Rebellion. Pride. Witchcraft.
In this message, I am going to focus on the attitude of the heart. You will see how our actions create unhealthy situations and how bad decisions can create a long life of trouble or even can take us to where God has never intended us to go. To do so, I will be using a specific character in the Bible.
God rejected Cain because of his heart. When we get angry at God, we turn on one another and start hating our brother and sister. Cain was not obeying God. He did what he was supposed to do from the outside, but from the inside the heart was wrong. If the heart is wrong, we won’t receive the blessing of doing it. God said to Cain, “If you do well, you will be received. But if you don’t, sin lies at the door.”
Our attitude shows our gratitude. Jealousy consumed Cain and made him a murderer. It brought him to a dry land. He was feeling miserable. Our actions always bring consequences. When we get in the flesh, we get the consequences of the flesh: death. The Spirit is life.
Abel was not doing anything wrong. It was actually Cain that had the problem, and he was taking it out on Abel. When God is trying to correct us, we can become rebellious or we can become fruitful.
We are supposed to be our brother’s keeper. The spirit of murder, religion, all start from Cain because he had a religious attitude with his offering. Now, we are the offering to God. We bring out hearts. Our daily sacrifice: you and your cross!
Satan is the father of pride. Everyone with pride always wants to be the one who is right. In pride, we don’t even hear the other, but we are already resisting Truth. Now, we need to break the mold of Cain. We need to break the mold of the old man. The blood of Abel cries out but how much louder is the blood of Jesus?
Pride only listens to its own heart and puts up walls because it does not want to be exposed. That jealousy killed Abel. This is what we see with one another. These three things: rebellion, pride, and witchcraft, go hand and hand. Pride births rebellion, and rebellion brings an atmosphere of witchcraft.
Abraham heard from God Himself but did not wait on God. He followed the suggestion of his wife. The World was turned upside down because of this one mistake: Ishmael. Don’t think that because you are His that you can’t create your own Ishmael. Abraham lacked judgment. His faith failed him at that time because he followed his flesh. He got in negative agreement with His wife even to the point of fornication just to make a promise come to pass. What started in the spirit ended in the flesh. He had to wait 13 years, the number of rebellion, to see the promise. Don't let our flesh get us off course. Don't let pride say it can’t happen to me.
Ishmael will create problems in the church and in your own life. Ishmael is a fruit of rebellion and pride. Disobedience is as the sin of witchcraft. Don’t think your mistakes won’t have consequences. If Abraham wanted to do it his own way or help God that is a sign of pride!
The problem with rebellion is that we want it when we want it, and we don’t want to wait on God to give us what He wants and when He wants it. Not obeying God when He tells us to do something and hesitation is also disobedience. We need to get this thing out! Rebellion is the breeding ground for many Ishmaels. We need to break the mold and follow Christ and not Cain.
The power of agreement is manifested when two come together. Abraham and Sarah experienced it but in a wrong way: Negative agreement. Two with negative agreement will put ten thousand to flight as well! Negative agreement is a work of the flesh. Positive agreement is a work of the Spirit.
Sometimes we are looking at the messenger and we are forgetting who is speaking through that one, and pride will not listen to anybody until they listen to God for themselves. God told Saul what to do and Saul did some of what God said. He also did what Samuel was supposed to do, the sacrifice. At the end, Samuel had to do what Saul did not do.
God said to Saul: Kill all! But Saul kept Agag the king. He took that seed of the enemy and kept it. It is the same thing: God is saying, “Kill all,” but you want to do it your way and keep what He is telling you to kill, and also not to take any. Sometimes we go where God sends us, but then we do it our way.
It grieved Samuel, and it grieves us, too, because we know there will be consequences for people’s pride. We see it, but they ignore it. God points out the way through His Word, but they don’t follow it. Samuel interceded for Saul all night because he even kept some sheep. Saul began to lie and believed that he was right. Rebellion takes people’s discernment and destroys it. Saul believed that he obeyed, but he had put himself under witchcraft because he did not do exactly what God told him to do. Pride came in in Saul’s life.
Sometimes we do just a little bit of what God tells us. When we are being tested, the master (teacher) stays quiet. It is easier to follow God when we are dead. When we are crucified, it is easier to obey God. There is no resistance. God can turn it all around if we take one trip to the cross. God said to him there was a season that he was little in his own eyes. God wanted him to know that pride had consumed him and made him his own god. Then God repented that He ever made him king.
If grace is lifting that means that pride is rising, that rebellion is rising. God gives grace only to the humble. This is a great thermometer for pride. When relationships get hard, when you start striving, check yourself. Pride cuts grace right out of the way.
Obedience is better than sacrifice. You may be doing this and that, but you are doing it out of works, not out of obedience. Your heart is not in it. Because of that, you will never be able to win God’s heart. Look at Cain.
“I don’t need an apostle. I don’t need a prophet.” Saul thought, “I'm king. I'm anointed." He tried to do his own thing through his own anointing, but God is very much concerned about order. When we break the order, we break God’s heart. When someone is rebelling, witchcraft follows them wherever you go. You put it on people – you don’t mean it – but it is just a natural effect. You say, “What changed here at the church, in my family, in my job? Things are not the same,” but it is coming from you because you are exalting your ways above His. Obedience is always better than anything else you do. If you are not doing exactly what He told you, He won’t receive even the things that you are sacrificing for Him.
Stubbornness is stiff-neckedness. It is as the sin of iniquity. Don’t you think that God will not reject your anointing? Everybody is beating themselves up because they are not doing what they are told to. Most of our problem is that we decide to exalt our hearts above His. “I did this, I did that,” but it does not matter. God can use a mule to fulfill his purpose. You may be still under rebellion doing things on the outside, but most of the rebellion is coming from the inside of your heart. Rebellion is anti-Christ, and an enemy of the cross suffocates love.
All of us have anointing and authority but that can be contaminated through rebellion. “I have to look good,” but there is no repentance. You did not change your mind. You just want to look good in front of people. Pride wants you looking good with fig leaves, but we need to be worried about how God looks at us when we are in rebellion. Saul’s pride was so strong when he was corrected by Samuel. All he cared was about was what he looked like to the people.
Samuel ended up doing what Saul was supposed to do. Samuel had to do what Saul should have done from the beginning. Secretly repentance won’t work. Sometimes God will use a prophet to kill what you are not capable of because you are blind and under your own witchcraft. Saul had so much pride. He was incapable of repenting.
When you get stiff-necked, you are really rebelling against God, one another, and His Word. Miriam had leprosy because she rebelled against the Man of God. We get too comfortable when God speaks through someone else. God is for us, but if we are against Him, who will be for us?
Did the Holy Spirit come out of Stephen like a ghost? No. He was a natural man full of His Spirit. They were killing God in Him. They were rebelling, rejecting, and resisting the Holy Spirit. The Word compares them to Jannes and Jambres – the magicians of Egypt (2 Timothy 3:8). They are always resisting, even those that are telling the Truth. They are always resisting God’s Word and His direction. That level of rebellion got all the prophets before Stephen was stoned. Only those who are able to obey and follow Him are the humble.
Threefold cord: pride, rebellion, witchcraft. They work together. I have never seen one without the others. When people are rebelling and you bring the Truth, they gnash their teeth. The power of negative agreement can make you a murderer. You even begin to hate people that are close to your heart. Just like when Stephen spoke, they killed him because of truth. He called them all rebellious saying that they always resist truth.
Stephen remembered what Jesus said and did the same: “Forgive them. They don’t know what they are doing.” What Jesus said… Stephen said, “Lay not their sin on their account.” Stephen thought… “I cannot be offended right now. I will do anything so my heart can stay pure.” And in holiness, he released his spirit, just like Jesus did, and saw the glory of God.
Now Judas was looking for negative agreement in the enemy camp. He did not agree with what and how Jesus wanted to do God’s business. If Satan can get in a heart of someone against a perfect leader like Jesus, how much more do you think Satan could get in our hearts because of our imperfect brothers and leaders? How much more we need to be careful? Judas had that entrapment spirit. We don’t go to the cross. We keep the list of wrong doing ready when we are being confronted, and we start pulling things out of the treasure chest. We say, “Love covers,” but actually, love eliminates even the record of sin done to and through us!
Loves does not just cover sin. Love dissolves it. Also, love does not keep a record of wrong. You keep hiding that list of wrong doing for later use. “He said, she said…” We don’t have time for that. Your laundry list needs to be burned.
Satan first put things into Judas’ heart: division, jealousy, strife, etc. And later on, he took over his whole being. When you have something against someone, sometimes nobody knows but that person does. Judas, for the last time, heard the message during the last supper and did not repent, and Satan entered in his heart! God gave him warnings. But the funny thing is that the humble ones were asking, “Is it me?”
When Jesus was washing his disciples’ feet, Peter first said, “I am not worthy of you washing my feet.” Then Jesus corrected him, and he received the correction and said, “Wash not only my feet, but my hands and head and my whole body.” That is the attitude He wants from us.
When you are rebelling, you stop seeing the little hints of correction that He is giving you throughout the way. We cannot walk in love and in rebellion at the same time.
In rebellion, you break communion with God. You can’t hear Him. You may be hearing Jezebel, but not Him. The only cure for rebellion is the fear of the Lord. Judas played the game all the way to the end. He was being nice to Jesus, but from the outside, he had his heart contaminated. Judas’ rebellion took his life, exactly the same way Saul’s rebellion took his life: suicide. That is what Satan wants us to commit: a spiritual suicide – killing our destinies.
Satan wants our heart. God wants our heart. We need to guard it at all times, or Satan will begin to try to poison our hearts. If you want to win these three towers – rebellion, pride, and witchcraft – you need to fight as a warrior. Guard that heart with every bit of your strength. In doing so, the three towers will become like crumbs if you humble yourself under His mighty hand! Shane Roessiger
Word: Genesis 4:1-4, Genesis 16, 1 Samuel 15, Nehemiah 9, Mark 14:1-12, John 13, 2 Timothy 3, Hebrews 10:20-39
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