JUN 18 2023 | Paul’s Third Missionary Journey S1E3 | Power and Authority

Sea Change Church · Paul's Third Missionary Journey S1E3 · "Power and Authority" · June 18, 2023
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

The book of Acts chapter 19 verses 13 through 20. Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon possessed. They would say, in the name of Jesus whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out. Seven sons of s Skiva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this one day.

The evil spirit answered them, Jesus, I know and I know about Paul, but who are you? Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding. When this became known to the Jews and Greeks living in Ephesus, they were all seized with fear and the name of the Lord Jesus was held in high honor.

Many of those who believed now came and openly confessed their evil deeds. A number who had practiced sorcery, brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly. When they calculated the value of the scrolls, the total came to 50,000 drachmas. In this way, the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power. This is the word of the Lord.

Hey, good morning if you have your Bibles open to Acts 19, 13 to 20. We are in the city of Ephesus and we're gonna be there for the next three weeks. And this is powerful and important for us because in a lot of ways, the city of Ephesus really mirrors where we are living today in a whole bunch of ways. And we see Paul here come into a city and begin to make dramatic change within that city. If you have your scripture, lemme just start with verse 13, the seven sons of Ske bear getting in trouble.

Some Jews went around driving out evil spirits. If you wanna circle, circle, driving out evil spirits and tried, tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were deemed and possessed. They would say, in the name of Jesus whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out. Seven sons, Quia, Jewish chief priest were doing this one day. The evil spirit answered them, which is really interesting. Jesus, I know, I know about Paul too.

Uh, but but who are you? Uh, then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them, overpowered them and gave them a massive whooping. And so that's my interpretation at the bottom. We're gonna get to verse 19. And, uh, that grew in power. Part is really important. Power is important in the scripture. Power is important in your life. That's we're gonna be talking about today.

I wanna start with this statement. Satan only understands power and authority and is they're only vanquished through those means. Let me say that again. Satan understands one language, power and authority. He's not gonna be, uh, talked out of doing what he wants just because you have a great argument. Unless that argument is in the power of the word of God in the power of the knowledge of God.

We'll see a verse about that and not understanding this key principle about how Satan and evil works in the world causes us sometimes to be on the sidelines. Now, I do want to say that I'm not encouraging you to go start a demon hunter's YouTube channel, like I'm not encouraging you to live on that realm. But we need to be aware that Satan wants to remove your influence.

He wants to remove your power and he wants to have power in your life. He wants territory in your heart. He wants territory in your home. He wants territory in your work. He wants territory in your relationships, and he wants to have influence or power in your life. What we see here is an archetype of how that works and how the power of Jesus is meant to be employed by believers.

And we can see it in the story about the sons of schema. So Satan only understands power and authority and is therefore only vanquish through those means. Quick question. How often do you feel that you employ the power of God? Love, we're all in the love, right? Love's awesome. Love is a form of God's power. We're all in the love, but how often do we take territory in our family's lives?

Territory taken in our own hearts, Satan only understands power and authority and we need to speak that language. The word power in some form is in the scriptures, 335 times. That's a lot. And it is you, it's 200 times in the Old Testament and 135 times in the New Testament. It's used in some form in 21 of the 27 New Testament books, 27 books in the New Testament and the lion's share, use the word power.

If you go to bible gateway.com and you just in the search put in power on the right hand side, we'll have a toolbar and it'll show you every book and you can go into every use of that power. I don't think that usage would be so prolific unless we were meant to live and understand the power of God and to walk in his power. Acts 20, go to verse 20.

At the very end here, it says, in this way, the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power. The word of the Lord spread and grew in power. It's easy to think about power as a nuclear power, plant power. You, you remember, you know, a a, a locomotive train, you think of that kind of power and the Bible speaks about that kind of power.

But the word here in this passage isn't that kind of power. The word here is the Greek word kratos. Kratos, and kratos means forced strength. So it is that kind of power in a way, but more it's dominion and territorial power. It means as if a king takes over a countryside and then his forces take dominion like King Edward did over the Welsh people for good or for bad depends on what side you're on. Uh, when he took power and there was a hundred or more so years where the English ruled over the Welsh, you see that it is a territorial power, this word cratos. There is territory in your heart, some is God, you've given it to God. Satan wants a foothold. The scripture says, and he wants to turn a foothold into a stronghold.

When you have attitudes of unforgiveness, that is a lack of cratos. When you have anger in your heart, that is a lack of kratos. And so it says because of what happened, people were so overwhelmed by what they saw that the sons of Cheba and this demon and they saw something happen. They saw basically a form, although it doesn't use the word of dunamis, we'll talk about dunamis in a malware that's in a minute.

That's force and strength and power. They saw dunamis and kratos usually in the scripture follows the dunamis. God moves in power. He heals somebody, he changes a heart, he fixes a relationship. Something, a check comes in the mail that you never thought would happen. Something happens where God moves and then kratos is taken.

We give more of our heart, we give more of our home, we give more of our relationship and our marriage. And so this word kratos. Now, dunamis is a different type of power and that's also in the scripture word. Dunamis means a physical power, a force a might, abil ability, efficacy, energy meaning power, deeds, deeds showing physical power.

Marvelous work. It means that power that is accomplished through God when someone is healed. Someone came to me before the service and said, had an issue and we had this thing going on in my heart, had a, I'm gonna have them come and testify at some point in the next few weeks. And they, they showed it on the, on the scan and we prayed when the doctor went out, the doctor came back in and it was gone.

They were one of our people that got baptized, 10 or 11 people that had been baptized in the last month. And they said, I think that's tied to the baptism. I said, maybe they're telling me I wasn't preaching to him. I said, okay, let's go. Um, they said that something happened, they were testifying and then all of a sudden there was power. Amen. I see that believers who understand. Now, here's two points we're gonna walk in today.

Number one, first point is this, the world is governed through spiritual power and authority. Gonna have to learn how to take power and authority or you're gonna be surrendering constantly. The devil is always on the move trying to take authority, authority in your home, authority in your heart, like I said. So the world is governed through spiritual power and authority.

Some people will say no, the world is governed by love. Love is a form of God's power and it is one of the, um, arrows in the quiver of God's power. But I think we've overemphasized love sometimes because there are other, justice is a form of God's power. Miraculous works the word of God. There's all this power and we need to understand how to walk in God's power.

So do you feel like you walk in God's power? That's a question that you can answer and you can through this message, you can define how to walk more in God's not only dunamis, but also kratos. And then number two, believers who understand and walk in the power of God and authority will take dominion. Kratos. Those who do not will become subjects.

I don't think it's possible to just stay neutral. I don't think there's any neutrality in the kingdom of God. I think that if we try to maintain neutral postures of prayer in our home, neutral postures of the word of God, neutral postures and relationships of eventually the devil will do his best because he's always working to take power that he will begin to subject you, whether you know it or not.

Now I'm not talking about subjection like the de demonic man was subjected here, but all of a sudden your heart is moved more towards anger than it is towards forgiveness. He's starting to implant attitudes. He's starting to take a little bit of territory. Um, slowly when the TV first came in the 1950s, one of the executives said, this is one of the ways we are finally going to be able to get beyond the walls of the home. We will become another family member.

We will have something to say. We will be putting influence into a family because of the messages we have. As soon as that TV came on, there was another voice within the home. RAAs had been taken and it's going, not that TV's bad, but what we allow and what we end to watch tends to matter. So those are the two points. Let's go to the first one.

The world is governed through spiritual power and authority. Verse 13, some Jews. So there's a whole group of them here and that was the thing. They would make money going around and there was some ability, I can't go into it all, to um, to cast out and, and and take authority and God's name, but Christ now was on earth and things were changing.

Real quickly before I go on, can you show the, the slide of my spiritual, um, holy Spirit course. Just put this down. I can't go into all this today cuz you're gonna have a lot of questions. That's not the one, the other one on the Holy Spirit course, we're gonna get to that one here in a second. I have a Holy Spirit course coming up that is gonna go into this in depth and how to walk in power. So we'll talk more about that.

It's going to be in July and you got there it is spiritual warfare, walking in power of authority. So Mark that out starts August 8th, you can put that there. So it says that there were some Jews that were doing this. Verse 13, some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits. Now I ask you to circle, circle it again. Tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus, but they didn't have the authority to do so over those who were demon possessed.

Uh, first thing I wanna start with is this, is that the universe is not only material. Now, I know in when I was 15 years old, Madonna tried to convince me that I was living in a material world and I'd never believed her then. And I don't believe her now. And the reason I tell you that is because if we default to a position that the world is only material, we are in the minority of people who have understood the spiritual metaphysical level at which the universe acts.

We know the Bible even says that the metaphysical, the spiritual, so to speak, is actually more powerful because everything that is physical will pass away, but everything that is spiritual will last forever. And so once again, I'm not encouraging you to od on metaphysics to start a YouTube channel, become a demon hunter. And everything is so spiritual.

They say, you're so spiritual, you're of no earthly good, but I want you to be aware of that and to be able to walk in authority in order to do that. So it says they were going and driving out evil spirits. Uh, the Bible was clear that demons exist. Evil spirits are mentioned or demons are mentioned 82 times in the Old Testament. In the Old Testament, demons are mentioned 82 times Interesting in the New Testament, in the Old Testament, or excuse me, in the Old Testaments mentioned 82 times, but in the New Testaments also mentioned 82 times.

So you have 164 mentions to demons. Now, you know, one thing is Jesus, when he dealt with a demon, it was like, no go. No, I got no time for you. He'd give one sentence answers to Satan. It was like he wasn't doing all this craziness. Oh, we're gonna have this incredible, you know, um, demon casting out ministry. That wasn't what Jesus, Jesus was about. Jesus as you watch him was like, no, you can go. Nope, you're out. Nope. Done, done. Paul's the same way.

So I want to say that while the Bible speaks about this, that while the Bible speaks about demons, I've been in churches where we become demon fascinated. If you were around in the 1980s, there was the books, um, you know, about wa you know, cast this present darkness and it was all about angels and demons. And there was a, in the Christian community, there was this massive interest in demons.

And what I wanna say is I'm not gonna give demons a stage that I wanna, I want to act like Jesus and I just wanna be aware of my authority. If you know the power of God and you understand your authority in Christ and you know the tools, then you can just walk calmly like Jesus and say, you have no right in my family. Here, I'll give you an a for instance.

This week I had some, some thoughts that were anxious. And because of studying the scripture, all of a sudden I was able to say, you know what thought, you have no authority in my mind it says, the Bible says using the word of God, be anxious for nothing but in all things through prayer and supplication, let your request be known to God and he will give you a peace that transcends all understanding. I was at Celebrate Recovery this week, Tuesday night, and there was someone who mentioned that my imagination has never been right.

And that was so powerful for me because we can start catastrophizing, right? We can start imagining all the things that are gonna happen in our life, but by understanding the authority of God, by knowing God loves me, by having the word of God and taking authority over every thought, taking captive every thought you can start walking in power thought you have no place here. You have no place in my mind, no place in my heart.

And so we see here that some Jews were driving out these demons and the Bible was clear. Now, just to give Corinthians um, some context, in first Corinthians 10, four, I think it's in your notes, there's a very powerful passage that makes it clear that we are not living in a material world as much as we are living in a metaphysical spiritual world. Here it is. First Corinthians, stand four.

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war. It's talking about warfare as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power. Circle power. I think that's dunamis to demolish strongholds. That's a stronghold in your mind, your heart, political strongholds, the knowledge it says strongholds.

We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. And we take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ. How good are you at using RAAs power in using the word of God to fight the thoughts that come into your mind, the unholy imaginations, the temptations, the thoughts, the anger, the anxiety. If you're going to work in Kratos, we don't just try to think our way out of that bad thought, we tend to do that, right? You get a bad thought and you think, well, I'll figure it out this way.

Or well, you go into your thinking of your own understanding. But Philippians says God wants to give you a peace. What beyond your understanding, meaning you don't need to understand it and the power of God can still wipe it away. You can take authority, you want to walk in authority. I think this is so important on Father's Day that fathers understand when their daughters or even their wives or people in their family might say something that is contrary to the word of God about themselves.

To be able to stand up and say that is not true. You are a child of God. I was sitting with a realtor yesterday, we were talking about her faith and she said, I prayed, um, you know, I went to church as a kid and I, I prayed and, and um, we were gonna lose our house 10 years ago. And, and a check came in for almost the exact amount that we were gonna, you know, that we were gonna lose our house. And why would God do that?

And I just spoke truth to her. I said, because you are a daughter of God and God loves you deeply. You are his child and he cares for you. She started crying. We're like in a business meeting and I'm just bringing the word. I'm just speaking truth. And as fathers I wanna tell you, don't curse your families. Don't speak negatively over your children.

Don't, don't be in agreement with the enemy. Who is the father of lies. Speak encouragement. Speak encouragement over your wife. Learn how to bless your family. Rarely a day went by where I dropped my daughters off from school without praying. The five second blessing. They knew when they left the door they were gonna get blessed. This is power.

This is RAAs. This is what takes territory in your daughter's home, in your daughter's hearts. In your son's hearts. It is what gives them courage. It is speaking the word of God. It is taking captive, demolishing, strongholds. There's a lot of strongholds today, especially with young girls. A lot of strongholds, a lot of cutting going on, a lot of self hate, a lot of self-loathing, A lot of fatherlessness say, I don't think think other than the power of God.

Anything is as valuable as a father who shows love and care for his wife primarily and then speaks truth, kindness, courage and boldness and blessing over their children. That will change it a entire society. And that's what's missing. We see that. We'll just read that again for though we live in the world. We do not wage world as the world does the weapons, these are weapons we fight with prayer as a weapon.

Word to God as a weapon are not the weapons of this world. What are the weapons of this world? Lies deceit, power, manipulation. That's the weapons of this world. On the contrary, they have divine power to what? Demolish strongholds. We have strongholds in our cities. Some of us have strongholds in our families, some of us have strongholds in our relations in our own lives.

God wants to demolish strongholds. Satan only understands power. He only understands power. I would say the next thing, go to verse 13 again, says some of the Jews went around driving out. I had you circle driving out for a reason why? Because demons are territorial. Demons are territorial. And unless they have a quarter a place to attach to, a place to call home where they have been invited, then they have to wander as Jesus says, looking for a place until they find quarter. I was telling my daughter this, we were talking about this. She goes, that's why I've never been afraid of Dracula. I was like, what?

What are we talking about? The scripture here? She goes, yeah, as a kid I was never afraid of Dracula. I said, why? She goes, because Dracula can't come into your house unless you invite 'em in. So it was a little kid I knew who's stupid enough to invite Drac into their house. I saw lost boys in the eighties. I was like, you're right. That's true.

I would say demons only dwell where they're given quarter. Well I'm a given quarter. When you let pornography onto your phone, you're given quarter. Fyi. When you lie on those mortgage papers, when you lie to your bo, whatever the thing when you live in unrighteousness, anything that we do and we are covered by God so he will cover us and care for us. I don't wanna spook you, but there is a legal system and if you wanna understand it, go to the book of Job and watch the book of Job Cuz job cuz the devil rolls up to God and says, I wanna attack Job but he's too righteous. I got no, but he doesn't gimme no quarter. That's what he says. Job, there's only two ways that the devil can attack you. One, you allow it or two, God allows it for his good and his purposes. That's it.

The devil cannot roll up on a place that you have clothed in righteousness and attack you in that area. He has no quarter. Only if God says I'm going to allow it. And why does God allow some things to happen? I have no, I have no idea. But we need to stop giving the devil quarter. We need to give him, give him no quarter in our tongue and the way that we speak.

No quarter in our hearts, no quarter in our imaginations, no quarter in our minds because demons will come and they will go before God and say, I have authority to mess with their finances because they cheat. I have authority. That's why I've never wanted to cheat on a tax form because the blessing is too good and I'm not gonna sell my blessing for a bowl of lentils like Esau did.

Are you giving quarter? Where are you giving Quarter. And once again, I'm not telling you to go around your house and touch everything and look at everything and get all crazy looking for demons. But if the Holy Spirit lays something on your heart, say, you know what? No more quarter for you in the name of Jesus be gone. You need to go and then be done with it. You don't gotta do a seance, you know, not that we do seance. You don't have to like burn sage.

We don't do that either. But you don't have to do all this stuff. You can just say be gone. You have no authority here anymore. Dads, I wanna tell you something. You give your kids a phone with no restrictions on the phone. You are opening your children up for the demonic to have quarter in your children's life. I read an article yesterday about low dopamine parenting.

No more phones. Please don't buy your kids a VR set. Please don't. I don't care how popular they are. If I had to do it again, I would give a phone a lot LA later in life than I gave. We tried to watch it. It's very difficult. Give dads, especially moms, if you don't have a dad in the house, moms give no quarter say that is not allowed here and take dominion.

You have authority in that place because demons only dwell were given quarter and we know it's territorial because it says they were casting them out, which means you can't be here. And so when you cast the demon out, Jesus said, what did they do? Remember it says they go and wander in desolate places. Jesus said, and I don't like that.

It's not comfortable for some reason we'll talk about that at my class starting August 8th. When they do that, then in that place they're looking for someone where they can go sit. They're looking for someone where they can go dwell quarter. So they go around. Jesus even said that. These are his words, looking for a place to have quarter, give no quarter.

I say that churches need to think about this cratos power as well as believers. We need to think about Cro toss. We are in the business of taking territory. One of the reasons we had the snow event out in La Jolla because we wanna make Christ known, not just between these four walls. We made a decision this year to be up on the hill to take risk on Easter.

It was financial to go to um, the the the show, the movie the passion of the Christ at a local theater. These are all reasons cuz we want to see the kingdom of God have RAAs. That means more than just the power of God. It means he's taking more territory. How much territory does God have in your heart? How much RAAs are the little spots the Holy Spirit's not allowed to go?

How much authority in your home are there places in your home? Hey this, this is my man cave. What happens in the man cave stays in the man cave Cratos. You either, you either walk in God's power or you're subjected to the enemies cuz he will use it authority wise to take it. Churches are meant to have RAAs. And remember in, in, uh, revelations two 13, it talks about churches.

And I believe that churches are meant if a church is doing what it's event called to do, it's supposed to take RAAs in the city. You're supposed to have more influence in the people's hearts. You're supposed to care for teachers and be on campuses and caring for people and showing the love of God all throughout the city. You want to be churches that take cities for the kingdom of God with the love of God. In Revelations two 13, it says, I know where you live.

He's talking to a church where Satan has his throne because Satan is not omnipresent like God. He can only be in one place at a time. He's very limited. And so this was up in Pergamum now before he was in Babylon and he moved to Pergamum. And if you remember the, the series of revelation a couple years ago, remember that there was an altar, um, that, that Hitler took from this area in Pergamum and moved to Berlin right before World War II started, which was really, really interesting. And it says, yet you remain true to my name. You did not renounce your faith.

Not even the days of Antipas. He was a a, um, Roman ruler who would kill people and persecute the church. You were my faithful witnesses. Many of you were put to death in your city where Satan lives. You see God, there's places where demons have been given so much quarter, they just take over. There's a battle for quarter in our nation right now.

If you don't understand, certain cities have given more quarter. You can look, you can look at the results of the cities. Certain cities are not giving quarter. And you can see that we want to be a city that does not give quarter, that brings life through our emotional renewal center that brings children in to be protected, to bring children in, to have a safe place to help fix marriages and and, and let the spirit of God rule over marriages.

We want to have more rass and hopefully you'll join us with that. But I gotta tell you what, we ain't gonna take a city if we can't take our home. We're just not gonna do it. We have to get serious and say, I want authority, I want, I want dominion. I think a lot, not all. So hear me out. I think a lot of the anxiety, I think a lot of the depression, the spiking things we have seen is because we're giving quarter.

I don't think it's all chemical. I think it can become chemical, but I think there's a portion, I don't know how much that is about. We have just given too much quarter. Finally as we close, number two, believers who understand in walking God's power and authority, dominion, those who do not will become subjects. Verse 14, the seven sons skia, a Jewish chief priest, sons of a Jewish chief priest were doing this one day.

The evil spirit answered them. Jesus, I know and I know about Paul, but who are you? If you can put that picture up on the screen. I made a little bootleg understanding it's not perfect. But there was a picture here that shows kind of how this works. You are either within Christ or you are not. Uh, and Christ is calling people within. And so Jesus is at the top of that pyramid, so to speak. And underneath that, within Christ, over Satan, over the world to take dominion.

Christ has shown us many times in the scripture that we can take cratos throughout the world. The more people who continue to advance the kingdom of God. You have Paul, Paul is in the power of Jesus. That's why when Paul cast the demon out, it went, the church is under and within the power of Jesus. You see the the um, prayer, God's word, uh, believers are all there and they have authority. Satan is underneath that.

Satan has no power over you. And we begin to sometimes get afraid or fearful. The devil's this, the devil's doing that the devil does nothing that he's not allowed to do. And we can take authority. The scripture is so clear. I just read that verse there. And if you wanna write, put a verse up that first Corinthians 10, four, cut that out and put it on your fridge. Everyth thought every pretension, everything that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, we will destroy.

I believe that a lot of the things that look strong in our culture are on some real shaky ground right now. Picture I keep getting in my head is like these kind of bamboo footings. You get this big powerful thing. It looks so powerful, but it's on bamboo footings. And as soon as the church arises, those things will be demolished. We'll turn this week I was frustrated.

I was looking at things that are happening. Culture, right? We get frustrated, right? It's like 1968. Things are rough right now. I was like, God, how are you gonna turn this around? You know the word I got in my heart? I moved the entire ocean every day, twice a day from one side of the earth to the other. You know how much, you know how much water? Like 15 feet, 20 foot tidal rises twice a day, back and forth all the water in the ocean twice a day.

Don't think that I can't change things like that. Look at my power. We believe in that power. But so often we fail in faith to believe that God can change our marriage, change our lives, change our hearts, change our patterns. This is what we're called to believers who walk in power authority, understand their identity in Christ. The sons of Cheban Cheba, were out of their depth. Show the picture again if you would not in Christ.

It's funny, why didn't they just call on the name of their father? Uh, the, in the name of my father, the Jewish high priest. I cast you out. They probably tried that. It wasn't working and so probably business was bad. And we're gonna see an Ephesus. There's a big commercial thing going on next week as we look at Ephesus and money's being made off a bunch of sin and things and they're making money on this. So hey, let's, let's try that Jesus name a little bit.

They called upon Jesus but they had no authority to call upon Jesus unless they first humbled themselves to go under his authority. And so they were outside of it. So Satan's like, Hey, game on. Let's go. You want, you wanna mess with me? Let's go. And they turned themselves over trying to live in an authority that they don't have. You cannot depend on someone else for your relationship with Christ.

If you're a kid, you're not gonna be saved when you're 22 because your parents are Christian. I never wanted to rent my kids our faith. I never wanted to rent my children our faith. And we let them struggle in their faith and we let them doubt their faith and walk through hard times. But I always told, you know, Hey, why are you a believer? It's not because of me. Are you still a believer?

Eight years old, 10 years old? I would question 'em on their faith. And to the point where about a month ago, one of my daughters was walking in so much holiness and purity that it was embarrassing to me. It was embarrassing. And I thought, I cannot let my daughter lead the family straight up. And so I thought I need to get my, I got, I need, I need to get some kratos going.

I need to get out of this and I need to take authority in my home again because they're submissive to the authority. See, my children want me to lead, my wife wants me to lead. And so to take that position and to take that place, we're gonna walk in that. And I can do that because Christ has given me that authority and they, my children and my wife want me to have that.

My wife and children want to be covered. And dad, if there is one, dads and fathers and men, if there is one role that I will say that we have, it's protectors, maybe providers, I know there's women that provide, I don't really wanna have the provider argument but protector for sure. Men, we need to protect our women. We need to protect them from the assaults of the world, from the things of the world and care for them.

And then give them free reign to move and walk in God's power and be whoever God calls them to be. But just know as a back, you know, not even as a backup plan, as the tip of the spear. I am here to make sure that you are honored, cared for and protected. That's what we're called to do. The Son Hebrew outta their depth and authority.

I wanna pray one show one more verse and then we're gonna close up. Sha Ephesians one 18 through 21. I pray that the eyes of your what heart that's territorial may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you. The riches of the glorious inheritance of his what? Holy people holies key there. Holiness gives territory if you don't know holiness, no territory.

And his incomparable great power for us who believe that power is the same as the mighty strength. He exerted when he raised what Christ from the dead stop right there. The power that you walk on in that he wants to make known to you is the same power that raised Christ from the dead. Tend to think Christ raising from the dead nuclear power plant, Adam Decel battery, nuclear power plant, decel battery. No, it's the same power. And we walk in that authority, not by lording over it but but just by understanding it and walking in that power and authority. And then it says this, he exerted this power in mighty strength when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him where at the right hand of the heavenly realms, far above, far above all rule, all authority, all power, all dominion.

Every name that is invoked, not only in the present but also in the age to come. It said that's the power you have. So are we gonna continue to take these thoughts that come on us? Oh, you're no good, you're, this is gonna happen to you. You're not cared for, you're abandoned. You are, you are an orphans. You know, are we gonna agree with those things?

Are we gonna stand up and begin to take that territory back? I don't have time to go in it, but I'm gonna mention these four. How do we leverage God's power? One is knowing the word of God. Hebrews four 12, you write that down cuz I don't believe it's in your notes. Read that scripture. It says that God's word is like a sword. You need to know the word of God.

Surprised how many people, if I say find the book of Hebrews, have no idea where it is in the Bible. We need to be a Bible believing church. We have to do a better job getting the word of God in your hands. Know the word of God, use the word of God. Number two, live righteously. Psalm one, six, for the Lord watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked, wicked leaves to destruction.

Two more prayer says, confess your sins to one another that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person. Righteous man, I think is the actual word, but it might be Greek, um, in the anthrop of all people, but women work as well, has great power and is effective. The prayer of a righteous man is affectual. It's the old, that's the old version. Prayer is effectual. One more thing guys.

The Bible also has a verse that says, if you don't treat your wife well, your prayers are not effectual. And then the final one is, says, seek unity. Unity is so important. Ecclesiastes four. And though a man might prevail against one who was alone, two will withstand him. A three four co cord is not quickly broken. Unity is power. When you have dis unity in your marriage, you are giving an opportunity for the enemy to come in and try to take quarter in your life. You are taking a away the power that you have. Unity, fight and struggle.

Do everything you can to have unity in truth, what does a divorce do? You're gonna lose power. You're gonna give your finances over to a judge, somebody you don't know. You're gonna get decided when you get to see your children by someone you don't even know. That's what divorce does. We need to fight and do everything we can to stand up and take RAAs. Is that what you want? Do you want power?

Do you want God's glory as the same power as the word of God? Let's do it. Amen.