No weapon formed against you shall prosper, And every tongue which rises against you in judgment You shall condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, And their righteousness is from Me,” Says the Lord. Isaiah 54:17
I recently heard a sermon on Christ’s finished work on the cross at a time when the enemy revealed a weapon he formed against my youngest son. As I meditated on the sermon I had a fresh revelation of Jesus’ might and what it truly means to say “the Lord is my keeper.” The magnitude of security my family and I enjoy in Christ blessed me like never before and I want to pass on what the Holy Spirit shared with me.
In the Old Testament, the sacrifice was completely consumed by the judgment it received in that it was burned to ashes. Jesus is the Lamb of God sent to be sacrificed for all our sins and though He died, He was not destroyed. Also, the magnitude of the sin and judgment He bore and the justification His sacrifice provides does not compare to Old Testament sacrifices. Animals had to be sacrificed repeatedly to do what Christ did thoroughly once and for all.
Jesus’ strength and endurance is absolutely amazing. Before they nailed Jesus to the cross He was brutally whipped until His bones shown, losing a tremendous amount of blood in the process. That alone would have been enough to kill a regular man, but Jesus stood up and endured a crown of thorns shoved onto His head, being spat upon and His facial hair plucked out. A battalion, of about 200 men by some reports, punched Him as well as beat His “crowned” head with a reed. Then He carried His own cross all the way to Golgotha, the location of His crucifixion. There He was completely or nearly stripped naked for all to see before being nailed to the cross. He went on to endure 3 dark hours of separation from the Father, in man’s place, bearing our sin. After all that He could still talk and say “it is finished”, declaring that He accomplished everything the Father sent Him to do on our behalf! What might, what awesome power! The Father held nothing back in the judgment poured out on His Son, the Old Testament makes it clear God hates sin. That judgment would’ve meant a quick death for a regular man, but the deity of Christ enabled Him to take His Father’s full judgment before He gave up His spirit.
When I thought about the fact that the believer is hidden with Christ and enjoys the victory He secured on the cross, I saw the enemy in his pathetic state. If Jesus endured His Father’s complete wrath before He voluntarily laid His life down, with what could the enemy possibly be successful in coming against one of the Lord’s own. The enemy is no match for Jesus. He is not Jesus’ equal opposite in any way, shape or form. Furthermore, Satan was stripped of whatever power he had when Jesus fulfilled the law Satan used to accuse us.
Make no mistake, the enemy still forms his weapons and waves them at us in a feeble attempt to intimidate us, but his weapons are a bunch of duds! When the enemy roars threats at you or your family remember his threats are empty. You are safe in the arms of Christ who endured the greater wrath of God, securing your victory!
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SOUL FOOD (Scripture References)
Psalm 121:5-8
John 1:29
Hebrews 10:1-18
Psalm 22:14, 17; Matthew 27:11-55; Mark 15:16-20, 33, 34; John 19:28-30; Isaiah 50:6
Colossians 3:3
Romans 8:31
Colossians 2:13-15
1 Corinthians 15:57
© Vanessa A. Harris and The Legacy of Faith, 2012.
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