Revelation 12:3-4 (The Dragon and his War for Heaven

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Thank you for subscribing to the Shepherds Church podcast. This is our Lord's Day Sermon We pray that as we declare the

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Word of God that you would be encouraged Strengthened in your faith and that you would catch a greater vision of who

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Christ is May you be blessed in the hearing of God's Word and may the Lord be with you

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Art is born out of a season of both peace and prosperity

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Prosperity art is born out of a season of peace and prosperity in war art takes a back seat

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In the ruins of economic collapse art is rarely made

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Apparently no one wants to pay millions of dollars for a banana duct -taped to a white canvas when their children are hungry

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Art is for a society that has standing peace and standing prosperity

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It's for societies that are wealthy long enough and peaceful Long enough where the artist can dream and write and sculpt and paint

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This is why nations at war do not commission sculptures and this is why starving countries do not compose symphonies

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They rationed food. They draft soldiers. They prioritize survival arts come in peace and prosperity and Art is also a thermometer for the morality of a nation.

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For instance a Christian society is a society that produced the grandeur and the beauty of Handel's Messiah or the sophistication of Bach's concertos or the epic poetry of Milton or the genius of Shakespeare which pales only to the

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Lord of all writers J .R .R. Tolkien in Comparison our society is a society that produces songs like WAP Disgusting music written on a third -grade level

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With no sophistication at all. Our society is the one that taped the banana To the wall.

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Our society is the one that calls Hunter Biden an artist Our society is the one where museums

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Actually put piles of trash on display and call it avant -garde. In our society

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We have great symbols and signs of our downfall and one of them is the stupidity and the moronic idiocy of our art

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We've been at peace and we've been prosperous so long it's poisoned us it is a thermometer of our morality

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But I also think and we'd have a whole sermon on that But I think that art tells us a lot about Christmas as well

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Because remember art is forged in peace and prosperity and we've brought our art into Christmas To the nativity and I think because of that it's tainted our view of what happened in the ancient world

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For instance in America, we're a nation that's blessed with incredible peace and prosperity

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We're also a nation that Christmas is a season of vibrant colors ornament decorations six -inch ribbon curls

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Elaborate feast extravagant gift -giving you got the reference and a season infused with materialism gluttony and luxury in the old days

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Which according to my four -year -old or six -year -old it was like ten years ago in the olden days

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But in the actual olden days Men would go out into the woods and chop down a tree with their bare hands with an axe of course

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They weren't karate chopping it and They would cut it into fire and they would prepare it for firewood months in advance because the winter was coming now

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We pay other people to chop down our trees not for our survival, but so we can decorate them

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With ornaments and lights and ribbons and all kinds of lavish gifts Now don't get me wrong.

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I enjoy this too. I I get way too involved in my Christmas tree You'd be surprised

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I I think I'm I think I'm a good picture of what masculinity should be And yet my tree looks like Martha Stewart's We all have our vices

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I guess All I'm trying to say is that prosperity has infiltrated

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Christmas and The way that we view peace has infiltrated Christmas so that now

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I don't think we really understand What is happening in the nativity? Questions, maybe we should ask ourself is does the lavish holiday that we currently celebrate look at all like a humble stable

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Does our art built on the backs of our opulence? Reflected all what was happening on the day that Jesus was born or have we misunderstood it entirely?

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Now if you'll notice last week it was all Christmas hymns because I love Christmas hymns, but the

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Christmas hymns contribute to this You Think about all this calm and all this bright you get this idea of a tranquil nativity scene where nothing bad is happening

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The air is crisp and the baby no crying. He makes the cattle are lowing old little town of Bethlehem wrapped in dreamless sleep

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It feels like that moment where you're just getting ready to close your eyes and take a nap in a hammock but is that what happened was

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Bethlehem really a a tranquil place where the baby made no crying and the cattle's did their lowing and the town existed in a dreamy sleepy peace or Does the

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Bible view it differently? Because in my mind, especially in Revelation 12 the

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Bible doesn't view The the nativity as a scene of tranquility, but it's a scene of war as the as the ships

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Landing on the beaches of the world and Christ launching his insurrection against the kingdom of Satan Think about this heaven has come down to earth

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Why so the Jesus can bring judgment to his enemies and it's all over the place if we actually look

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Simeon the great old man who's holding the baby says that this baby was born for the rise and the fall of everyone

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That's war like language you remember the the shepherds this is one of my favorite scenes

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I love this the shepherds They're just doing their shepherd stuff. And then all of a sudden this guy explodes with the glory of God and who shows up It wasn't heaven's quartet

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It wasn't the choir boys from the throne room. It was the heavenly host

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That word host is strata in Greek, which means soldiers armed for war

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So the shepherds when they're out there Watching their sheep to like millions of army people with their weapons fully loaded show up all of a sudden

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No wonder they were scared and Then the soldiers say peace on earth.

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Well, surely that means peace, right? Not entirely because when you look at it, it says glory to God in the highest and on earth peace

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It doesn't stop there peace to who among men whom God is pleased with. So what does that mean to the ones?

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He's not pleased with it's war Peace only comes upon those whom the

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Lord is pleased with His coming for everyone else Is tragedy the wise men sent their wartime delegation with gifts makes sense

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Herod sent his assassination squad That's what you do in war to kill your rival

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King What we're gonna see today is that Christmas is the greatest war that ever happened it's when

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We're gonna see how Satan began the war in heaven and how Satan had been waging this war from Eden to Bethlehem and How Jesus entered the world?

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Not just as a beautiful baby Not just to save his people.

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Yes, and amen, but also to bring the war to the enemies of God It's a central theme of Christmas And if we don't understand it, we won't understand

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Revelation 12 And if we don't understand Revelation 12 wait to the end I hate to do that, but there's a really really important reason why this passage is so important and when we think about Revelation we think

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It doesn't matter such a complicated book. This can't have any relevance to my life you wait it has relevance

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It has eternal Consequential earth -shattering relevance to your life

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So I don't hype it up any more than that Today We're gonna look at three things We're gonna look at first this scene in Revelation 12 and we're gonna introduce the character of the dragon

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Just like we did last week when we introduced the woman we're gonna introduce the dragon second thing We're gonna do is we're gonna talk about his failed

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Insurrection his failed war that he started that Jesus ended and then third we're gonna talk about what this means for us

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The church so if you will Turn with me to Revelation 12 verses 3 through 4

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Again last week we identified the woman and we talked about her as being the people of God Israel Judah and the church all the people of God who call upon the name of God past present future this week

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We're gonna talk about her enemy The enemy of the people of God the dragon

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So if you will, let's read in Revelation 12 3 through 4 Then another sign appeared in heaven and behold a great red dragon

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Having seven heads and ten horns and on his heads were seven diadems and His tail swept away a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth.

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This is the Word of the Lord Let's pray Lord thank you for this apocalyptic

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Christmas scene this nativity in the heavens That tells us on earth what it means

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What your coming was all about What was the purpose of it? Lord help us today as we enter into this passage to understand who the dragon is to understand what the war he brought was and Lord help us to understand how it has

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Incredible relevance to our life Lord. We ask these things in Jesus name.

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Amen Now just as a little bit of a recap last week. We talked about how signs work actually two weeks ago

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We talked about it more. How do signs work signs are given to a particular people at a particular time in a particular

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Context and they don't cross time zones very well, for instance You and I when we drive home today, we will not be looking at road signs that are written in French we will not be seeing billboards from Manila We will not be looking at dirt roads that were designed for the

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Serengeti. We have roads. We have signs We have all this stuff for us in our context in our day.

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That's how we make sense of where we're heading We don't have speed limits that apply to the

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Autobahn even though sometimes that would be great We have signs that apply to Our people at our time just like they happen in the

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Bible Biblical signs are for them at their time in their situation to help them navigate the world that they were living in and their signs

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If you want to talk about a decoder ring for the signs It's the Old Testament the

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Old Testament tells us how to interpret the signs of the book of Revelation So what we need to do is we need to open up that key

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So that we can understand what this passage in Revelation 12 means if you walked up to a door

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And there was a key lying right in front of it A good assumption would be that the key applies to the door when you walk up to Revelation 12

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With Genesis through Malachi standing right in front of it a good assumption is that this is the key

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This is how we make sense of this. So let us do that now as we talk about the dragon's Identity.

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The first thing that you need to know about the dragon's identity is a concept of seraphim

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Seraphim are one of the three classes of created beings called Elohim in the

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Bible now in case you're curious God is also called Elohim Seraphim are called

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Elohim cherubim are called Elohim angels are called Elohim stars are called Elohim.

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What's the deal? It's divine beings the word God in Hebrew Elohim means divine being it doesn't always mean the one

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True and only God that's Yahweh Elohim means divine being and there's three classes of angels the seraphim

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Who guard the or who worship God in the presence of God They're the ones who are in the throne room of God.

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Then you have the cherubim These are the ones that guard the way to the presence of God That's why

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God installs two cherubs outside of the Garden of Eden to guard the way into his presence That's why there's two cherubs outside of Jesus's tomb to guard the way into his presence

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Cherubim are guardian angels They guard the way to God's presence and then you have messenger angels that come to earth and deliver messages to us

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They look like humans. They talk like humans and That's what they do. So those are the three kinds seraphim though are probably the most glorious if you could categorize them that way

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They're the ones that are in the throne room of God in Isaiah 6 to where they're singing Holy, holy.

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Holy is the Lord God Almighty They're the ones who are surrounding the throne of God singing God's praises endlessly continually forever more now what's so fascinating about these beings is

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That their name Actually means shining burning fiery dragon in Hebrew the word seraph means dragon or fiery serpent so what you have especially in noun form is

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When you come into the presence of God You don't have a group of middle school

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Choral team or what it what is it called? You know the group that does the choir I guess choral you don't have that When you enter the presence of God you see

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God on his throne in matchless glory With fire breathing dragons surrounding the throne of God.

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It is an epic scene It's actually beautiful if you think about it the

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Bible doesn't talk about dragons as always being evil Why would God have evil beings inside of his presence?

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This is one of the signs in the of this This glorious creature that God created to worship him in his presence and yet it's not evil at least not yet We know that there was a great fallen angel whose name is

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Satan Satan is compared to a dragon the word for seraphim means dragon

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What you have and I can't prove this totally But I can get really close is that Satan is a fallen seraphim

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He is a dragon. He's a fiery dragon Seraphim or dragons it makes sense

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So if this is true Satan we don't often think about this this way

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Satan was there before the creation of man Singing holy.

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Holy. Holy is the Lord God Almighty Have you ever thought about that that he was one of the ones that was joining in the heavenly chorus before he fell

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Another example of why he's probably a seraphim is that he was not a low -level angel He was one that was in the presence of God It says that he was in the presence of God and elevated himself above God The only way that's possible is if he is a seraphim

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Not a cherubim So I think the evidence points to the fact That Satan was one of those class of angels right in the very presence of God singing the praises of God until he wasn't

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Now what is the reason that Satan fell? Of course, it was pride. He wanted to be like God He wanted to elevate himself above God, but also

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It's pretty interesting that he falls and then immediately slithers into the

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Garden of Eden, right? And it's also interesting when the Bible tells you that man was made a little higher than the angels and Then it's also interesting when you consider that Satan Being of the most glorious class of angels now is no longer the most glorious of all the created beings

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Adam and Eve have supplanted him So Satan and his pride rises up in war against God He's defeated cast out of heaven and yet he's mangled from this process.

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He elevates himself up to this highest station and Yet the one who flew and the one who soar and the one who roared in the presence of God now has to slither and hiss

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When he goes into Eden He's been immensely downgraded from his high station

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And he comes in to launch war against the people of God that people who've been elevated to surplants and the people who

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God Himself loves and called very good now. He's there to supplant them and that is exactly what he does

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He comes into the garden. He steals the crown from Adam He subjugates Adam and Eve so that now he has dominion over the earth and not the humans

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It's after this fall That the word dragon in the Bible started taking on a nefarious tone where the undertones of it became evil

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Which takes us to our second point? The dragon is seraphim. Yes, but the dragon is also compared to this sea creature called

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Leviathan This is the first bad word that is used of the dragon Now Leviathan was an ancient water dragon and it says that when he sneezed his breath is like flames

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Pretty incredible. Oh, that's just mythology. Is it I? Actually think there were fire -breathing dragons at one point on earth

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We're not gonna get into that today This creature

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Leviathan Symbolizes chaos and rebellion. He's the untameable beast.

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He's the ultimate beast He's the beast that cannot be defeated by humans sounds a lot like Satan he has armor and fire that surround him

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Job says this about him It sneezes and flashes forth light and its eyes are like the eyelids of the morning

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There's not a creature on earth that can subdue this creature But yet only

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God can defeat it sounds a lot like the relationship of Man God to Satan men can't defeat this great beast, but yet God can

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Psalm 74 13 through 14 says you divided the sea by your strength You broke the heads of the sea monsters that word there's dragons in the waters

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You crushed the heads of Leviathan you gave him his food for the creatures of the wilderness to God The greatest water dragon and the greatest beast

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Satan himself is nothing to the power of God God breaks him apart and feeds him as chum

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To the fishes The only reason that Satan exists is for the glory of God.

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The only reason that Satan exists is to do the will of God Because in a moment he could snap his fingers and break this

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Fiendish creature in an instant Isaiah 27 1 says that God is going to destroy

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Leviathan and in this passage. It's talking about Satan and that day the

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Lord will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpents Leviathan the twisted serpent and he will kill the dragon who lives in the sea

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As we're thinking about Revelation 12 and the identity of this dragon and the Old Testament images.

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We're thinking about a fallen fire -breathing Dragon that is the picture of chaos and rebellion who can't be defeated by man

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But can be defeated by God the picture of his identity is coming into focus The third aspect of this dragon there's more but I limited myself to only three

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The third aspect of this dragon is that it's a symbol of wicked and prideful empires and especially their leaders

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For instance consider Pharaoh king of Egypt. Did you know that Pharaoh king of Egypt is described as a dragon in the

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Bible? Exodus or sorry Ezekiel 29 3 through 5 thus says the

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Lord God behold I am against you Pharaoh king of Egypt the great monster that word is dragon

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That lies in the midst of his rivers that has said my Nile is mine and I myself have made it

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Now what God is not doing here is saying that Pharaoh is an actual literal dragon

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What are you saying? Is that the real actual literal dragon is the one who's possessed Pharaoh? That Satan is doing his bidding through this potentate through this dictator through this

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King Similarly Isaiah 51 9 through 10 talks about Rahab Not Rahab from the book of Joshua Rahab another dragon sort of sea beast

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Wasn't not you Who cut Rahab in pieces? Who pierced the dragon was it not you who dried up the sea the waters of the great deep who made the depths of the

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Sea a pathway for the redeemed to cross over Isaiah 51 9 through 10 Here's another example of a dragon being compared to ancient

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Egypt because that's when God dried up the waters That's when the faithful walked across the waters.

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It's the parting of the Red Sea and the destruction of Pharaoh Metaphorically this being compared here to Rahab this great sea monster

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It symbolizes the pridefulness of the nations the nations who rise up and say this is mine

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This Nile River is mine. I put it here. I control this river and God laughs at them

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For their insolence. Did you know Nebuchadnezzar was compared to a dragon in the

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Bible before his conversion? Or to say it a different way before God made him into a beast.

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He was compared to a beast Jeremiah 51 34 says Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has devoured me.

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He has crushed me. He has swallowed me like a monster And this is not bro.

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Talk. Yeah, he swallowed me like a monster This is the word for dragon

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This is the word for a prideful fiendish creature That is manipulating the hearts of men and who's leading empires astray

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In the ancient world, especially in the ancient world To be a king invited the dragon into your court

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To manipulate you and to shift you and cause you to do all sorts of wicked things

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This is why we should pray for our leaders So if we're applying all this to Satan this imagery we have a

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Shining creature says that he comes as an angel of light Seraph means fiery dragon or shining one.

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He comes as an angel of light He comes lying he comes prideful he comes boasting

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All of this is here in the dragon imagery of the old testament He comes to deceive the nations although that's right here in the imagery of the old testament in Leviathan and Rahab in dragon and water monsters and in all of that You have this picture forming of Satan who is at war with God And again, there's other aspects that we could add here

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But I think that that Sort of sums up his character sums up who he is

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And these are all implicit references So revelation is using this this is it's it's biblical theology what a dragon is

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It's using that to talk about dragon in revelation 12. That's his implicit knowledge that it's knowledge base

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But revelation 12 also gives us explicit references that this dragon is satan

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You have lots of theories in revelation on who this dragon is But john tells us who this dragon is we don't have to guess

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Revelation 12 3 through 4 gives us a picture of who this dragon is He's the one who is a great red dragon seven heads ten horns

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His tail swept away a third of the stars and there's been all sorts of theories on what this means But if people would keep reading down to verse 7 through 9, it tells us exactly who this dragon is

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Revelation 12 7 through 9 says and there was war in heaven Michael and his angels waging war with the dragon

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The dragon and his angels waged war and they were not strong enough and they were no there was no longer a place found in Heaven for them and the great dragon was thrown down The serpent of old who is called the devil and satan

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Who deceives the whole world? He was thrown down to the earth And his angels were thrown down with him

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So here we have the identification markers, he's a dragon old testament theology says that satan

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Then he's called the serpent of old old testament says genesis 3 that satan then he names him

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It's satan just in case we're confused Just in case we're like i'm not sure maybe it's the roman empire.

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No, it's satan It's the one who was thrown down. It's the one who led the armies of heaven astray and Just in case we're still confused about this revelation 20 verse 2 says and he laid hold of the dragon

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The serpent of old who is the devil and who is satan? Revelation is not a confusing book if you know how to read it

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This is satan that we're talking about Now we need to now that we've identified who this creature is

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Now we need to talk about what his purpose is And right here in this passage revelation 12 3 through 4 his purpose is revealed.

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He's at war He's at war look at what it says in verses 3 through 4 one more time

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Maybe there'll be more times but for right now one more time Then another sign appeared in heaven by the way

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Did you pick up on that? There's a great sign in heaven. Who's the woman and then another sign happened in heaven that's sort of the

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Sort of john's way of twisting the screws a little This great sign the people of god great in her glory because she knows the lord

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And here's the sun This dragon It's a diminution Okay, let's keep going

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Then another sign appeared in heaven and behold a great red dragon having seven heads and ten horns

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And on his head were seven diadems and his tail Swept away a third of the stars of heaven and threw them into the earth.

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That is not a kind sweeping That is not the dragon coming into heaven and saying, oh, it's a little messy in here

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Let me sweep it up. No, this is a act of war This tail sweeping is an act of war and it's his first act of war this verse revelation 12 3 through 4

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Is talking about the very first act of offense that satan ever committed This is the war in heaven that caused him to be cast down to the earth right here

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In revelation 12 3 through 4 he swept away a third of the stars. What does that mean? Does that mean that before Satan fell there was 33 more stars in the sky

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No It means he took with him in his rebellion a third of the angels

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How do we know that? There's a couple points that I would give you number one in isaiah 14 12 through 15 satan is called a star not a celebrity

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Like an end like a heavenly body For instance how you have fallen from heaven old star of the morning

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Remember, I told you that stars and angels both have divine language like elohim so satan is a star that has fallen from the sky, it's

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Apocalyptic imagery Also angels are called stars in the book of job

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For instance job 38 7 says when the morning stars came and sang together and all the sons of god shouted for joy

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This is not a scene where the sons of god came and all the stars came and they joined together in a heaven and earth sort of chorus

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This is what's called apposition in greek I'm, not going to bore you with it too much But all it means is is two things are put side by side and they mean the same thing the stars came and sing comma the sons of god came and worshipped

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The sons of god are the stars the sons of god Is elohim that word there in that passage is elohim

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It's not humans. It's divine beings who are portrayed as stars Who get together to worship god?

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Also, we have great evidence that satan did lead a rebellion and that he really did sweep away

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Many angels with him not only your angels compared to stars, which would make sense of revelation 12 But second peter 2 4 tells us that god did not spare the angels

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When they sinned But he cast them into hell and committed them to the pits of darkness reserved for judgment

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So we have a period of time where angels send Jude 1 6 and the angels who did not keep their own domain

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There's a lot going on in that verse But abandon their proper abode he has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of that great day

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Essentially what i'm pointing out is in these four verses We have evidence of a fall of angelic beings

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Many of them fell they were cast out of heaven revelation 12 3 through 4 says that it was satan himself who incited this rebellion and he took with him a third

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Of the stars or a third of the angels with him That's when the war in heaven began

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When he was cast down to the earth now, what's satan's intentions for war? We need to talk about that. We've talked about the first shots that were fired in the war

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He took the angels with him. What's his intentions for war? well In order to understand this

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It's really important that you understand how this war plays out This war plays out in the bible in four battles

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Okay This is very important it plays out in four battles in two realms

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It starts in heaven satan is cast down to earth It begins on earth Then he's defeated on earth.

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He goes to heaven He starts a second war in heaven and he's cast out a second time And then he starts a second war on earth.

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Do you see the pattern? It starts in heaven. He's put down on earth and defeated it starts in heaven

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He's put down on earth and defeated if you can remember that pattern you will understand the entirety of the war that satan brings against God's people

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And it will play out and i'll show you more about it as we go We need two weeks actually to cover this by the way.

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I need to warn you So next week this week we're going to cover the war in heaven Next week we're going to cover the war on earth

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And then i'm going to trust That you put it all together Like a puzzle piece. So this week we're going to talk about the war in heaven

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And we're going to construct a timeline for these things The first phase of the war was when satan was kicked out of heaven when he

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Rebelled against god and he took a third of the stars with him This happened before creation began or excuse me.

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This happened before adam and eve were created that more rightly said Isaiah 14 12 through 15 said you said in your heart

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I will ascend to heaven I will raise my throne above the stars of god and I will make myself like the most high

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Nevertheless, you will be thrust down to shield to the recesses of the pit Now this passage is talking about a human king

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But but it's also in the new testament applies this passage to satan And what it means is that originally?

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Satan was in the throne room of god worshiping god And then there was a moment where he ascended above god where he

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Proclaimed that he was higher than god and a war in heaven broke out And a third of the angels followed him and they were cast out of heaven by the power of god

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And where did they go? That's part two They went down to earth Luke 10 18 tells us that jesus saw this happen

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He was telling his disciples. I was watching satan fall from heaven like lightning Jesus said that he was an eyewitness to this event

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Where he saw satan stripped of his glory stripped of his exalted position and hurled down to the earth

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And it was there that satan slithered into the garden as we've said and that's where satan grabbed dominion over the world

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And that's why when jesus comes to satan In the wilderness satan offers him all the nations of the world

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Satan is not stupid He offered what he had And what did he have?

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He had the nations, but what did he not have? He did not have dominion over christ

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Satan was the champion of earth the highest No one compared to him

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But there was one now who was higher than him who was standing on the very earth That he possessed and that was the lord.

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Jesus christ So satan was willing to trade all the nations of the world to have supremacy over christ

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And christ defeated him wisely winsomely and resoundingly in that wilderness

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And satan slithered away and fled But it's important for us to recognize here

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That this was not his defeat yet His defeat came at the cross and it's also important to recognize one other aspect of satan's tyranny on earth

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Satan was cast out of heaven right cast down to the earth But satan also has access to heaven in the old testament

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Satan shows up in heaven. So the doors weren't locked His permanent home was taken away from him

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And now his permanent home was the earth, but he still had access. How do we know that when job chapter one?

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Which is a fascinating passage God gathers together all of his divine counsel and he's going over the people of earth and job's name comes up Have you considered my servant job and it says that satan was the one who said it

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He only worships you because you've given him everything Satan is in heaven in job one.

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What's he doing? He's accusing the saints Did you know that satan's name is not a name satan is not a name

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Satan is a title Do you know what the title satan means in greek? slanderer

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So from genesis 3 Until Jesus comes satan had access to the throne of god

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Where he would go and slander the saints day and night where he would accuse them of all their sins

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So that in heaven's courtroom you could hear The echo and the refrain of all your sins repeatedly abraham isaac jacob david all their sins on blast 24 hours a day when

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I was in um I went on a missions trip as a 15 year old Uh poor planning on my part.

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I went to the most christian country on earth. Uh thinking that I was Going to go to a place that didn't have any christians

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I didn't do good research back then but one of the cool things about it when I was in korea They took us to north korea

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And on top of the mountains that were facing the south korean border. There was these massive speakers that blasted 24 hours a day

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All kinds of propaganda like your freedom is rotting you or Very positive messages by the way or come to north korea.

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It's better here or whatever they said. I don't speak korean But for 24 hours a day propaganda was blasting

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Trying to get north or south koreans to defect and come to north korea That's kind of what it was like in heaven 24 hours a day

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Propaganda and slander was being leveled at the saints of god And it wasn't like it was inaccurate

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All their sins were sins And satan knows that god is a holy god

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And god satan knows that god will by no means leave the guilty unpunished So for thousands of years he was slithering up into heaven's court slandering accusing

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The saints of god We see this in zechariah 3 1 through 2 where he's accusing the high priest

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We see this in first peter 5 8 where he's compared to a roaring lion He's going all throughout the earth seeking whom he can devour so that when he appears before god in heaven

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He can slander them once again That was the second aspect of the war that war that part of the war lasted from genesis

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To the cross of christ Because it was at the cross of christ Where satan was defeated it was actually in the incarnation where the shots

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Were finally fired back from heaven In this battle satan had been firing shot after shot after shot for thousands of years heaven's response came in the birth of christ

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The shots were fired And it was a mortal wound Jesus took satan's stolen inheritance.

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Isn't it interesting? Isn't it wonderful? Isn't it glorious satan? Tried to offer him all the nations of the earth and and matthew 28.

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Jesus says guess what? I have him now And I didn't have him by taking a shortcut like adam did and bowing down to satan

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I had him because I let satan do his worst and crushed me and then in that I crushed him And matthew 28 when jesus says that all authority in heaven and earth now belongs to me

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You have to read between the lines and say that there is a new king on earth and it is no longer satan

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All authority in heaven and earth belongs to jesus because satan has been defeated We see jesus doing this in his ministry

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Matthew 12 28 through 29 But if I cast out demons the spirit of god in the kingdom of god has come

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We see it in his crucifixion where he steals this from satan He living he liberates those who are captive to satan and then what happens in revelation 12

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This is one of the most interesting parts of it And this is one of those parts where you don't have to believe me on this

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This is not a matter of your salvation, but I think it's very fascinating Satan's defeated at the cross and in revelation 12 satan shows up in heaven again

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What's happening Well what I think Is that when jesus came and lived and died

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He put satan in handcuffs And then when he rose again from the dead satan was bound

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And then it says in revelation 12 5 7 through 9 check check out the timeline here

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And she gave birth to a son a male child. That's jesus who was to rule all the nations with a rod of iron He defeated satan

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And her child was caught up to god and to his throne. What is that? The ascension

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And then it says and then there was war in heaven have you ever thought about that Every time and and i'll confess.

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I haven't thought about this a lot either every time I think about the ascension I think about jesus coming to a party jesus coming to a victory

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Celebration jesus coming to angels cheering angels worshiping angels welcoming him with pomp and circumstance

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But right here it says that he ascended and when he ascended there was a war so before jesus sat on his throne in Ascension, he actually came with a similar kind of spear that pierced his side and he pierced the dragon

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He chased him out of heaven. Why? When the original war when god cast satan out of heaven satan wasn't fully defeated yet Satan still had access to the throne

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Satan still could come in and accuse the saints day and night In this defeat

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Jesus comes And he permanently cast satan out of heaven because Having satan have access to heaven

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Having satan being only partially defeated Was not enough for our lord and savior.

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Jesus christ He came He made war He ascended into heaven and he finished the war

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And he cast satan out. Listen to what it says and there was war in heaven Michael and his angels waging war with the dragon

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And the dragon and his angels waged war and they were not strong enough and there was no longer a place for them

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Why does it say that? Because all throughout the old testament there was still a place for them They didn't live there, but they could come in there

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Now there was no longer a place found for them in heaven And the great dragon was thrown down the serpent of old who's called the devil and satan who deceives the whole world

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He was thrown down to the earth and his angels were thrown down with him

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And then in revelation 10 12 10 it says then I heard a loud voice in heaven saying the accuser

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Of our brethren has been thrown down He who accuses them before god day and night is finished

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When you think about the ascension and i've harped on this a lot over the recent years we talk about the cross

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Amen, we talk about resurrection. Amen, but we need to talk about the ascension Because it was in the ascension that jesus went and made war in heaven and finally and forever cast out that old lion

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Slytherin serpent who accuses the brothers and sisters day and night and now there is no more word in heaven from him

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Listen grab hold of this. This is so important. We're going to talk more about this Next week, but I want to end here

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Christmas is not about materialism christmas is not about trees and shopping carts and it's not about all of that It's about a war that satan himself initiated and jesus finished

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And how did he finish it? He cast that lying monster out of heaven so that there's no more word

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If you were to walk into heaven's courtroom today There is not a single mention of your sin that is being uttered and it will not be ever again

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You know how in a courtroom scene there's two attorneys There's the one defense attorney and then there's the prosecuting attorney

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The prosecuting attorney has been kicked out of the courtroom And the only record

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That is being stated the only words that are being uttered in heaven today because of jesus's ascension

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Is his record Which means that your record of failure your story of Brokenness your greatest sin your darkest hour your thing that you did that you still can't believe that you did

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Haunt you to this day is never uttered in heaven But what is uttered is the matchless stainless perfect record of jesus christ

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In job's day Consider my servant job and satan was there to accuse now what happens?

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Consider my servant rex consider my servant. Tiago Consider my servant laushna consider my servant shannon consider my servant jeremy

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What is said an accusation of you? nothing Because the final word has been spoken by jesus christ.

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This is why revelation matters Because the war that jesus brought

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Is the war that brought you peace? When we sing with the angels glory to god in the highest

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And on earth peace among men whom it is pleased It's you God is pleased with you

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And he's pleased with you because christ brought the war That ended all wars.

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Amen Let's pray Lord we thank you That we can celebrate this great victory

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That you accomplished In casting satan out originally from heaven

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In defeating satan here on his own turf on earth And dragging that old snake up to the throne of god where you whipped him

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And beat him and kicked him out of heaven once and for all Lord, let us remember what that means for us

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That when we think about our record as shoddy and as broken as it is This is not what is being declared before your throne

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The only word ever spoken of those who are in union with christ is christ And him crucified

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His record has become our record lord. Let that be our joy Especially in this time in this season.