Forward March

Hello family of God, I have been wanting to write this blog for a while but just have not sat down to do it. Today I want to talk about one of our responsibilities as believers. That responsibility is advancing the Kingdom of God. You may have watched a football game and heard the term “keep the offense on the field” that means you are forcing your opponent to play defense. When you are on offense you are forcing your opponent to react to your moves. It means you are in control. But as Christians, a lot of the time we are playing defense and just reacting to the moves of the devil and his demons. This is not a position of strength. If we are who the bible says we are, we should be marching forward like soldiers in the army of the Lord, tearing down strongholds, sowing seed of the Word of God and taking over territory for the Lord.  

If you look around your community, what will you see? Would you say the territory belongs to the Lord or the devil? Are most of the people living in victory or are they weighed down with depression, failure, addiction and so on? What is the condition of your local church? Our enemy the devil is constantly trying to take over territory to advance his kingdom. He uses people to carry his plan out, the same way Holy Spirit uses the church to fulfill the plan of God. The Great commission clearly tells us to make disciples of all nations (Matt 28:19-20) but there are other things we need to do as well. The world is being bombarded with television, social media, and countless other things that corrupt the world, we have to have a plan of attack to combat it.

Strategy 

In political campaigns one effective strategy is to get your opponent “off message.”  If your opponent is traveling all over telling people the positive things they want to do, they are on offense. They are in control of the narrative. To get them off message, somebody may make an accusation and force them to respond. Now they are on defense, which is a place of weakness. The devil uses all sorts of tactics to get the Church on defense. He may use sickness/disease, create turmoil at our homes or work, temptations, or any other distraction to keep us from advancing the Kingdom. We can remain on offense by ridding ourselves of the cares of the world and picking up our cross and following Jesus. Jesus is always on offense, so we must be as well. A lamp is not lit to be put under a bed, neither did God put His Spirit in us to hide us in a building. Church is where we go to worship together, edify one another and get healed up from spiritual battle. We attend church to hear the Word and then go out and deliver it to our communities. We cannot be hearers of the Word only (James 1:22). But to sow the seed of God in our communities we must first prepare the soil with fasting and praying. Fasting and praying, along with powerful worship will move the hand of God to remove strongholds over the territory we want to take over. Make it your prayer to have a heart of compassion for the lost, just as Jesus did. 

Preparing for Battle 

To do battle we first have to make sure we are battle ready. A military does not send its wounded out on the battlefield. Sometimes we go through seasons where we are getting healed up from things and are being prepared for ministry but are not ready yet. Therefore, it is important to be in church, to read the Word as much as possible, and to have a strong prayer life. Once we are mature Christians and are walking in victory we can get back on the battlefield and help our fellow brothers and sisters take back what the enemy has stolen. Below are some things we can do to change the spiritual climate in our areas. 

• Create a prayer team at your local church that fasts and prays specifically for your community. 

• Plan outreaches in the community, this can be going door-to-door and handing out gift baskets that include information about your local church and a bible tract or something. Having a cookout at a community park or public area, and have people designated to those who would like prayer. 

• Invite people to small group gatherings. If your church has small groups that meet during the week, invite others to attend. The small, informal gathering may be more inviting for those who are not used to the church atmosphere. 

• Walk the streets in your town and pray, speaking the Word and declaring His promises. 

• Be a blessing. If there is a need in the community, do what you can to meet it. If a building needs some work, a park needs some attention or trash needs to be picked up, do what you can to help as a church. If someone in the area needs resources, we as a church should try help them. Being willing to help peoples’ physical needs is an effective way to tell them about Jesus. 

• Invite people to church. It is easy to invite someone to come and hear about how much God loves them. 

Beloved, we are the hands and feet of our Lord, it is our job to reach the lost. When we get to Heaven we want our Father to say well done good and faithful servant.