The Master‘s Class, LifeChange Church Wichita

TO KNOW SOMEONE (2 Cor. 11:21-27)

When you look at the people around you, all you can see is what they physically display.  You cannot see the experiences that have shaped them into who they are as a person.  Our first impressions of people are often lasting impressions.  Successful people dress differently than others.  Educated people speak more eloquently than others.  Poor people act with less confidence in a society that rewards only success.   The same thing applies to our churches.  Many people are misled by those preachers and teachers who boast of the credits applied to their name.  They proclaim their educational credentials, their heritage, or the churches that sent them.  Are these the things that really matter in preaching the gospel message?  Listen and rejoice as we learn that God's gospel message is simple.  It is a message of God's grace and not man's efforts to follow some set of religious ritual.  It does not need to be hidden behind fancy speeches and educated speakers.  The gospel message is so simple a child can understand it, and a broken heart can accept it.

RECOGNIZING THE WORK OF SATAN (2 Cor. 11:8-20)

Most people would not willingly choose to trust in Satan.  The Bible describes him as the father of all lies.  To be deceived by Satan is put your eternal destiny at stake.  To be deceived by Satan means that you will spend an eternity in hell away from God, instead of an eternity in heaven with Christ.  Yet, how can you discern the work of Satan from that of God?  Can you recognize the work of Satan by the outward appearances?  To have beauty on outside is often equated with truth and honesty on the inside.   To have great physical strength is perceived as being the protector of the innocent.  To be eloquent of speech appeals to the ear and projects the image of intelligence, education, and sophistication.  Those who are confident in their speech, draw those that lack the confidence of their convictions.  Recognizing the false from the truth is not easy.  Satan has been perfecting his deceptive lies for the entire history of mankind, from the Creation of man, to this day.  He knows what works, and what draws man to him.   He knows that man is an inherently religious being, so he creates attractive religions.  He knows that man finds certainty in boundaries, rules, and the predictability of ritual.  So that is what he gives them.  Yet, when man follows these religions he finds himself in bondage, bankrupt financially and spiritually, and beaten by those that would enslave them.   Listen to this podcast and find out how to discern between the work of Satan and God.

THE TRUE GOSPEL (2 Cor. 11:1-7)

How do you decide what is true and what is false?  When it comes to salvation, how do you know the true gospel from a false gospel?  When Satan tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden he was described as being subtle, or crafty.  There are many teachers who proclaim to be from God.  They cry out that they provide a gospel message of salvation.  Yet these false teachers have taken the Word of God and subtly changed it to meet their own form of religion.   They apply rules to a free gift of God.  They apply religious ritual to God's gift of grace.  They apply legalism to the gospel message of Christ that frees man from the burden of the law.   Eve faced the temptation from Satan with two weapons, the Word of God, and the Spirit of God.  Satan attacked those weapons by creating doubt about the authority of the Word of God, then he denied the accuracy of the Word of God, then he created delusion about the acceptability of the Word of God.  Satan uses these same tactics today.  Listen to this podcast and find out how to determine the true gospel message of God.  Learn how Satan is currently working in our world and how to combat him.

THE WEAPONS OF GOD (2 Cor. 10:1-8)

When the world thinks of the weapons of warfare it thinks of tanks, guns, cannons, swords, and shields.  They use secular weapons to fight a secular battle. 

 

Yet the believer’s battle is not physical in nature, but spiritual.  Therefore, the believer’s weapons are very different than those used in secular battles. 

 

Listen to this podcast and learn how the believer arms themselves as they prepare to battle the powers and principalities of Satan’s world.