0:00:00 - 0:00:39 So I try really hard to set aside ideas that I would like to speak about when I can't justify placing them ahead of what are obviously more important, foundational ideas. But as I go through life, I have situations just by myself or frequently with other people that helped that highlight the value of 0:00:39 - 0:01:05 some of the things that the Lord has taught me that I realize are probably not thought of by others. And I have a strong desire to help other people to, to, to leverage that same value in their lives. But it's, it's a constant struggle. Uh not, not just because of the limits of time and the priorities 0:01:05 - 0:01:44 here, but because it's much more attractive emotionally to make a video laying out something that's a very strong feeling in my heart presently versus jumping into the slog of what is much more difficult in parsing out and organizing and expanding these ideas that I've been collecting for years. It's 0:01:44 - 0:02:12 , it's, it's very difficult work. One of the difficulties is that it's so far off, it's an awful lot to put together and keep into your mind and be able to navigate in and out between extremely high detail and, and the bigger picture and maintaining, maintaining a perspective that's others focused because 0:02:12 - 0:00:00 it's easy to get obviously inside your own head and what you think about all this. But I digress. So lately I've had a few different interactions with different people that as I was reflecting upon them, you know, it was rather heartbreaking as most interactions with other people are for me because, 0:00:00 - 0:02:57 well, well, that's its own topic. But in this particular case, this, this scripture came to mind from Ephesians 612 where it says for we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against Principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high 0:02:57 - 0:03:23 places. I know what people think of when they hear that scripture and I'm gonna take this in a different direction. So first off what this is speaking of is there's a hierarchy of angels and that exists on both sides. And so this is specifically referring to the one that that resides on the side of darkness 0:03:23 - 0:03:53 . And when people think of this, I think typically they think of the powers that be in this world, the humans here who do evil. And a lot of them happened to have quite a bit of control over the world in their various situations. But Paul wasn't speaking about those people so much as the people who pull 0:03:53 - 0:04:22 their strings, namely the the agents of darkness, the spiritual beings who, like I said, they're there. And I guess I should just qualify my terminology. I know that a lot of people have a lot of will say varied beliefs about this idea of angels, but all human beings are spirit Children of God. And it's 0:04:22 - 0:04:53 correct to call them all, all of us angels. Whether we serve in that capacity is a choice we have here. And it's a choice that we could also make to serve Satan. And those choices are carry overs from what was before our birth. And some people already chose to serve Satan at that time. And so there's 0:04:52 - 0:05:16 this hierarchy and and it exists. So what does that have to do with, with these experiences I've had with other people? Well, in the world, we make a distinction between ideas in the people who have them, whether having them refers to creating them or just carrying them. And so you could create an idea 0:05:15 - 0:05:36 by discovering some invention, you can share that idea with others and maybe they don't create it, but they still carry it right. So if you're, if you're watching this on some kind of electronic device, odds are you didn't invent that device but you're using it. And so in, in the world, we make a distinction 0:05:35 - 0:06:20 between people and ideas. But on the spiritual side of things, that is definitely a lot more blurry. There's a connection between ideas and people that has a lot to do with with how you are and who you are anyway, when it comes to how we are. I think that in, in spite of the fact that I know in that 0:06:19 - 0:06:44 in many churches this is preached against, there's still this very sticky perception of or paradigm of thinking of your quality as a person being the sum total of the good against the evil, like some sort of scales. And what you're trying to do is make the good side heavier than the evil side. And it 0:06:44 - 0:07:09 doesn't work that way. If, if we had time, I'd take you to the scriptures and lead you through enough to believe that if there's anything in the evil side, that's what you are. That's an unpopular position with, with Christians in particular. That's really unfortunate. But it is what it is the thing 0:07:09 - 0:07:45 about being under control under the, the control of Satan. So we, there's this scripture, there's another Pauline scripture where Paul talks about being the servant of sin. He says if you're sinning, if you're still sinning, you're the servant of sin. Of course, what we want to be is the servant of God 0:07:45 - 0:08:07 want to be God's servants. And that means that we do what he would do in our place as far as we understand it at all times. If we fall short of that, then it's not that we're sometimes servants of God and sometimes servants of the devil. We're still squarely in the devil column. And I say still because 0:08:07 - 0:08:37 all people sin and start there. So mankind has fallen and we start in that column. The goal of the Gospel is to get us out of that and it is sufficient, Jesus is sufficient to get us out of that. So what happens is Satan's strategic objective is to keep people as miserable as he can and creating or sustaining 0:08:36 - 0:09:12 the greatest misery of others that he, that he can when he fails to keep you in an overt evil place, he's happy to keep you in a less obvious evil place. And so what he tends to do strategically is to hold back His influence, except in the places where it matters the most where he can do the greatest 0:09:12 - 0:09:37 damage. The more overt he is the more obvious it will be that He is in control. And so he tries to stay hidden and what's true of him. So there's this interesting thing you can do in the scriptures if you read through and you look at things that Jesus said about himself in the New Testament. Well, actually 0:09:37 - 0:10:00 anywhere, any place God is talking about himself, you could ask yourself, would this ever be something that someone who serves God could also say? Is there a situation where someone who serves God could say the same thing that, that God said about himself? That's an interesting thing to look into. Well 0:09:59 - 0:10:20 , on the other side, it's equally true that this strategy that I'm describing of Satan, it's the same strategy his servants employ too. So when we read about these Principalities, powers, rulers of darkness of this world, and spiritual wickedness in high places, we read about the hierarchy of the angels 0:10:19 - 0:10:49 of darkness. We ought to understand that just because you don't feel like you are guided by such a being that does not mean that you are not in fact under the full control of such a one as this, would you even know it is the question or in other words, how evil can you be without realizing you are evil 0:10:48 - 0:11:22 ? It's a very important question. And so often it's the case that if you have a bit of awareness, which I use that word to refer to this, this conglomerate of wisdom, knowledge, character, morality, basically, all good things, your understanding of reality yourself, God, good evil, all of that if you 0:11:22 - 0:11:49 have a little bit of awareness and you start interacting with people, what happens is you find out very quickly that anyone who has not repented of their sins is in fact a servant of Satan, even if Satan is holding back the use of such a person for the time when they will cause the greatest damage to 0:11:49 - 0:12:21 themselves and others, it, you find those edges very quickly and you find them in ways that are still camouflaged to the victim, the victim of the demonic influence. So one thing that's very difficult is when you're interacting with these people and because of the awareness you have, you see what they're 0:12:21 - 0:12:41 saying, you know, where they're coming from, you know what they're feeling when they say it, you know what their motive is. You also see the motive that they have that they don't know about. You see what they're feeling that they're not acknowledging. You also see 23, 1020 steps down the road of where 0:12:41 - 0:13:01 this is going to lead them in life. You see the choices they're making, you see the options they're looking at. You see a more correct version of the cost and benefit of those options. You also see all the other options that they're not aware of or whose cost and benefit is so distorted in their understanding 0:13:00 - 0:13:28 that it's not even on the table for them. This would include things that just take greater faith to not just believe in but embrace the things that are too much of a long shot for example. And so you find yourself in this unenviable position where you know, of a wonderful potential outcome with this 0:13:28 - 0:13:55 person that lies far beyond what they understand what they can see and what they can really believe in. But you're shackled to where they presently are. Any path to that has to go through where they presently are and they don't even know that they are a Marionette of Satan. He's got his hooks in them 0:13:54 - 0:14:19 and he's making them dance exactly how he wants them to. They really think that they're somehow on the path to greater good when really they're, they're on this carefully constructed path further away from God and it leads straight down to hell. And so how do you diffuse this bomb? What makes all this 0:14:19 - 0:14:49 even more difficult is the more awareness you have, the more effectively you can see all of this. There, there are more and more situations of greater and greater importance that you uniquely can see. But the more awareness you have, the higher the cost to interact with that person at their level because 0:14:48 - 0:00:00 you have to set aside this mountain of understanding about their situation and all of the emotions that come with that. You know, Paul said, I have not seen the good things that God has prepared for those who love him. Well, in another place, he talks about how some eyes have seen. If your eyes are, 0:00:00 - 0:15:40 are two of them that have seen, imagine holding back that wall while you're dealing with someone who not only can't see all the things that you do, but really thinks that you guys are on the same playing field and that you're near peers at a minimum, but probably that you're the same and maybe even that 0:15:40 - 0:16:07 they're better than you and you have to play their game, you have to come down and play their stupid little game and pretend that these things are all the same while holding back what you know, is possible and everything you've had to pay to know that. And so you start to understand that when angels 0:16:06 - 0:16:32 and glory appear to men and women, why it is that they're accompanied by fire, it looks like their feet are brass in a furnace. And it's the contrast. It's the contrast that they have to live in, of knowing of much, much greater things, but standing in a place that's far below that and they, they do 0:16:32 - 0:17:09 it for you. They do it out of love. So that's a really hard thing to do. It's a really hard thing to do. There's a whole pile of things that if you are successful in descending, in ascending the mountain of the Lord. As you do this, you're going to realize these things and then you're going to look back 0:17:09 - 0:17:36 and reinterpret interactions that you've had in your life. And you're gonna wonder how, how anything that you saw was possible that you saw others do because as you become the person doing them, you're going to be grossly overwhelmed by how challenging it is, how, how, how much it hurts, how much it 0:17:36 - 0:18:07 costs. But the benefit you will have is that you will be able to look at others as examples of people who have done it before. And that will make all the difference in the world in terms of lightening your load. But that is not a luxury that's available at the present.