John 14 (Part 4) :18-31

Open your Bibles to John chapter 14. We are continuing our study here on Sunday morning of the Gospel of John and we've been in the 14th chapter now a long time, just because there's so much here. And we've gone, even gone through the very verses that we're going to read this morning. But I'm doing them again because I know that there are things in here that some of you, when we read through these last time you might've even been a little disappointed because they didn't cover some of the things that were being said here, so we're going to go back and cover those things. Beginning at verse 18, John 14:18, and down through the end of the chapter. I'm reading from the ESV, follow along as I read through these verses.

Let's pray. Oh Lord, we pray for open hearts to hear your voice today as you speak and as you teach and as you instruct us. As you fill our hearts with words of grace and comfort and promises that fill us with supernatural joy. Guide us, Lord, through this time as we unpack these verses, Lord, speak to our hearts. We long to hear from you, for we ask it in Jesus precious name, amen. Toward the end of that, you might recall that Jesus reminded them. He said, you, heard me say to you a little bit ago that I'm going away and that really upset them. In fact, He said it in chapter 13, let me put that up on the screen from chapter 13. He said, John 13:33 (ESV) ‘Where I'm going, you cannot come’ As a matter of fact. And that really took the wind out of their sails. So knowing as Jesus did that they were distressed by that statement, He begins to speak words of comfort and many of those words contain wonderful promises with them. In fact, promise after promise. And as I looked through this section of scripture, it depends on how you count them, but I counted 7 words of comfort. And so, I don't know how much you need comfort today, but we're going to be comforted by our Savior just as He sought to comfort His disciples on that fateful night. In fact, we're going to put these up on the screen so you can see them together and these are wonderful. This is what I found, the first thing is, 7 Words of Comfort “I will not leave you as orphans” “You will see me” “Because I live, you also will live” “You will know that I am in the Father…” “The Holy Spirit…will teach you all things” “My peace I give to you.” “Let not your hearts be troubled”

That sound good, huh? Yeah, we can, we can hang onto that. The first word of comfort is in verse 18 in your Bible where Jesus says, “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” I found something interesting about this word. I actually, I looked it up because I thought, you know, I mean, we all know what orphans means, but I thought, you know, sometimes the Greek has some very interesting dynamics to it and I was not disappointed. I found out that this word in the Greek does not just refer to children who have lost their parents, but it could be applied to students who had lost their master, isn't that interesting? Or lost their teacher. And so He says to them, “I will not leave you as orphans;” I will not abandon you. I will not abandon you, my Father will not abandon you. What a wonderful thing, do you think that they were comforted? I hope that they were comforted when Jesus said that, I will not leave you. You know, I know I told you here just a moment ago that where I'm going you can't come, but I want you to know something, I'm not going to abandon you, I'm not going to just leave you, I'm not going to hang you out to dry. That's one of the phrases we might use today. And some of you might be thinking, well, I'm sure that was a very comforting statement for the disciples to hear. Sure, it'd be cool if I could hear something like that from the Lord. Well, you have, because this promise that Jesus gives us, that He will not leave us, is one that we can all embrace, and I'll tell you why. There's a wonderful repeat of this in the Book of Hebrews, let me show you on the screen. It's from Hebrews chapter 13, where the author of Hebrews says,

Keep your life free from love of money, (we actually looked at this verse last Wednesday in our study of Genesis) and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” Now, the writer of Hebrews is actually quoting the Book of Joshua, but he's bringing it into the New Testament understanding that all believers can embrace that promise; the very promise that God gave to Joshua right before they went into the promised land. Or actually, they were just into the promised land, but before they had begun to engage in the various battles that would take place, He said,

(Joshua 1:5) And the writer of Hebrews helps you and me to understand that promise is the birthright of every believer in Jesus Christ.

You can embrace that promise. I will not abandon you, I'm not going to leave you, you're not going to be like orphans. I'm going to take care of you, and it's a wonderful promise. And you need to know that whatever you're going through right now in this life, you're not going through it alone. I have learned over my years of walking with the Lord that although God may not God will not deliver us from every difficult circumstance, He'll go through it with you. He won't abandon you in it, that's one thing you can know. Even though God, I mean, God may deliver you, He may, that's His choice. And I don't, you know, and I never know, and you don't know really either until it either happens or whatever. But whether He delivers you from a painful or difficult circumstance or not, you can be sure that He will not abandon you in the midst of it, you know that. Moving on to verse 19, we find the second word of comfort where He says, “Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me.” Now this is a word that was directed specifically to the disciples. He was assuring them that the separation that He spoke of earlier would not last forever, they would see Him again. And of course this was true as 3 days later, 3 days really from this time, He appeared to them on the day of the resurrection and then He also appeared to them later. Look what Luke tells us in Acts chapter 1, up on the screen it says that,

So Jesus made good on this promise. He said, even though I've told you that I'm going away, I want you to know that you'll see me again, and they did. For 40 days, in fact, they continued to see Jesus prior to His final ascension. The third word of comfort, which is also a promise, is at the end of verse 19, where Jesus says, “Because I live, you also will live.” And that's a wonderful statement, but I have no doubt about the fact that the disciples really didn't understand it at the time that Jesus gave it, “Because I live, you also will live.” But later they would come to realize that when Jesus said, because I live, He was referring to His resurrection from the grave and that because He raised Himself from the grave, that was a declaration of the very power that He is then giving to you and me as believers in Jesus. The promise of life everlasting, the death, the death of the physical body is not the end, in fact, it's really a beginning.

You know, sometimes it's weird. I don't know how you process death and dying, but the Lord reminded me of something recently and it was one of those interesting sort of things that when. You ever have that happen, when the Lord reminds you of something, you kind of go, you know, of course I knew that, but I just wasn't thinking about it, but I was. Sue and I like to watch these documentaries and some of them go way back to, well, hundreds and hundreds of years ago, we just enjoy watching documentaries. And I'm looking, sometimes I'm looking at a picture, like whether it's something from World War 1 or maybe World War 2, and in my mind I'm kind of thinking, man, all those people are dead. What a morbid thought, but it just kind of pops into my brain from time to time. Well, the Lord reminded me of something recently, He said, Paul, all those people are alive, their bodies may have died, but they're alive. And I thought, you know what, Lord? You're right about that, they are alive and particularly those who died in Christ, they are more alive than when they were living on this earth. One of the most wonderful joys of being a pastor over the years is when I've had the privilege of doing memorial or funeral services for a believer, it really is a joy. There's sadness for the family who are desperately missing the presence for the time being of the loved one who has gone before them, but there is such joy in the knowledge that their loved one is with the Lord and more alive now than ever. And if that loved one had a choice of staying where they are or coming back, they'd say, thanks very much, I'll stay right where I am and just wait for you here, right? We think this is just, we get the impression that this is life, this is not life, this is dying. From the moment you were born, you began to die, the dying process was underway. And in some of us who are a little older, it's a little more visible. But it doesn't really matter how old you are, or were at some time in your life, the dying process was underway. The very first time you ever got a toothache, that was a reminder that the corruption of the body is taking place, you know, isn't that something? But, our birthright as believers is life. You remember when Jesus said this to Martha at the standing before the tomb of her brother, and I don't even know how much Martha understood what He was saying, but let me put this on the screen. It was from John 11, we dealt with this earlier. Jesus was talking to Martha and He says,

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, (speaking of physical death) yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me (this is crazy) shall never die. Do you believe this?” And you know, I love that question at the end, “Do you believe this?” Jesus is saying to you and me, do you believe this? Are you hanging on to this? You know, when the Lord had to remind me as I'm watching TV and going, oh, those people are dead and He's going nah, uh, that's not true. Do you believe this? Yeah. The fourth word of comfort is found in verse 20, look with me in your Bible. It says, “In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.” And He's talking about the coming of the Holy Spirit to indwell believers. We've made the point several times here just recently, that in the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit did not indwell believers, the Holy Spirit came upon believers, the Holy Spirit was with people. But the Spirit did not come in to dwell until Jesus cleansed the vessel so that the Spirit could come to indwell, which He did through His death on the cross. And now that the Holy Spirit comes to live inside those of us who have embraced what Jesus did for us on the cross, one of the things He comes to do, well, He obviously gives us new birth. But He also comes to communicate with you and me, with the believer, and He communicates that we are in Christ, that Christ is in the Father and you are in Him and He is in you and this is passed along and confirmed by the Holy Spirit. Paul wrote about this in Romans, let me show you this.

The Spirit himself (Paul wrote in Romans 8:16) bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, Did you notice that the Holy Spirit does not come to bear witness to your intellect? He comes to bear witness to your spirit that you are a child of God. It's a challenge as a believer to learn to listen to your spirit, it's a challenge. We are so geared to listening with these physical ears and understanding life from what we can see and taste and touch and so forth. But we, as believers in Jesus, have been made alive in the Spirit. Our spirit has been made alive, and the Holy Spirit is now living within us, and He is communicating to you and me constantly, every day, talking to us, revealing Jesus, revealing truth, revealing confirmation of who we are in Christ. What is true? What is good? What is bad? He's talking to us all the time. Here's the question, are we listening, are we listening? I don't pretend for a moment to suggest to you that learning to hear with the Spirit is easy. But it is of necessity for you and me to begin to say, Jesus, help me to quiet my soul so that I can hear through my spirit, whom you are joined with now through your Holy Spirit, you know? David talks about this in the Psalms, I have learned to quiet my soul. (Psalm 131:2) What is the soul? It is your emotions and your intellect, and it's constantly going, even when you're asleep, it's going, isn't it? That's why you get those wacky dreams, right? And I mean wacky, I get whacked out, oh, if I, even just last, I still remember last night's dream, it was weird. We were, I was helping get cattle put together, like we were doing a roundup, and one of the cattle had this beak like a prehistoric animal and it was freaking me out, and I woke up going, what was that all about? You ever do that? That's because your soul is constantly active, your soul never goes to sleep, your body does. And so the soul is constantly knocking at the door of our consciousness and it's saying, listen to me! And many of us just give into it all day long and we just, we're constantly listening to our brain and our emotions and we miss what's going on in the Spirit, we miss. Because, you know, before we came to Christ, we didn't have that spiritual input, all we had was the soul, all we had was intellect and emotion. And the world, of course, that's all they've got. So their constant mantra of the world is, follow your heart, follow your emotions, right? Where's that? How's that doing for you? And that, but that's all they've got, that's all they've got. And many of us as believers in Jesus, we've embraced that idea of following your heart in our Christianity and it's, I'm telling you, it's a dead end. The Bible tells us that our heart is deceitfully wicked and beyond cure, don't follow that!

That's going to get you into trouble, follow the Spirit. We are to be Spirit led as believers in Jesus. And that's possible now because the Spirit has come to live within us when we came to faith in Jesus. But it's not an automatic thing that we begin to follow the Spirit just, boom! Because we've had a lifetime, many of us, of following our soul and then we've got this habitual sort of a thing going on in our lives, right? Can you relate guys? You're not, you're, let me see a little action from you. I mean, some of you are just kind of going, huh? But, because, listen, I was 25 years old or so when I got serious about walking with Jesus. So I had a quarter of a century to learn to follow my soul and do you think it was overnight when I came to Christ to start tying in or listening to the Spirit? Heavens! I still struggle to this day, learning to hear, learning to quiet my soul so that I can hear His voice. We live in such a busy world that is constantly impacting our intellect and emotions and if we don't learn to quiet our soul so we can hear the Spirit, we're going to miss out on so much. One of the things we're going to miss out on is the assurance of who you are in Jesus Christ. As Paul said, the Spirit bears witness with your spirit that you are a child of God. (Romans 8:16) Sometimes when people come to me and they say, “pastor, I don't understand it, I just don't have an assurance of my salvation. I know that Jesus died for me on the cross, I know that what He did for me was for me and I've prayed and I've accepted what He did and I just don't have that assurance. I've put my faith in Jesus, what am I doing wrong?” I think a lot of times you're just dealing with somebody who just hasn't learned to quiet their soul. And that voice of the Spirit that wants to speak to them and say, you're mine, just hasn't gotten through the noise yet. Okay, the fifth word of comfort, Jesus in large is here on the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer in verses 25 and 26. Look there with me, He says, “These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. 26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” So here's another work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer and that is the teaching work of the Spirit. And those of you who've been around Calvary Chapel for a while, this is probably no big surprise. You know, I pray at almost every time before I teach and you hear me praying, I say, Holy Spirit, come and teach us, that's His role.

Every person like me who is a pastor teacher, we're just an extension of the Holy Spirit's teaching ministry, it's Him teaching, right? We're just vessels, He's the teacher. That's what Jesus is saying, the Holy Spirit will teach you all things, and He will bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you, beautiful. And it's beautifully expressed, believe it or not, in the Psalms. Look at Psalm 32:8.

Did you see? Now, one of the things I love about this passage is that the Lord says that not only is He our teacher, He's our counselor. In fact, you know, the Bible talks about Him as the Wonderful Counselor. (Isaiah 9:6) In other words, He's really good at what He does. Yeah, I'm impressed. Can I just tell you right now, it breaks my heart sometimes when I see Christians running after earthly counselors, when they have the Wonderful Counselor living in their heart. We've gotten way too off out of balance people with counselors, okay, as a culture. We've, and I'm not saying that counselors can't do good, I'm not saying that. I'm saying we've got out of balance and we've given deference to human counselors and we've ignored the Wonderful Counselor and God makes His promise in His Word, “I will counsel you.” Are we willing to sit down at His feet and hear His counsel? You know. We need to start listening, the Wonderful Counselor and we can trust that He will teach and counsel us. The sixth word of comfort is found in verse 27 in your Bible where it says, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.” And then He gives us this contrast, He says, not like the world, it's not going to be like the world gives peace, He says. That's not the kind of peace I'm going to give to you. So of course it makes us all stop and kind of say, well, what kind of peace does the world give? Well, the world, peace in the world is simply the absence of trouble and it's temporary. It might last an hour or two or a day or a week or something like that. But it can then be just quickly removed because just one bad thing happens in our lives and then suddenly we're not at peace anymore. There's chaos in our hearts, and we're just all, you know. Whatever it might be, whatever it might be. Whether it's problems with your family, problems at work, maybe you got a kind of a scary diagnosis from the doctor or something like that and suddenly your peace is gone, it's just gone. And so Jesus comes along and He says, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.” And by the way, it's not like the peace that the world gives because you see that peace is dependent on circumstances, mine is not. And so I got to thinking about this when He says, “Peace I leave with you;” and I thought to myself, well, what is that peace? Well, you know, I thought 2 things where Jesus brings us peace. And the first is the inward peace that we have as believers, knowing that we've been reconciled to God. Now, don't overlook this one, Paul talks about this in his letter to the Colossians. Let me show you this from Colossians 1. He says,

For in [Jesus] all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, (and look at this last phrase) making peace by the blood of his cross. What is Paul saying there? He's saying that, do you guys remember before you came to Christ how restless you were? How restless? And you were looking for satisfaction and you were looking for meaning and purpose and you couldn't find it. And you were running around the world, you know, trying to find it there, and some of you tried to make money, and some of you tried to have things, and some of you tried to think, you know, pleasure, physical, or whatever. You know, all the things, all the, and nothing satisfied, and you continued to be just as unsatisfied and restless as, you know, as ever. And then you came to Christ and suddenly you realized, I am at peace with God. And whether you verbalized it or not is really not the point, because we do feel it, we do sense it. I'm at peace with God, there's no stress or difficulty or irritation, I'm at peace through the blood of Jesus Christ. People, don't underestimate this first expression of peace because I believe that this lack of peace that the world, and I'm talking about now your unbelieving neighbor or friend or relative or whatever. This lack of peace is what is behind so much of the violence and darkness and anxiety and stress that is felt and experienced daily in the world. People are making themselves crazy and I mean that literally because they have no peace with God. Now they don't know that, they don't know that they are not at peace with God, all they know is something's not right because they were created by God. They were created to worship and to know God, but they don't know Him and they don't worship Him and they know something isn't right. And so they're looking in the world to try to make what is wrong right, and it's not working, and they are literally driving themselves insane. Yeah, literally. If you look at the world and you watch the news and you think this is insanity and now you know where it comes from. The more a culture says no to God and yes to self, the more insane they become and the sicker they become emotionally, you know that? So, yeah don't underestimate this peace that we have with God. And this is one of the things that the enemy is going to try to wrestle with you about. He's going to try to get you to think about your sin, you know, when you make a mistake, when you mess up and he's going to begin to speak to you and go, oh, oh, look what you did, God's not going to be happy with you. And what he wants to do is take away your peace by taking away your belief that you are at peace with God. And that's when you have to come back to the scripture and you have to remind yourself that it is through the Blood of the Lamb that you are at peace with God, not by your own personal righteousness, are you with me? I am at peace with God because of what Jesus did, not because of what I do or don’t do. It's because of what He did, so important. But there's another kind of a peace that comes into the lives of believers, and that is the peace that comes from knowing that Jesus is taking care of us, that He's in charge of our lives, that He's working in our lives according to the purpose of His will. Remember what Paul wrote to the Philippians? Let me show you, he says, Philippians 4:6-7 (ESV)

…do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. (and what happens as a result of that?) And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, (that's that peace that Jesus gives, that's not like the world) will guard your hearts and your minds (that's a great word, that word means it will be like a sentry standing on the wall, right? Gun cocked, looking for things that are trying to take away your peace. He says, He will guard your hearts and minds) in Christ Jesus. But listen, that promise of peace isn't automatic. It requires that we make a determination in our minds and hearts not to be anxious, first of all, and then to bring whatever is bothering us to the Lord in prayer, and that's that supplication. And remembering thanksgiving, because it is good to have a heart of thanks, especially when you're worried, to just think about all the things that you can be thankful for and to lay those up to the Lord. I tell you, when you have a thankful heart, it's a more receptive heart to the things of the Lord. And He says, then the peace of God, which transcend understanding, goes beyond your ability, in other words, you're not going to be able to explain. I don't know why I'm so peaceful, but I just have peace. And we often hear this when people are going through very stressful and very difficult circumstances, we get all upset for them. We come to them and go, “are you okay?” And they're like, “I'm good.” And we're like, “how are you good?” “I got the peace of Jesus.” You know? It is really incredible, I have walked into so many hospital rooms and so many sick rooms and ministered to people when they were going through stressful things. And I went in there kind of thinking, oh Lord, how in the world am I going to say anything that's going to give them any comfort and I'm putting all the pressure on me, you know. I got to be, you know, pastor Paul with the perfect word of comfort and so forth and I get there and I find out they're at peace, and they minister to me. I walk out the door going, oh God, you're so good, you know, because they've got that peace that passes understanding. How wonderful it is that peace that guards our hearts when we make a determination not to be anxious, but instead to pray. Alright, seventh and final word of comfort is at the end of verse 27, which says, “Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” Earlier, you'll remember, in the very first verse of the chapter, Jesus said, “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.” And this is one of the statements that reminds us that a troubled heart can be avoided if we place our faith in the Lord and trust Him to care for us, a troubled heart can be avoided. I have to keep telling myself that because I've had my share of troubled hearts, just like you have. And I have to keep going back and saying, you know, Lord, you've given me a way to deal with a troubled heart and I just, I got to put my faith in you, Lord, I got to put my faith in you. It's so much easier said than done. You know, you walk up to somebody who's got a troubled heart and you just go, have faith! You know, or something like that. No, it's so easy to say, but how's your faith doing, when you're going through hard times? It's a reminder to all of us, isn't it? That we need to keep praying, keep pressing in, keep pressing in to have a deeper, more substantial faith. All right, I covered those 7 statements, but you'll notice that there's just a couple of final things that Jesus says that I want to touch on before we finish here today. We're almost out of time, but would you look with me at verse 28? There's something here that might be a bugaboo for you. He says here, “You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.” I wanted to touch on that statement because that's, it's one that continues to cause a great deal of trouble for a lot of believers when they see, you know. Well, they hear us saying, you know, Jesus is equal to the Father, Jesus and the Father are one. Jesus, you know, is God in human flesh, He's equal with the Father and then they read a verse like this, where Jesus says, “the Father is greater than I” and they're like, okay, what now, what? They’re just kind of, now I'm confused, what exactly does that mean? And the reason we get confused, Christians, can I just tell you this? The reason we get confused is because we cannot comprehend the incarnation. And when I say the word incarnation, that's a word that simply means God becoming a man, which He did in the person of Jesus Christ. Now, you know that happened, you know that God became a man, right, in the person of Jesus, but you can't know how He did and I can't either. All we know is that it happened. Do you know that theologians for years and years and years have been calling this the mystery of the incarnation? Did you know that? Do you know why they call it the mystery of the incarnation? Because they can't figure it out, because they recognize it is beyond human comprehension. Let me, Paul tried to give us a little insights in his letter to the Philippians. Here's what he said, from Philippians chapter 2, he said,

… Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, (and that means before His incarnation) did not count (or consider) equality with God a thing to be grasped, (or held on to, and then here's the phrase) but emptied himself, (take note of those words) by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. Now you'll notice that Paul uses words that we can readily understand. He uses words like, emptied himself, right? Taking form of a servant, born in the likeness of men. We can understand what those words mean, but those simple words speak of a reality that is so far beyond our comprehension that we can't even begin to understand it. And to think for a moment that we could comprehend the process by which the eternal God, who has no beginning and will have no end, condescended to become like you and me, to think that we could possibly grasp the depth of what that means is arrogance at its height. There's just no way, you can't understand it, I can't understand it. But our conclusion is, that as a man, Jesus spoke of the Father as greater than He. As the Son of God, which is touching His essence, He said, I and the Father are one, right? They are equal. As the son of man, the Father is greater, as the Son of God, He is equal to the Father. And I say those words because they're consistent with what has been revealed in the scripture, but I don't begin to comprehend them. And this is one of those truths that we confess with our mouth, but we, as far as understanding them, we bow the knee, and we simply say, Lord, you are God. Like the apostle Paul, we cry out as he did in Romans chapter 11 saying,

How unsearchable.

The final statement that I want to look at here this morning is one that ought to be an encouragement to all of us, it's in verse 30, we'll end with this. He says, “I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me,” And there's 2 important statements that are being given here. First of all, Jesus called Satan, the ruler of this world, that's what Jesus called him, I didn't, He did. He said, Satan is the ruler of this world, but his ruler rulership is limited, right. And that's an important thing for you and me to remember. But the next statement is even more important and that is where Jesus said, “He has no claim on me.” The NIV renders this as, “He has no hold over me” and what that means is, is that there's nothing that Satan can do to push or coerce Jesus to do or to say anything that He doesn't want to do or say. Satan has no power over Jesus. Christians, did you hear me say that? Satan has no power over Jesus, none. Zero, zip, zilch. That's why it is impossible for a believer to be invested with a demonic spirit. Do you know how many Christians believe that believers can be demonically possessed? Do you know how many Christians believe that? And they believe it because they're taught that. Some of you may have been taught that. It is a falsehood, there is not one single biblical reference to a believer being invested with a demonic spirit. And never once, when Paul is writing his letters or Peter or James, and they're addressing the issue of sin, never once do they suggest that what you need is to have a spirit exercised from you. Never once, they only ever say, you need to confess your sin and repent, that's it. Listen we've been making the point here today that as a believer, the Holy Spirit lives inside of you. You really think the Holy Spirit is going to share you with a demon? Good grief, no. Where light is, darkness cannot be and the light of His presence lives in you and you need to remember that. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 28? I love this, you guys hear me say this a lot. Matthew 28:18 (ESV) And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” Hey guys, all authority means all authority and it's not just in heaven, it's on earth. Satan might be in some sort of temporary rulership over the world, but Jesus has ultimate authority over the earth, right? And that means that Satan has been deposed.

Paul says it in Colossians, he says that, Colossians 2:15 (ESV) He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him. So Satan is a defeated foe, but he's also one that has not yet been eliminated. Do you understand the difference? Defeated, but not eliminated. You can be a defeated foe and still be running around making trouble, and he's still running around making trouble even as a defeated foe. That's why Peter says to you and me what he says in his first letter, he says, be sober minded, be watchful, your adversary, the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. (1 Peter 5:8) Listen, what do you have to do as a believer? Just resist him, resist him firm in your faith. James says resist the devil and he will flee from you because you are resisting him in the power that is given to you in the name of Jesus Christ and he cannot overcome the name of Jesus Christ, amen? (James 4:7) Let's stand and pray. Thank you, Lord. Jesus, we worship you, we thank you, we love you. Thank you, Lord, for these words of comfort, thank you, Lord, for these words of life. Thank you for your peace that passes understanding. Lord, I pray for these people here today, whatever they're going through, whatever they're finding in their lives, whatever challenges they're facing, Lord, that they would remember every single one of these words of comfort and that faith would rise up. That they would take the shield of faith with which they can extinguish all of the lies of the enemy and that they would hold that shield up high and take up the sword of the Spirit, the Word of truth and stand in the power of your name. The name that you have given to each one of us, the name that is above every name. We thank you and we praise you in Jesus precious name and all God's people said together, amen. God bless you, have a good rest of your Sunday.