One of the finished works of Jesus Christ is that the battle against Satan has been won. The battle against our accuser has been won. You see whether we want to admit it or not, we have an adversary, and that is the devil. More than anything, he wants us to deny that he exists, because he wants us to doubt that the victory over him has already been won. Jesus stripped the devil of his power. He is now nothing more than a shadow. You know that a shadow can’t hurt us right? The devil is like a bull dog with no bark. His teeth have been pulled, and he has no power. When we realize this then we will be able to celebrate the victory.

As God’s child, we have to learn a very important thing. The battle we are having with Satan daily is a false battle, because he has already been defeated and now we have to stand in the victory. Let me be clear about this, we don’t need to be trying to the get the victory, because we are fighting from the place of victory. We do not fight from the place of defeat anymore. No matter what we may be going through, we are not fighting from the place of defeat. We aren’t fighting from our hurts. We are not fighting from the place of brokenness. We don’t fight from a place of defeat, because our fight is from the place of victory which Jesus Christ had already won for us.

Let me show you what the Bible says, “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10) First we need to learn how to fight! We have to understand that this battle is not for us to receive healing, deliverance, or prosperity, because these things have already been given to youus by Jesus. This fight is different.

“The thief comes to steal….” Who is the thief? The thief is Satan. The thief’s purpose is to steal, kill and destroy. The thief comes to steal from us, what has he stolen from us? The thief’s purpose is to kill, what has he killed in us? The thief comes to destroy, what has he destroyed in us?

The thief has his purpose, but so does God. He also has a purpose, and what is that? He comes to bring you life and life more abundantly. His purpose is to give you us a life that is rich and satisfying. In order for us to have this life, we need to step out in faith and take what has already been given to us. With faith we must receive the finished works of Jesus Christ. If we don’t accept what Jesus has already done, we are saying to Him that His blood was for nothing. If we don’t reach out and take what He has given us then we will never possess all that He has made available to us. Take for instance this Scripture, “Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.” (Luke 10:19) What is power? Power is translated to mean authority. God is saying to us, “I give you authority, the right to command the serpents and scorpions.” This is the meaning of power in the first part of this verse. The word power in the second part of this verse means, “ability.” If we were to re-read this verse, God is telling us, that He giving us authority [the right to command], the serpents and the scorpions, and over all the “abilities” of the enemy, therefore, nothing shall by any means hurt us. What does mean for us? This means that the enemy cannot use his abilities against us.

What abilities does the enemy have? One of Satan’s abilities, is that he has the ability to use “suggestion.” He says something to us or he shows something to us, in order to get us to tune into him. He tries to inflict fear into our lives. He tries to get us to panic. We become fearful over something that has not yet happened. Satan uses the power of suggestion to make us think, “What if?” Satan uses the power of suggestion, so that he can influence what we see and what we hear.

The Bible says, that we have the authority over those strategies. Please understand this, we have an enemy that develops strategies against us. These strategies are designed to stop us from reaching or achieving the call that God has placed on our lives. Know this though, that God will use what the devil throws at us to exercise our spiritual muscles in order to achieve the calling He has placed upon us. The strategy of the enemy is to stop us from moving forward with our calling. If he can hold us down, then he can paralyze us with fear and keep us from taking what God has planned for us. The devil wants to keep us paralyzed with fear, so that we will remain where we’re at. Many times God gives people a calling to minister for Him, but they become fearful and paralyzed and they don’t want to move forward in their calling. They fear the unknown. God has not given us a spirit of fear…but what He did give us was His love, power over the enemy and a sound mind to discern the tactics of the accuser. Understand this, we have authority over the devil. We have authority over every negative thought. We have authority over what we see and hear. We have authority over our hurts. We have authority over any attack that comes our way. We need to start reminding ourselves that when we are attacked, that we have authority over it.

If we experience emotional pain, because someone close to us betrayed us, we have authority over it. If the doctor tells us that we are sick with a disease or the “Caronavirus,” we have authority over it. When our finances are bottoming out, no money, no job and the bills are piling up, we have authority over it. There is nothing in our lives that God hasn’t foreseen, that He hasn’t provided for, but He wants us to use the authority He has already given us.

When the devil brings those negative thoughts, emotions, desires, and circumstances; God wants us to remember that He has given us authority over them. We need to command what we need to happen in Jesus’ name.

The Bible also says, that we do not only have the authority over the enemy, but that nothing will hurt us. Nothing means zero. This means that we are protected from the enemy. Let me share with you how I saw this power of God unfold before me while I was in Afghanistan. The enemy and at this time they were known as the “Taliban,’ would attack camps next to the ones I was stationed at. Whenever my team and I went out on mission, we would pray, or I should say I would pray all through the mission. Never once, did my team encounter and IED. When I flew around the country in a helicopter, my team were never fired upon. You can call this luck, but I believe in Jesus and His finished works. I know that He protected me and the men I was stationed with. Like I said, the enemy cannot hurt us. I believe that when the enemy comes against us, that we have the power to stop him. My time in Afghanistan was where my faith grew. I believe that when we stand in faith against the enemy he can only do one thing, and that is run from us. We have to exercise authority!

I am recently retired as a police officer, but during my time on the job, I was given authority. What gave me this authority? The government did. How did people where I served know that I had the authority? By the uniform I wore and the badge that I carried. The people in the city where I worked knew my authority because of how I appeared, the car that I drove, and the weapons I carried. But in the long run, the job of enforcing the law was given to me, because I represented the city where I worked. I was their representative. If I was directing traffic in the city and I raised my hand out and blew a whistle ordering the traffic to stop. People would stop! What made them stop? It was the authority that I possessed because of the the power I was given. What power? The power to arrest. But lets say I stood in the middle of the intersection, with just everyday clothes on, no badge of authority, no fancy vehicle with blue lights, and no weapons and I held my hand up to stop traffic. I would be called a fool, people wouldn’t listen to me. Why? Because I was not given the authority, nor was I given power.

We need to exercise our authority. The Bible says, “Let the redeemed say so.” (See Psalms 107:2) We can’t let the devil keep beating us up. Look at what God says, turn to Colossians 2:13-15, “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.  Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.” Satan has been defeated. Look at these verses in the Amplified Bible, “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh (worldliness, manner of life), God made you alive together with Christ, having [freely] forgiven us all our sins,  having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of  legal demands [which were in force] against us and which were hostile to us. And this certificate He has set aside and completely removed by nailing it to the cross.  When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities [those supernatural forces of evil operating against us], He made a public example of them [exhibiting them as captives in His triumphal procession], having triumphed over them through the cross.”

When God took away the law, He also took away the power that demonic spirits can use against us. The devil was stripped of his powers. All demonic spirits were disarmed. This means that they cannot be used against us. The only way they can hurt us, is if we allow them to. Otherwise, they can’t. Why? It was because they were disarmed, they were stripped of all their powers. What does mean? It means that we have victory over every demonic spirit.

Some of us don’t believe in the devil or demons. Do demons exist today? Yes they exist to try to torment us. They try to get us to submit to their influence or their suggestions. They still try to go into our addictions. They still try try to influence us to run back to our sex practices, the parties, and the alcohol and drugs. But we have to be like the policeman and put up our hands and say, “Stop.” We have the authority to change things.

God will not impose His will on anyone. This means that He gave us the authority to choose. Do you remember the phrase, “The devil made me do it!” You need to know one major thing, that the devil can’t make us do anything, and God won’t make us do anything. So, who does that leave? I t leaves us. We have to decide! James 4:7 says, “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” Resist what does this mean? It means to fight back! It means to withhold and to withstand. To resist the devil means that we are to fight back. How do we do this? It is by standing in the victory. It is by holding onto what Jesus has already done. Fight back against the influences that try to get us to return to our old life, without Jesus. We need to stand and tell the devil, “No!” We are to declare it today that we are delivered, set free and that we are healed.