BREAKING THE POWER OF THE DEVIL !

Breaking the Power of the Devil : We see in (Ephesians 6: 12) that ". . . We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places" [a marginal note calls them "wicked spirits and the heavenlies"]. The word of God teaches us that these evil spirits are fallen angels who have been dethroned by the Lord Jesus Christ's. Our contact with these demons should be with the knowledge that Jesus defeated them, small them, put them to nought (Colossians 2:15). And now that Jesus has dethroned them, we can reign over them ! ADAM'S TREASON: Originally, God made the earth and the fullness thereof, given Adam dominion over all the works of His hands. In other words, Adam was the god of this world. Adam committed high treason and sold out to Satan, and Satan, through Adam the first man, became the god of this world. Adam didn't have the moral right to commit treason, but he had the legal right to do so. Now Satan has a right to be here and be the God of this world until "Adam's lease" runs out. Satan had the right to rule over us until we became new creatures and got into the body of Christ, as we see in (Colossians 1: "Giving thanks unto the Father. . . Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son. . ." (vv. 12--13). That's why Satan has no right to rule us or dominate us. Yet the average Christian has more faith in Satan's world system and authority and power than in God's ! The Bible not only talks about the first man Adam, but also about the second Adam, Jesus Christ, who became our substitute. In (1 Corinthians 15:45), He's called "the last Adam," and in the 47th verse He's called "the second man." All that Jesus did He did for us. Our trouble is that we regulate everything to the future ! Most church people believe we will exercise our spiritual authority sometime in the millennium. If that is so, why does the Bible say Satan will be bound during the millennium ? There won't be any need to exercise authority then, because there will be nothing here that will hurt or destroy. AUTHORITY NOW: It's now, when there is something that will hurt and destroy, that we have authority. But many people believe we can't have much of anything now. They think Satan's running everything down here. We must remember, however, that although we are in the world, we are not of the world. Satan is running a lot of what is here on earth, but he's not running me anymore. He's not running the Church, which is this body. He's not dominating me. We can dominate him. We have authority over him ! Jesus said, "Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing [nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing] shall by any means hurt you "(Luke 10:19). Does the church in this century have less authority than it did right after Jesus death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seating it the Father's right hand ? If it has less authority today, it would have been better for Jesus not to have died. But no, blessed God, we have authority. We need to build these truth into our lives by meditating and feeding upon them until they become a part of our consciousness. NaturallySpeaking, we eat certain foods every day because doctors tell us we need certain vitamins, minerals, etc, to build strong bodies. There are spiritual "vitamins" and "minerals," so to speak, we need to take every day, not just when you feel like it or when it's time for you to go to what you call church. Too be a healthy believer.