Praise
When an earthy king is angry at a foreign nation, he summons his
army and sends them into battle. Likewise,
God also has an army of mighty warriors that battle against the demonic enemy. Isaiah saw this army in a vision:
Raise a
banner on a bare hilltop, shout to them; beckon to them to enter the
gates of the nobles.
I have commanded
those I prepared for battle; I have summoned my warriors to carry out my
wrath— those who rejoice in my triumph.
Listen, a noise on
the mountains, like that of a great multitude! Listen, an uproar among the
kingdoms, like nations massing
together! The Lord Almighty is mustering an army for
war.
They come from
faraway lands, from the ends of the heavens—the Lord and the
weapons of his wrath— to destroy the whole country. (Isaiah
13: 2-5 NIV)
Who are
the Lord’s warriors, His "mighty ones that carry out His wrath?"
Isaiah told us it was “those who rejoice in His triumph!”
I love
that word- triumph!! Jesus triumphed over the devil at the cross:
And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. (Colossians 2:15 NIV)
You and
I become mighty warriors in the army of the Lord the moment we decide to
rejoice that the battle was already won at the cross!!
And as we
rejoice in His Triumph, demonic strongholds come crashing down and demonic
rulers are bound and shackled:
May the praise of God
be in their mouths and a double-edged sword in their hands,
to inflict
vengeance on the nations and punishment on the peoples, to bind their
kings with fetters, their nobles with shackles of iron, to carry out the
sentence written against them—
this is the glory of
all his faithful people.
Praise the Lord. (Psalm
149:6-9 NIV)
As warriors, the first weapon that God has given us for battle is
the weapon of praise, and it acts as a double-edged sword,
inflicting vengeance and punishment on the demonic enemy.
Praise:
Give God praise because at the cross, all these things were
finished!! Praise Him in the past tense,
for His Triumph at the cross.
If you’d like some promises to Praise Him for,
I made a list of my favorites here: Promises
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Scripture quotations marked (TLB) are taken from The Living Bible
copyright © 1971. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream,
Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.