Victory in the Place of Authority


…… and they cried, The sword of the LORD, and of Gideon. (Jdg 7:20)


Christ looks at the church as His body, in oneness both in joy and in suffering. Jesus prayed that we would be one as He is one with the Father, because this is the reason for the world that they may believe that the Father has send the Son (John 17:21). In that sending of Jesus is the testimony of the Father’s love (John 3:16) for the world which cannot save itself. Beyond saving us is that ‘God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh’ (Rom 8:3). This is the victorious Christian life that Christ has conquered sin (the ‘factory’ of sins) for us and the church glorious (Heb 2:10), no longer bond (Rom 6:16). There is a freedom from as subjects under the authority of sin to the Divine Authority of Christ.


If Gideon’s army merely cried out ‘the sword of the Lord’ and no further, they could not have realized their victory over their enemy who enslaved them. As with soldiers (2 Tim 2:3, 4), our victory can only be realized under authority. Paul and the other apostles had never taught rebellion to the oppressive Roman Empire but to be subject, giving thanks in prayer for the authorities (1 Tim 2:1,2). God has been sovereign to ordain even our government and employers regardless of they being hard taskmasters or not (1 Pet 2:13, 14, 18). Family order and spiritual authority also play important roles for our protection. It is easy to consider ourselves subject to the authority of Christ, but are we willing to come under authority that we may not view as ‘spiritual’. Followers of the Way do not distinguish the spiritual and the natural. Oswald Chambers said that the test of our spirituality is not at the mountain top experiences, but down at the valley of testing.


God has laid out His divine order, are we willing to submit to both natural and spiritual authority? Or are we rebellious and our prayers, words and actions carry elements of witchcraft (1 Sam 15:23). Passing the test of the Divine order in the natural life is also the proof of submission in the spiritual; hence there is our cognizance of total victory in glorious Christian life.