Hold The Line | Week 1 | Daniel Goulding | Echoes Church

Man, I hope you guys had an incredible summer. It's always weird to say that like summer has come to a close when you walk outside and it's still 250 degrees and you're like, my face is melting off, but I guess summer has come to a close. Right? School school is back in session, which all of us parents are like, yes and amen for. Right? Like some some order again in the house, some schedules, all the things are back and hopefully over the summer you were with us as we walked through the book of Romans.

Today again, we're starting a new series and a new book and every time you open the Bible, you wanna ask yourself a few questions because these these weren't originally just one big book. They were individual letters written by somebody

to somebody and and that information gives you a lot of the context that makes what you're about to read make sense. One of the questions you wanna ask when you're reading something in the Bible is who wrote this letter? Okay, this letter that I'm about to read, who wrote it? The letter of the word that we just read in Ephesians was written by a guy named Paul. The same guy that wrote the book of Romans, one of the most important figures we have in the New Testament,

at one point was incredibly hostile to the message of the early church of Jesus.

He was he was actively opposing the spread of Christianity but then God got a hold of him and he goes on to be an incredibly important figure. So we know who wrote it. The second question is who's the audience? Who is he writing this to? Now again, a lot of the titles in the bible give away the audience. Now the the book is called Ephesians because it was written to a city that was called Ephesus.

Now again for this to make sense for this this church that was birthed in this city called Ephesus, you've gotta understand some things about the city of Ephesus. The the the closest like modern day context that I could give you for what Ephesus would have been like in the first century

is imagine that you take the like the social, the economic and the population of Los Angeles

and you combine it with like the spiritual atmosphere of Sedona, okay? You like take those two things and you make them it's a weird baby but imagine that they had a baby together. K? That's the city of Ephesus and that's I always laugh when people come back from Sedona and they're like, man, I just there's so much energy in Sedona. I'm like, yeah, there's a lot of energy in Sedona but I don't like the energy. A lot of it is occult and demonic and it's some of this freaks me out, like I love the heights, not so much the energy, right? That's the city of Ephesus. It was a it was a port city. In the first century, you didn't really have massive

cities yet Ephesus was probably two or 300,000 people. It was a port city, massive commerce, tons of money, exchanging of hands and in the middle of that, there's this thriving church but you've also got to understand that Ephesus wasn't just a wealthy city, it was also the occult

capital of the world. One of the seven wonders of the world exists inside of the city of Ephesus. The temple to the goddess Artemis was there. All types of crazy pagan worship was taking place in this city

and yet still there's this thriving church that we we know a lot about because the bible tells us a lot about the church that was taking place in in Ephesus. Acts chapter 19 tells us, it gives us a little bit of a glimpse into what was taking place there spiritually

but it tells us that a number of them, a number of the citizens that were getting saved in this church, they had been practicing sorcery, they brought their incantation books and they burned them at a public bonfire. The value of the books were several million dollars and so the message about the Lord spread widely

and had a powerful effect. This church was exploding in this very pagan city and the church was changing the climate of the city so much that the the silversmiths

in the city started to come and say, guys, this is this is bad for business. All the people that used to come into our our our silver stores and buy all these statues to dedicate to the goddess Artemis,

they're not doing that anymore because they're a follower of Jesus now. This is bad for business, right? The reason I give you the context, the reason that the the cultural climate matters is because all of that sets up what Paul is addressing. The third question you wanna ask once you know who wrote it and who the audience is, is you wanna know what's the

what's the primary purpose of the letter. Now Ephesians, Paul has a couple purposes but I think the primary one, the one that I wanna focus on today over these next seven weeks is he was trying to prepare a church for war. He was trying to prepare a people for battle.

My goal this morning, my goal over this series is to prepare you and I for the battle that is in front of us whether you know it or not. If you don't realize that you are in a war, I'm telling you, you are already fighting from a position of of defeat. The Bible tells us that from Genesis chapter three on after Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden Of Eden that you and I were born into a posture

of warfare, that there is an enemy that is here that is real that is is fighting against us, that if you don't realize it, I'm telling you, you will always walk around defeated but

but praise God, there is victory that is available to us in Christ, we have to learn how to battle not in the physical but in in the spiritual.

I wanna talk to you about this idea that the struggle is spiritual because I just believe that what Paul is saying is true and that the struggle that you and I are really up against, the battle that's really being waged in your marriage and in your home and in your mind, the anxiety that can be so overwhelming at times,

it is more spiritual than you realize. We again will spend the next six weeks walking through what Paul says is the armor of God that you've got to put on as you're going to engage in this warfare.

Now again, this was not just some random symbolic reference that Paul is Paul is mentioning. We learn at the end of this letter that Paul is enchained as he's writing this. Most likely, Paul was literally in under home arrest being chained to a centurion guard. He's literally chained to a Roman soldier who every morning made a decision to put on the full armor to engage in the battle that he was in

and Paul starts to realize, friends, if we're gonna win not the physical battle that we're in but spiritual one, we've gotta learn how to put the armor on as well. My hope and my goal this morning is again to just lay a foundation to help us realize there's a war that is waging all around you and if you don't realize it, if you don't begin to engage in it, you've already lost.

Paul doesn't even have to with the church in Ephesus. He doesn't even have to talk about the reality of spiritual warfare. He didn't have to convince them that it was real,

why? Because they saw it every single day. They were watching the forces of darkness move. They were watching the supernatural break out in their lives. Here's our tension as Americans living in 2026.

A lot of us think about the idea of spiritual warfare and we're like, are you for real bro? Like, you're you're in 2026 and you believe in demons

and I'm like, yes, they are very real and my fear is that we typically as Americans take one of two positions that are both equally not helpful. The first posture that a lot of us take is we just put our head in the sand and we go spiritual warfare is not a real thing. That's like for the weird Christian people. I'm telling you if that is your posture, you've gotta wake up. My singular goal for you is to help you begin to engage into the fight. There's another group of us though, it's not that we don't think that they're real, we're the people that think that there's a demon behind everything, right? You ever met one of those people and they get up and they have a bad hair day and they're like, there's a demon in the blow dryer. You're like, no.

It's just called humidity, bro. Like you're just having a bad hair day. Right? Like there's not there's not always a demon behind everything and here's what you gotta understand about spiritual warfare.

God and Satan are not like equal adversaries. We're we're not talking about two opposing forces that are that are equal in power. No. No. No. God is so much more powerful, so much stronger and the enemy knows that. It is why often the warfare that he wages with is a warfare of deception, it's a warfare of the mind because he knows what he doesn't want you to know,

that he's already defeated. That the power of salvation that's available to us is also the same power that can help us walk in victory over him in this life but if you don't if you don't even begin to engage in it, I'm telling you, you've already lost the fight, Paul starts

Paul starts his letter and he tells us in Ephesians chapter six verse 12, we are not fighting against flesh and blood enemies but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.

Paul starts by telling us where the battle really is. He reminds us that I know you think your mother-in-law is the enemy but that's not the real enemy.

You and I will be tempted to think that our fight today is with doctor Fauci or it's with Joe Biden or it's with Donald Trump or the Democrats or the Republicans or our boss or our spouse and Paul says no,

none of them are the real enemy. The real enemy is the spiritual opposition that's coming against you and it's not random, it's organized. It it is not sporadic, it is structured.

There's a very real enemy that is tactical in how he's approaching you and if you don't realize it that there's a war that is being waged over your home, over your mind, over your legacy and over your children, I'm telling you, you have no ability to win the war that is that is spiritual.

But Paul says, you can begin to realize where the fight really is, you can begin to focus your attention there, you'll begin to realize the the struggle is more spiritual than you realize, maybe you can start to see victory in the things that have been being victorious

over you. And I know for some of you, man, you've been facing incredibly incredibly intense anxiety and depression. I'm here today to tell you that the struggle is is spiritual. For some of you, it feels like temptation has just been overwhelming in this season. Let me just tell you the struggle is is spiritual.

I know some of you men, home that usually supposed to be a place of of calm and peace and sanity has been a place of warfare. I just want to remind you that the struggle is spiritual and if you will fight the right enemy, you can begin to see victory.

My hope and my prayer is to show you over these next few weeks how to fight the spiritual battle because if you fight a spiritual battle with natural weapons, I'm telling you, you're gonna lose every time.

If you approach a spiritual battle with natural weapons, you you've already lost and you've got to realize that in the darkness, the enemy has has all authority because that's his dominion and as long as we continue to live in the dark, you will you will lose but there's a battle tactic that we've been given that the scriptures show us that if you can begin to implement it into your life, you can walk not defeated but in in victory. The first thing you gotta do is you gotta know your enemy. You gotta know who you're fighting because if you're gonna defeat him, you gotta first know who he is. The the first thing that the Bible tells us about our enemy is that he's destructive in nature.

You gotta realize Satan has one goal. He has one hope. He has one aim and it is absolute destruction.

He's not here to play games, he wants to destroy your life, he wants to destroy your marriage, he wants to destroy your children, he wants to take your integrity, he wants to take your calling, he wants to take your assignment, he wants to take the authority that God has given you, he's coming for all of it, his goal is destruction. John chapter 10 says that the thief, his purpose is to steal,

kill and destroy. You know whose words these are? Jesus. He says, but my purpose is to give them life that is that is a rich and satisfying life. Jesus has come so we can have life and life abundantly but there's a thief that is trying to destroy

that life. Again, my my mind kinda goes to pictures often. When I think about the destruction that the enemy is causing in our lives, in our homes, in our marriages, in our our businesses, the havoc that he's wreaking, I think about the picture. Have you ever seen a city after a hurricane or a tornado has ripped through it like it doesn't take a genius to look at a picture like this and go, well,

something happened here, right? Like it's easy to see that something took place here because you can see the path of destruction.

What the Bible tells us is that the same is true in our lives and if you would if you could see the path of destruction, you'd begin to realize that the destruction has a direction that points back to an enemy that is spiritual

but do not do not think that the enemy is just here playing games. His aim is singular. His goal is one in purpose. It is absolute destruction. That's his goal. What's his tactic? The Bible tells us that he is he's a deceptive enemy. His tactic

deception. He knows that he's already defeated, he knows that he can't really actually do anything to harm you and I who are in Christ, so what does he do? He lies and he deceives and he manipulates. Paul will tell the church in Corinth, second Corinthians chapter 11 that Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.

It tells me that Paul is giving us insight into here's the enemy that's coming against you. Oftentimes what he's going to do is he's going to appear as an angel of light.

That tells me that if you and I are going to have any chance of of defeating the spiritual enemy that we have, we've got to realize that oftentimes what he's going to do, the the carrot he's going to dangle in front of you is not is not something that is obviously

bad. See, this is what's really hard is what he'll do is he'll masquerade as an angel of light and he'll convince you that something that feels good, that appears to be good will lead you where you want to go but he he fails to mention that there's a there's a hook that's in the snare. That there's a trap that has been laid and this is where we as the people of God need the discernment of the spirit of God to help us discern between not not bad and good,

where we need discernment, where we make the biggest mistakes in our life is is not discerning between good things, seemingly good things and God's things. Sometimes the greatest thing that the enemy uses to pull us away from the purposes of God are disguised as things that just appear

to be good but it tells me if this is real, this is true. As the people of God, we gotta realize that not everything that looks good is good. Not everything that looks good, not everything that promises pleasure

is actually for our good and the tough part about that is we're living in a cultural moment that says, no, no, no, if it feels good, you should do it. If that's how you feel, you should live that but the Bible says that there's a way that makes sense to man but in the end, that's what leads to death

and you've got to make a decision, do you want what the Bible says, what God says is gonna lead to true life or do you want to be the Lord of your own life? And you've got to understand that oftentimes with you at the reins, what is what is really the fuel and the engine behind the decision making is the enemy

masquerading as an angel of light going, it's not that big of a deal. It's just one time. You'll do it differently this time. It's just an innocent conversation.

I'm telling you, nobody wakes up and makes a decision. Today's the day that I'm gonna cheat on my wife, destroy my integrity. Today's the day that the the entire group of people that I live life with are going to see me differently, where my kids are going to question my integrity, that that's not how it starts.

It's always a seemingly insignificant conversation that's it's a good thing. Not that big of a deal but I'm telling you those things without the discernment of the spirit of God can take you into some really really dark places. The enemy knows.

The enemy knows how to to play into your your weaknesses. His goal is destruction. His his his tactic is deception. What is the the third thing the bible says about our enemies? That he's an incredibly determined foe. He's patient, he's willing to wait but eventually, he's going to come and try to destroy

everything. It's why first Peter chapter five says to be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. He's looking for someone to devour.

He's looking for someone that's willing to go on the journey with him and this is what's hardest, he knows the very thing that will cause you to to stumble into temptation. And again, church people always get weird when I say it but like if you've if you've never

had any fun while you were sinning, I'm telling you, you just were doing it wrong. Like there's there are moments where sin can be really fun. The problem isn't that sin's not fun. The problem is that sin's not very fun for very long

and oftentimes what starts as fun ends up becoming the thing that enslaves you and you need to understand that the enemy is patient and he's he's looking for somebody to devour. Does Satan hate you and I so much?

Why is his goal to destroy us? Because he knows he can't do anything to God. He's already been thrown out of heaven. Again, I wish I had time to to unpack the bible that shows us in the book of Ezekiel that Satan at one point before there was any humanity, he was a worship angel in heaven. He was actually probably the most gifted, the most beautiful of all the angels. He led all of the angels in worship before God. His job, like our job was to bring God glory with his life and it's what he did for a long period of time but eventually he started to go, man, I don't want to worship God, I don't want people to see through me to see God, no, I want people to see me.

I want people to see how awesome and how great I am and prize it into his heart and so this war happened in heaven. We we call it a war, it wasn't really a war, God just threw him out of heaven and with him a third of all of the angels went with him and that's now what we have here on earth as demons

and these demons are in spiritual opposition to the life that Jesus is trying to give to you and I. Why does he hate us so much? Because he knows he can't do anything to God but he knows the way to hurt God is to come after his children and here's the thing I hope that we can see today.

All throughout the bible is this principle that before seasons of significance, before moments of incredible ministry and breakthrough often is preceded by seasons of intense, intense trial, intense persecution, and intense temptation.

Here's what it tells me, is that if you and I find ourselves here this morning in a season that feels overwhelming, where it feels like spiritual opposition is is more and greater and stronger than it's been in a a long time, it tells me that the enemy knows that something great is about to come into your life.

Remember Jesus' story? Before a single miracle, before a single day of ministry, what happened? He went through a season of intense testing and trial and persecution. It tells me that maybe if you're feeling spiritual opposition here today,

here's the truth that the level of the attack reveals the level of assignment that is on your life and then maybe the enemy knows the incredible things that God has planned for your future, so he's trying to get you to quit now

before you ever get into it. He can't do anything about the salvation you and I have been given through Jesus but he can get us to walk away from the assignment that's on our life. That's voluntary.

You can walk away from the authority and the power and the majesty of God's work in your life but it it it forces you to give it away, he can't he can't take it but here's the good news. The very first verse we read in Ephesians chapter six verse 10, it gives us the key to this whole thing. See see Paul's reminder to us, his final word is to be strong, here it is, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

This is the beautiful invitation of faith. This is the gospel invitation to you and I. Paul's not saying, hey friends, you got a spiritual foe that is that is destroying, he's trying to destroy everything, who's deceiving you, who is relentless and determined, so go and get strong.

Go to church a lot, read your bible a lot, pray a lot so that you can fight him in your own strength. No. No. No. That's where we get this whole thing wrong. Paul starts with, here's your access to power.

If you wanna win the spiritual war that's being waged over your home, over your life, over your mind, over your sanity, over your future, you've gotta learn how to not operate in your strength but to tap into

God's strength and God's power and again, I always say I wish I had three hours for all of these things but what what what the Bible makes clear all throughout the scriptures, anytime there's an invitation to experience and rest in the power of God, there's a connection to the missing piece that is I think the answer to this whole thing

which is the presence of God. There's this connection between the power of God and the presence of God. I'll give you two examples. Joshua chapter one verse nine, this is God commissioning a new young leader named Joshua. He He says, have I not commanded you be strong and courageous,

don't be afraid, don't be discouraged for the Lord your God will be with you. Here it is, wherever you go,

you can be strong because I'm I'm with you. Psalm chapter 73 says that my health may fail, my spirit may grow weak but God remains the strength of my heart, he is mine forever. Here's what Paul is getting us to see this morning that I hope you walk out of here with it, that God doesn't wanna just give you strength.

He doesn't wanna just give you strength, he actually wants to become your strength and it's different. Operating in the strength of God is different than God temporarily giving you access to some strength. So the real question that we should ask is how do we operate and how do we access

the strength of God? Now again, this is the part that kind of throws us as westernized Americans into a bit of a into a bit a tailspin because we've been conditioned that if you want something in this life, you've got to earn it. You've got to achieve it. You've to work harder and we are we are designed, we are hardwired

to lead with the things that we think will impress people. We walk into rooms and we talk about what we do for a living, we talk about the big businesses that we've built, we talk about all the accolades that we have, we we hang the the pieces of paper that validate our education to prove to the world that we're worth something on the wall in our office so people can see them.

Yet Paul will tell us that the invitation to access the power of God is not through your strength, it's actually through our weaknesses.

And Paul writes to the church in Corinth after years of trying to figure this out, how do I operate not from my strength but from God's? Paul tells us he was asking for God to remove his weakness multiple times but God never did and eventually he tells us in second Corinthians chapter 12 that this is what God said to him, my grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in

in weakness. Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my about my weaknesses so that Christ's power may rest on me. Here's what I think the bible implores you and I to consider

is that maybe the access to strength and God's power that we really need is found not on the other side of our accolades and the things that will impress people, but it's on the things that we try to hide from everybody.

It's the things that we try to protect and cover at all costs. What would happen? I just wonder what would happen if we were to be the people who started walking into emotionally appropriate rooms and starting to say, hey, my name my name is Daniel and this is what last week looked like.

I made a lot of mistakes last week.

I got angry. Was I frustrated, I'm still struggling with whatever it is, you just you just started to put your junk out there. All of a sudden, I I've learned this uncanny thing that as I've been willing to share my weaknesses with the room, convinced that I'm the only one that struggles with them, all of a sudden what begins to come back to me is not is not judgment,

it is not critique, but it's a lot of people going, yeah, man. Me too.

I struggle with that too. And all of a sudden, one person shows their scars and other people are willing to do that as well. I I say all that to say, if you and I are really going to win the the struggle that is more spiritual, we need to learn how to operate not just from our strengths but to tap into to our weaknesses. Here's what I'm trying to say is that I think your greatest strength is found at your greatest point of surrender.

The real invitation of faith is to a life of surrender. I don't know why my my brain often thinks in pictures, but when I think about this idea of tapping into God's strengths, I immediately go back to the WWF. Anybody who grew up watching the WWF?

When they told me it was fake, I was like, are you talking about? It's not fake. I watched it, like people are bleeding, entertainment, get out of here. It's the World Wrestling Federation to the glory of God, right? The the crazy part was my my sister, my older sister at one point, she was dating this guy named Chuck Palumbo. K? His signature move in the WWE was called the Chuck Deluxe. You can go look him up. He showed up for Thanksgiving dinner. He was like bigger than the fridge. He used to do this thing where

he had this pit bull and he would take a rope and he would put it in the pit bull's mouth and literally one arm, he'd pick this pit bull up and swing it over his head. Was the craziest thing I've ever seen in my life. The guy larger than any human I've ever seen and Chuck was a he was a a tag team specialist in the WWF

and and if you start to realize, if you ever watch a tag team match in WWF, you realize, oh, okay. It's scripted because the same thing happens every single time. If you know what I'm talking about, you know exactly where I'm going. What always happens in a tag team match is one guy is in the ring with an opponent and they're just getting demolished. Right? They're getting beat up. They're like almost getting tapped out. They're about to get to three and somehow they kick out real quick and it's while they're bloody and beat up and defeated, they somehow crawl over to their to their teammate that's in the corner like, man, just tag me in and somehow they reach out and they're about to die but they tag in their teammate and then what happens?

Man, the teammate jumps in and they start kicking some butt to the glory of God, right? Like they all of a sudden the tides turn, they win the fight, that's the picture that I see as I look at this idea of what Paul is saying, friends, there's a power source that's available to you and I that requires us not to not to fix it all, not to solve it all, but to learn in our weakness,

in our moments where we feel like we are down and out, where we are completely destroyed and we have to learn how to somehow crawl to the arms of the father and reach out and tap into

his power, and when you begin to tap into his power, you will begin to operate not in your strength but in in his, and I'm telling you the way that we win the struggle that is spiritual is not by our power but is it is by by his. Paul reminds us second Corinthians chapter 10, for though we live in the world, we we don't wage war as the world does. The weapons that we fight with are not weapons of the world. On the contrary,

they have divine power to demolish strongholds.

All of this is a build up to this moment, friends. We gotta learn how to fight in the supernatural. We gotta fight in the spiritual. It's not a physical fight, it's a spiritual one. The struggle is spiritual. Spend the next six weeks walking through every piece of the armor of God but I wanna give you four quick things that you and I have got to learn to use and leverage

that the bible says that we've been given as weapons

of the supernatural war that we are in. Four weapons for spiritual warfare and I'll get us out of here. The first one is the name of Jesus. The bible talks about this in so many different places but one of the greatest weapons that we've been given is the name of Jesus. Friends, do not diminish, do not dismiss

the power and the authority that that is ushered into our lives when we declare the name of Jesus. Philippians chapter two says, therefore,

God elevated him, Jesus to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth. Here's what he's saying,

is if you know nothing else in the spiritual realm, if you know nothing else about fighting as a friend of God, what you need to learn is how to use the name of Jesus to your advantage. If you find yourselves in moments where I just don't know what else to do,

I don't know how to fix what's happening in my marriage, I don't know how to fix what's happening in my mind, I'm telling you, just start to declare the name of Jesus. Start to declare the blood of Jesus over my home, over my life, over my marriage, over my children. I declare Jesus in this place. It's why Satan will never just show up and try to fight you one on one because he knows the bible is clear that if you just say the name of Jesus,

that every stronghold will be broken. The name of Jesus is is powerful. Again, couple verses. Acts chapter four says that salvation is found in Jesus alone. No other name can save us. Acts chapter three, faith in the name of Jesus brought complete healing to the men who could not walk. Luke chapter 10, the disciples rejoiced that even demons obeyed. Here it is, when they used the name of Jesus. Proverbs chapter 18 says, the name of the Lord is a strong tower, the righteous run to it and are

safe.

There's a reason that the name of Jesus still causes more division in our world today than any other name. It's because there's power in the name of Jesus. Don't dismiss it. The second one I wanna give you today is the word of God. The word of God is one of the greatest weapons that we've been given to wage this struggle that is spiritual.

We'll spend an entire week on this, the last piece of the armor of God. It's the only piece of the armor of God that is offensive in nature. Paul calls it the sword of the spirit. Hebrews chapter four verse 12 says that the word of God is alive and active. It's sharper than any double edged sword. It penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and the attitudes of the heart. Why do you need the word of God in your heart and in your mind? Because oftentimes, here's what the enemy's gonna do.

God creates, Satan corrupts. What often takes place is Satan, what is taking place in our world today is Satan is taking even the word of God, he's corrupting it, he's twisting it, he's manipulating it and he's feeding it back to a gullible population that don't know the truth of the word of God

and the fallen for a lie. What happened to Jesus when he was being tempted in the desert for forty days? Satan tried three times to feed him misinterpretations

of the word of God. Same thing that happened in the Garden Of Eden, but unlike Adam who failed the test, Jesus knew the word of God and said, no no no, for it is written and he correctly

he correctly applied the word of God. Friends, you and I in the day that we're living in today, it's not enough to take the word of somebody on a stage with the microphone telling you what the word of God is. You need to work to know the word of God. You need to test even the things that I'm saying here against the word of God. Why? Because the enemy is really really good at taking even good things and twisting them and distorting them. One of the greatest weapons that you've been given, don't dismiss it as the word of God. Third one, third one is agreement in prayer.

So often, think we dismiss, we diminish the power of what prayer is. Here's why we have a prayer team down here every single Sunday after service. It's not it's not because we wanna verbally process with you out loud to God. No. No. No. It's not counseling, it's not therapy, it's warfare.

It is declaring the truths of God over our lives, believing the word of God to be true. Here's what Jesus said before he left this earth. Matthew Matthew chapter 18 says, again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my father in heaven for where two or three are gathered in my name,

there I am with them. Why do we push so hard for you to get into a crew? Why do you need a group of people that know you, that are processing with you the things that are going on? Why do we have a prayer team in the front? Because prayer is one of the weapons we've been given to wage the spiritual

struggle, the spiritual

battle. For some of you, the end of our service today, I'm telling you, you just need to come down here in the front and let one of our team members agree with you in prayer to begin to watch the power of God be unleashed in your life. Last one, I'll close with this one. One of the greatest weapons that we have to fight the the the spiritual warfare is praise and worship.

I think one of the things that we often dismiss

is the power of what worship music is for us and can be to us. And I know for some of you this is gonna really surprise you but worship is actually what happens at the beginning of our services. It's not a transition to get your kids checked into kids ministry and to get here for the regular service to start. Like the first song is where we believe the spirit of God begins to move. And what you'll see all throughout the Old Testament is when the nation of Israel was sending their army out to battle, they would put the worship leaders in front of the warriors and there was worship before there was warfare. Why? Because they understood the spiritual principle

of that God can do more in the supernatural than we can do in the natural. And so worship, when we sing, when we declare the truth of God over our life, I'm telling you, it's not music. It's not just songs that that set the tone. No. It's just like prayer. It's warfare.

It's us battling the lies in our mind. It's us declaring the truth of God in circumstances that we're unsure of. That some of the greatest worship we will ever offer the father is when we come here on a Sunday morning and we stand with hearts that are that are still in turmoil,

that are still questioning the goodness of God, yet we're making a decision to declare the goodness of God despite the uncertainty in my heart. Have you ever wondered have you ever wondered why sometimes it can be so hard to worship?

Even for me, I find myself in environments where worship is there and the spirit of God is inviting me to participate. I'm like, no, man. Everybody's watching. I don't wanna be the weird guy that's, like, singing and raising my hands. Like, that's that's for the emotional people. And then I started to think about it.

Do you ever wonder why maybe the enemy attacks us in our moments of worship so intensely? Is because what was his job in heaven again? Oh, he was the worship pastor of heavens. Why we don't trust the worship leaders? Right? Like, can't trust him. I'm just joking. Tell me that joke will get when you get home.

I think Satan understands the reason he comes against our minds so strongly when we when we attempt to engage in worship is because he knows what happens in the heart of a created being when they make a decision to bring glory back to their father despite the uncertainty that's happening in their heart. He knows the hope that will rise again. The anticipation that will rise again. So my encouragement, my prayer is that not when life is perfect, but when life is really difficult, when you're struggling, when things are hard, you make a decision to walk in here to worship together understanding that it's warfare. Last verse I have for us. Here's the posture one Psalm chapter one forty nine verse six says, may the praise of God be in their mouths and a double edged sword in their hands.

Here's the posture of somebody who's engaging in spiritual warfare. It's praise on my mouth and a bible in my hand, and I believe that somehow

God will take care of the rest. Here's what I'm asking you If you would stand to your feet with me, the band is going to lead us in a song, but this is more than a song, friends. It's it's warfare. And I don't know what it is you're struggling with. I don't know what it is you're carrying. I don't know the the battle that is raging inside of your heart, inside of your mind, inside of your marriage, but my encouragement, my my my my nudge to you today is let's go to battle together. Let's wage war together with one of the weapons that we've been given called worship.

Amen? Let's worship.