A scriptural study of the judgment of the nephilim and the gods of Egypt helps us to understand the judgment upon the gods of this age. The judgments that happened in Egypt have deep significance today. What God was doing in the first Passover, against all of the gods of Egypt, was one of the most fantastic things ever done. It was not just a Passover; God was determined to break every one of the gods of Egypt and their oppressions. Just bringing deliverance would have been much easier.
We may begin to wonder why we cannot break through to deliverance when it seems like such a simple thing. But God is using our bondage to futility as an occasion of judging Satan and all the other gods of this present age. Be encouraged in what is yet to happen. The picture of what is to be is not what we are seeing at the present time. The church service now is not the kind of service that we will have in the Kingdom. It will not be labored. The Kingdom age is the true age of entering into His rest.
What we face now is deceptive, as far as the overall picture is concerned. Things are not now as they will be later. Once we are deep into the Kingdom, we will not have services as we have now, no more than travail is a permanent state of a woman’s life. The Kingdom will be a time of release for us, just as pregnancy is terminated with the birth of another human being. The pain of birth and the travail that must come upon a mother is not a permanent way of life. It is a way of transition as she is becoming a mother, a person whose relationships will change from that time on. After she gives birth to the baby, her breasts fill with milk. She begins to sustain another life, but not in her own womb—that life will be independent of her as far as his own personal existence is concerned.
This illustrates what a remnant of God’s people is experiencing at the present time. The end-time ministry will not be a permanent state of travail and heavy responsibility. It will shift. A release is coming in which today’s travail must give way to another spiritual state. The Kingdom was never meant to be a permanent position of travail. But we must labor much to get into it.
The time of the first Passover was similar to our time. When the Lord told Moses, “I will send you down to deliver the children of Israel out of Egypt,” he went down; and it became much more complicated than he had thought. After nine plagues had almost totally destroyed the Egyptians, they came to him and said, “Don’t you know that Egypt is destroyed?” (Exodus 10:7.) Egypt was permanently destroyed and never rose again to its former power. It is significant that the Lord had to execute judgment against the gods of Egypt before He could deliver His people totally.
Likewise, we have to see the judgment come against the principalities and powers and nephilim spirits of this age before release comes totally to the people of God. There must be the coming forth of an apostolic company, as well as the breaking of the satanic hosts that hold God’s end-time ministry back. There must be this release so that the whole of God’s will can come forth. This is the reason we must intensely pray and travail and prophesy it into being. The ministry of a remnant has turned into the ministry of a spiritual midwife to bring forth through labor the apostolic company that will shake the earth. And in that very process of labor, they are fathering the ministry that will father the nations. They are fathering the ministry that first fathered them. As the sons come forth, they enter into the mature travail to help their spiritual fathers come forth, and in turn they join them in bringing forth the nations.
This is a mutual thrust, somewhat like the action in a roller derby, in which a couple of skaters pull another skater to throw him ahead of all those who would try to block him. That game has an amazing spiritual application, especially in the way they become violent and vicious. The skaters are keyed up for total violence at any minute. Their skating is a picture of symmetry and beauty, but underneath is a volcano, ready to blow! Some skaters position themselves to block an opponent, but others come by and swoop through them. They trip each other—anything goes.
This is exactly the way the devil is fighting us. Satan tries to block us and keep us from getting into the lead and making spiritual points. But the action that counts is our standing together. As we stand together, we help one after another to come in; and the more we press on, the better. We must unrelentingly press into worship and spiritual warfare. This does not mean, however, that we will always battle spiritually as we do now. Once we have defeated the foe, oppression will not rise up again. There is a host of demons, but we are in the process of seeing very great principalities and powers broken. As they are broken, it will lead to the easy breaking down of the lesser demonic powers and evil spirits that can be dispelled easily. It will be easy, once we overcome the principalities and powers.
This is exactly the way Paul identified our warfare. He did not say that we are fighting a lot of little demons. He said, For our wrestling (warfare) is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world-rulers of this darkness… Ephesians 6:12. We are not shooting at little demonic spirits. We are going after principalities. Many little things come against us as we walk in God’s end-time move of the Spirit; but the nagging little demons are not the problem. We are coming against the big ones. We are choosing the area of conflict and challenging the enemy. As we come against the enemy, we are enforcing the victory of Jesus Christ. This is exactly where we must stand in this present hour. This is why we must intercede and pray, but never battle on the human level.
End-time spiritual warfare can never be reduced to the human level. Human beings who become dedicated instruments in the hands of the great spiritual powers that oppose God’s people will enter into the end-time judgment. They will become channels of Satan. Regardless, Satan cannot destroy the work of Jesus Christ without destroying the Body of Christ. As long as we are alive and we stand as instruments through whom the Lord has chosen to manifest Himself, the work of Christ will go forward. By the same token, Satan has chosen human instruments who will come against us, yet they will receive judgment. The judgments upon the earth will see millions of people die, because they are as dedicated to be tools of Satan as we are dedicated to be tools of God. Satan has his own body and organization that he is bringing forth, just as Christ has His. Satan’s organization, to label it, is Babylon—the hold of every foul spirit (Revelation 18:2). It is the fortress that is deeply entrenched by the spiritual wickedness in high places. And we must come against it with everything that is within us. The slain of the Lord at our feet will be many (Isaiah 66:16).
The challenge now is a contest between the two bodies, between the corporate structure of Satan and the corporate structure of Christ. It is not between just God and Satan, but it has come to the ultimate issue of Satan wanting to control the world and trying to control it through human instruments. No matter how many demons he has on the scene, it is through human channels that he does his work. God is doing His work through human channels. The Lord’s Body is bringing it forth. The battle, then, is no longer on a human level; it is between God and Satan. Consequently, your defeat is the defeat of God, but your victory is the Lord’s victory. It is as simple as that.
This passage of Scripture from Isaiah, chapter 65, tells us about the new heavens and the new earth and what the new Kingdom really represents. “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth; and the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind. But be glad and rejoice forever in what I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem for rejoicing, and her people for gladness. I will also rejoice in Jerusalem, and be glad in My people; and there will no longer be heard in her the voice of weeping and the sound of crying.” (Note the complete change that takes place.) “No longer will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does not live out his days; for the youth will die at the age of one hundred and the one who does not reach the age of one hundred shall be thought accursed.” Isaiah 65:17–20. This is speaking of premature death.
Notwithstanding the emphasis that should be on natural foods as opposed to harmful junk foods, the breakthrough for divine health will not come through nutrition, because the thing that is killing people is the presence of sin. The power of sin is death. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, saying, The sting of death is sin … but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. I Corinthians 15:56–57. You have to face the fact that the processes of death are manifold.
James 1:15 says, Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Death is a process. It starts with a disobedient thought, a rebellious thought within you. Death comes from wrong attitudes. A wrong attitude is like a seed that starts growing, or like a germ that starts multiplying. It produces a certain way of life, and that way of life leads you to rebellious, difficult things, which in turn lead you to a course of death.
Paul wrote, For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Romans 6:23. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption (corruption goes on into death); but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. Galatians 6:8. This is a process that also affects the physical body. Our breaking through into divine health will not be so much through nutrition nor through anything that medical science can bring to us. Divine health will come through God, through a spiritual state that affects us.
The rest of the passage from Isaiah 65 promises these great blessings of the Kingdom: “And they shall build houses and inhabit them; they shall also plant vineyards and eat their fruit. They shall not build, and another inhabit, they shall not plant, and another eat; for as the lifetime of a tree, so shall be the days of My people, and My chosen ones shall wear out the work of their hands. They shall not labor in vain, or bear children for calamity” (this is good to know, for the prime young men of several generations have been the fodder of the war machine); “for they are the offspring of those blessed by the Lord, and their descendants with them. It will also come to pass that before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall graze together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox; and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall do no evil or harm in all My holy mountain,” says the Lord. Isaiah 65:21–25.
This is speaking about the changes of what is termed the millennium that we are striving to break into. We must break through to see the nature of things change. With the defeat of Satan, no longer will he be the roaring lion roaming about and seeking whatever little lamb he can devour; we will see the change first in the spiritual nature of everything. The change will not come by a conversion of Satan; however, the way that the present satanic spirit world preys upon the believing world is going to be reversed. We must intercede and travail for one purpose—to come into the authority of Christ, to come into the manifestation of the victory of Christ through us. You must understand the fact that Christ has already overcome Satan. The real battle is based on our understanding the past provision of victory which is ours and how to appropriate that victory at the present time.
Every problem now is based on appropriating what is really ours, on lifting our veil of ignorance to cure areas which we do not comprehend yet. We have more than we realize. More has been committed to us than we realize. We are more than we realize—we are God’s special creation. We are His sons. We have more faith than we know, but we are blinded to our potentials. We are unaware of where we really stand. We are deeper into the Parousia (the coming of the Lord) than we really know. It is later than we think, but it is earlier than we think, too. We are facing a whole new day, a whole new age, but we are slow to grasp it. The illusion that we are limited still limits us. We must break through the futility, the frustration, and the unawareness we are under by persevering to the point where the illusions vanish.
This calls to mind a story about two convicts in a penitentiary who were working on a rock pile. Both of them kept whacking away at a rock until finally the trustee came over to them in disgust and said, “You fellas have been whacking on that rock too long. Let me show you how to do it.” So he lifted the sledgehammer and hit the rock, and it shattered into hundreds of pieces. He simply said, “There!” But they just looked at him and said, “We softened it up for you.”
This seems to be happening in the Body of Christ at the present time. We whack away in prayer at something by faith without realizing that the rock is being softened. There is often even an illusion that the job is not being done. We do not really see what we are doing; we are not aware of it. We are not aware of how effective we are in worship and intercession every time we enter into it violently. We change the whole spiritual climate. We are coming out of winter and into springtime. The rains are coming, and we are ready to see creation burst forth and begin to grow in the sight of the Lord. But first we must understand that we have more and we are more than we realize.
The passage in Isaiah 65 gives us the picture of what is going to be. “It will also come to pass that before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear.” Verse 24. Wouldn’t we like to see that day come! Before we could open our mouths to ask, the answer would walk in the door. But we are not experiencing this. It would seem the opposite—the more we cry and pray, the more the enemy fortifies the illusion that we are ineffective. And yet we are not ineffective. We are deeper into Christ’s victory than we know; we are in the process of appropriating His perfect provision, and soon we will have appropriated it perfectly. When this happens, there will be no resistance against us; and before we call, the answer will come.
What a bond, what a relationship with the Lord is yet to come! We will not find demonic powers positioning themselves between us and the perfect provision and victory that God has provided for us. We will have dispelled them. Therefore, we must face spiritual warfare and pray constantly, while believing that the present is only a temporary state. The breakthrough in appropriation will come as we keep ramming away at the rock. The rock is weaker than ever before. Perhaps one more good blow, and we will have a pile of sand instead of a rock.
The Scriptures give us encouragement for constant persistence and the exercising of ourselves in godliness. Even in the world we hear reviews of some of the fantastic feats that people have accomplished. For instance, one review honored some women who had plowed through indomitably against almost impossible odds in what they had accomplished. There was no way that they would give up—they kept pressing on. One woman had won the Olympic gold medal for figure skating. It was easy to see how she could win that. It looked so easy as she just floated around on the ice so gracefully. There did not seem to be a bit of work to it. Anyone would think it was her great natural ability. Then it was brought out how many years she had exercised and practiced for several hours a day. Another woman had practiced a number of years in order to race downhill on skis in a contest. She missed winning by one turn, by just a little slip. Nevertheless, she went on to practice for a few more years and finally won first place.
The patience and long-suffering of these Olympic contestants provide us with examples which we can apply to our spiritual efforts. The victory will be won, not by him who prays violently for a night or two, but by him who stays with it. Isaiah 62:6 tells of the watchmen who cry day and night to the Lord—out of that comes spiritual strength. Every time you enter in to pray, you become stronger. What causes a righteousness of spirit to take over? Constant practice!
One of these days, before we speak, the answer will come. It will be like seeing an Olympic skater gliding on the ice to music—jumping and whirling, with everything looking beautiful and easy, but behind it all are the years of practice, several hours every day. This is what God is speaking to us. He is saying that we ought always to pray and not to faint (Luke 18:1). The persistence that is required is difficult for some to understand. Weak faith is not an issue. Persistence is the issue. Actually, violent persistence is the issue.
“Bodily discipline is only of little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things” (I Timothy 4:8). Here, godliness means godly discipline. Athletes can discipline the body and reach a certain goal, but it is of little profit. Likewise, many people are good, but goodness is not an end in itself. Godliness is not an end in itself. However, godly discipline holds the promise for the present life and also for the life to come. In order to break through to a divine existence, you cannot rely on physical discipline alone. Although it is good to try to take care of yourself by keeping in condition and eating the right foods, you will find that many people who do all of that are certainly not saints. Some people who go out of their way to avoid eating any processed food might be classified with those who strain at a gnat and swallow a camel (Matthew 23:24).
Where should the emphasis be? Eat the best that you can. Live the best that you can. Take care of yourself. Try to get the proper amount of sleep. Then go against it and break all the rules. Forget about eating and go on a fast. Forget about sleeping and stay up to pray all night. There comes a time when godly discipline does more for you, and you come out well and strong with health surging through your body. You come out as a brand new creature, not because of what you did physically, but because you exercised yourself in godliness.
Paul went on to say, It is a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance. I Timothy 4:9. What is a trustworthy statement? Bodily exercise is only of a little profit, but godliness—exercising yourself in God, in prayer, and in persistence, seeking after God—is profitable for the present life and for the life to come. It really pays. For it is for this we labor and strive (is not this what we are doing? laboring? striving?), because we have fixed our hope on the living God… Verse 10. The discipline, the exercise in God, the fasting, the persistent prayer, the striving, the intercession and travail—all of these things are meaningless unless you fix your hope on God. Does God come through for us, or do we break through to God? We must break through principalities and powers, declaring them defeated foes, in order to enter into that which is laid up for us.
Paul told Timothy, Prescribe and teach these things. Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe. Until I come, give attention to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and teaching. Do not neglect the spiritual gift within you, which was bestowed upon you through prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands by the presbytery. Take pains with these things; be absorbed in them, so that your progress may be evident to all. Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things; for as you do this you will insure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you. I Timothy 4:11–16.
Whatever you are doing right, in due season you will reap the benefits of it. You cannot help but break through, because you have more than you think. God has made a greater provision for you than you ever realized. An unawareness still veils the Body. The people do not appreciate who they are and what God has created them to be. They do not realize their destiny. They do not realize how much faith and love He has placed within their hearts. They do not realize how far they have gone on in the Parousia or how deeply they have penetrated into the days of the Kingdom. They do not realize that they are the holy remnant of God and that a destiny rests upon their own heads.
One thing we must pray: “Lord, open our eyes to see, and let us persevere. Let us be diligent.” It is in the perseverance of a remnant that the judgments of God will fill the earth. It is in the perseverance of a remnant that the promises laid up for centuries past will be fulfilled in this generation. This is the truth we must walk in today. Let us walk forth faithfully in what God has set before us. Let us believe that He will renew our spirit, making it even stronger to persevere in the things that He has set before us. Let us be “steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord” (I Corinthians 15:58).