Confronting the Enemy Within Part 4 of 7
PART 4 of 7
An excerpt from Chapter 5 in David Orton's book,
"Snakes in the Temple: Unmasking Idolatry in Today's Church"
“But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ”
2 Cor 11:2-3 NIV
Strongholds of Self-Justification
Ezekiel was asked,
“…do you see what the elders of the house of Israel are committing in the dark, each man in the room of his carved images? For they say, ‘The LORD does not see us; the LORD has forsaken the land’” (8:12 NASB).
The only way the elders could continue in their secret sin was to play mind games. They justified themselves by blame-shifting. They rationalised: “God has let us down … he has forsaken the land …he has not fulfilled his side of the covenant… why should we fulfil ours?” They were now free to turn to other gods for their protection.
The mind – the battlefield of the enemy
Paul knew that the mind is the battlefield of the enemy –
“But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ”.
It is the place where the serpent’s cunning leads the child of God astray. Through deceitful mental processes Satan takes ground and establishes “strongholds”. Consequently, he explains to the Corinthians,
“The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world (flesh). On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension (every deceptive fantasy and every imposing defence, JB Phillips) that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Cor 4, 5 NIV, emphasis & parenthesis mine).
Strongholds – a defensive position
A stronghold, in warfare, is a defensive position. It is where we dig in and build a fortress to defend ourselves. Therefore strongholds of the heart and mind usually consist of defensive arguments. This usually works by blame-shifting and self-justification, as with the elders in Ezekiel’s vision. It was God’s fault that Israel was in this mess. They were only in Babylonian captivity because God had forsaken them, and so, they were justified in looking for help elsewhere.
Self-defence is the essence of idolatry. In indigenous cultures idols are worshipped solely for the protection they promise from either enemies, the forces of nature, or the spirit world. And so our self-justifying thoughts become a source of protection and security – and, therefore an idol – a stronghold. Our prideful imagination, which we raise up for our own protection, hinders us from resting in Christ’s justifying work. We consequently trust in our own righteousness and become Pharisaical.
The weapons of our warfare
But Paul has an answer. He talks of weapons that are mighty through God to the pulling down of idol-strongholds.85 They are not of the flesh – they are not found in our own strength, or self-justifying arguments. The Corinthians and their “super-apostles” had been boasting in their own accomplishments – in fact, in their own spirituality (remember, this church was the Charismatic/Pentecostal church of the NT). But Paul, coming out of the opposite spirit, said, “ If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness” (2 Cor 11:30 NIV).
This was the genius of his message:
“For the message of the cross is foolishness…but to us…it is the power of God… For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength” (1 Cor 1:18, 25 NIV).
This is why, he explains,
“Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, that no one may boast before him…”(v 26-31 NIV).
The weapon, therefore, that brings down idolatry – that destroys every prideful self-justifying attitude is the humility of the cross. The mind that bows to its own self-justifying arguments considers the cross as weakness. But when in repentance and humility we embrace that weakness the Serpent’s cunning is destroyed. Through the humility of depending on Christ’s righteousness alone we are justified and the spirit of anti-Christ is brought down.
85 2 Cor 10:1-3
…. an excerpt from David Orton’s book, "Snakes in the Temple: Unmasking Idolatry in Today’s Church".
REPRINT AGREEMENT: Duplication and re-transmission of this writing is permitted provided that complete source and website information for Lifemessenger is included.
Thank you.
Copyright © David Orton 2008
www.lifemessenger.org
Lifemessenger Inc.
PO Box 777
Mount Eliza VIC 3930 Australia