Title Spiritual Warfare / Revelation 12:7-12
Content Spiritual Warfare / Revelation 12:7-12 Rev. Kiho Um
Human history has been the history of the Fall. After Adam and Eve sinned and left Eden, their eldest son Cain killed his brother Abel. God gave Seth instead of Abel, but their descendants also lived mixed with Cain's descendants and fell together. Finally, God decided to wipe out all people except Noah's family and caused a flood, but after that, humans started to fall again, and that is why they started building the Tower of Babel. It was an act that challenged God's authority. God stopped by confusing people's language. From that time on, Babylon became a symbol of humanism and a symbol of a group or nation that rebelled against God. “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, has become a dwelling place for demons, a gathering place for every unclean spirit, and a gathering place for every unclean and detestable bird” (Revelation 18:2).
Babylon was located about 90 km south of present-day Baghdad, and there are still ruins of the Tower of Babel on the nearby Euphrates River. In the time of Abraham, Sumer ruled Babylon, and after that, the Amorites became the masters of Babylon and achieved their heyday in the days of King Hammurabi. was a great power. Finally, in 605 B.C.E., the famous king Nebuchadnezzar took control of the Assyrian region, leading to the Babylonian era.
God took that Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, to attack Jerusalem, which had forsaken God and was walking the path of corruption. At that time, Daniel and other royal boys were taken away, and tens of thousands of Southern Judahites were taken captive, including the prophet Ezekiel. King Nebuchadnezzar completely destroyed Jerusalem, burned the temple, and utterly destroyed southern Judah. The country founded on that Babylonian dominion is now Iraq.
Iraq's President Saddam Hussein was a president with a proud heart to compare himself to King Nebuchadnezzar and restore that Babylon to its glory. He had a savior fantasy that he was destined to be the historical leader of Iraq who would become a superpower in the Middle East in the future. In the 33 years since he became president in 1979, he has manufactured chemical and bacterial weapons, used those biological and chemical weapons against the Kurds, an ethnic minority, inflicting more than 40,000 casualties, placing relatives in key positions, ruthlessly crushing the opposition They killed and terrorized. During his reign, 130,000 people were killed by public security police, including not a few Christians. And through the war with Iran that lasted eight years from 1980, the Gulf War in 1991 caused by the armed invasion of Kuwait, and the United Nations nuclear weapons inspection, he was stigmatized as the ‘incarnation of evil’.
Dear saints, The American war against Iraq has begun. As President Bush of the United States gave an ultimatum, the White House entered into a full-scale wartime system, and soon afterward, the second war began in the 21st century. What we need to do while watching this war is to pray to God. We should pray that the buildings and weapons that threatened world peace will be destroyed, but the damage to civilians will be minimized, and that a short-term war will end so that it does not spread into a religious war or escalate into the Third World War.
War in the Garden of Eden
God created the world and created Adam in the same image as you. And he said to Adam that he can rule and rule over everything in this world, but he warned that he would not eat only the fruit of good and evil, that if he ate it, he would surely die. Of course, humans could have violated God's ban on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, or they could have obeyed. Because God created man in His image as a person with the right to choose, that is, free will.
However, the devil challenged God's word and stirred up Adam's heart. In Genesis 3:4, the devil said, “You will never die, for God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” These words are meant to destroy Adam. This is a tempting word for Adam. But Adam abandoned God's voice and chose the devil's voice. Because of this, he was completely defeated in the spiritual battle with the devil and became a sinner, bringing death, the price of sin, into this world.
We should listen to the voice of God, not to the voice of the devil. Listen to the voice of conscience, not the voice of lust. The devil makes humans sin, derails, kills and destroys them, and prevents them from entering the ranks of blessing.
war in the wilderness
Exodus 17 records the scene where the Israelites, liberated from Egypt, met Amalek, who loved war, and went to war in the wilderness of Rephidim while on their way to Canaanite welfare. At this time, the Israelites were bewildered because they had no war experience and no weapons. Satan's purpose was to somehow prevent and destroy the Israelites from entering Canaan's welfare. So, war was waged through the Amalekites.
While Joshua went to battle, Moses went up to the top of the mountain and raised his hands to pray. Raising your hand here means total surrender before God. This is to make a final vow to God, and it is a prayer of supplication. It is an earnest appeal to God to intervene and a life-threatening intercession. Moses was also human, so his raised hand kept coming down because he was tired. When the hand came down, Israel lost the war. Aaron and Hur held up Moses' arms from both sides and kept him from coming down all day, so we were able to win the terrible battle with Amalek.
Just as a good leader like Moses was weak and tired, so today's church leaders can become tired while doing church work. Therefore, the saints should always look after their leaders and help them not to become tired and anxious. Behind every great thing a leader has done in history has always been a capable assistant.
war between believers
Today’s text reads, “And I heard a loud voice in heaven saying, “Now is the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the dominion of his Christ, for the accuser of our brethren, the accuser before our God day and night, has been cast down” (Rev. 12:10).
The devil accuses him through his conscience. When we lie, when we sin, the devil knows precisely and pierces our conscience. That is why we suffer, suffer, and suffer. Also, the devil accuses through humans. If you want to kill others, you will die first, and if you make others cry, your eyes will shed tears of blood. But Jesus gave us complete victory. The blood of the Lamb won. We have received the forgiveness of sins and redemption through the blood of Jesus, and we have the kingdom of heaven through faith. Therefore, trust in Jesus Christ, fear God, risk your life like Daniel, pray three times a day, and like Esther, I hope you will become a believer of power like Elisha.