[CHAPTER 26] BELIEVERS AUTHORITY -FIGHT TO WIN!

Chapter 26
Fight To Win!
I’ve received many benefits through understanding the believer’s authority.
I’ve realized that Satan doesn’t have the power to make me do anything. This old
saying, “The devil made me do it” is absolutely wrong. Satan can’t make you do anything. All he can do is lie to you. Then, if you believe his lie, you empower
him to accomplish his will. But he can’t do anything to you without your consent
and cooperation. This is the reason the battle isn’t against demonic powers
directly. Satan has been stripped. His only power is deception.
That’s how he came against Adam and Eve. Satan didn’t come in some
intimidating animal like a tiger, bear, or mammoth. He chose the most subtle,
cunning, crafty animal and came against them with words—deception. Satan
chose the snake because he knew he had no power to force Eve into doing
anything. He used words to deceive her.
If Eve would have evaluated those words and refused to allow those ungodly
thoughts to influence her, she wouldn’t have been tempted. If she would have
refused to listen to or think anything that countered what God had said, she
wouldn’t have committed that sin and plunged the whole human race under the authority and dominion of the devil. This all happened through words, and it’s
still happening today. Satan is fighting us with words and thoughts.
CHOOSE WISELY
The battle is right between your ears. It’s not out there somewhere in the
heavenly places. It’s in your head. Every word you hear either releases life or
death. Words that are based on and are in line with the Word of God release life.
Words that are inconsistent with what God says minister death.

Death and life are in the power of the tongue.
PROVERBS 18:21
It’s either life or death, one or the other. What are you listening to? What are
you saying?
But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall
give account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be
justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.
MATTHEW 12:36,37
Every word you speak and every word you hear are either producing life or
death. Everything you listen to on radio, television, or movies is ministering
either life or death. If you disagree with these truths from God’s Word, you’re deceived.

Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.
1 CORINTHIANS 15:33

I’m not suggesting that you move into a monastery and take a vow of silence.
I’m encouraging you to recognize life and death, and to exercise more self-
control in what you’re choosing. Every television and radio I’ve ever seen had an On/Off knob and multiple stations to choose from. You don’t have to sit in front of the set and just passively take whatever is offered to you. Choose wisely.
I have to deal with this the same as anybody else. There have
been times when I’ve had nothing specific to do. I’ve wanted to kick back and relax a bit, so I’ve turned on the television. I’ve flipped through the channels and nothing was on—what’s new?—but I ended up watching something just for the sake of watching it, not realizing that it was pouring junk in me.
You need to recognize that Satan is fighting you with negative words. You
can’t change the fact that every word you hear is either releasing death or life,
but you can change whether you listen to it or not. You don’t have to swallow it
and believe it. You can get to where you’re constantly listening to words that
minister life, but the choice is up to you.

RENEW YOUR MIND
Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God,
and of Jesus our Lord.
2 PETER 1:2
It’s through the knowledge of God that grace and peace are multiplied unto
us. Satan knows this, which is why he battles us in our mind.
Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing
of your mind.
ROMANS 12:2
Metamorphoo is the Greek word rendered “transformed.” It’s where we get the English word “metamorphosis.” If you want to change from being something creepy, crawly, and earthbound into something beautiful that can fly, then you need to renew your mind. Many people are trying to take a shortcut. They keep their mind in the gutter, listening to all the things of the world. They allow the sewage of this world to flow through them, but they want the results that God produces. They think, If I just pray and ask, I can receive. There’s more to it than just praying and
believing. You must also cooperate with God’s spiritual laws. God operates
through us when we get our heart and mind stayed upon Him. However, Satan
hinders God through our thoughts.

WORD-MINDED

To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and
peace.
ROMANS 8:6
If you want to experience life and peace, then you need to become spiritually
minded. Jesus said:
The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.
JOHN 6:63
Being spiritually minded is being Word-minded. It’s thinking on what God
has to say about your situation instead of what the world has to say. If you are
Word-minded, you’ll have life and peace. Grace and peace will be multiplied to
you as you continually think on the knowledge of God. You can’t think
negatively—adopting the mindset of the world—and then experience the life,
grace, and peace of God. It doesn’t work that way.
I get nearly all of my news off the little three-minute news bites on the radio.
I hardly watch any television. I figure if something is really that important, it’ll
make the radio news bites. I’ve come to the place where I can pretty much handle three minutes of anything negative that the world has to say. But even in those three little minutes, so much of what they say is based on fear, doubt, and unbelief. If you swallow all of that, you’ll be in turmoil. But if you listen to and go by the Word of God, you’ll have life, grace, and peace.
Through God’s Word, I know I’m protected.
No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue
that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD.
ISAIAH 54:17
Notice that you aren’t automatically protected. This verse says that you have
to condemn the words that come against you. If you just passively sit there and
let these ungodly things be spoken, then they will impact you. (1 Cor. 15:33.)
But when you hear something contrary to God’s Word, if you will condemn it—
recognize it as being wrong and counter it with the truth of the Word—then it
becomes powerless.
My wife will tell you that there are many times when I talk back to the
television and radio. We’ll be listening to the news, and they’ll say, “It’s flu
season.” I’ll declare, “There is no season where the Word of God doesn’t work.
By His stripes, I have been healed. I’m not getting the flu!” This is what it means
to condemn the words that come against us. Even if many people around me are
affected, I’ll be safe and sound.

A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked.

PSALM 91:7,8
In addition to protection, God’s Word promises prosperity, healing, and
deliverance. If you will keep your mind fixed on God, these promises will work for you. Remind yourself of how God
protected, prospered, healed, and delivered other people in the Word. Keep those thoughts in the forefront of your thinking, and you’ll have peace. But if you allow your mind to go the way the world is thinking—fear, doubt, and unbelief — you’ll have all those things instead. It really is this simple.
THE ANTIDOTE TO ANY PROBLEM
Grace and peace come through the way you think. Think properly, and you’ll
have grace, joy, life, and peace. These don’t come by prayer, but through the
knowledge of God.
According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain
unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to
glory and virtue.
2 PETER 1:3
All things that pertain to life and godliness come through the knowledge of God. It’s not “some things” or “a few things,” but “all things.” This means that if you are sick in your body, you have a knowledge problem. If you’re poor, you
have a knowledge problem. If you’re depressed, you have a knowledge problem. The antidote to any problem is the knowledge of God.
Most people don’t believe that. They think that if you have an emotional
problem, you go take a pill for it. “This problem has nothing to do with me and
my choices. I don’t have any responsibility whatsoever. It’s just the way my hormones are— my chemistry. It’s what so-and-so did to me.” All of these excuses are wrong in light of God’s Word. You need to accept responsibility, go to the Bible, and start thinking according to the Word. (Isa. 26:3.) The key is how you think.
Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that
by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the
corruption that is in the world through lust.
2 PETER 1:4
Through the knowledge of God, we are given exceedingly great and precious
promises. The Word of God is the knowledge of God. It’s God’s thoughts. These promises are the knowledge of God. We become partakers of God’s divine nature and escape the corruption that is in the world through lust by the
knowledge of God—not through begging for it in prayer or pleading for God to move. You must get your thinking straightened out. (Prov. 23:7.)

WHAT IS YOUR MIND FULL OF?
You can’t be tempted with something you don’t think.
Truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came
out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
HEBREWS 11:15
This scripture is talking about Abraham and Sarah. They used to live in Ur of
the Chaldees, which was in the area of Babylon. God told them to leave there
and come over into the land we now call Israel. (Gen. 12:1.) He told them that
someday they would inherit that land. Abraham actually entered into the
Promised Land when he was about seventy-five years old. He lived to be 175
(Gen. 25:7), and never did inherit that promise in his lifetime. He bought a
parcel of that land just to be able to bury his wife (Gen. 23:15-19), but it was
generations later when the Israelites actually came in and possessed the land.
How did Abraham remain faithful to God’s promise—His word to him—for
all those years? Hebrews 11:15 says that if they had been mindful—thinking—of
the country they came out of they might have had opportunity to have returned.
For them, an opportunity to go back to Ur of the Chaldees would have been a
temptation to sin. It would have been rebellion against God for them to have
returned to their homeland. Their opportunity to sin—temptation— was linked to what they thought.
If you think on things that provide you with temptation, then an opportunity
to sin will come. But if you refuse to think on things that gender temptation, you won’t be tempted. That’s good news! Another way of saying this is: You can’t be tempted with what you don’t think.
Our culture has convinced us that we need to be “informed” about all of the
junk, rottenness, and perversion going on out in the world. God’s Word teaches
us otherwise.
I would have you wise unto that which is good, and simple concerning
evil. ROMANS 16:19
We are to be simple—ignorant—of evil. The Lord doesn’t want us to be well
versed in these things. The original temptation Adam and Eve fell for was the desire to know more—to know good and evil. God had already given them all
the knowledge they needed. Everything He told them was good. God doesn’t
want us to know evil.
Yet, today we feel like we need to know all kinds of evil—what everyone
else is doing. By doing so, you open yourself up to temptation. You can’t be
tempted by what you don’t think. We need to win the battle for our mind. We
need to quit exposing ourselves to all of the junk that Satan is offering through this world, and get to where all we do is think on God’s Word. If the

Word of God is all we meditate on, then God’s Word is all we’ll be tempted
with. That’s the way it works.
NAIVE IN NEW YORK
I’m a living example of this truth in action. I was raised in a Christian home
and just believed what I was told. I don’t remember hearing much about adultery,
fornication, or sexual immorality except that they were wrong, so I never really
thought about it.
When I was eighteen years old, my mother took me to a Billy Graham youth
event in Bern, Switzerland. Since we were traveling as part of a group, I stayed
with a bunch of guys while Mom was with the other women. Our first stop was
New York City. I was plucked out of my controlled environment and planted
downtown in a very ungodly city. I was exposed to things I had never seen or
heard of before. I didn’t even know they existed. Because I was naive, I wasn’t
tempted.
I remember walking around 42nd and Broadway, where there was a
tremendous amount of prostitution. There must have been about a hundred
women lined up along a wall there that night. I didn’t have a clue. It never even
dawned on me. I never even wondered why they were there. I just thought, What
a great opportunity to witness! So I took some tracts out and went down the row
passing them out and witnessing to each of these prostitutes. I didn’t know what
they were or why they were standing there, so I wasn’t tempted. There I was out
on the streets of downtown New York City at two in the morning witnessing to
people. I’d never seen that many folks in my life. As a little country boy from
Texas, I was pretty shocked.
While out there, a pimp tried to sell me one of his girls. He came up to me
and started speaking in street language. I didn’t know what he was talking about.
Nobody I knew talked that way. This guy tried to sell me for ten minutes, but I
didn’t understand what he was trying to communicate. Finally, he just looked at
me, turned around, threw up his hands, and walked off shaking his head. He was
probably wondering, What rock did this hick crawl out from under?
Back at the hotel, I told my roommates some of the things this guy had said.
They had to explain to me that he was a pimp trying to sell me a prostitute. I was
so naive, I didn’t even know what he was talking about. I hadn’t thought that way
before. I wasn’t aware of the terminology. Therefore, I wasn’t tempted.
YOU CAN WIN
Are you someone who has to fight temptation tooth and nail? Are you
holding on with white knuckles, yet you can’t understand why it’s so hard to live
for God? If so, most likely the reason is that you allow so much junk to be

planted in you. You’re trying to rebuke lust, sexual addiction, and pornography
by doing “spiritual warfare” against these demons, yet you’re sitting there
listening to and watching this garbage every day on television, which encourages
sin.
Much of today’s television programs will expose you to more sex-related
subject matter in an hour’s time than your great-grandparents saw their entire
lifetime. Even if you find a decent show, usually the commercials will kill you.
The average magazine and newspaper isn’t much better. They show all degrees
of nudity and sexual content. The media bombards us with it on all sides.
The sad thing is that most Christians allow this stuff into their home. They
expose their children to it (through television and other medium), and then
wonder why they’re having problems. They’re doing “spiritual warfare” and
“intercession” so that their kids will grow up to be godly people, but then they
just allow Satan to deposit his perversion and unbelief in them. The devil loves it
when parents use the television as a babysitter so they don’t have to pay any
attention to their kids.
We’ve allowed things into our lives and then wondered, Why am I so
tempted? Why is the Christian life so hard to live? It’s hard because Satan comes
at us through the way we think. He can do nothing to you without your consent
and cooperation. We need to start being selective about what we let into our
eyes, ears, and hearts.
Your life will go in the direction of your dominant thoughts. Don’t let the
junk of this world fill your mind. Set your heart to seek the Lord and meditate on
His Word. The battle truly is in your mind. You can win this fight, but you must
fight to win!