Ephesians 6:10-12 - "Be Strong in the Lord"

Youcan't fight the devil in your own power. “Be strong in the Lord andin the power of His might”. Oh my friend, we stand in His power and in Hismight that is mightier than the power of Satan. As powerful as Satan is, he'snot mightier than God. Then secondly, notice what Paulsays in verse 11, “Put on the whole armor of God that you might be able tostand against the wiles of the devil”. The wiles of the devil is a wordthat means those crafty strategies and clever schemes that he comes up with todeceive you. We think back to Genesis 2 when the devil showed up for the firsttemptation in humanity and that he tempted Eve with.  Satanmade her question God's word and then began to change it. That is an attempt ofSatan, his deceitful device to cause us to question the authority of God overour lives. What should be the finally authority over our lives? Of course it isthe Word of God! Now, if you go back to this passage of scripture in Ephesians5, we are told to submit ourselves one to another in the fear of the Lord.Secondly, Paul then talks about wives submitting to husbands. The he talksabout husbands loving the wives as Christ loved the church and gave Himself forit. How did Christ love and give Himself for the Church?  Welook back to Philippians 2:5-11, where we read how Christ was obedient untodeath even the death of the cross. Why? Because He humbled Himself. Hesubmitted to the authority of the Father. He did the Father's will. We read whereJesus said several times in the Gospel of John, “I came to do my Father'swill”. And we find that He even cried out there in the garden before Hewent to the cross, “Not my will but thy will be done”. Jesus submittedto the authority of the Father and He became obedient to death, even the deathof the cross. This is where we can begin to understand this principle ofauthority.  Wemust remember that there's no authority on planet earth that's not there, butthat God placed it there (Romans 13:1-2). This includes government authorities,parental authorities, school authorities, work authorities, whatever authorityis over our life. God has placed the authority of the church over our life. In2 Corinthians 2:11 we are told that we should not be ignorant of Satan'sdevices, his schemes. What is his scheme? To cause you to question God's Wordand God's authority that's been placed over your life.  Rememberthis passage in 2 Corinthians is about a man Paul is asking the church atCorinth to forgive. Why? In first Corinthians, this man was in a sinfulcondition. He was having incest with his stepmother and Paul said you put himout of the church. You put him and turn him over to Satan (1 Corinthians 5:1-5).When you put him over to Satan, outside the church, he goes outside theumbrella of God's protection over his life. Then Satan is there to deal withhim in such a way that he runs back to the church. He asks for forgiveness andhe's restored back to fellowship. Paul says “Forgive him”!  Forgivenessis a major thing. That's why the passage in Ephesians 4 ends with, “Forgiveone another as Christ has forgiven you”. When we understand this principleof authority of coming under God's authority, we're dealing with what God isteaching us about submission. As we submit to the authorities God has over ourlives, we have a special protection from God, over Satan and from Satanattacking us and deceiving us and leading us astray. Oh, it's so important tounderstand this.  Whenwe begin to understand this, it makes a major difference. That's why he says,remember, we do not wrestle with flesh and blood. Our battle is not withpeople. Often that is what we start doing, but we are fighting the wrong battle.We get bitter because we won't forgive. We come out from under authority becausewe won't forgive. We won't submit to what God is doing in our life. He's usingsometimes people to bring to our attention some weaknesses, some things in ourlife that shouldn't be there.