
Now, you might say, «No, no, no, my mama did grab my ear this morning.» You’re here! You are here! And if you’re here, you’re winning. If you’re in the house of God, you are winning. You may not know what decision you made last week, but the decision you made this morning was a godly decision. You say, «Well, I don’t know how I’m going to do this week.» Let me tell you how you’re going to do this week: Psalms 56:9—every single time you pray, the tide of the battle turns.
How many people here prayed while worship was going on? How many people sang during worship? How many people, at the very least—even if you didn’t sing—lifted your chin to the Lord? How many people here allowed your heart to go toward the Lord? You were worshiping Him! By doing all those things, the tide of the battle is shifting. Those demons that are after you are being gone. Psalms 34:1 says there is an angel of the Lord above your head to deliver you. This is warfare! Are you with me? Say yes. The only people who lose are the people who don’t pray, and the people who pray always win. Are you with me? Say yes.
Alright, let’s go to the next point. The next point is anointing. The Bible says in Isaiah 10:27 that the anointing breaks the yoke. Now, yoke for those of you who don’t know is, back in the day— they don’t do it now, but whenever they were plowing fields, they would put a plow behind two oxen. They would have like railroad ties with it, and they would drop it over these oxen. The reason they would drop it over is they could be easily controlled that way. The enemy wants to put a yoke on you so that he can control you—so he can make you down, he can make you depressed, he can make you think like this, he can make you feel like this, he can get other people to drag them over to you, and then he can grab your neck and pull you down.
Let me tell you this: your feelings, your thoughts, your emotions often follow your chin. When your chin drops, the enemy is having a lot of fun with you. When your chin is up, the enemy has no power. How do I know that? I’ve lived it. When I’m walking, my chin drops—like, «Uh oh, I’m in trouble.» I better get that back up! The yoke wants to pull me down. What breaks the yoke? The anointing breaks the yoke. If you are going to win, you have to believe in the anointing of God. The anointing is not something you can see; it’s something you walk in by faith. «I am anointed by God; I am anointed by God.»
Will you believe it while you’re saying it? No, but that has nothing to do with anything. You just speak it—"I am anointed by God.» It’s like communion; the blood—it’s when you take communion, whether it’s grape juice or wine, it’s the blood—the anointing. There’s power in it! I’m speaking at a women’s conference in January—oh, we are in January! Wow! It’s in two weeks. We’ll put it on the website if you’re interested in going. There are usually several thousand ladies there; it’s in Baytown, so it’s about an hour and a half away. If you’re interested, we’ll put it on the website if you want to go.
One of the speakers is a lady named Jenny Donnelly. What she noticed is that as long as she was outside of her house, she was full of joy. She’s always laughing; everybody wants to be around her; she’s just fun. But as soon as she went into her house, it was the exact opposite—down, upset. Their family was fighting; the kids were the same way. As long as the kids were outside of the house, they were the life of the party; but every time the family came into the house, they were just fighting all the time. So Jenny said, «This is spiritual!» This is not just a bad day. Just as a sidebar, if there are ten chickens on a fence and one is squawking, that chicken’s having a bad day. But if all ten are squawking, there’s a wolf in the woods. Sometimes when there’s one thing bad going on in my life, I’m just like, «Man, geez.» But when there are a lot of bad things going on in my life, there’s a wolf in the woods.
So she walks into her house one day and says, «There’s a wolf, and I’m tired of it.» Remember what I said? The anointing breaks the yoke. She went to the grocery store and bought a whole bunch of grape juice—Welch’s grape juice. She comes up to the cash register and boom—drops it everywhere! When she gets home, she takes the grape juice and says, «Lord, I know that the anointing breaks the yoke, and I know that there’s power in Your blood.» She went around her house in a circle, saying, «In the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus, in the name of Jesus.» She said, «Devil, this is God’s house!» Wouldn’t you know that when the family comes in, everybody is laughing, in a good mood, joyful?
I remember my dad doing the same thing but in a different way. My dad’s Sicilian, so it’s going to be different right off the bat. He walks to the back door of the house, opens it, and says, «Devil, I know you’re in here. I don’t know how you got in here, but get to stepping right now! Get out right now!» Some of you need to go to the front door, kick it open, and say, «Hey, I don’t know how you got in here. I don’t know if you came through the air conditioning vent, but here’s the door. The door is open—get to stepping! Bye-bye! See you later!» Are you with me? Say yes.
Last scripture: 2 Samuel 16:13. Samuel walks up to David. David is just a teenager. There’s an evil king in Israel; his name is Saul. God’s done with Saul. «I’m done with you. You’re out! I see a boy who knows how to pray.» Man, if you know how to pray, God is going to give you more influence. You might say, «I’m not good at praying"—get good! If you can say, «I love you, I love you,» over and over again, you’re the best prayer in the room! Are you with me? Say yes!
So Samuel comes up to David. Keep in mind, David has older brothers who do everything but spit on him. The Bible says this in 2 Samuel 16:13: «Samuel grabbed the horn of anointing oil and poured it on his head.» This is what I love: in front of his brothers. See, sometimes the Lord will anoint you and make your enemies watch. Have you ever bumped into somebody who was mean to you several years ago? Have you ever bumped into anyone who didn’t believe in you and thought you were going to be a loser your entire life? Then you see them, and you’re like, «You’re welcome, bye-bye! I don’t want you talking to me. You know too much about the old Frankie; you need to get out right now!»
People who don’t believe in you end up seeing what God does with you. Samuel anointed David in front of his brothers, and the Bible says this in the second half of that verse: «From that day forward, the power of God rested on David.» We’re going to anoint every single person in this room, and I want you to know that from this day forward, a greater anointing than you’ve ever walked in in your life will happen. The authority you have—if you need to open up the door and tell the devil to get out, or if you start praying for somebody and say, «I need the tide of the battle to turn"—when you walk out of here, those words will carry more authority than ever in your life.
So in a minute, I’m going to ask for everybody to stand. I asked nine guys—I could have asked 49 guys because we’ve got a lot of men in this room. I could have asked 109 guys who are men of God, but I asked these nine men. If I were in trouble, I would ask for them to pray for me. In fact, Joe’s sitting on the second row. We’ve watched each other go through battles for almost 20 years, and I told Debbie, who organized this service, «I want Joe praying for my family. I’m not praying for them; I want Joe to do it.»
I know where you usually sit in this section; I recognize your faces. In other words, if some people start sitting over here, I’m just going to be like, «Hey, where’s the good-looking baldheaded guy? Where’d he go? Oh, he’s over here.» So we strategically placed these men of God to pray for you. I’d like for everyone to stand on your feet. After you’re prayed for, you’ll be free to go. If our ushers and people who are going to help me pray would all get in their positions, they’ve all got anointed oil. Every person here is going to be anointed by God.
You know, have you ever taken a cup of water? I have this plant in my room; I take a glass of water, go over there, and pour the water into the plant. Now, is the glass itself the important part? I could put the glass on the plant or the soil and walk out, and nothing would happen. It’s the water inside the glass. So the people praying for you are just the glass—the vessel. It’s the anointing that’s blessing you.
Let me pray for you corporately: In the name of Jesus, Satan, I command you to leave this room. Every single demonic spirit, I command you to leave in the name of Jesus! In the name of the Lord, I speak strength into your life. I speak victory into your life in Jesus' name. This will be the greatest year you’ve ever lived! I want many of you to go home and grab a piece of paper or a journal and write down five victories that you have to have this year. Watch what God does! You need to write them down because He moves so swiftly and stealthily that He’ll take care of those problems, and you won’t even realize it because you’re praying about the next battle. You have to look back and say, «Wow! I can’t believe He took care of that. It happened so fast; I didn’t even notice!» So write it down in the name of the Lord.
Alright, let’s begin praying. Part three of spiritual warfare will be next Sunday.