As much as God wants us to have love, joy, and peace, He also wants to know how to fight. When you hear the Word, your enemy will immediately try to comes and snatch it away from you. He knows the powerful life you can live if you get ahold of the power of God’s Word. So he will do all he can to keep the Word from taking root in your life. That’s why you have to cultivate a lifestyle that holds on to the Word of God, so that it can build your faith. You have to learn how to keep the Word of God in your mouth, and consistently speak it over your life. This is how we fight.

Faith has a voice. Faith must be confessed and spoken out of your mouth. When you speak what God’s word out of your mouth, you begin the first stage of manifesting the promises and blessings that God want to release into your life. There is a connection between what you believe in your heart and what you say with your mouth. Faith must be spoken to be released. And what do we speak by faith? The word of God.

As believers, we can have all of the other moral qualities of the Bible, we can exhibit all the fruits of the Spirit, but we must have faith to properly navigate this Christian life. Faith is the foundational doctrine of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Christians cannot live without faith. Faith is the key the door to love, hope, and holiness. Without faith, you literally cannot please God. So, if this is the thing that pleases God, then we should prioritize faith and understand how to walk by faith in our daily lives.

As believers, we must let our prayers be formed and rooted in the scriptures. Our confession of faith takes place when our words agree and align with the words of scripture. To speak the confession of faith, we need to know the best ways to confess God’s Word, why God needs us to confess His Word, and the potential impact of God’s people unified around God’s spoken Word.

Our spear is our weapon of prayer. Prayer fights for us from afar, offensively and defensively, and invites God into the fight with us (Phil. 4:6-7). We have been given divine authority to push back the devil, and we must learn to effectively use our prayers to fight back. We need to remember to “pray always.” God is with you all the time through the Holy Spirit, and you need to connect with Him all the time. Prayer should be like breathing for the believer. Prayer, together with the promises of God’s word (sword of the Spirit), is a powerful weapon against the enemy!

We need the Word of God to navigate this life as a believer of Jesus Christ, especially in this day in age, as we face the daily challenges of the world we live in now. As a society, we are addicted to the distractions in our lives, especially our phones. But how many of us can say we are equally (or more so) addicted to the Word of God? We need to hear from God regularly to withstand against our enemy. We need strategies from God. We need to hear his voice speaking to us in His Word.

One of the final commands from Paul is to fight back with our offensive weapon – the Word of God, which is the Sword of the Spirit. We need to know what the Word of God says so that we can wield it (speak it with authority) like a weapon to fight back when the enemy tries to attack us. When we combine the Word of God with our voice, we release the power of God to confirm it. We must attack the devil’s lies with our words. We must stand and SPEAK THE LIVING WORD OF GOD!

The helmet of salvation is designed to protect the head, wrapped completely and tightly wrapped around its entirety. As a spiritual weapon, salvation protects our minds and our thought lives. Your salvation must be kept in your mind, at the forefront of your mind, because it will protect you on the battlefield of your mind. As your mind is being renewed (Rom. 12:2), remembering what Jesus did to save you will protect your mind. When this life tries to attack your mind, remembering your salvation pushes back that attack.

We need to learn how to suit up in the armor God has given to his children to fight their battles. That is why Ephesians 6 commands us to stand strong in the Lord and the power of His might by putting on the full armor of God – the belt of truth (John 17:17), the breastplate of righteousness (2 Cor. 5:21), shoes of the gospel of peace (Romans 16:20), the shield of faith (1 Cor. 16:13), the helmet of salvation (1 Thess. 5:8), and the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God (Heb. 4:12).

The moment we enter the kingdom of light, we become the target of the enemy. He will do whatever he can to tempt you, lie to you, distract you, deceive you, and slander you if he can. He is actively fighting against us, and we must learn how to fight back. We are in a wrestling match with our enemy (Eph. 6:12) and we need to not only exercise our authority against him but also learn how to suit up in the armor that God has given to his children to fight their battles.

We have been delivered from the power and the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light, the kingdom of God’s Son. But the moment we enter the kingdom of light, we become the target of the enemy. He will do whatever he can to tempt you, lie to you, deceive you, and slander you if he can. He is actively fighting against us, and we must learn how to fight back. That is why Ephesians 6 commands us to stand strong in the Lord and the power of His might by putting on the full armor of God.

The Church carries the power and authority of Jesus to transform society. Jesus said he would build His church and the gates of hell would not prevail against it. That means we (the Church) have victory. But you only have victory, when you have an enemy. To win, you have to have someone to win against. Victory is unnecessary if you don’t have forces that oppose you. As a body, we need to recognize that we have an enemy who is actively working against us, and we need to wield the power God has given to us to win.

We must each take our place in the body, and as we learn to come together, to unite, and to stand fast together, that is when miracles will happen. God has given His power and authority to His church as a kingdom key, a key designed to unlock spiritual and supernatural blessings here on earth. We need to know this. We need to have wisdom and knowledge about the kingdom keys given to the Church so that we begin to use them to release God’s higher purposes and promises into the world we live in.

The Church is called the hope of the world. But the Church is so much more than an organization, a business, or the four walls of a building. The “Church” always refers first to His people gathered together in His name. People are drawn and called to their local church by the revelation of Jesus. And they are called together for a higher calling. Because the Bible tells us that His church was given the keys to His authority (Matt. 16).

Poor communication makes a relationship go from GOOD to BAD to WORSE. Healthy communication can make a relationship go from GOOD to GREAT to GODLY. Good communication is the foundation of any strong relationship. God says communication has more to do with what you are hearing than what you’re saying. It can’t always be the argument: “It’s not me; it’s you.” Communication is an art and it is a skill we can only learn from God.

The number one and most important relationship you will ever be in is your relationship with God. That’s why from Genesis to Revelations, the Bible is a playbook on relationships. The Word of God is designed to help you navigate all the relationships in your life. Whatever God has for your life, he places providential relationships into your life to do it. The law of association is critical to your future and the success of your life. You are responsible for the outcome of the relationships in your life.

God made his family eclectic, different and diverse. He did it on purpose and for a purpose. God has made His children – generation to generation – unique to adapt to the needs and demands of their unique culture. God tailored his children to be a light to world in every generation. But together, we are the body of Christ, called to be the light of the world, a city on the hill. But we must remember, if we allow it, differences can divide. That’s why we have to be careful to guard our hearts and our minds.

We are called to have relationships with others, and yet, we are diverse in thought, opinion, and perspectives. These differences often create conflict in relationships. And we each have our own way of responding to conflict. Our response to conflict is often cultivated by our experiences that have taught us how to handle conflict. But conflict does have to be combat. We must learn to navigate conflict with grace.

In Sunday’s message in our new series, Summer of Love, Pastor Pascale taught about how to manage different levels of relationships. Even though God can do things independently; on His own, most of the time He chooses to use people and do things through people. We just ended a series of messages on stewardship. The reality is that relationships may be one of the most difficult areas to steward in life. Why? Because relationships can be complicated and even very messy at times. God wants us to learn how to discern and steward (or manage) the relationships in our lives.

The old saying is true: “Show me your friends, and I will show you your future.” Your future is tied to the relationships in your life. It is important to remember that people can and will rub off on you. That is the nature of the law of association. You need to be careful who you allow access to your life. Negative people can have a negative influence on your life. But positive people can have a positive influence. The good in them can get on you, too!