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We have been talking about the reality of spiritual warfare, and how the kingdom of God and the kingdom of this world are in conflict with each other. We saw that when we do things to build God's kingdom, such as healing the sick, those same actions tear down the devil's kingdom. The devil will feel attacked by our kingdom activity, and he is likely to fight back by counter-attacking us. But God doesn't want us to be taken out by the enemy's attacks, so He has given us spiritual weapons that we can use to defend ourselves. That includes the spiritual armor of Ephesians 6. In addition, there are definite things we can do to prepare for the enemy's attacks so that we will win the battle when it comes upon us. We came up with nine of them in lesson 10.
We already looked at the first two in previous lessons, so lets pick up from where we left off. We will look at number 3 in this lesson.
KEEP SPIRITUALLY ATTUNED
We talked about being Spirit-led in our last lesson. This is very important in the context of spiritual warfare, as the Holy Spirit is our Commander and Advisor, the One Who leads us in battle. He tells us what battles to fight, and what battles to rest and trust the Lord in. He gives us battle strategies. He reveals the enemy's plans to harm us and gives us strategies to counter these attacks.
But we cannot follow Him if we are not attuned to Him, if we do not know how to recognize His leading or recognize His voice.
We need to build an ongoing relationship with God in order to get to know Him well, so that we are able to follow Him when He leads us. The ability to hear His voice (to recognize His warnings, and follow His directions) is something that we learn by spending time with Him. We need to keep up our "quite times" with God. We need to spend time in His written word, the Bible, to get a good understanding of what He is like, of what He expects of us, of what pleases Him and of what displeases Him.
We also need to spend quality time with Him to build a personal relationship. This includes things like prayer, worship, and godly meditation. We spend time in prayer (talking to God and listening to what He has to say to us). God intends for our prayer time to be a two-way communication. We speak to Him and share our hearts and our struggles with Him. We bring our needs and our requests to Him. And we also listen to what He has to say to us. If you haven't already done this, you will be pleasantly surprised to learn just how much God speaks to us. He gives us direction and He encourages us, but He also likes to "small talk" with us, to talk to us about all sorts of things. Think of it like a personal friendship...we get to know each other and we share things with each other.
I am reminded of a story I heard at a pastor's conference. I don't remember who shared it, but the gist of the story goes like this: a pastor and his wife were driving cross-country to visit some friends; lets call the friends Ted and Irma (I don't remember their real names). While they were driving out, God spoke to the pastor's wife in the car and said, "Irma has a new refrigerator with all sorts of fancy features and she just loves it." The pastor's wife spent about an hour pondering the information God had just given her, trying to find some sort of kingdom application for it. She finally told God, "Lord, I simply can't figure out why you told me that...I mean, I can't see anything I need to pray into, any prophetic message to deliver or anything I need to do about it. Why did You tell me this?" And God replied, "Oh, I just wanted to share Irma's good news with a friend."
She was overwhelmed to hear that God thought of her as a friend and wanted to simply share things with her that she did not have to do anything about. It revolutionized her perspective on her prayer life and caused her to dive into a new and deeper personal relationship with God.
God wants to that same kind of deep and personal friendship with each one of us. And the closer we draw to Him, the more clearly (and the more accurately) we will be able to discern His voice.
Worship is another great way to spend time with God and get to know Him better. Psalm 22:3 says that God "inhabits the praises of His people" (KJV). That means that when we worship God, He responds by coming to us with His tangible presence. There is nothing quite as awesome and wonderful as spending time enveloped in God's tangible presence. He reveals some aspect of Himself to us in those times and we get to see Him "close up." He might manifest His great love for us. Or He might manifest His holiness, or His power or His glory... or whatever aspect of Himself that He wants to make more real to us at that time.
We can't get attuned to God's leading without spending time with Him and developing a personal relationship with Him. We can't get good at recognizing God's voice if we don't get to know Him and develop a personal two-way relationship with Him. Jesus put it this way in John 10:27, "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me."
There are three important things that we should glean from His statement. The first is that God expects us to have a personal relationship with Himself. We see that in these phrases: "My sheep... and I know them..." The second is that God expects us to hear His voice, as per the part that says, "My sheep hear My voice." The third is that God expects us to obey Him when He does speak to us, as per the part that says: "and they follow Me."
To summarize, we need to spend time with God and build intimacy with Him on a regular bases, as a part of our day to day lives. That way, we will be attune to Him and able to hear His voice for any warnings, leadings, or directions that He gives us.
I should also bring out one more important fact. Relationship with God is the key, not doing works for Him. God doesn't like it if we do the "works" of Jesus if we are not in personal/intimate relation with Him, led by His Spirit and following His agenda. Look at what Jesus said in Matthew 7:21-23: "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 Many will say to Me in that [judgment] day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' 23 And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me.'"
We see a similar dynamic in Luke 13:24-27, when Jesus talked about entering in through the narrow gate. He explained that we can't get by on our proximity to God (like just attending Church), we have to build a real and personal relationship with Him. Jesus said, "Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. 25Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, 'Sir, open the door for us.' But He will answer, 'I don't know you or where you come from.' Then you will say, 'We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.' But He will reply, 'I don't know you or where you come from. Away from Me, all you evildoers!'" (NIV).
The simple truth is that we must develop a personal relationship with God and be spiritually attuned to His leading, as well as being quick to "obey Him because we love Him" (John 14:15). When we do that, the Holy Spirit (Who resides inside of us) begins revealing more of God to us. It is not our responsibility to somehow figure out what God wants; He will speak to us and He will show us. This is what Jesus said in John 14:26: "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you."
Of course, the more we make an effort in our day to day life to tune into God's Spirit, the easier it will be for us to hear His voice to get His direction, leading, warnings, etc. That is why it is so important to spend time each day seeking Him and developing our personal relationship with Him.