BY THE WORD OF GOD—AND HIS HORNETS
Chapters 7 and 8 of Deuteronomy describe the way that immunity in spiritual warfare comes to God’s people and the way that it is preserved. Chapter 9 mentions the sons of Anak, the Anakim. They were giants, a breed of Nephilim who constantly opposed the children of Israel. A study of the battle with the Nephilim of that day will reveal secrets for our immunity and our prevailing over the Nephilim in today’s spiritual conflict.
The Lord gave the Israelites this word shortly before they went into the land of Canaan: “All the commandments that I am commanding you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the Lord swore to give to your forefathers. And you shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. And He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord. Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years. Thus you are to know in your heart that the Lord your God was disciplining you just as a man disciplines his son.
“Therefore, you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God, to walk in His ways and to fear Him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills; a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey; a land where you shall eat food without scarcity, in which you shall not lack anything; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. When you have eaten and are satisfied, you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land which He has given you. Beware lest you forget the Lord your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today.” Deuteronomy 8:1–11.
The children of Israel were warned not to take credit for subduing the land, lest their hearts would become proud, and they would forget the Lord who had brought them out of slavery and forget all the benefits and blessings He had given. “But you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who is giving you power to make wealth, that He may confirm His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day.” Deuteronomy 8:18.
“Hear, O Israel! You are crossing over the Jordan today to go in to dispossess nations greater and mightier than you, great cities fortified to heaven, a people great and tall, the sons of the Anakim, whom you know and of whom you have heard it said, ‘Who can stand before the sons of Anak?’ Know therefore today that it is the Lord your God who is crossing over before you as a consuming fire.” Deuteronomy 9:1–3a.
Further reference to the Nephilim is found in Numbers 13, where the Anakim are mentioned in verses 22, 28, and 33. In verse 33, the sons of Anak are mentioned as being of the Nephilim. Anakim were giants who entered into a superhuman generation by devil power. Nephilim existed also in the antediluvian world (Genesis 6:4). When the sons of God went in to the daughters of men, it was the occasion for Satan to produce giants and great men of renown. Nephilim are human individuals who become direct channels for satanic attack against the people of the Lord. They are probably one of the most satanic forms of harassment that can come against them.
Myths from ancient countries, such as the legend of Hercules, are stories of the Nephilim. The generations of Nephilim which come forth today are almost superhuman. They gravitate to high places in government. They become political and military leaders and powerful financiers. Through discernment, they can be traced in prominent families. Nephilim came down through the ages to control the affairs of men and to bring harassment upon the people of the Lord, in an effort to keep them from their heritage in God.
Joshua and Caleb saw the Nephilim when they first spied out the land of Canaan. They determined not to back off from the giants, and forty years later they took as their inheritance the land that was occupied by the Anakim (Joshua 14:12). Even before they went into Canaan, the Lord told them that they would go in and fight the Anakim. Numbers 13:33 identifies them as Nephilim. Nephilim are not always directly fathered by Satan, but this one thing is true: the generation of these people is satanically inspired.
Malachi 2:15 tells us that God is seeking a godly seed. Therefore, He blesses the husband and wife who will seek God that their children might come forth as a godly seed. Satan is God’s ape, and he, too, is striving to bring forth a seed in the earth—a seed that has a basic satanic nature and spirit. Christ recognized the fact that this had already come to pass. He said to certain of the Jews who seemed to be very religious, “You are of your father, the devil” (John 8:44), indicating that Satan is the father of many people who stand in high religious places.
The Israelites went into Canaan with the promise that God would give them the power to obtain wealth and to overcome the Anakim. God promised that He would be a consuming fire before them. In Deuteronomy 7, He listed additional immunities and blessings: “Then it shall come about, because you listen to these judgments and keep and do them, that the Lord your God will keep with you His covenant and His lovingkindness which He swore to your forefathers. And He will love you and bless you and multiply you; He will also bless the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground, your grain and your new wine and your oil, the increase of your herd and the young of your flock, in the land which He swore to your forefathers to give you. You shall be blessed above all peoples; there shall be no male or female barren among you or among your cattle.
“And the Lord will remove from you all sickness; and He will not put on you any of the harmful diseases of Egypt which you have known, but He will lay them on all who hate you.” Everything beamed at them by the enemy was to come back upon the enemy. “And you shall consume all the peoples whom the Lord your God will deliver to you; your eye shall not pity them” (there was to be no religious sympathy in the people), “neither shall you serve their gods, for that would be a snare to you.” Deuteronomy 7:12–16.
God promised His people immunity. In the eighth chapter He promised that their clothing would not wear out, that their feet would not swell, and that everything would be fruitful among them. He promised to give them the power to obtain wealth. He promised to be with them and to bless the land. Notice this promise in verse 20: “Moreover, the Lord your God will send the hornet against them, until those who are left and hide themselves from you perish.” The enemy would hide, but still they would die from the poisons of the hornet.
The conquest of Canaan, under Joshua, was the perfect type of what is taking place now. God’s people are ready to enter into the Kingdom Canaan of all time and into the great rest of the Lord. They will have to learn from Israel of old. We read in Deuteronomy exactly what God had in mind and the secret of obtaining it.
“You shall not dread them, for the Lord your God is in your midst, a great and awesome God. And the Lord your God will clear away these nations before you little by little; you will not be able to put an end to them quickly, lest the wild beasts grow too numerous for you. But the Lord your God shall deliver them before you, and will throw them into great confusion until they are destroyed.” Deuteronomy 7:21–23.
God brought confusion upon the enemy then, and He will do it again now. God’s people should prophesy confusion to evil forces such as the Communists, so that they will make wrong moves—no matter what pattern and plan is set before them, no matter what blueprint they have for world conquest. Confusion should be prophesied to Communist Russia to bring it down, so that it cannot be calculated in Satan’s timetable to destroy the world. The people of the Lord must prophesy against everything that would restrict them.
The Canaan of God’s people today is a matter of seeing the gospel of the Kingdom go into all the world, the glory of the Lord coming to fill the earth, and the Lord setting up His Kingdom. This is what many believers are prophesying. The iron curtain must be brought down, Communist China’s bamboo curtain must come down, and in countries that are completely dominated by the Vatican, that which is called the purple curtain must come down. People must prophesy so that the word of the Lord will have free course and run swiftly. God will do a quick work in the earth as His people believe for all of this to come to pass.
The Israelites were to drive out the enemy little by little, and not all at once. Because they could not take over all at once, it would result in a vacuum in the land, with the wild beasts multiplying rapidly. In the meantime, the Canaanites were left in the land to tend the vineyards, take care of the beehives and the livestock, and milk the cows. They kept the land in good order until the time when the Israelites were ready to take over completely. Then they could crowd out the giants and take over their well-kept vineyards.
This also presents a type for our day. Although these are days of judgments, we can have faith that God will preserve all the creative and productive forces in the earth. They will not be destroyed through the satanic purpose and cunning by which he wants to destroy the whole earth. Satan’s effort is to destroy, and the Lord warns us that unless these days are shortened, no flesh will be saved alive (Matthew 24:22). Total annihilation of the human race is what Satan has in mind. He leads the Communists to believe that they will take over all that is productive in the earth and make slaves of all the world. But that is not the reason Satan is inspiring them. His motivation is to destroy the Communists along with everyone else, so that none will inherit the will of God and the blessings of the Lord.
Oh, what carefulness should be upon us not to miss what God has for us! A key to entering into our inheritance is found in Deuteronomy 8:3. “And He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna…that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.”
You cannot enter into the blessings of God by your own resources, but God has given you a means by which you can inherit all these immunities and blessings. The key to everything, even the power to get wealth, is in the word of God. He is teaching you that you are to live by the word. This involves far more than coming to church and listening to the word; you must hide the word in your heart and incorporate it in your life. It is not enough to carry it like a stick of dynamite; it must be used to blow up the barriers and hindrances in your life.
The word of God in you must be living and powerful (Hebrews 4:12). It must become a sword of the Spirit in your hand (Ephesians 6:17) and the hammer that breaks the rock in pieces (Jeremiah 23:29). It has to be a fire that kindles and consumes every opposition. In this end-time walk with God, He is giving His people a living word. But giving them a living word is not an end in itself; He wants to make them channels of that living word so that they may war by that word, and prevail by that word.
Continual violent prophetic proclamations in the Church will have deep significance, not just to keep everyone on the back row in church from going to sleep; but the word which God speaks through His Body will swell into a floodtide that will sweep away the refuge of lies. It will sweep away all that has been deceptive, all the power of the enemy; and it will bring us into the inheritance that God wants. It will bring down every hindrance, create before us the path to walk in, and give light upon that pathway.
The ninth chapter of Deuteronomy begins with the words, “You are crossing over Jordan today.” This must have been written just before Israel’s entry into Canaan land. As we enter into the provisions of the Lord, it is as if we, too, are passing over Jordan; therefore, we should heed this word. All through the wilderness wanderings and on into the wars of Canaan, God’s people were to live by the word. Even Joshua, the general, was told, “You will be successful if this book of the Law does not depart out of your mouth. Day and night you are to meditate on it. Then you will be prosperous” (Joshua 1:8). The Israelites prevailed over all the enemy by the word that was in them.
The battle you face is one of faith. You cannot roll up your sleeves and fight a Nephilim, but you can stand back and say, as Christ did when He came against Satan, “It is written.” You can bring him down and defeat him with the word. The word is not just something you quote; it is something that lives within you. When God’s words live within you and you speak them, they become the sword of the Spirit that drives everything in all the universe to its knees before the Lord of lords and the King of kings.
Prophesying is not an end in itself; it is a tool, a channel, a means to an end. If you want to possess the Kingdom and walk in the will of God, give yourself to the word of God. Give yourself wholly to the words which God has spoken over you. Meditate on them. Concentrate upon the richness of the word and watch God bless your life. You will not prevail by your wisdom or your strength. Man does not live by bread alone. God will humble you in the wilderness. He will make you hungry so that you realize that you do not have enough facilities or resources to do what He has set before you.
God teaches that you are not to live by bread alone. As you bring down Nephilim, you will not prevail by anything of the human element. You will have immunities and do the will of God because the word of the Lord is going to prevail. You will have power to obtain wealth, and you will see nations come forth. Every wall, every barrier, will come down. You will even prophesy to your clothes and they will not wear out. By the word of the Lord you will prophesy and prevail.
You can loose God’s people from religious Babylon. Just stand and prophesy by the hour, “Come out of her, My people. Come out of her” (Revelation 18:4). Watch God bring them out. The Body of the Lord Jesus Christ will produce a level of prophecy whereby a person can stand and prophesy like Ezekiel, and he will see bones standing up and becoming an army of the Lord. Prophesy and create it. It will not be done by any wisdom of man, but by the word of God loosed in all of its power in the world.
Prophesy the breaking of your limitations. Prophesy that the walls come down. Prophesy until your pocketbook is full; then empty it for God, and prophesy for Him to fill it again. Do the will of the Lord, and become a channel of His blessing. Never judge anything by your reserves of strength or cash or possessions. Judge only by the word of God that will loose you from all limitations. II Corinthians 9:8 promises that God will cause all grace to abound toward you, so that you will have all sufficiency in all things to abound to every good work. You will prevail by His power.