Salt, Light and a City

I have told you that in the messages that I plan to bring to you throughout this week I want to deal with the theme of our responsibility as Christians towards the nation in which we live. I believe the Word of God clearly reveals that as Christians we are accountable for the society and the nation in which we live. Unfortunately, it seems to me that the great majority of Christians have not even begun to think about this responsibility. For my part, being a British resident in the United States, it seems clear to me that your country is facing one of the greatest, and possibly the greatest, crisis in its entire history. And I believe that our coming together as Christians in this camp would be utterly unrealistic if nothing was accomplished during this week that had any bearing or positive effect upon the needs of the nation in which we live. I believe that we should have failed God, and so for the entire week I want to deal with the theme of our positions as Christians in the nations in which we live, our privileges and our responsibilities. I want to deal with it in the most practical way that I am capable of, if there is a more practical way, I don’t know it. But I am going to be as practical as I am able to be.

Just a little while ago, I will not say where, I heard a speaker dealing with the situation in the United States today. He took three-quarters of his message to tell us all how terribly bad everything was and how it was getting worse every week. Well, that is probably true, but by itself it certainly isn’t good news, and the gospel is good news. The gospel is not negative, it is positive. Jesus never encountered a situation where He had to sit down and fold His hands and say, ‘I’m sorry, there is nothing to be done.’

At the end of his message he devoted a little while to telling us that a Holy Ghost revival was what was needed. (I trust I am doing him justice, I do not believe he devoted one sentence to telling us how we could have a Holy Ghost revival.) For my part, it is my aim—how far I shall achieve it remains to be seen—to point out to you as fellow Christians what we can do, what lies in our power to do, to change the course of events for the better. I am firmly convinced that it needs to be changed, that it can be changed, and that we are the people that should change it. And I am going to seek to show you this out of the Word of God, and I am going to seek to show you how we can do it.

For the introductory text I would like you to turn with me to the fifth chapter of Matthew and I am going to read to you verses 13 and 14. Now these words are taken from the Sermon on the Mount, and it is almost universally accepted by Christians that the Sermon on the Mount is the standard Jesus set for all true Christians. It is not a special message for a special class of person, such as apostles, or evangelists, or preachers, this is the revealed will of God, the standard of living for all true Christians is unfolded in these three chapters, which we call the Sermon on the Mount.

Now in the verses that I want to read to you, this is what Jesus said, Matthew chapter 5, verses 13 and 14. ‘Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men. Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.’

Speaking to us as Christians, Jesus tells us three very important facts about ourselves. He tells us that we are the salt of the earth, the light of the world, and the city set on an hill that cannot be hid. I want to take a little time, an introduction to my theme, to point out to you some of the plain implications of these three statements. Let’s take them in the reverse order to that in which they were spoken.

First of all, we are a city that is set on an hill that cannot be hid. Now this is true, it’s true of every person who professes faith in Jesus Christ publicly as Savior and Lord. The moment that you make that profession publicly you become a city that is set on an hill that cannot be hid. From that moment onward you are conspicuous, eyes will be on you from all directions at all times. And what people will be thinking to themselves is this: Now is that person’s faith genuine? Do they really believe what they claim to believe? Do they live it out? They’ll analyze every aspect of your life; they’ll analyze your family life, your home life, your business life, your dealings in business. They will analyze the conduct and testimony of the church that you attend. And in most cases they will form their judgment of Christianity from what they see in you. You are a city that is set on an hill.

You know that, the moment a person professes to be saved, in a school classroom, in a factory, in an office, that person becomes the focus of all eyes. All eyes are turned in that direction to see if it is real. I tell you frankly, that as a young man in the Anglican Church in Britain, I came to the conclusion that Christianity was a failure and I formed my opinion by looking at the people round about me and I decided that those people did not really believe what they claimed to believe. You cannot avoid this, the moment you profess faith in Jesus Christ you become conspicuous. If you don’t want to be conspicuous, if you don’t want to be watched and judged and analyzed, don’t profess faith in Jesus Christ. But if you profess faith in Jesus Christ, that is your situation. From that time onward you are a city that is set on an hill that cannot be hid.

Secondly, ‘ye are the light of the world.’ Now I’ve been a teacher of English off and on in various times and places, and I’m convinced that I understand the English language well enough to know this— that when Jesus said ‘ye are the light of the world,’ He meant that we are the light and there is no other light. This ‘the’ is exclusive. We are the only light; the world has no other light.

Now Jesus said in the ninth chapter of John’s gospel, ‘So long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.’ But now, He is not in the world and we are His representatives. We represent Him; therefore in His place, we are the light of the world and the world has no other light. If we do not give light, there is no other source to which the world can turn or look for light. The world is totally dependent upon the Christians for light.

In the Old Testament, in the tabernacle which God commanded Moses to make as a witness, there is a little simple illustration of this, which I want to bring before you for a moment. In the tabernacle that Moses was commanded to make there were two compartments: the first, which was called the Holy Place; the second, which was called the Holiest of All or the Holy of Holies. In this first compartment, called the Holy Place, there were only three objects of furniture. And one of them, the golden altar of incense, though it was in the Holy Place, was related to the Holiest of All. It was immediately in front of the second veil and it was the way into the Holiest of All. Because no one could go into the Holiest of All, except when they had in their hands a censor filled with incense from the golden altar of incense. The way into the Holiest of All was the way with the incense from the golden altar of incense. So we are left with the other two items of furniture.

On the left hand side, as you went in, was a seven branched candlestick; and on the right hand side, opposite the candlestick, was a table called the Table of Showbread. Now these things, as the writer of Hebrews tells us, are typical, they contain a message and the message is to the church of Jesus Christ. The candlestick has always, in all Scripture, typified the church. It was a seven branched candlestick typifying the sevenfold church begotten of the Spirit of God. The same message that is brought to us in the seven churches of Asia in the book of Revelation.

Now you would be wrong to picture a candlestick as we have them today with candles stuck in them. Because that was not the way. They had bowls and channels filled with oil, little wicks dipped in the oil and the light was provided by the oil being set on fire. And unless there was oil in the candlesticks, and unless the oil was ignited, the candlestick gave no light. And in that place the candlestick was the only source of light. If there was no light coming from the candlestick, there was no light at all.

And this is true of the church. We are the light, there is no other light. We are the seven branched candlestick and we only give light when we are filled with oil and the oil is set on fire. Now the oil is always in Scripture a type of the Holy Spirit. So the church can only give light when it is filled with the Holy Spirit and set on fire. Otherwise, the church is just as lightless as any other object of furniture. The candlestick, in itself, is incapable of producing light without the oil and without the fire. And you remember that John the Baptist said of Jesus, ‘He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire.’ Now the whole purpose of the candlestick was to cast light on the object which was immediately opposite it, which was the golden Table of the Showbread. The Showbread, of course, is a type of Jesus Christ, who said, ‘I am that Bread of Life. I am the bread which came down from heaven.’ So the whole purpose of the candlestick was to do one thing and one thing only: to illuminate the Table of Showbread; and this is exactly true of the church of Jesus Christ. We are here for one purpose and one purpose only, to cast light on Jesus, the Bread of Life. And we only do this when we are filled with the Holy Ghost and set on fire.

There is a little picture: Apart from the candlestick there is no source of light. Apart from the church, there is no light in the world. The candlestick can only give light when it was filled with oil and set on fire. The church can only give light when it is filled with the Holy Ghost and set on fire. The candlestick had only one object upon which to cast light that was the Table of Showbread. The church has only one object upon which to cast light and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. The only reason that you and I, as Christians, are here is to cast light on Jesus Christ, the Bread of Life. This is the only primary purpose of our presence in the earth; everything else that we may do is secondary to that. We are the light of the world.

Thirdly, we are the salt of the earth. Again, the ‘the’ is exclusive. It means that the earth has no other salt; we are the only salt available to the earth. Now we heard this afternoon something of what it means, and you were told about the prism which is made out of salt. There are various different ways in which you can apply the significance of salt. Being no scientist, I have to keep myself at a very humble, homely kind of plane. And I would just point out to certain obvious facts about salt which everybody here knows.

First of all, one great function of salt is to give flavor to that which would otherwise lack flavor. Scripture says in Job, ‘Is there any flavor in the white of an egg?’ And the answer is ‘No.’ So that is why when you eat the white of an egg, if you are like me, you put on salt to give it flavor. We are the salt of the earth. We are here to give the earth flavor in the sight of God. We are here to commend the earth to God. Apart from our presence in the earth, there is no other reason why God should deal with this world any longer in grace and mercy. We are the only thing that makes the earth acceptable to God. We are the only thing that holds back the final judgment and wrath of God on a Christ-rejecting world. As long we are in the earth, our responsibility is to live in such a way that we commend this earth to God. That we cause Him, we give Him a reason to continue to act in grace and mercy towards this earth rather than in wrath and in judgment.

You remember in the Old Testament in the eighteenth chapter of the book of Genesis, the Lord came to the home of Abraham and then went on to the city of Sodom. And the Lord told Abraham that He was on His way to bring judgment upon the city of Sodom. Now Abraham was concerned because his own nephew, Lot, and Lot’s family, lived in Sodom. And so Abraham went on with the Lord towards Sodom pleading with the Lord for Sodom. And he is bargained with the Lord, if I may use that phrase, on the basis of numbers. He said, ‘Lord, if there were fifty righteous men in that city, would You spare that city?’ The Lord said, ‘Yes.’

“And Abraham said, ‘If there were forty, would You spare the city?’ The Lord said, ‘Yes.’ Then Abraham said, ‘If there were thirty, would You spare the city?’ The Lord said, ‘Yes.’ Abraham said, ‘If there were twenty, would You spare the city?’ The Lord said, ‘Yes.’ Then Abraham said to the Lord, ‘Please, Lord, don’t be angry, I want to ask once more. If there were”

just ten righteous men in that city, would You spare the city for the sake of the ten righteous men that are in it?’ The Lord said, ‘Yes, I would.’ The tragedy is that the Lord didn’t find ten righteous men in Sodom.

You know, I cannot help believing that Abraham had a little mental calculation, and said there is my nephew, and his wife, and his unmarried daughters, and his married daughters, between them surely they must be able to muster ten righteous people. And if Lot had been doing his job, they would have done it. But Lot was one of those believers that failed God. Oh, he was a believer, he’d heard all the revelations that Abraham had had, but he wasn’t living in the light of the revelation that he had. And I want to tell you something in parenthesis, it always touches me when I hear the story of Lot; and I say it to you as parents, those of you that are parents, for when I think of the terrible responsibility of Lot. Who took the family into Sodom? Lot, but he could not get them out again. He got out just two daughters, not even his wife. And parents, you can take your children and your family into things that you can’t get them out of, and you will be held accountable. It is a most terrible thought. I cannot picture how Lot must have felt when he looked at the blazing, smoking ruins of Sodom and knew that his own married daughters and his sons-in-law had perished. And he looked at the pillar of salt which was his wife and said to himself, I took them there. Do you understand that you can take people into things that you can’t get them out of?

I hear people say, ‘Well, we stay in the church for the sake of the children.’ I say to people, ‘So what’s not good enough for you is good enough for your children?’ Friends, you better take more serious heed to your children, some of you. Don’t imagine that your children can be fooled today with second best, they can’t. Young people today are discerning, discriminating, they look at things and they measure

them up. And do you know what they want? Above all else, honesty, reality. They don’t see it, they won’t buy it. You can’t fool them, don’t try. Don’t be a Lot, because you can live to regret it eternally. But the principle is there, for ten righteous men, God would have spared a complete city. That proportion is true today. Ten grains of salt can commend a whole serving to God, and our business is to be such that we commend this earth to God. That our presence makes a difference. That our presence causes God to deal with the world in a way that He would not otherwise be able to deal with the world. And every single believer should be a single grain of salt in his particular place. God does not lump all believers together in one place any more than we put all the salt in one mouthful, it would taste bitter. Every little grain is scattered in some particular place and God has put every person here in some particular place to be a grain of salt in that particular place, whether it is your family, your office, your place of employment, or whatever it may be. You may say that I feel so lonely. You are there just to give flavor to a place which otherwise without you would have no flavor.

I was saved and baptized in the Holy Spirit in the Second World War in the British army as a soldier. God did not take me out of the army and say, ‘Now this ungodly atmosphere and these ungodly surroundings are no good for you as a Christian. I will change that dirty brown uniform you have; I will give you a nice black suit, I’ll give you a round white collar, and I will put you in a nice ecclesiastical, academic atmosphere and there you will really flourish as a Christian.’ Do you know what the Lord said to me in that place? ‘In the same barrack room where you cursed, drank, and blasphemed; I am going to leave you to show what it means to be a Christian. My grace is sufficient for you.’ Do you know what somebody told me once? It is a beautiful thought. The will of God will never place you where the grace of God cannot keep you. I’m going to say it again: The will of God will never place you where the grace of God cannot keep you. If you are in the will of God where you are, the grace of God is sufficient for you.

And oh, how I thank God for the army. I had a very prolonged and elaborate education, but the most useful part of my education was in the British army. I didn’t say it was the most enjoyable, but I said it was the most useful. My wife has always said that she was glad that she never met me until I came out of the army. But I’m mentioning this for a reason. For about one-half a year after I was saved and baptized in the Holy Spirit, I was in the North African desert in the midst of the war in North Africa. I was with a medical unit as a medical orderly and for a time our unit was cut off behind the enemy lines. We got lost in the desert—it is very easy to do. It may sound strange, but in the desert it is easy. For about 24 hours, we didn’t know whether we were going to be taken prisoner or what was going to happen. And do you know that in that situation a very tough driver of a truck, he was not a medical orderly, who cursed and blasphemed and lived a godless life came to me and he said in all sincerity, ‘Corporal Prince, I am glad you are with us.’ He was sensible enough to know that my presence made a difference, and it did. I was with that particular company two years in the desert and they never lost a man. After I left them, they lost plenty. We are the grains of salt, our presence makes a difference. There shouldn’t be a single believer whose presence doesn’t make a difference.

Later on, still in the army, I was working in the office of a hospital, actually on the Mount of Olives. I was in the admission office, I was in charge of it towards the end of the war. They gave me a young man, a lance corporal to work with me. And for about two weeks he was working with me and for some reason or other, I didn’t actually speak to him about God or religion. And then another soldier came in one day and these two were talking in front of me and this lance corporal that worked with me began to blaspheme. Suddenly he checked himself, blushed bright red, turned around and said to me, ‘I’m sorry, Corporal Prince, I didn’t know you were here. I wouldn’t have spoken like that.’ See, I never told him that I disapproved of cursing or blaspheming, I had actually not spoken to him about God. But my presence convicted him that it was wrong.

That’s what it means to be salt. If you don’t make an impact where you live there is something wrong with you. If people carry on just as they were carrying on anyhow, regardless of whether you are there, there is something wrong with you as a Christian.

Now another great feature of salt is that it is a preservative. Before the days of refrigeration, as I understand it, when sailors went on a long journey and wanted to preserve their meat or other things they salted them. And the salt had the effect of holding back indefinitely the forces of corruption that would have worked in that meat. And we are the salt of the earth; we are here to hold back the forces of corruption. So long as we are in the earth, the forces of evil—godlessness, rebellion, corruption—that are at work shall never be allowed to come to their fullness. Only after the church has been taken from the earth will wickedness come to its final culmination. We are here to arrest and hold back the forces of corruption—moral corruption, social corruption, political corruption, corruption in every realm of the society in which we live. We are responsible for, it is our business to hold it back; we are the salt of the earth.

Now listen, if we are not doing these things, if our presence does not commend the earth to God, if our presence doesn’t cause God to act differently to the world, than He would if we were not here. And if our presence does not hold back the forces of corruption, do you know what we are? We are salt that has lost its savor. We are salt that is not doing its job. We are salt that has become saltless. And listen to what Jesus says about the salt that has lost its savor. ‘It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men.’ In Britain, the phrase, ‘Good for nothing,’ is one of the worst things that you can say about anybody. A ‘good-for-nothing’ is just about as bad as you can be; and that is what the church is if it isn’t doing its job. We are good for nothing; but one thing, to be cast out and to be trampled underfoot of men. And I want you to notice that it is men’s feet that will trample the saltless church under; God will use men to do it. And if you look around the world today you will see millions of feet, literally millions, hundreds of millions, just waiting to trample us under. Am I speaking the truth? Is it not correct? There is no exaggeration in that.

You look at the Eastern Europe, Russia, the Far East and you can count literally millions of men that would consider it a privilege to trample us under foot. And you know what; if we don’t change, they will do it. And you know what, when we are being trampled under we will have no cause of complaint. All we will be able to say is, ‘we deserve it.’ And God warned us it was coming and do you know the bitterest reflection of all when that happens? Do you know what it will be, it never needed to happen. All we need to do is repent and change our ways and it does not need to happen.

I am absolutely convinced at this moment that if the church of Jesus Christ in the United States were to meet God’s condition, very simple, very clear, very specific, they could change and arrest the downward course of events. And if we don’t do it, it’s our fault and we will be the ones that will suffer first and worse. And we will deserve it.

Now before I go further, I want to apply this much of my message to you. Having trained teachers for quite a long while, one thing that I ingrained into them was that a lesson without an application is not a good lesson. So I am going to stop now and give a little, simple application to this lesson. I want you to make it personal, every one of you. If you don’t believe what God says, and if you aren’t convinced by what I preached, well, don’t join in. But if you believe that I am simply expounding to you in a practical way what the Scripture teaches, I want you to unite with me in reading the thirteenth verse together right now. Matthew 5:13, I am reading the King James Version, if you’ve got another then it doesn’t matter. When I just put up my hand, would you start reading with me?

“Ye are the salt of the earth. But if the salt have lost his savour wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men.”

Now listen, I want you to apply it a little more personally. I believe this is legitimate. We realize that Jesus is talking to Christians and we are Christians. So where it says ‘Ye,’ I want you read it a second time and say ‘We.’ And one further thing, where it says in the middle of the verse, ‘it is thenceforth good for nothing,’ I want you to read, ‘We are thenceforth good for nothing.’ Do you see the two changes? Instead of ye, you say we, and it is you say we are, and I believe this is an absolutely legitimate change. So now when I put my hand up this time, I want you to read it this way.

“We are the salt of the earth. But if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? We are thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men.”

Now you’ve said it, and you are going to be answerable to God in time and eternity for what you said tonight in this place.

Now I want to explain to you one of the various different reasons why the church has this unique position. And this is the line that I am going to follow for the rest of this week. Now I am by no means claiming to expound to you all the different aspects of this truth. Rather I am going to concentrate on one aspect and unfold it and show to you one major scriptural reason why the church alone, of all the agencies in the earth today, has the ability to change the situation effectively for the good.

Turn with me, if you will, to Ephesians, the sixth chapter and the twelfth verse; Ephesians chapter 6, and verse 12. Again, I believe all commentators would agree that where Paul says ‘we’ here, he is speaking about all Christians. He is not talking about some special class of people; but he is talking about Christians generally. And this is what he says, ‘For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.’

Now I am going to give you the Prince version, so many other people are producing their own versions I feel I have the right to produce mine. Somebody asked me if it was in print, the answer is no. It just comes out. But I have studied Greek since I was ten years old, and I believe that I can put it in a way that makes it just a little more plain and vivid, that is all I am seeking to do.

“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities or ruler ship, against powers or authorities, against the world rulers of the present darkness, against spirit of lawlessness in heavenly places.”

I’ll say that again. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities or rulerships, against powers or authorities, against the world rulers of the prince of darkness, against spirits of lawlessness in heavenly places in the heavenlies.

First of all, you’ll notice that as Christians we are engaged in a wrestling match. Again, this is not a thing about which we have any option. If we are Christians, we wrestle. We don’t choose about this; it is necessary. It is the result of being a Christian. Automatically, you become involved in a tremendous spiritual conflict. Paul took this picture of wrestling from the ancient Olympic Games, and he took various other pictures from other parts of his writing. But I believe that the picture of wrestling is significant, because I believe that wrestling was the most intensive, the most exacting, the most all inclusive of all struggles. It demanded the total man in total effort. There was nothing left out. It was total conflict and exactly so in the spiritual life. It’s total conflict—spirit, soul, mind, and body—all are involved in a tremendous conflict against unseen spiritual forces in the heavenly realm. The emphasis is that we are not fighting a human being; people of flesh and blood, Brother Prince or Brother Jimmy or his wife, or some person like that, or the drunkard down in the cabin, or the prostitute, or even the dictator of some foreign nation. We are not fighting human personalities. We are fighting spirit forces, spirit personalities; they are persons, but they are spirit persons.

And they are in an unseen realm which is not visible to the natural eye, but it is absolutely real. In fact, more real than the visible world. For the apostle Paul said in Second Corinthians, the fourth chapter, ‘the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal.’ The things that we can see are temporary, they’re transient, they are impermanent; but the things in the unseen spiritual realm are permanent. They are more real than the seen. Visible, temporary things have passed away, the unseen spiritual eternal things will still continue.

So we are engaged in a tremendous wrestling match against unseen forces which, from a heavenly position, dictates and controls the course of world affairs. ‘The world,’ the Scripture says in the first epistle of John, in the fifth chapter, ‘lieth in the wicked one.’

Now the King James Version says that the whole world lies in wickedness; but that is not the correct translation. ‘The whole world lieth in the wicked one.’ The whole world is in the lap of the devil. He is the world ruler. He and those forces that join him in rebellion against God are the world rulers of this present darkness. Ephesians chapter two, verses 1, 2, and 3 bring out this fact. Speaking to Christians, Paul says, Ephesians two, 1, 2, and 3:

“And you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sin, wherein in times past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air. The spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience, among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind and were by nature the children of wrath even as others.”

Notice, Paul says, until we were converted and came to Jesus Christ, we were in the same condition as all men all over the world. We were under the control of the prince of the power of the air, the spirit of the air, the spirit of the authority of the air. This is one of the titles of Satan who works in all unregenerate, unconverted, disobedient humanity. Dominating them and controlling them through the lusts of the flesh and, please note, of the mind. Satan dominates the rebellious intellectual just as much as he dominates the prostitute or the alcoholic. He dominates and controls all unconverted all unregenerated humanity by unseen spiritual forces that control their minds and their fleshly lusts. He is the prince of the power of the air. He is the prince of this world—Jesus called him that twice. He is the god of this world, and the apostle Paul called him that.

He is the great ruler of the unseen forces of darkness; and under him he has deployed innumerable multitudes of spirits, which are all working under his control against God and against the welfare of the human race. And it is you and I, as Christians, who are called to deal with this person, Satan, with the forces that work with him. And with the situation that has been brought about, first, by his rebellion in heaven; second, by man’s rebellion on earth. For man has become the subject and slave of Satan, not through God’s ordinance, but through man’s rebellion. Man sided with Satan against God and thus made himself subject to Satan.

I am going to deal with this in greater detail in our message tomorrow, because until we understand this we cannot really understand the true situation in the world today.

So behind the seen realm is the unseen. Behind the forces we are familiar with, that the newspaper reports to us daily—the social situation, the economic situation, the political situation, the international situation—behind all that, dominating it, controlling it, directing it, are unseen spiritual forces and they are directing it towards evil. Towards rebellion towards God and towards destruction. And it is your and my privilege and responsibility to intervene and change this situation.

Now I am going to take a few moments out of the Old Testament to lift a little corner of the veil and show you the reality of the unseen spiritual powers controlling the destiny of nations. I want to turn first of all to the prophet Ezekiel, the twenty-eighth chapter, and I want to point out to you that in the first part of this chapter we are introduced to two persons. The first person is called ‘the prince of Tyrus [or the city of Tyree],’ the second person is called ‘the king of Tyrus.’ And I want to show you very, very briefly that these two persons are related in this way. The prince of Tyrus is the visible human ruler of Tyrus; but the king of Tyrus is the invisible spiritual satanic personality dominating the visible ruler, and through him dominating the entire city and empire of Tyrus. And indeed, when you analyze what it says about the king of Tyrus there is only person to whom this description could possibly apply and that is Satan himself. There is no other person in the universe of whom these words that we are going to read could be true.

Let’s notice first of all what it said about the prince of Tyrus, and then we will move on to the king. Now this is a historical prophecy relating to a historical situation in the past. It is also a God-given preview of a situation that is yet to come in to the world under the dominion of Antichrist; the last great evil ruler who is to come and dominate and rule all nations immediately prior to the setting up the earthly kingdom of Jesus Christ. And the prince of Tyrus and the king of Tyrus are the clearest single pattern, or preview, given anywhere in Scripture of Antichrist and of Satan ruling Antichrist and the world through him.

So notice this, because there is so much in this chapter which immediately leads on to the prophecy of Antichrist in the New Testament. As I will point out briefly; now taking Ezekiel 28, and verse 2, we have these words:

“Son of man, say unto the prince of Tyrus, Thus saith the Lord God. Because thine heart is lifted up and thou has said, I am a God, I sit in the seat of God in the midst of the seas, yet thou art a man and not God though thou set thine heart as the heart of God, behold thou art wiser than Daniel. There is no secret that they can hide from thee.”

That is pretty wise, to be wiser than Daniel. But do you notice that Satan can make a man even wiser than Daniel.

“‘With thy wisdom and thine understanding thou hast gotten thee riches and hast gotten gold and silver into thy treasures [and so on].’
Notice the ninth verse:
‘Wilt thou yet say before him that slayeth thee, I am God? But thou shalt be a man and no god in the hand of him that slayeth thee.’”

Notice how clear the Scripture is. Here is a man—and he is a man, he is a human being—he claims to be god, he shows himself as god, but he is not god he is not a spirit being, he is a being of flesh and blood. A man. And he is going to die a natural death, killed by the sword.

Now we move on to the king of Tyrus, the unseen personality behind him. Notice what is said about him, in verse 12 and 13:

“Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyrus and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord God, Thou sealest up the sum full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.”

And I will point out to you before, and I will show you clearly that this is a picture of Satan as he was before he fell.

“Verse 13:
‘Thou hast been in Eden [notice that] the garden of God.’”

The earthly ruler of Tyrus has never been near Eden, the garden of God. Eden had been blotted out centuries before this ever was written. Then it describes all the beautiful stones with which he was adorned. And I tell you one thing, ladies, don’t imagine that Eve was deceived by some slimy, slithering serpent, she wasn’t. Whatever this being was, he was very, very gorgeous. Very beautiful, very elegant. It was only after he deceived Adam and Eve that he was cursed and caused to go upon his belly as a snake.

Did you notice that? Verse 14, ‘Thou art the anointed cherubim that covereth.’ The word art is in italics, it is supplied by the translator. In the Hebrew language, it would be just as right, in fact more right to put ‘wast’: ‘Thou wast the anointed cherub that covered.’ Do you know where Satan was? Right over the throne of God. He wast the cherub that covered the throne of God until he fell.

Notice a little further on, ‘Thou wast upon the holy mountain of God.’ Notice, ‘Thou hast walked up and down in the midst of stones and of fire.’ Verse 15: ‘Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created.’ Notice, he is a created being, ‘Till iniquity wast found in thee.’ Verse 17, ‘Thine heart wast lifted up because of thy beauty.’ Why did Satan fall? Because of pride in his own beauty. Do you want to see another little picture of the fall of Satan? Turn to Isaiah the fourteenth chapter. Isaiah chapter 14, reading verses 12, 13, and 14. Isaiah, 14, reading verses 12, 13, and 14. ‘How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning?’

Now listen, I want to tell you a secret. I learned this in the desert in North Africa. Lucifer is the morning star and you may say, ‘Well, why is Satan called Lucifer?’ Well I found that out in the desert, for about nine months we had no lights, we saw no paved roads, we lived, ate, slept on the sand, we went to bed when the sun set, we got up when the sun rose. And during those nights on the desert, I discovered that at certain seasons of the year there is a false dawn. That is to say, the morning star comes up over the horizon, immediately preceding the sun. And it is so bright that it causes the whole horizon to glow and be light and you would really imagine that the sun was coming up, but instead there comes up just this unusually, unnaturally bright star. And then a little while later the real sun comes. And I’ll tell you, when the sun really rises you see no more of the morning star. Because it is blotted out in the brilliance of the rays of the true sun.

And this is the Antichrist. He is going to bring humanity a false dawn, just immediately before the coming of the true Son of righteousness, Jesus Christ. There is going to come this tremendous ruler who is going to say, ‘I’ll bring peace and prosperity and order. I’ll solve your problems.’ And he will be just like the morning star. He will be so bright that when he comes up on the horizon people will think this is the real sun. But I’ll tell you, when Jesus Christ comes; you will see no more of Antichrist.

Now, in the book of Revelation, Jesus is called ‘the bright and morning star.’ But understand that means the sun, that doesn’t mean Lucifer, it is very important to be clear about that. Lucifer is what we call ‘the morning star,’ the bright and morning star is the sun itself. The Bible was accurate enough and knew that the sun was a star.

Now look at what Lucifer, what was the motivation of Lucifer. Verses 13 and 14, why did he fall? Why was he cut down? ‘Because thy said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides of the north, I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the most high.’ Do you notice one phrase repeated five times? Do you know what it is? ‘I will.’ Do you see that the basis of sin, do you know what it is; it is ‘I will.’ It is the rebellious ‘I’ set against God.

Sin is like a tree; it’s got a root, it’s got a trunk, and it has branches. Most preaching, most church activity is concerned only with the branches, the sin—smoking, drinking, swearing, and gambling. The trunk is sin, out of which comes sins. But even the trunk isn’t the original thing; the original thing is self, which is the root. And you see, when Jesus came, John the Baptist said, ‘Now also the axe is laid to the root of the tree.’ That’s the New Testament, it is radical. You know what radical means? It means it goes to the root; it is the most radical dealing of God with any age or dispensation. And Jesus said, ‘If any man will come after me, let him deny himself.’ First step, cut out the root. You cannot be a Christian until you’ve denied self. Do you know what to deny is, it’s very simple. Say no. The old ego says, ‘I want,’ you say, ‘No, Christ wants. I will not please myself; I am not here to do my own will. I am a son like my Savior. I came to do the will of him that sent me.’ You cannot be a Christian until you start that. The first step to the Christian life is self-denial. That’s why we get lots of miserable failures in our churches; they haven’t dealt with the root. Most of them are fiddling around with a few top branches. Here is the root exposed. It didn’t start in earth it started in heaven. ‘I will’ five times a will set against God. This is the basic nature of sin, it’s rebellion.

Notice the last statement, I will be like the Most High, I will be equal with God. Notice what the serpent said to Eve, ‘You eat of this tree, you will be as god.’ Exactly the same temptation, but you know what it says in Philippians 2 about Jesus. ‘He, being in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with God.’ That is another literal translation. He did not consider it something to be grabbed at, to be equal with God. Satan grabbed at it; Jesus didn’t have to. It was His by divine, eternal right. That’s the difference.

And here is the root of all problems, it is the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now worketh in the children of rebellion. The root of all problems, rebellion. And there is a prince of rebellion in the unseen realm dominating and controlling all the children of rebellion.

Now just my confirmation of this, turn to Second Thessalonians, chapter 2, and reading from verse 3, just a few verses, to see how perfectly Ezekiel 28 is a preview of this.

“‘Let no man deceive you by any means. For that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first and that man of sin [but the correct translation is lawlessness, rebellion] be revealed. The son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped. So that he as god sitteth in the temple of God showing himself that he is god.”

Notice what he said, he said in Ezekiel, I am god, but God said, ‘You are a man and you’ll die like a man.’ This is the type and the antitype, the Old Testament and the New, but behind all this is the truth of the unseen spirit world dominating all the lot, all those who are still children of disobedience and therefore of wrath.

Now one other example from the Old Testament in Daniel the tenth chapter; Daniel chapter 10, and I am only going to read a little portion of this chapter, just a few verses, but if you really are interested you should read both Ezekiel 28 and Daniel 10 by yourself carefully. Daniel 10 and verse 2 reads as follows:

‘In those days, I, Daniel, was mourning three full weeks.’ He gave himself to special prayer, denying himself the normal niceties of life. Living on something just a little—more or less bread and water—to seek God for three weeks in prayer. And at the end of three weeks the answer came in the form of an angel. Indeed I believe it was the archangel Gabriel.

“Then he said unto me, fear not, Daniel, for from the first days that thou didst set thine heart to understand and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were heard and I am come for thy words.”

Notice, Daniel’s prayer was heard the first day. The answer came the twenty-first day. Why did he have to wait three weeks? Here is the reason, ‘But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one and twenty days. But lo, Michael one of the chief princes, came to help me and I remained there with the kings of Persia.’ Notice, the prince of the kingdom of Persia is not a human being; it is the spirit ruler behind the earthly kingdom of Persia. And in the spiritual realm when Daniel started to pray for the restoration of Israel from their captivity, which was closely connected with the Persian Empire and God sent Gabriel with the answer to Daniel, this unseen evil power withstood the angel Gabriel in the heavenly realm twenty-one days.

Now you may begin to understand why the answer to your prayer tarries sometimes. Can you see that? You’re involved in a spiritual warfare, and I want to point this out to you, it is a most tremendously important fact. It was Daniel’s prayer on earth that got the angels moving in heaven. The initiative is with the church, friends; it is not with the angels. Things depend on what we do, the angels are ministering spirits sent forth to minister unto them which shall be heirs of salvation. We are not waiting for the angels; the angels are waiting for us. When you begin to pray, you stir the angels up. Not only the good angels, but the bad ones too; and notice, that’s very true, and maybe you started to discover that. And notice that it was Daniel’s prayers that opened the way for the angel to come. Do you see how much we have to do? We think about ourselves like Bobby Burns spoke about—the mouse: the poor, weak, sleepy, timorous, cowardly beastie. That’s how most Christians picture themselves—a little mouse disturbed out of its nest just hoping to get back again as quickly as possible. Friends, we are the rulers. We are the people with the initiative. The world is waiting for us, the unseen world and the seen world. We are the people that decide the destiny of nations. We are the salt of the earth, we are the light of the world, we are not unimportant. We are the most important people in the world today. And if you aren’t that, you are not a Christian. You can’t be a Christian without being important. You matter. Things depend on you. Too long have you been waiting for somebody else to do something.

I’ll tell you what, I didn’t mean to say this, but I have it in my heart to write a book called War on Satan. And I’ve chosen that title because of a book was once written called, War on the Saints. A good book, but I’ve decided that it is about time that we stop waiting for Satan to take the initiative and took the initiative against Satan. The church has had the attitude through the centuries, ‘Well, maybe if Satan attacks I can hold out.’ It’s about time we give Satan the impression, ‘Well, if the church attacks, I doubt I can hold out.’ We have got to take the initiative and this age will not close until we do it. It depends on us. Now notice just one more thing, when the angel left Daniel in the twentieth verse of the same chapter he said, ‘Then said he, Knowest thou wherefore I come unto thee and now when I return to fight with the Prince of Persia and when I am gone forth, lo, the Prince of Grecia shall come.’ The next great empire that followed Persia was Greece, and behind each of these empires was an unseen spirit personality called the Prince of the empire of Persia and the Prince of the empire of Grecia. And there was war in the heavenly realm to open the way for God’s scattered people in exile, Israel to return to their inheritance. Both the kingdom of Persia and the kingdom of Grecia were involved. And behind all that took place in the historical, political realm was this unseen conflict in the spiritual realm and in that conflict the prayers of God’s people on earth were decisive. And the same is absolutely true today. The unseen spiritual realm decides the course of history; it decides the political, the social, and the economic. That’s where the issues are settled, and the decisive factor in settling those issues is the church of Jesus Christ on earth.

That’s one major reason why we are the salt of the earth, why we are the light of the world. We are, as was said this afternoon, the body of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ operates through His body. God will not set aside His Son, Jesus Christ, because it would be a dishonor to Him. Therefore He will not set aside the church, which is the body of His Son. Therefore God has limited Himself in His sovereignty to doing the most important things needing to be done through the church and that means you and me.

Friend, I trust you go out of this place tonight realizing one thing, you matter. It always grieves me to hear Christians talking about themselves as though they are insignificant, unimportant people. Everything depends on you. Your nation depends on you, your political leaders depend on you, the course of history depends on you. It is about time you realize this.

Let me give you one other picture that sums this up. In the twenty-fourth chapter of Isaiah and the twenty-first verse; and the twenty-fourth chapter of Isaiah is a picture of a final, tremendous, climactic judgment that will close this age, when the whole earth will reel to and fro and be turned upside down and shaken like a cottage. And the inhabitants will be scattered abroad, it’s tremendous. You want to read Isaiah 24, 25, and 26 in the light of revelation. It is a little apocalypse in the middle of Isaiah. And then at the close of this there is the coming of the Lord in glory. And in the twenty-first chapter— in the twenty-fourth chapter, ‘And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall punish the host of the high ones that are on high and the kings of the earth upon the earth.’ There’s the two realms, you see, the kings of the earth and their sphere on the earth, and the hosts of the high ones who are going to be punished by God in the heavenly realm. That’s the way it is—behind the visible, the invisible. Behind the carnal, the spiritual, and the spiritual is decisive. When you have victory in the spiritual realm you have victory, period. Everything that follows in the natural, historical, social plane is a result of what has been achieved in the spiritual. That’s why the church is perfectly well able to change the course of the natural and the historical. All that is needed is that we get the victory in the spiritual.

And in closing now, let me direct your attention to one other Scripture, 2 Corinthians chapter 10, verses 3, 4, and 5. Second Corinthians chapter 10, verses 3, 4, and 5. The Bible is perfectly logical. We have a spiritual conflict, what kind of weapons do we need? Spiritual weapons; and that is what we have been given. Second Corinthians 10, verses 3, 4, and 5,

“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”

We walk in the fleshly realm, we live in bodies of flesh, we are living in the world of time, but our warfare isn’t in that realm. Our warfare is in the spiritual realm, and the weapons that are given us correspond to the realm in which we have to fight. We cannot win with bullets and rifles and tanks and guns because they just don’t reach the enemy we are dealing with. And you see, that’s why the rulers of today are frustrated because they do not have the means to intervene where the decisions really are decided.

But you and I have. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but they are mighty through God to the pulling down of Satan’s strongholds in the unseen realm. And notice in verse 5 where this affects humanity. Notice the words, casting down imaginations, and in the margin, ‘reasoning,’ and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the

obedience of Christ. Notice: reasoning, imagination, knowledge, and thought—that’s the realm. It’s the unseen realm, but in that unseen realm that controls man’s thinking, and his reasonings, and his thoughts and gives him knowledge. In that realm is the warfare of the church and God has given us spiritual weapons that will insure spiritual victory if we use them.

And that is what I intend to speak about: our spiritual weapons and how to use them. And this is going to be the theme of all my messages. This is the one theme that I am going to deal with, how to get the victory in the spiritual realm.

Now we’re going to close, I’ve gone just about the allotted time and I believe that it is normal and appropriate that we close by inviting people who would like to come forward for prayer to do so. And I want to invite you to pray about one specific theme, that God may equip you and enable you to play the part in the world that He is expecting you to play. And if you feel that up till now that you have not really been playing that part, and maybe you haven’t even been aware that you were called by God to play such a part but now having seen it out of His Word, you are willing you are a volunteer, then I would suggest that you come forward in a moment of truth to this altar and just tell God that. Offer yourself to God tonight as a volunteer for the spiritual conflict and I would suggest particularly as a volunteer in the spiritual conflict which will settle the destiny of the U.S.