The Chemistry of a Christian 06: Spiritual Conflict
Spiritual Conflict
Everything we have is a result of God’s grace and goodness.
THE WONDER OF HIS LIGHT
Light is the culmination of the manifest character of God and the revealed character of God.
JOHN 1:4 (NLT)
In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
Jesus is both the manifest and revealed expression of God’s character.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
(Genesis 1:3)
God made something out of nothing.
There was a time when Supernatural DIVINE Light was the order of the day.
Darkness is not only evil but simply the lack of light. We can be in a dark place and not necessarily be evil.
Consuming darkness wants to make you feel evil. So evil that you believe you are too far from God (identity) and that He would never want to know you (relationship)
Without the threat of darkness, we easily identify as supernatural beings.
We accept that intimacy and relationship with the purest form of divine Light is possible and that because of our supernatural status in connection with the highest God, we have full authority in the realm in which we were created. In its purest form, that authority is more powerful than our current expression.
MADE FROM DUST
GENESIS 2:7 (NLT)
Then the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nostrils, and the man became a living person.
Scripture uses dust to indicate frailty.
Bring frailty into the presence of divine light/influence, and there is a supernatural expression of identity, authority, and purpose.
Bring darkness into the presence of light, and there is an explosion that purifies, makes right, corrects, and gives life.
Even before sin, forgiveness was a part of God’s character. It did not need to be manifest or revealed, but it was there.
WHEN THE LIGHT COULD NOT BE SEEN, AND THE FRAILTY PREVAILED
Divine light was no longer recognized; in humans’ hearts and minds, the divine had been deauthorized.
GOD REDEFINED AND QUESTIONED
GENESIS 3:1 (NLT)
The serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild animals the Lord God had made. One day he asked the woman, “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the garden?”
Satan introduces the idea that LOVE, JUSTICE, WISDOM, AND POWER should not be the LIGHT setting primaries.
THE WORD WAS TWISTED
GENESIS 3:2-3 (NLT)
“Of course we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,” the woman replied. “It’s only the fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden that we are not allowed to eat. God said, ‘You must not eat it or even touch it; if you do, you will die.’”
THE LIFE-GIVING SPIRIT DISMISSED
GENESIS 3:4-5 (NLT)
“You won’t die!” the serpent replied to the woman. “God knows that your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God, knowing both good and evil.”
Satan questioned the establishment of life as revealed by the Spirit.
THE LIGHT AND DARKNESS DO BATTLE
Adam and Eve were LIGHT Bearers. Now they shifted in their chemistry. They now had a new force to carry – the darkness that the Spirit had seen and that the Light had irradiated.
GENESIS 3:7 (NLT)
At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves.
In the hearts of man, there was now a purpose that they were not designed for or had the authority to carry: To be like God knowing right (light) and wrong (dark).
The Holy Spirit could handle the dark. Jesus conquered the dark, but we were never designed to carry anything other than LIGHT.
Light from all three, all the time had not been extinguished, but now humans would have to carry a sense of right and wrong, and that weight would leave them doubting the wonder of God.
The flesh and the natural had been given room. But with God’s character – there was still Hope.
LOOKING FOR ADAM AND THE PROMISE OF JESUS
GENESIS 3:8-9
When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees. Then the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”
GENESIS 3:15 9 (NLT)
And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”
HOPE AND GRACE REJECTED
GENESIS 3:10
He replied, “I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.”
With GRACE rejected, the manifestation of God’s character (LIGHT) could no longer be appreciated.
No manifestation of God’s character meant no identity and no purpose.
Satan manipulated their purpose and their identity and robbed them of their blessing. And he is trying to do the same to each of us today.
Their purpose was questioned, their identity thwarted, and their authority extinguished.
The character of God was never irradiated, just distorted.
THE GREAT DISTORTION
In the mind of Adam and Eve, Satan distorted the primary elements of the Father.
His POWER was questioned.
His LOVE of humankind made strange. The LOVE of His Word brought into disrepute, and the reflection of His LOVE through the Holy Spirit covered over.
WISDOM was now allowed to be construed by flesh-thinking humans, and the new level of JUSTICE was whatever humans decided it was.
TRUTH and HOLINESS were gone, and the resultant RIGHTEOUSNESS was made to look dirty. Man was now bound to the dark thoughts as he saw his FREEDOM dissipate.
The view that God was EVER-PRESENT and LONG SUFFERING was a distant memory. Being a vengeful God would cloud His Divine Decorum and His GRACIOUSNESS. Being a lofty heartless judge would taint His MERCY.
PEACE would be gone in Word and Spirit. And with that, Peace SOUND-MIND and LOGOS logic would go too.
All of the life-giving wonders the HOLY SPIRIT brought to push back darkness would be forgotten, And with no MANIFESTATION or REVELATION, the Divine Hope of the World would no longer be in fashion.
Lives would become overwhelming, and even feeling some moments of joy would become difficult. Work overwhelms us, and relationships frustrate us.
Who would want to perform any discipline for a God that judges, hates, and no longer forgives?
With grace forgotten and the wonder of His FORGIVENESS and EMPATHY lost – we find ourselves HOPELESS.
WONDER and PASSION get lost in the churn of life.
GENESIS 2:16-17 (NLT)
But the Lord God warned him, “You may freely eat the fruit of every tree in the garden— except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If you eat its fruit, you are sure to die.”
The rot of disobedience now manifests in just that: LIFE was no longer as beautiful as it had been.
JOHN 3:19-21 (ESV)
And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.”
The Light Went Out
SATAN TWISTS; HE CAN NOT CREATE
2 CORINTHIANS 4:4 (NLT)
Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.
HE TWISTS THE DIVINE INTO FALSE GODS
1. SATAN – The Father now becomes the father of lies.
2. WORLD ATMOSPHERE – The WORD becomes the word on the street.
3. HUMAN FRAILTY – THE HOLY SPIRIT’s revelation becomes HUMAN thinking.
GRACE AND PURPOSE WARPED
GRACE is turned into LIES
Divine PURPOSE is warped into SELF-DETERMINATION
IDENTITY AND RELATIONSHIP SEPARATED FROM LIGHT
Satan turns Divine IDENTITY into a thought process of NO SELF-WORTH
Divine relationships make way for EMPTINESS.
THE HORRID FOUR
1. FEAR is twisted by lies into DEPRESSION in our thinking and OPPRESSION in global delivery.
2. PRIDE gives the world FALSE AUTHORITY and turns individuals into OPINIONATED machines.
3. DECEPTION
4. DOUBT
SATANS CORE
Control
Rebellion
Destruction
Confusion
HUMANITIES RESPONSE
Blame
Shame
Condemnation
Excuses
Addiction
Temper
God’s character is present but wholly corrupted.
0 Comments