Spiritual Warfare: Principalities, Part 1

Hi, this is Dave Olson. I'm the senior leader of

Heartland Church located in Ankeny, IA.

I hope the following message challenges and courages and

ultimately changes you. Thanks for joining us.

We are going to jump back into our series on spiritual warfare

and the battle we're living in understanding evil.

And so I want you to turn with me to Psalm 82.

Psalm 82, we're going to look back at that one now.

Just a little bit of review just for those who weren't here for

our other installments, kind of give you a little back store.

And where we're at here, we talked about that the the Second

Temple Jewish theologians had a theology that looked at 3

entrances of evil rather than just one.

As modern evangelicals, we recognized the one entrance of

evil and that was the fall of Adam and Eve in Eden and that's

where man, man's nature became fallen and we understand that.

But the Jewish people also had two other episodes or entrances

of evil within their theology. One of them we're somewhat

familiar with and that is the. So Genesis 3 is the one that

we're understand. We understand we're Adam and Eve

sinned. But Genesis 6, it says we're the

sons of God, entered into the daughters of men.

And out of these this union came the Nephilim, the giants of old.

And so there's different theologies on that.

There's what I was taught was that was the sons of Seth going

into the sons of of of Abel or of Cain rather.

And and that was, you know, and so they they de mythologize it

and just kind of take the supernatural out of it.

But the early church believe that was where demons came from,

that demons were the disembodied spirit of this this half breed

race, and that these sons of God actually were.

They were Watchers. And we see the Watchers show up

in the book of Daniel. If you remember, Dan or

Nebuchadnezzar has a dream in this, this angelic creature that

he refers to as a Watcher comes to him and pronounces judgment

on him. There's several episodes in

there. And so throughout Scripture we

see this term, the sons of God. The the first chapter of the

book of Job where it says the sons of God gathered and the

Satan in the Hebrew, it says the Satan was among them.

And the Lord says to the Satan, where have you been?

He said, I've been going to and fro throughout the earth.

And so this Son, these sons of God, were these angelic or these

these supernatural creatures, They were not human beings.

We see this show up in a number of passages.

And so then we have the third entrance of evil that we often

don't talk about, and that is the rebellion of these creatures

known as Elohim. Now let me just, let me just

pause there, or sons of God or these ruling spirits.

Now we're going to look at that and give you a little

background. I want to, I want to root this

in Scripture because this is important for us to understand.

In order for us to function and fulfill our purpose.

We want to study the whole scriptures.

Amen. We want to know what the Bible

says on these subjects and so we're going to look at that.

But the the, the I was taught all in Bible school that Elohim

was a title for God. How many of you just had been

taught that? That's that's what I was always

taught. But if you look at the

scriptures, you find out that this term, Elohim is used of a

number of different types of beings in scripture.

Even Samuel when when the witch of Endor called him forth.

Now there there's a problem passage.

You know, we're not going to get into that.

Whether that was Samuel or whether it wasn't, we're not

going there. As much as I'm being pulled,

we're not going there. But the fact is he was, he was

called an Elohim. So an Elohim, The Elohim is a

title of a of spiritual residence or a type of being.

It's not. It's not a class in the sense of

God being the only Elohim. I was taught that, and so I was

always intrigued by Psalm chapter 8.

Psalms 8 · chapter mention

If you've been around here more than five years, you know that's

one of my favorite passages. What is man that thou art

mindful of him, the Son of man, that thou would visit him.

You put glory and honour you. You made him a little lower than

the the New Testament says angels, but the Old Testament

says Elohim like, well, what's the deal?

Which one's right? Uh, huh.

And it's because of our misinterpretation of this verse

Elohim or this concept of Elohim.

So there are beings that's a class of being.

It's a spiritual entity. And so there are classes of

beings, types of spiritual beings that we need to be aware

of and scripture, God put it in there for a reason.

I was telling Kathy I I was on this Facebook group that deals

with a certain subject and so they were they were all excited

that this one pastor of this large church was preaching on

the subject. Guy has about 15,000 people in

his church. I thought, I wonder how he dealt

with this. I listened to it and I told

Kathy I was so irritated because he was like apologizing that the

Bible's actually supernatural. And he was saying could it be

that when people struggle with addictions and and there's

things bad things are happening. Could it be that it's not just

happen chance that possibly there are intelligent evil

beings coming into play And I'm like yeah, and we we dance

around that stuff because it's we're uncomfortable around here.

We're just weird. We're not uncomfortable with it.

But we need to understand these things because we Paul said, you

wrestle not with flesh and blood.

Your real battle is not flesh and blood, but with against

principalities and powers, rulers of this dark age over

this present darkness, authorities and powers, You're

engaging them whether you know it or not.

You're better off knowing it. Ignorance is not bliss in this

scenario. And so we need to understand

these things. And so there's this other

rebellion that took place in Scripture that we see alluded to

in Psalm 82, and it's really the Old Testament backdrop for what

the New Testament refers to as principalities and powers.

And so we need to understand this because all three of these

entrances are these episodes of evil, These three falls, if you

will. Each one of them involves

different entities and also requires of us a different

response. Not going to get into this other

than to say the first one, I can't rebuke my flesh.

I yeah, I was born in sin because of our great, great

grandma and Grand Pappy's Adam and Eve, their sin.

And we were born into sin. And we've got to contend with

that nature. We have a new nature, but it at

times it wants to rear its head. We talked about that.

How to deal with that? You know, as much as I want to

deal, begin to deal with it again, it's because it's so

important. We just need to know.

You can't rebuke that. You got to deal with it.

You've got to be discipled. You got to mature.

You got to deal with your woundedness, you got to renew

your mind, you got to heal your emotions so that that old nature

doesn't have an Ave. to manifest itself.

You don't rebuke it. You don't cast it out.

You discipline your new man, your your spiritual man is going

to manifest in your physical man.

And it comes through the conduit of your soul.

And that's where the problem is. So you got to Discipleship

happens in the soul. So deal with it.

OK, so we got to. If we don't understand that,

then we're trying to, you know, cast out our own character.

Ain't going to work. Number two, you don't counsel a

demon. The 2nd fall resulted in demons.

You don't sit and counsel a demon.

I've tried. Seriously.

Try to have a conversation with the demon.

Don't work. It's matter of fact.

It's highly irritating. I don't have conversations with

demons when I when I'm dealing with someone with a demonic

issue, I don't ask for information from a demon.

They, you know, they're they're liars from the beginning.

I don't, I don't ask for information.

And so we just deal with what we do is we tell that thing to be

quiet so we can get information from the individual needing

deliverance. And so we deal with that so that

we can get them free. So this needs to be cast out.

You don't discipline a demon. You don't counsel a demon.

You don't try to disciple a demon.

Some of you have tried. Some of you lights.

Oh, that's been the problem. Yes.

So OK, the third one, this third entrance of evil.

Now we're dealing with a different level of evil when we

talk about Ephesians Chapter 6, Principalities and Powers,

Ephesians 6 · chapter mention

Rulers of this Dark Age Cosmo Crators is what the Greek is

good. That's not one Cosmos creators

it, it means rulers, world rulers, they have a world reach

that are overseeing this present darkness, this skotoast that we

talked about the last couple we or two weeks ago about this

darkness that darkens the mind. So people can't see the truth

and they're groping about and they can't connect the dots

between their actions and the consequences.

We're seeing that on the Evening News every night.

It's all over. TikTok.

You want to see some confusion and some skotoes Get on

Facebook. There's some skotoes going on

out there. People don't connect their

actions with the consequences, and they're wanting to be

relieved of the consequences while they caught all the

actions. And so though you know there

there's a lot of darkness, but what's going on is there is

these operatives, these rogue entities in the spiritual realm

that need that, that we're contending with, Paul says we

wrestle with, but we don't cast them out.

In fact, you'll never see Jesus addressing these principalities

and powers. He cast out devils, and one of

the reasons is because they had not yet been unseated, Jesus

unseated them at the cross. They have been defeated.

However, we need to understand although they've been defeated,

they need to be unseated. We need to we need to remove

them. We need to contend and we need

to remove them from their place. The the the the victory of Jesus

is a legal victory, but there's still a lot of cleanup to do.

A lot of times preachers, including this one, will use

this. This illustration there was in

World War 2. There was D-Day and we had to

establish a presence on the the coastline of France.

We had to once again put our feet on that continent and begin

to move in. And the Germans knew and the

Allied forces knew. Once we got a beachhead,

essentially the war was over. However, the bloodiest battles

were fought afterwards, because even though they knew it was all

of there's no way that they could keep hold of this thing.

There would. They fought tooth and nail to

keep the little that they had, and it's a very similar

situation. If you see this in the book of

Joshua, Joshua Moses has died. God says, OK, Joshua, it's time

to quit grieving your spiritual father.

I've got job for you to do. You're going to go into the

promised Land and he tells them everywhere you put your foot is

yours, man, that's a good word. Glory.

However, we've got to understand what that word meant.

It is yours legally. It's yours, potentially, but

it's not yet yours, actually. You've got to go and take what

has already been given to you, and it's a picture of our

spiritual reality. And if we don't understand that,

we can fall into what I call charismatic bravado, slinging

hash, making, you know, big sweeping statements.

But the reality is not showing up in our life we lay claim to

things that we're not really walking in.

And the fact is, Jesus has won the victory, But it's ours to go

in and register this victory. We've got to take the ground

that he won. And a lot of this goes back to a

true understanding of what Kingdom is.

We think of Kingdom as a place, as a geographic location.

That is not how the Bible uses this term.

The Greek word is Basilia and what it really means is the

King's right to rule. I've, I've talked about this

recently where, you know, in Spanish if Hoal was here, he'd

say you're right, Pastor. In Spanish the the word we

translate Kingdom is Reno reign, the reign of God.

And it's a better translation. It's a more vivid translation

than what we use, really. The the word Kingdom means

King's dominion. That's it's a compound word

Kingdom and so the Kingdom of God when it comes, it's God

bringing his dominion. But we have to follow through.

So what Jesus did on the cross is purchased the legal right for

us to go in and take what is ours.

But the the enemy exercises squatters rights and we have to

unseat him. And there is a wrestling match

that takes place. And if we don't understand that

then we live in this, we can get into some weird cosmology.

So let's look. So what I want to look at this

morning is I want to look at how do we deal with principalities

and powers. And we may not get through this

all today. We might have to extend our

series into the future, and it won't be next week, but but I

want to. I want to look at this because

this is an important distinction.

We're not dealing with it when we're talking about

principalities and powers. We're not talking about low

level demons. These these disembodied spirits

of the nephalum, these rogue entities on the earth that were

that were that that early church looked at them as sentenced to

the earth. We're looking at these rulers in

the spiritual realm. Where did they come from?

By how did they come to their position?

And how do we deal with them now that they've rebelled?

Those are the questions we need to understand, because you don't

deal with them the same way. Jude says that Michael himself

told the principality. The Lord rebuke you.

He didn't just go in there and say I rebuke you.

He said the Lord rebuke you it. Michael's got some mojo.

I mean that. He's one bad dude.

OK, so we need that. We need to pause there and

realize that we don't just sling hash, that We need to understand

our role so that we can deal with these entities the way God

would intend. OK, Did we pray?

Because I really feel the need to pray, Father.

Lord, I ask that you would instruct us this morning, Lord,

that you would teach us, Lord, expand our understanding.

And Lord, we want to be a people.

We want to be a house that is firmly anchored in your book.

And so, Lord, I ask for the spirit of wisdom and revelation

in this room this morning that your teaching would fall like

rain. Lord, I ask that even now, Lord,

that there would be verses that would come to people's minds and

they would begin to take notes that they would chase down

later, that you would speak to them.

Things that either I forgot to say or I don't even know yet,

but you're going to show them. And Lord, we ask that you would

teach us as a people, as a house, so that we can fulfill

your purpose in Jesus name. Amen.

Let's get into this passage, Psalm 82, verse one, who I'm

reading out of the ESV and you could read it out of a bunch of

different translations. It's essentially the same thing.

So I didn't choose one because it's got my pet interpretation

verse. One God has taken his place in

the Divine Counsel COUNCIL. It's a body, an administrative

or governing body, a counsel Okay.

And it will go into a Hebrew word study on that in a moment.

In the midst of the gods, little G he holds judgment.

Now depending on what translation you read, some

translations will have the little quotes.

Gods, you know, as if you know, kind of to to call into

question, you know, like this is a, we're just talking about, you

know, kind of what other people call gods, But that God doesn't

call gods. The word is gods.

It's elohim. So God the Elohim has taken his

place in the divine council. In the midst of the elohim, he

holds judgment. But in the Hebrew, it's very

clear. The first one is a distinct, A

singular. The second one is plural.

And so we we use that terminology and we get nervous

with it because we we automatically assign a set of

ideas to this term God. But it's it's not talking about

uncreated beings, it's talking about created beings.

That's why the Old Testament calls God the Most High God.

If there were no other little G gods, that wouldn't be much of A

compliment, would it? You say Dave Olson is the most

handsome 58 year old guy on the platform?

Well, that's not much of A compliment.

I'm the only guy up here, you know.

That's not saying anything when we say that God is the most high

God in comparison to what these other little G gods, they're

created beings, but God bestowed upon them a high level of

authority and honor in his created order.

OK, hang with me here. I know this.

You think, Pastor, He's a heretic.

Now that's hearing a word in the midst of the gods.

He holds judgments, holds judgment.

And now we're going to hear what the Lord says.

Now let me just pause there. If you go back up, all virtual,

all translations, because it is part of the scripture, It says

this is a Psalm of Asaf. It's a Psalm of Asaf.

Asaf was an interesting dude. Asaf was.

It says in Second Chronicles 28 or 29 rather 30, that he was a

seer, that he prophesied under the direction of King David and

first Chronicles 25 two some believe him to be the grandson

of the prophet Samuel, which is interesting, this generational

influence that came down through his life.

He was among three musicians who led the prophetic intercessory

worship of the Tabernacle of David.

If you really want to learn about ASAP, talk to Rick Irwood.

He's got some fascinating I've I've called Rick on this several

times. It's just fascinating because

Rick is, you know, very similar. This Psalm is an example of

material that simply would not have been possible to know

without a revelatory encounter from God.

Because listen, what it's saying.

Saying that God gathered this council of these spiritual

beings and he sat down, He convened these beings and he

rebukes him. He he calls, he calls them to

order, and he begins to rebuke them for not fulfilling their

role. How did a soft know that

happened? ASAP had a revelatory encounter

in which the Lord allowed him to see.

Matter of fact, in the Old Testament you see this phrase

show up Psalm. I want to say it's Psalm 28.

Let me see if I wrote that down. Psalm 28 or not.

Psalm Jeremiah 28. I don't know where it's at.

I'll. I'll look it up in a minute

here. But Jeremiah 28 uses this phrase

and there's several other places where it talks about he who has

stood in the council of the Lord and the word is COU&CIL, not

SEL. Now the fact is, sometimes those

will be translated interchangeably by some because

they're uncomfortable with council and they are very

related because you go into his counsel to get his counsel the

where you get the info as you get into the meeting.

And this is relevant to you and I, because although in the New

Testament this was closed and a prophet was one who had said

stood in the council of the Lord, some scholars believe, and

I I, I think they're probably right, that one of the criteria

to be a prophet, a legit prophet in the Old Testament, would be

one who stood in the council. You look in Isaiah.

When Isaiah was called, that was a divine council scene.

And Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up in his train, filled

the temple, it rocked him to his toenails and shook him to his

teeth. And he was called to be a

prophet from then on. But he had this encounter in the

council and so ASAP, and it says he is a prophet, he's a seer.

He was brought into this this scenario where he has this

vision of what's really going on, and it's God the Creator,

the Most High. God gathers this counsel and he

rebukes them for what they didn't they were not doing, and

he assigned them. So what does he say?

How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the

wicked? Seela, think about that.

He says Give justice. Give justice to the weak and the

fatherless. Maintain the right of the

afflicted in the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy.

Deliver them from the hand of the wicked.

And then in verse five it shifts gears.

And I believe it's a reference to these weak and needy,

destitute people in need of deliverance, he says.

They, Speaking of the weak and needy, have neither knowledge or

understanding. They walk about in darkness.

All the foundations of the earth are shaken.

So let's back up for a minute. The rebuke gives us an

indication of their responsibility.

What he rebukes them for not doing the is the flip side of

what he assigned them to do. This was their role.

It was an administrative governing role.

Now what does that have to do with us?

Well, there's there's a lot of things that has to do with us,

but among them, let me just pull up something here.

I'm so sorry. Oh, here it is.

OK, here's here's a couple things.

This worldview was prevalent in the ancient world.

OK? This was no mythology, mind you.

It was the oral history of those to whom God had revealed how he

rules. This was clearly the view of not

only the Hebrew writers of the Old Testament, but was all but

also of the surrounding nations, of the ancient people.

And so you see this, this worldview and many of the

ancient writings of these, the the surrounding culture around

the Hebrew people. But it wasn't some mythology

that they adopted. This was by revelation that God

gave to his people. Now why is this important?

Number one, It helps us understand mysterious or problem

passages in the Old Testament like this one, Psalm 82, which

for years I just read over and thought, well, that's weird,

let's move on. So what is this divine counsel?

Why would God even need one? Well, the answer is he doesn't,

any more than he needs you or I, any more than he needs angels.

I remember talking to a, an old pastor one time, a an elderly

pastor about angels and he said, well, I don't, I don't think

that's what angels do. He said why would God need

angels? I don't think he does, but we

can't ignore the fact that he uses them #2.

It grants us insight into how he rules.

God delegates authority is foundational to his Kingdom.

Now if we don't have that as a backdrop, then there's going to

be a lot of things we misunderstand and and it

inevitably pulls us into a theological category called

cosmology. The cosmology is how the cosmos

works, and your cosmology will have a controlling effect on how

you live your Christian life. Those with the an overly

simplistic cosmology will find themselves coming up against not

only some problem passages, but insufficient in there.

There, there's two forms of an overly simplistic cosmology.

Some people think that God micromanages every little detail

of human existence and in the cosmos.

Anybody got a word for that? Someone want to yell it out?

Yeah, Sovereignty. Or Yeah, it's under the the

heading of Calvinism that interprets sovereignty as God.

What's it Micromanaging? Everything.

Like everything that happens has been not only allowed by God but

intentionally orchestrated by him so that everything that

happens is God's will and God's will always happens.

Well, if that's the cosmology you buy into, that is going to

undermined if nothing else, your prayer life.

Because you're going to be hard pressed to really get yourself

up early and stay in the prayer closet when you think your

prayers really don't matter because God's will is going to

happen every anyway. Everything that happens is God's

will and God's will always happen.

So why am I praying other than to get intimate with God and I

can do that later is what my mind would think anyway, as I'm

saddled with the responsibility that I've got to enforce his

purposes in the earth As a Co Regent, As one who rules and

reigns with him. As a God who exerts his rule

through layers of delegates. God delegates to delegates.

There are layers of rulers just like.

And when God adopts this language of it ain't of Kingdom

when he's speaking to an ancient people, when an ancient king who

had, you know, outlying areas, he hears that one went into

rebellion. He didn't say, well doggone it,

get my horse, I'm going to go over and take care of that.

The king didn't go out and do that himself.

He ruled over delegates and he would send a general or a vassal

ruler to go and bring that Kingdom back into subjection to

him. And we see the same thing in

Scripture, that there are layers of delegates, including you.

God's will is done through you. Furthermore, God's will is done

through delegates who are imperfect.

You know, touched by an Angel. Had it right that sometimes

angels mess up. I don't think they look like

Monica, but you know, they they they might, I don't know.

But you know sometimes they mess up.

There are layers of delegates that some of which have

rebelled. And so when we pray, if you see

Daniel praying to God in heaven goes on the original Daniel fast

the 21 day fast Daniel's praying for 21 day and all of a sudden

an Angel breaks through on the 21st day as Halo's bent his, you

know, his wings are ruffled. He's.

He said, man, I took off the day he started praying, he said.

But I had to fight the Prince of Persia.

Who's the Prince of Persia? It's what we're talking about.

And God didn't just show up to Daniel in person, All right,

Daniel, when you started praying, I wanted you.

I felt like you needed to lose a little weight.

So I waited till the 21st day. You're looking good, by the way,

son. But anyways, here's what you

were asking. That's not what happened.

He sent an Angel, a delegate, to fight through the opposition in

the spiritual realm. The reticence or the resistance

was not in the heart of God, the Angel said.

I was sent the moment you started fast, and that day I was

on my way. God was more than willing.

The resistance was not in the heart of God.

It was in the resistance in the heavenly realms, fighting

through a Prince of Persia, a principality, one of these rogue

entities that had rebelled against God.

And Daniel had to keep praying until the thing broke through.

And Daniel didn't get to day five and say, man, I'm really

hungry, must not be God's will. Again, the resistance was not in

the heart of God. And if we don't understand these

things, if we don't take the word serious, if we are like

that pastor that say, could it be that there's an evil entity

that has intelligence? Duh.

It's in the word and we need to understand what these things,

what's going on. And so there are these, there,

there is these principalities in the heavenly realms that are

resisting. So then that the question, the

obvious question to me is how did they get there?

Who made them boss? Who put them over regions?

Because the implication of the word principality.

It's like where we get the word municipality.

It's a pality, is a geographically distinct area.

That's why the Prince of Persia was called the Prince of Persia.

It's not the Prince of that. Vaguely that area of the earth.

It had a distinct name assigned to a distinct Kingdom.

There was there's geographic boundary lines to the spiritual

realm, just as there are geographic boundary lines

distinct to the physical realm. And there are ruling spirits

that try to exert rule from literal Thrones in the heavenly

realm. Now, Colossians speaks to this.

Let's let's pause for a moment and go to Colossians.

Matter of fact, let me look it up here because I don't want to

have to close that. Look at Colossians chapter one.

You know what? I bet it will change my It'll

change what I'm reading on my laptop if I open it in that,

won't it? Wonderful technology.

Thank you, Jesus. OK, Colossians chapter one.

And this is an interesting This is really the resume of Jesus.

OK, Paul's giving us his rundown.

If, like, if you're going to give your resume, this is what

Paul is doing for Jesus. He's going to tell him.

Look at I'm in the Amplified. Can't read that it'll take us

all day. You know they do.

Some people have called the Amplified the female version.

Hey it wasn't me. I I I was just point I wasn't.

I don't agree with them. I'm just saying that some people

do I those they shouldn't. Those people.

Yeah. Thank you, John.

Thank you. John saved me.

OK, look at this. Look at verse 15.

Whoo. That is small.

He is the OK. This is Speaking of Jesus.

He is the image of the invisible God, the first born, overall

creation. For by him and through him all

things were created. Now listen to what he He

references what God created. And and just by the way, it's it

starts out with what he created and then what he redeemed.

So he's saying it's all twice his.

He was the author and then he was the Redeemer.

He created it and then it went. Those that to whom he had

delegated it rebelled. He won it back.

OK, so listen to what he says. He created all things, whether

things in heaven or on earth, visible and invisible.

He's talking about both realms, whether Thrones isn't that

interesting, or powers or rulers or authorities.

All things were created for him, by him and for him.

He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

And he is the head of the body of the church, the first born at

the beginning of first born from among the dead.

And he goes in to begin to talk about how he's redeemed it all

as well. But what he's talking about is

this. He's saying that there are

Thrones. Invisible, invisible.

He reiterates this and other passages that there are

spiritual Thrones. Matter of fact, in Daniel it

says that Daniel, I want to say it was Daniel that saw.

He saw a divine counsel scene and he said he saw Thrones,

plural. And then the the ancient of days

took his throne. So there are these other rulers.

The word throne literally means a seat of authority.

It's used the same way we think of it.

They are positions in the spiritual structure of the

universe that are positions of delegated authority, and the

person that occupies them can leverage them for their ends,

their value system. And so God created these

Thrones. He He, they were created by him

and they were created for him. God created a universe with

layers of authority. There is structure to the

spiritual realm. It's not just a bunch of angels

going around playing harps. And then we just pray to God

we're interacting with him, and then he just comes down and

answers our prayer it. This is the Kingdom and there

are layers of authority. There are angels that when we

pray, the Father hears our pray prayers and sends angels on

assignment to fulfill what we're praying, just like he did with

Daniel. And there's opposition in the

spiritual realm because some of these creatures, these entities,

have rebelled against the Most High, and although they've lost

their authority, some of them still occupy a position that

they need to be displaced through intercession and not

they. They may have lost their

authority, their authorization from heaven, but they retain the

trade secrets of the Kingdom. They understand things you and I

do not. And that's why we need to press

into the council CIL to receive the council SEL.

We need the Council of the Lord because they're dealing on a

plane that we don't understand and it's God's good pleasure to

teach them a lesson. Ephesians says to teach these

principalities and powers in heavenly places.

He's going to instruct them and teach them lessons through the

church. They're going to learn about

him. He I I look at it as he grabs

him by the nap of the neck and says you're going to watch this.

You're going to Sunday school today, watch what the church is

going to do. They they they're they they're

not as smart as you. They don't know what they you

do. You think they will deny me when

they go through trials, But look at my children this morning.

Look at that one. You know what she's going

through this week? But look at her worshiping and

look at this one over here. And he forces them to watch.

And through us they learn about God and they don't like it.

But it's also his good pleasure to overcome darkness through the

church. God's not doing it directly.

He does it through a praying church that will pray to him,

engage him, He'll send his angels.

We continue in prayer to overthrow evil.

And there's also the the, the, the ground level activity.

Now when we read Psalm 82 and what God is rebuking them on,

look at what it says. It's talking about unjust

systems that favor the powerful, the wealthy, the elite of

society, and misuse and abuse the weak, the destitute, and the

vulnerable. And God calls him to account.

So what happens is when we begin to talk about systemic evil that

finds its roots in the principalities and powers,

because just like the enemy came to Jesus in his temptation, you

remember that. And he offered him positions of

authority in the earth. He said if you'll bow down and

worship me, I will give you all the kingdoms of kingdoms of this

world. And Jesus didn't challenge him

and say you don't have authority to do that, did he?

He didn't question his authority, he just said no, I

won't. I'm not going to bow before him.

And in fact that offer, and it's always this way.

By the way, every temptation that you received from the enemy

at some level is actually an indication of your destiny.

That's why it's tempting he's poking on something you say,

Pastor. Well, what if I'm what if I'm

attracted to drugs? I'm tempted to drug you.

That's my destiny. No, the peace you are seeking

through those drugs is your destiny.

But the enemy is trying to lure you into a shortcut.

Well, Pastor, I'm. I'm.

I am tempted with pornography, and that is false intimacy.

But you were created to really connect with people, and you're

trying to get it through a shortcut.

And the enemy will always try to give you the very thing God has

called you to, promising it through a shortcut.

And when you get it, you don't, you're not qualified to steward

it because you took the shortcut.

And in actuality, the journey is what qualifies you to steward

it. And so God doesn't take you

through a shortcut. He awakens it within you, a

vision, a sense of destiny, a desire.

And if you will walk with him, he will fulfill all the desires

of your heart. But it's going to be through a

process and he did the same with Jesus, he says to him, he says,

I will give you all the kingdoms of this world.

It's evident from these this scripture in Psalm 82 that these

principalities, they they occupy an administrative governing role

in the world. And this at least some of them

are favoring the powerful elites that will bow to them and.

They will worship these people, will worship them, and in trade

then they'll give them those positions of power and

authority. And God is rebuking them.

And so and engaging powers and authorities in the spiritual

realm. Prayer is essential.

We see that with Daniel that we're enlisting the powers of

heaven to come and engage in battle.

Gabriel is on his way and Michael has to come and help him

is what it was Gabriel that and Michael came to help him.

Michael the Archangel, Archangel, Archae.

ARCHE is the Greek word that we translate principalities.

So Michael is a principality. He is the Prince of Israel.

Just as there was a Prince of Persia, he is the Prince Angel

for Israel. That's still loyal to God, but

there are there's a battle going on in the spiritual realm, and

your prayer really does matter in this regard, but so does your

activity on the earth. Because one of the ways we can

overcome principalities and powers is work for justice on

the earth. When unjust corrupt people get

in power, they fuel the demonic in the spiritual realm, and you

see it from this passage. And the enemy loves to get

wicked people into power. Corrupt people.

When the wicked rule, the people Groan proverb says.

But when the righteous rule, the people rejoice.

So we've got to in our nation. We are very fortunate.

One of the one of the most spiritual things you can do is

cast your vote in an election. We can vote for righteousness.

We can vote for godly ends. But we can also work on the

ground level. A number of years ago when I'm

going to keep your Bible here, John, a number of years ago when

Jamie Galloway came here the first time.

Jamie's a prophet travels the world.

Great young guy. He's not so young anymore.

But when we first met him he was and Jamie he came and he when he

came he said I have never spoken in Iowa.

I've been longing to speak in Iowa.

He said I had a dream many years ago about the Twelves and he

said it was about a revival coming to Iowa that was 12 times

greater than what we've seen. And he kept saying this, he kept

saying 12/12/12 and he was talking about all these twelves

in his dream. And so after he was done, I

didn't know Jamie at the time, he we we were hosting a

conference. So I went up and and I said,

Jamie, do you do you know what our address is?

He said no. And I said it's 1212 NW 36th St.

He said that's not a coincidence.

He said you need to get ready. I said, well what does that

mean? And he quoted me that obscure

passage in Matthew where he says, if you bought you, you

drive off the strong man and and you sweep the house clean, and

the enemy comes back and looks at the house and it's swept

clean, set in order but uninhabited, It will bring seven

of its friends. It'll be worse in the end than

in the beginning, he said. There's not only an individual

application of that, there's a regional application of that

principle that in revival the enemy is displaced.

And the Lord spoke to me and this was the idea of what he

said, he said. You can actually cut people of

influence off from the influence of the enemy through loving

them. Well, if you can win their

heart, then they will respond to you rather than to those

principalities and powers. Love is an act of spiritual war.

Honoring people, serving them well, keeping our attitude

right. I I OK, I got a confession.

I like to drive fast. I've always loved muscle cars.

I love to watch shows about muscle cars.

You know, I've. I you know, when I was about 14,

I wanted a ZL1. You know what that is, guys?

ZL1. It's an aluminum block, 427

Chevrolet. It's aluminum, so it's

lightweight and it is. It's like 700 horse stock, if I

remember right. It was amazing.

God never gave me one. That was a desire of my heart.

But he's never given me that desire and I would dare say it's

because my maturity level has not warranted that entrustment.

OK, but even though I like to drive, I, I, I When I drive

around this town, I try to really be careful and smile and

give people the right away. The other day I had my Heartland

Worship Collection T-shirt on. And of you.

It's going to happen to you. You, you know, people know you

from church. Listen, we've got to love.

Well, I would never intentionally be a jerk, OK?

But I'm capable of doing it unintentionally.

And I need to be very careful that we had someone come up to

me one time and say my sister waited on you and your children

at a restaurant. Your wife and your children are

there and they just kind of let it hang in the air.

And I'm thinking did something happen?

And and then she said, she said, you know what she told me I'm

like what? She said your children were

tremendously well behaved and you taught you tip very well.

I was like Hallelujah cuz that that matters.

I didn't give her a tract that looked like a 20.

She'd get excited and open it up as you need to get right with

Jesus. You know, whoever thought that

would be a good idea. How insulting, unless you put a

50 in there, you know. But those we need to love people

well because we can produce an influence over their lives.

So we we are in a spiritual matter.

There are, there are spirits that operate within given

geographic regions. We'll pick up on this in the

future. We'll we'll get back into this

after, you know the next installment that I get up after

this next one and we're going to look at this.

But we need to understand that the these, the principalities

and powers, they operate in distinct geographic areas and

they have an administrative role in which they try to get their

people in power because they want to manifest their Kingdom

through them. And so we need to be engaged in

prayer, but we also need to love and serve.

Well, Chris Vallaton has this great phrase.

They've served the church that he's a part of his serve their

city so well. One time there was, they became

aware of a need in the city, they needed some type of police

equipment. I don't remember what it was

they committed as a church to give $500,000 to that one need

in the Police Department. And usually they didn't make

those things public, but they made it public because they

wanted to challenge the rest of the city.

Let's step up and help. They they used to tithe to the

city. I don't know if they still do.

They were trying to honor well and Chris said this.

He said the rights you gain by demanding your rights will be

kept by continuing to argue for your rights.

They'll be defended by you arguing form demanding.

But the rights, the access that is gained through honor, will be

guarded through favor. The people that you honored will

actually keep the door open for you because you've you, you've

gotten favor with them. And I'm not talking about being

manipulative. I'm talking about being

Christian. I'm talking about let's carry

ourselves in such a way that we exemplify Jesus in the Kingdom

that we love. Well, doesn't mean we need to

agree with people. I don't even agree with

everything I say. Okay, we don't need to agree

with everything. But what we do need to do is we

need to honor their person, the value of who they are, and their

position. Because God created a structure

and when people occupy those position, we honor the position

and we want to cut them off from that spiritual influence through

honor. So we'll pick up where we we

left off in the future here we're going to, we're going to

look more at this because it's very important for us to

understand when we're talking about principalities and powers

or this divine counsel world, the what what all this means.

Let me just read a couple more things and then go ahead and

stand. So, you know, I'm going to quit,

OK? It grants us insight into how he

rules. God delegates authority.

Authority is foundational to his Kingdom.

The the term, the biblical term Kingdom, or bassilia, is

absolutely nonsensical. If there's no such thing as

authority, that's what it is. It's God's right as the author.

He has authority, and he authorizes others to exercise

it, and when he does, it's a real thing.

It's a real force that drops upon them, and it would do you

well to honor what's on their life, even if you don't agree

with their person. Honor their position.

The cosmology. This cosmology protects us from

faulty conclusions which result in a dangerous resignation that

results in impotence on the one hand, and an arrogant Bravada

which lays claim to victory not yet achieved on the other. #3 It

explains evil. It lays the responsibility for

evil where it belongs. Furthermore, it reveals the

governmental administrative structure through which this

level of evil functions. When we begin to understand what

these principalities are, we begin to realize we we laid the

the the blame for evil at the feet of where it where it

belongs. God gets blamed for things that

he didn't do. He's got big shoulders.

He's very merciful, but it messes us up because we can

actually give cover to the enemy by attributing to God what he is

doing and if it's from the enemy we want to be at war against, it

#3 It explains okay. It reveals the governmental

administrative structure through which this level of evil

functions. And #4 it defines the battle,

understanding these ideas, it, and explaining the source of

evil. It clarifies the nature of our

struggle. It is not ultimately against

flesh and blood, but it rather against these ruling spirits.

So we'll talk next time about so how did they where, where, where

do we get that? They how, how did they get

assigned this position? And if they're assigned that

position, why would we fight against them?

So we'll look at that Okay. Father.

Lord, I ask that you would please make sense of what I've

talked about this morning, Lord, that you would continue to train

us, teach us. Lord, I ask that you would

instruct our hearts. I bless each one of these.

This morning, Lord. I I just.

Lord, we ask that you would help us to walk out with an awareness

of your presence. That we, when we step out this

door, that we are representatives of the Most High

God. Lord, help us to recognize it as

much as the principalities do in Jesus name.

Amen. Thanks for listening to our

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