DEWITT
TABERNACLE TEACHING SERIES
SATAN’S
LEGAL DEFEAT BY THE GOD-MAN
(OR
BY THE MAN WHO WAS GOD)
By
C.W. Wood
October, 2004
We as Believers must have a solid foundation for our belief that Satan
has been fully defeated by our Christ, and that His victory over him must now be
enforced by the Bride. Until we see this in the Word, and take it into our
hearts, we will not have the real Faith to exercise our authority over the
enemy!
In once sense of the word, our God is a legalist, in that He works according to Laws that He, Himself, has
made. We want to show in this sermon how our God made a Law, and how He used
this Law to defeat Satan in the most legal sense. Was the Cross a VICTORY for
Jesus Christ, or was it a defeat? You may hurriedly answer, “It was a
VICTORY!” In saying it was a victory, we are saying we believe the scripture
in I John 3:8, that says, “……For
this purpose The Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of
the devil.”
But, then we often go about our daily lives allowing Satan to BLUFF us.
It is this sad condition that our God has set out to deliver us from. It is not
pleasing to our Lord to testify that we believe Jesus destroyed the works of
Satan, and then live a life that disproves our testimony. Satan’s defeat was
done legally in the Mind of God, and
it is for Eternity! He is finished, the moment a Christian believes it.
Though Satan is defeated, he is not yet destroyed. God is using him to
prepare a Bride for Rapture, as well as to bring Judgment on those who refuse to
obey. God allows Satan to preach his gospel of fear and unbelief, then watches
to see who we choose to believe. It is very sad, but also very true, that Satan
has the world, and the biggest part of the Church, convinced that HE IS
ALMOST, IF NOT QUITE, as powerful as God! The motive of this sermon is to
show God’s legal defeat of our enemy through Jesus Christ.
The Prophet taught us that God only works by His own Laws.
QUOTE: C.O.D. BOOK, PAGE 416,
“Or if you’re standing out here in the middle of a field, and it’s black
dark, and you’d say, ‘Oh, great electricity, I know you’re in the field.
Now, I’m lost, don’t know where I’m going. Give light, so I can see how to
walk! There’s enough electricity to light the field up.’ That’s true. Yes,
sir! There’s enough electricity in this room to light it without even them
lights, without that. But you have to govern it. Now, you might scream to that
till you couldn’t scream no more, it’d never light up. But if you work
according to the laws of electricity, then you’ll get light.
CONT. QUOTE: “Well, that’s the same way it is
by God. God is the Great Creator of heavens and earth, the same yesterday,
today, and forever. He’s still God. But He’ll only work as you follow His
laws and instruction. Friends, I say this, ‘I’ve never seen it fail, and it
won’t.” (End Quote) (We are not saying that God does not work miracles,
where natural laws are set aside.)
Now, let’s look at how our all knowing God used one of His Legal Laws
to destroy Satan’s power. In order to understand the Victory that was won at
the Cross, we have to understand what happened at the Fall in
Gen. 1:26, “And
God said, let us make man in our own image, after our likeness. And let them
have dominion over the fish of the
sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over ALL THE EARTH,
AND OVER EVERY CREEPING THING THAT CREEPETH UPON THE EARTH.”
This was God’s original plan and he has never changed His Mind. The
Bride Revival is “God restoring Man (The Bride) to full authority on Earth”.
David spoke of this restoration in Ps. 8:1-6, “O LORD our Lord, how excellent [is] thy name in all the earth! who
hast set thy glory above the heavens.
2
Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of
thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.
3
When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars,
which thou hast ordained;
4
What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou
visitest him?
5
For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with
glory and honour.
6
Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all
[things] under his feet:”
Yes, the Babes and Sucklings (The Bride) are receiving strength. Through
them, God is stilling the
avenger. All things are being put back under Her feet all for the glory of
God, that He may finish His work on Earth! According to our Prophet and the
scriptures, the entire Universe is governed by God’s Laws. In the Book of
Genesis we see the Law of “Free Moral Agency.” God made Adam and gave him
the RIGHT and the RESPONSIBILITY to choose his own course of action. Standing in
this position, of being allowed to make his own choices, Adam was given the gift
of Dominion over the whole earth. God
had a right to turn the dominion of Earth over to Adam. God does what He wants
with what is His. And once the gift was given to Adam, he also, in turn, was
given the right to do with it as he saw fit. This was God’s Law of Free
Moral Agency. Dominion of the earth was legally transferred from God to Adam.
Then, whatever Adam chose to do with this dominion was Adam’s responsibility!
When Adam chose to willfully disobey God, and by his sin turn that dominion over
to Satan, God could not LEGALLY stop him. That would have violated His Law of
Free Moral Agency. Of course, we know God could have stopped Adam, but we are
seeing God abiding by His own Laws, he had a grand purpose in doing so!
The main thrust of our sermon is to see God’s absolute, legal defeat
over Satan through the MAN who was God, Jesus Christ. We will see that our God
has left Satan without one single argument; he has no ground left to stand on.
If God had gone over Satan’s head and forcibly took back the dominion that
Adam lost, God would have violated Satan’s right to that dominion. The
scripture says that Satan had a right to rule over Adam, because Adam had chosen
to obey him. Adam’s wrong choice gave Satan the right to rule over man and the
earth. Adam was our representative.
When Adam chose to obey Satan, he became Satan’s servant.
It
wasn’t angels that God had ordained to rule the earth, but
But, where could such a man be found who was actually a member of the
human race (Our Kinsman Redeemer), and who still had the legal authority to take
Satan’s ruler-ship away from him? Now remember, we are studying Satan’s
LEGAL defeat, and how he has no way under the Creator’s Laws to squirm out
from under his defeat!
This man, our Redeemer, would have to be one who could have sinned, had
He chosen to do so, but whom, His whole Life, chose not to! He would have to
also have the ABILITY to live above all sin. This Man would have to be born
of a woman in order to be our kinfolk,
our “Kinsman Redeemer.” Now
don’t let this stumble you, but He would have to have a flesh body like ours,
in which was “THE LAW OF SIN.” In
Rom.
Do the scriptures teach such a thing as this? Yes, and so did our
Prophet.
Rom. 8:3, “For what the
Law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son
IN THE LIKENESS OF SINFUL FLESH, and for sin, condemned sin in the
flesh.” In this powerful scripture, we notice two things: First: We cannot
keep God’s Laws perfectly because of the weakness of our flesh. Unless a MAN
who was kin to us would come and do it for us, we were lost. There is a Law
of Sin in our flesh that we cannot overcome (Except by FAITH, and believe that
we are forgiven moment by moment as we repent.)
Second: We read that God sent His own Son, “IN THE LIKENESS OF SINFUL FLESH”, or that is to say, “He sent
Him in sinful flesh like ours.” His flesh was not above being tempted. The
Scripture says, “He was TEMPTED.”
not in His Soul and Spirit, but in His flesh. But, because of His Blood Line
(God’s own Blood), He could, and did live a SINLESS life, in a SINFUL body.
This is what made the victory that Jesus Christ won over Satan LEGAL in every
respect. A man had lost the dominion
of Earth to Satan, and now one who was very
man had taken it back.
This Man (Christ) had to be a man who could have sinned, being tempted,
but who, being a free moral agent, as the first Adam had been, chose every day
of His life to yield to His Father God and not to Satan! Had he ever yielded and
committed one sin, you and I would still be lost! That is true. Because of our
blood line (from Adam), we cannot keep God’s Holy Law perfectly. His sinless
life was a matter of physical fact; no
man could accuse Him of sin. Our sinless life is a matter of FAITH. We have
to repent and wash away our sins in His Blood as we have need to do so (moment
by moment).
Surely, you understand that we are not teaching that Jesus Christ was
only a man. We know He was both Creator God and man. Because Jesus was the
result of God’s Seed being planted in Mary, then God’s Divine Nature was
fully in Him. But, because His body was produced in a woman, by the food she
ate, He was also a man who could be tempted by sin.
Heb. 2:14 again points out the fact of His flesh being the same as
ours, “For as much then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He
also Himself likewise TOOK PART OF THE SAME; that through death He might
destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil.” Please note
the phrase, “TOOK PART OF THE SAME.” Jesus,
through being born of a woman, took part of the same kind of flesh that we have.
Acts
Some might want to say that there is more than one kind of human flesh,
but the scripture says there is only one kind of flesh of man. I Cor.
15:38-39, “But God giveth it a body as it has pleased Him, and to every seed his
own body. All flesh is not the same flesh, BUT THERE IS ONE KIND OF FLESH
OF MEN, another flesh of beasts, another of fishes, and another of birds.”
Here we see that God did not give but one kind of flesh to men, and Jesus
partook of that same kind.
QUOTE: BLASPHEMOUS NAMES, PAGE 34, “Now, they were looking at
that little body that was born of Mary. See? THAT WASN’T GOD! That was the Son
of God, but God was in that body.” (End quote)
And so we see that God, Himself, was going to keep His own Laws by coming
down and defeating our enemy, and His, by living a perfect life in a body just
like ours. This being the only legal way that Satan’s dominion over this earth
and over men could be regained. But, thanks be to God, it has been regained. Now,
hear the next step. Although dominion has been regained, and the victory of
Jesus over Satan was total and complete, this Victory must be enforced
by the Bride. This is a most important statement! We see the truth of it as
it is written in Eph. 1: 18-23, “The
eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope
of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the
saints,
19 And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who
believe according to the working of his mighty power,
20 Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set
him at his own right hand in the heavenly places,
21 Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and
every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to
come:
22 And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head
over all things to the church,
23 Which is his body, the
fullness of him that filleth all in all.”
So,
as to better understand this scripture, we will say it in our modern way of
speech. I am referring now to Verses 21-23, “God has set Jesus Christ
far above all other powers, and has put all things, and all creatures, including
Lucifer and his demons, under His feet. Then God gave Him, Jesus, who is the All
Powerful One, God gave Him and all His great power TO THE CHURCH (Bride). God
gave this power and authority to the Church, which is the Body of Christ. They
are now filled with the fullness of His power that fills them all together.
Jesus and His power was given to the church by the Baptism of the Holy Ghost!”
Here we have the delegation of authority to the Church (Bride), by the
One who won the total victory. Because of this, it is now our responsibility to
use this authority and enforce God’s will and plan on Earth. We do this by “Binding
the strong man” so that our Lord, by His Spirit, can spoil his goods (his
works) (See Matt.
His victory is now our
victory, because it was won in a flesh body like unto ours. Our
authority over Satan is perfectly legal, and is being backed up in Heaven by the
One who came down and lived as a Man!
QUOTE: THE KINSMAN REEDEMER, PAGES 33-34, “Oh, I’m so glad! I
am so happy to know that our Kinsman Redeemer, that the God of Heaven, who is
Spirit, came down to Earth and was made flesh, made like I am, made like you
are, and TOOK ON THE FORM OF SINFUL FLESH, knowing no sin, that our sins might
rest on Him and become Kinfolks to us, made a public testimony of dying, paying
the full price.” (End quote)
This statement of the Prophet is exactly the scripture. It does say that
our God came down, took on the form of sinful flesh, and in such, defeated the
devil.
I John 4:1-4, “Beloved,
believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; because
many false Prophets are gone out into the world. (Saying that Jesus Christ
was only God and not Man.) Hereby know ye
the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in
the flesh is of God. And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ
is come in the flesh is not of God. And this is that spirit of Anti-Christ,
whereof ye have heard that it should come, and even now is already in the world.
Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them. Because greater is He
that is in you, than he that is in the world.”
All
Hell is against the teaching that Jesus Christ, as
a man, came to Earth and defeated Satan, showing forth the powerful truth
that other Holy Ghost filled men now have the authority to enforce the
victory Jesus won as a man!
Do we now have the revelation that God came to Earth in a
man’s flesh body? If we can see
this, let’s move another step up the spiritual ladder. The MAN, Jesus Christ,
did not minister on Earth as God, but as a MAN, filled with the Holy Ghost. He
ministered by the nine gifts of the Holy Ghost, even as we must. He did not
minister as the Great Creator, but as a Brother to us, raised up from the Seed
of David. In Matt. 22:41-46, Jesus asked the Pharisees, “Whose
son is Christ?” They replied, “The
Son of David.” Jesus said then, “How
does David in the Spirit call Him Lord. If David call Him Lord, how can He be
His Son?” Trying to show them that Christ was BOTH MAN AND LORD GOD!
But, they missed it! (So have many today.)
The next step is to see that God raised up a Prophet in our day, who
through the power of the same Holy Ghost, did the exact same works that Christ
did 2000 years ago. Can you believe that? This is what the Third Pull Ministry
was. It was the Mystery under the Seventh Seal. It was the Seals pulled back,
revealing what the Thunders had uttered. But, what does this mean to the Bride
in these last hours? Just this! She has the very same Holy Ghost that Jesus
Christ and His Prophet, William Branham, ministered by.
In John
QUOTE:
CHURCH AGE BOOK, PAGE 172, “Those in the Bride do only His will. No one
can make them do otherwise. They have ‘Thus Saith the Lord’ or they keep
still. They know that it has to be God in them doing the works, fulfilling His
own Word. He did not complete all His work while in His earthly ministry so now
He works in and through the Bride. She knows that, for it was not yet time for
Him to do certain things that He must now do. But He will now fulfill, through
the Bride, that work which He left for this specific time.” (End quote) This
was spoken over 40 years ago. We have been on the back side of the desert 40
years. It’s time to go down into
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