[CHAPTER 7] THE BELIEVERS AUTHORITY BY ANDREW WOMMACK

Chapter 7
Under The Umbrella
In light of what we’ve seen thus far, Ephesians 6:10-11 ought to make a lot
more sense.
Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.
Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles
of the devil.
Wiles literally means “cunningness, craftiness, and deception.” Satan’s only
power is deception. He can’t force you to do anything. He can’t make you sin.
People tell me, “I don’t want to commit sexual sin, but I just don’t have the
power to resist. Satan is stronger than I am.” Not true. Satan doesn’t have the
power or the authority to force you to do anything. The problem is that he’s a
master liar, intimidator, and deceiver. It’s all deception. When we don’t know the
truth about who we are in Christ and the power we’ve been given, then—in a
very real sense—we are the ones who are giving Satan the power and authority
to rule and dominate us. You can break that.
Recently I was speaking to one of our Bible college students about a certain
area in the student’s life, and that person admitted, “I know I’m wrong in this
area. It’s rebellion and I want to break it, but there’s just something in me that I
have trouble doing the right thing. I just can’t seem to overcome it.”
I told the student, “Here’s how you can overcome it. Do what you know
you’re supposed to do but don’t feel like doing, every day. It doesn’t matter that
you don’t feel like doing it. Do it every day. If you’ll start obeying and yielding
your actions to the Lord, then He’ll be strengthened in your life. As you quit
obeying and yielding your body to the devil, it’ll weaken him in your life.” That’s why the Bible says you have to stand against the wiles, deception, lies, and deceit of the devil.
Satan is out to deceive you and he’s coming at you every which way through
all of the help and support he gets from people. Our airwaves are full of lust and
lies. Every time you yield to the lies, you are the one who empowers the devil to
come in and destroy your life.

WHY JESUS CAME
Since God is a Spirit and doesn’t have a physical body (John 4:24), and since
He gave the power and authority over the earth to physical human beings, He
would have been unjust to come down here and intervene in the affairs of man.
He couldn’t just step in and straighten out the mess. He had the power to do so,

and as Judge He could have said, “Alright, I’m tired of this whole mess. I’m
going to wipe out the entire human race.”
He came close to doing that with Noah and the flood. As Creator and owner,
He’s always had the right and privilege, but outside of total judgment, He didn’t
have the authority to just come into the affairs of men and change things. He
didn’t have it because He had given that authority to rule and reign over the earth
to mankind. (Ps. 115:16.) Even though they used that authority in a way contrary
to what He desired, God would have been unjust and untrue to His own
statements to come down here and change things.
This is why God had to become a man. This is the reason that God had to
send His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to this earth. It all comes back to this issue
of authority being given to physical human beings. God didn’t have a physical
human body, so He wasn’t free to just operate unrestricted on this earth. He had
to become a man. Jesus—the Word made flesh, the God-Man—had to become a
physical person so that He could have authority on this earth. (John 1:14.)
God couldn’t have saved mankind any other way. Until He obtained a
physical human body, He was limited in what He could do. He tried to work
through people, but they were all corrupted, deceived, and under the devil’s
control.
I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and
stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I
found none.
EZEKIEL 22:30
He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no
intercessor: therefore his arm brought salvation unto him; and his
righteousness, it sustained him.
ISAIAH 59:16
Since there was no person sinless, pure, and able to bring God’s
righteousness into the earth, He had to come and save us Himself. He had given
the dominion of this world to physical human beings, so He had to become one.
God Himself took upon Himself flesh, and limited Himself to a physical body
My teaching entitled “How to Conceive a Miracle” goes into greater depth on
this topic. It’s the second message from Lessons From the Christmas Story.
FOUR THOUSAND YEARS
God spoke Adam’s body into existence when He had absolute authority over
the earth.
God said, Let us make man. GENESIS 1:26
God created man by speaking words. Subsequently, He spoke words giving
man dominion—authority and power—over the earth. In doing so, He limited

His own authority. Man corrupted themselves by selling out to the devil and
making him the god of this world. God wasn’t in control. He didn’t have
dominion over the earth because He had given it to man.
That’s why God wasn’t able to just speak the physical body of Jesus into
existence on His own. He had to speak to the spirits of men—the corrupted spirit
within them—and then they had to take those words and speak them out of their
mouths. It literally took God four thousand years to find enough people who
would operate in enough faith to speak forth and prophesy the things that needed
to be spoken for Jesus’ body to be created. There’s no telling how many people
God inspired to say, “A virgin shall conceive, and bear a son” before Isaiah
actually spoke it (Isa. 7:14). Not many prophets would like to stand up and go on
record declaring such a thing. It took a lot of faith for Isaiah to say that.
After all of these prophecies had been spoken over four thousand years, the
angel approached Mary and told her what would happen. (Luke 1:28-33, 35.)
She humbled herself and said:
Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.
LUKE 1:38
The angel took all of those prophecies—the spoken words of God—and the
Word entered into Mary’s womb.
The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.
JOHN 1:14
God created the physical body for Jesus to inhabit by speaking words over a
four thousand year period of time through anointed men. Then those words
entered into the womb of Mary, and that’s how Jesus was conceived. That’s why He had authority on earth to do what He did.
SHIELDED FROM THE RAIN
Satan was in trouble now. God always had the power to intervene, but He
had given the authority over the earth to mankind. His ability to intervene in the
affairs of man was limited because He didn’t have a physical body. When man
turned from God and gave their authority and power to the devil, he began to oppress the human race. God wanted to redeem us, but He had to have some physical human being— a person with a physical body—here on the earth so that He could have authority to do battle with the devil.
When you’re under an umbrella, it shields you from the rain. The rain may be falling, but it isn’t touching you. When Satan rebelled against God by deceiving
men and gaining their authority, he came under the protective “umbrella” of the
authority God had given to mankind. This human authority shielded the devil
from God getting to him and stripping him of all this power. God couldn’t get to
Satan directly without violating His Word because He had given authority over the earth to people with physical human bodies. This is why Jesus had to become a Man.
Christ said it this way:
For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have
life in himself; and hath given him authority to execute judgment also,
because he is the Son of man.
JOHN 5:26,27
Jesus said the reason He had authority to execute judgment was because He
was the Son of Man.

THE GOD-MAN
Both of the terms “Son of God” and “Son of Man” refer to Jesus. Son of Man
emphasizes His humanity and physical side. Son of God emphasizes His divinity
and the presence of Almighty God that indwelt Christ’s body. Jesus existed
before the worlds began and He created all things. (Col. 1:16-17.) Jesus was God
manifest in the flesh. (1 Tim. 3:16.) He was fully God and fully man
simultaneously. Therefore, Jesus was the God-Man.
Son of Man refers to Christ’s humanity. So when Jesus said that the Father
had given Him authority to execute judgment because He was the Son of Man, He was making a direct reference to the fact that He had a physical body. He always had power as Creator, but He didn’t have the authority to use that power until He took on flesh.
All this confirms the integrity of God’s Word. Once He spoke, “You have
dominion” to mankind, it was theirs. He limited His own authority and power on
the earth by giving it to us, and God never breaks His Word.
One time one of my employees was believing God for a car. When the Lord
blessed me with a better vehicle, I gave my previous car to this person. It was a
very nice car. It was brand-new when I got it, and my wife and I had only used it
for a couple of years. I gave this car to my employee as a gift and signed the title
over to him.
A year or so later, he asked if it would be okay with me if he used that car as
a trade-in toward a better one. I told him, “You can do anything you want with
that car. It’s not mine, it’s yours.” He felt he needed to get my permission, but it
wasn’t necessary. In every way I had given him that car. It was legally his. If he wanted to park it on the curb and charge ten dollars each for people to take a swing at it with a sledgehammer in order to raise money for another car, he
could have done so. He could have done anything with it he wanted.
That’s integrity. If I gave someone a car and signed it over to them, it’s theirs.
If a couple of years later I find them selling swings with a sledgehammer for ten bucks each and that’s not what I intended, it would be wrong for me to come up to them and say something. If I truly gave the car to them—no strings attached— then it’s their business, not mine. They now have the authority over it.
A PHYSICAL BODY
That’s how God gave authority over this earth to us. God Himself was
limited until He became a physical human being. Jesus wasn’t only physical, but He—God Himself—inhabited a physical body on the earth. Now the devil was in trouble. He’d been using Adam and Eve like a hostage, saying, “God, if You do anything to me, You’ll have to destroy these people You have made too.” But now Jesus became one of the hostages —a physical human being.
Jesus entered into the devil’s kingdom and destroyed it. He took away all
authority and power from Satan and reduced him to a zero with the rim knocked off. The enemy has zip, zilch, nada power and authority against us. All Satan can do is tempt us. If we yield to him, we’re doing the same thing Adam and Eve did
—we are yielding our human power and authority. Satan can’t do anything to
you without your consent and cooperation.
This is completely opposite of so much of what the church has taught. Most
people think that Satan is a major force to be reckoned with. He does exist, and
you can’t just be ignorant of his devices. (2 Cor. 2:11.) You need to know what’s
going on, but the devil is not someone to be feared. He’s someone you need to
recognize and resist, but Satan can’t do anything to you without your consent and cooperation.
Understanding this truth has transformed my life and given me a tremendous advantage over the devil. Now I recognize that if I’m having a feeling, a desire, a drawing, or a lust in some direction, all I have to do is quit yielding to those things that are allowing Satan to draw me in that way. I just use my physical body to go in exactly the opposite direction. What I do with my physical body releases either the power of God or the power of the devil.