Intercession is the way the church conducts spiritual warfare. 1/2/2004 7:02:00 PM
By R. Arthur Mathews
-Overseas Missionary Fellowship
INTRO NOTES: Intercession is the way the church conducts spiritual warfare. As this nation moves into an important election year, what victories are won will be dependent, more than ever, on the spiritual battles intercessors engage in. This series constitutes a summary of key points on the topic of spiritual warfare from the book BORN FOR BATTLE, by R. Arthur Mathews, a missionary who was with China Inland Mission (now Overseas Missionary Fellowship)### Because of the devil's hostility, the work of conforming the members of Christ's body to the likeness of the Head's soldier image is high on the priority list of the Holy Spirit. As believers we are in Christ and he is in us. This means that his aggression against Satan must be expressed through us. So we are no longer free to play the role of civilitians, living as if there were no war.... At this point, let us ask ourselves some serious questions: Am I expressing the enmity God put between the devil and the church's Head? Or, am I seeking detente, coexistence, and peace through compromise? Am I available to my Lord as a willing instrument, ready for his use in hiswarfare? Am I aware of the teaching of Scripture about my part in the spiritual conflict? ...The Soldier of the Cross [Jesus] had taught his disciples the need to pray, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." The obvious inference is that God has limited certain of his activities to responding to the prayers of his people. Unless they pray, he will not act. Heaven may will something to happen, but heaven waits and encourages earth's initiative to desire that will, and then to will and pray that it happens. The will of God is not done on earth by an inexorable, juggernaut ominpotent "out there" overriding or ignoring the will of man on earth. On the contrary, God has willed that his hand be held back will he seeks for aman, an intecessor to plead, "Thy will be done on earth," in this or that specific situation... The Soldier of the Cross won his battle in the praying field of Gethsemane with only a sentence prayer, but it involved his life. There, the embattled Savio knelt and "fired the shot heard round the world" -- "Thy will be done."... The one who wills with God will pray and find God fights his battles through self's resigned will. If we accept the fact that our role in life is that of a soldiers, then we must drop our toys and become more acquainted with the weapons of our warfare...A soldier's best friend is his weapon because it is his one resource for disposing of the enemy... It is important that Jesus was obediently and willingly submissive to a higher control. His heart was completely devoid of the least suggestion of presumption...Submissive to the will of the Holy Spirit of God, Jesus is led away from the haunts of men. Confrontation with the devil is not to be sought presumptuously, nor is it to be entered into under conditions in which the individual is not filled with the Spirit... God's soldier must be able to endure hardness and to learn how to keep down the clamorous hungers of the flesh if he is to be a good soldier... These are the factors that are preliminary to the actual conflict with Satan...[First, Jesus] was filled and controlled by the Holy Spirit. The initiative for the confrontation with the devil was not his; he was brought to it by the Spirit of God...[Second,] his mind was a storehouse of the words of God. For the Holy Spirit to wield his mighty sword effectively through a human instrument, he must first have absolute control of the instrument, and the mind of the man must be well stored with the words of God... Amazingly, all that it took to defeat the devil was "every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." Apart from this word, "our striving would be losing." Victories over the devil are not won by...resolutions and good intent. It takes the sword of the Spirit, God's specific utterance, thrust at the enemy in the power of the controlling Holy Spirit... There is nothing that Jesus used to defeat Satan that is not available to us... Let us not ignore the relation between condition and competence. If we want to be competent in withstanding the attacks of the enemy, then let us be careful of our condition. Am I being led of the Spirit? Is he in complete control of my being? Am I diligently storing my mind with the Word of God? Then, "the only thing that matters," says Amy Carmichael, "is to throw all the energies of our being into the faithful use of this precious blade"... ### Taken from BORN FOR BATTLE, R. Arthur Mathews, OMF International Press, 2001
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