Declaration of War Against the Forces of Darkness

(click here for printable PDF version)
Now, before you start thinking we're talking about YOU, this is about EVIL - not people.  Sure, some people are stinkers, but we're to love people and we're to hate evil.  The darkness from our sinful nature is in all of us. We're not any better, it's just Christ in us that helps us be redeemed.  Anyway, this is about the BIG picture, not any specific person, organization, leader, etc.
No more. It ends now.

For too long we've ignored what was going on in the church. For too long we've sat out or even denied there was a war. We've been infiltrated. We've been co-opted. We've been dumbed down. We’ve had our greatest weapons ridiculed and demeaned until nobody wants them anymore.  This is no kind of way to fight a war.

We've allowed ourselves to be fattened up and we've planted roots. We've been herded together in big groups like cattle and we bump around against each other making useless noises. Wolves have come in and we’ve welcomed them. We've accepted aid from the enemies of God. We've taken the enemy's advice about how to make war. We’ve hired consultants to show us how to be more like the world.

We've ignored our own King's plan. We've sent a pitiful few skirmishing parties out to do the work of missions for us and patronized them when they come home wounded and hungry. We've given all the ammunition to the supply clerks back home and deprived the infantry of what they needed to push back the darkness. Everything about what we’re doing is upside down.

No more will we take on the names and philosophies of men to define and identify us. No more will we allow factions over secondary issues to divide us. We are to be OF Jesus and Him alone. Only He gets to put His brand on us. Only He gets to direct us. Only He is truth. This is war! Nothing else can be trusted. His is the unbreakable cypher. Pure, full, uncut Truth cannot be spoken by the enemy. Truth and Love are our uniform, our code, our defining characteristic. Only Truth and Love will suffice for battle against principalities and forces of darkness.

No more will we waste time on our own vain pleasures and indulgences. No more will we allow the egos and prides and traditions and philosophies of Man to divide us. We will love Truth and settle for nothing less. We will learn to sniff out and purge compromise and half-truths. We will force out of us every bad dark thing by being completely filled with the Bread of Life. We will be nourished by Truth. We will be armored by Truth. We will swing the Sword of Truth in big wide circles and pierce the hearts of anyone near. We will fight and not grow weary. We will charge forward and never retreat. Should one slip, others will lift him up. Should one fall, others will take his place.

No more. It ends now. There are those that are already equipped to fight and we will enlist them, organize them and send them back out to recruit more. We'll fight with love to awaken our brethren who are asleep and get them in fighting form. We will push back the darkness by speaking nothing but TRUTH. It is rare and precious - and only Jesus is the source. Every man-made thing will burn off in the fire. Only Jesus can be trusted.

As Gideon, we will lovingly restore our own altars first while the people are sleeping. Then we can rally a restored, awakened people to fight the forces of darkness. Those on the front lines that have proven themselves good and faithful servants and stewards of their talents will be provisioned with a hundred times their own needs so that they can feed the hungry and give drink to the thirsty as they see any need. We will pray and encourage and support them and recruit more. We will always strive to continue growing up into Jesus, who is the Head.

In view of the great mercy shown us by Jesus Christ, we will offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. We will stop conforming to the pattern of this world. We will be transformed by the renewing of our minds so that we will be able to test and approve what is God’s good, pleasing and perfect will. Then we’ll go and do it.

I Corinthians 14:8 "Again, if the trumpet make an uncertain sound, who will prepare for battle?"

No more. It ends now. As clear as we can say it, this is war.

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