Some people are “frightened” when they read the book of Revelation, especially when they see that there will be a time when Satan will get all the worship – through Antichrist, when he calls himself “God” (1 Thes. 2:4). In this universe there is a great battle for worship – when the Lord was on the earth, Satan tempted the Lord Jesus to worship him and he will give the Lord all the world with its glory (Matt. 4:9).
Worshipping is giving God that which one day will be exclusively His. Satan fears our worship of God, and his kingdom is maintained by our worship of him (the result of this worship of Satan is sin).
Especially at this time, we want to give God a special worship, enjoying Him and living in our spirit, because we see that Satan is getting more and more worship for himself. Whenever we are not enjoying the Lord in our spirit, we offer Satan the worship that he wants. No, Satan cannot touch us in our spirit – this place is reserved only for God. But through our fall, our soul has become independent from God – just like Satan is.
Satan’s principle is independence and rebellion towards God. Our soul, our untransformed soul, the self, is independent from God and “does what he wants”. “Do what you want to do” – this is the most common thing you hear today. Even as believers, whenever we are not abiding in the Lord by living according to our spirit, we worship Satan, we give him food – he feasts on our living in our self/our flesh, and he grows: from the little serpent in Genesis, he becomes the great dragon in Revelation.
Our spirit is forever tied to dependence – we depend on God for life in our spirit, whereas our soul is forever tied to independence, since we have fallen in Adam. Our whole life we learn to develop and increase, enlarge, cultivate our soul.
Education, culture, the social life, knowledge – all these “enlarge” and grow man’s soul, so that it becomes the predominant part in man’s being. We need culture, education, the social life, knowledge, etc – but we need to have a continual turn to our spirit as we’re in all these. Otherwise, we become like the others, a generation of stubborn and self-sufficient men, who do what they want, when they want, with whomever they want.
Actually, whenever one lives out what he wants, without him expressedly knowing it, he is under Satan’s control and does his will – unless you depend on the Lord, you are one with the other one in this universe, God’s enemy. So we must learn how to live by our mingled spirit and ask the Lord to deliver us from the power and the grip of our ever-increasing soul.
This is why the Lord said that we must lose our soul-life, we must take up our own cross, and follow Him. This is a ongoing daily experience: we give God the worship that He desires by us denying ourselves and enjoying Christ, drinking of Him, in our exercise of our spirit!
Let us NOT do things by ourselves, according to what we think / the way we want it, but come to the Lord and check with Him about everything. Let’s give Him our worship and let God have all the glory! Glory be to God! He is worthy, He is wonderful, and He is our life! Today we worship only God!
