Christ has disarmed the Accuser in the life of the believer

One day, before God opened my eyes to His Grace (Christ Himself,) I was listening to a taped message from a church that my family and I followed as I drove to work. At a point the preacher went: “There is someone here. It is your own father that is at the root of your problems."

Not his exact words but this was the gist of what was said. I wasn't aware that I had any "problems" like that but I still showed some respect for the message and the preacher by heaving a sigh of relief: my dad fell asleep in Christ years ago so this "someone here" with an evil dad that was at the root of her issues couldn't possibly be me:)

I had barely finished formulating this thought in my mind, at ease because I couldn't possibly be this "someone here," when I heard the very next words proceeding from the CD: "Unfortunately the man is dead."

Whaaaat???!!

Was he talking about me, especially as I just had that thought about my own dad being asleep in Christ? He wasn't specific. What were the odds?!!!! The voice from the CD player commanded me to start breaking curses of my father's house (something along that line) that it accused me of having and which I did not even know existed until less than a minute before. And I did, just in case! I didn't even think to reason out what the problem was that this "father" was causing me; just gullibly half-believed it because this very popular preacher said so on a car CD player! “Better safe than sorry,” I thought. See oppression that makes a wise man mad!

There, we were commanded to fast and pray and do some other weird stuff towards breaking generational and other curses when Christ has redeemed all true believers from the curse. See this in Galatians 3:13:

“Yet, Christ paid the full price to set us free from the curse of the law. He absorbed it completely as He became a curse in our place. For it is written: “Everyone who is hung upon a tree is doubly cursed.”

Believers, this is what Satan the Accuser does. He accuses believers of being less than what our Father God has made us to be in Christ, right from the pulpit. The same strategy of accusation was used to seduce Eve to do something that would make her godly (be like God) when God already made she and Adam like Himself.

We see what God has made us to be in Christ in 1 John 4:17- “Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world.”

For all who believe (all who have Christ as their righteousness and strength,) as Christ is so are we IN THIS WORLD.

Christ has no curse. He redeemed us from the curse of the law. But mouthpieces of the Accuser accuse believers in Christ of still being under the curse. Believers, by grace, believe right. The result of their accusation is fear and that looming expectation of punishment (bad things happening) if one does not follow their prescriptions that have to be done by the arm of flesh (human effort) that will fail. Fear reigns here. But see what 1 John 4:18 says about fear:

“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. 19 We love Him because He first loved us.”

This perfect love is by no means our love for the Lord. It is His love for us. See this in verse 10 of the same chapter: “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.“

By Grace, see more and more of the perfect love of Christ for us, so much that He gave Himself for us to make us righteous, redeem us from every curse and give us the assurance of salvation from sins, death and hell through His finished work. So much more.

There is no generational or other curse in the life of the one who is believing Jesus Christ. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law.

So much more concerning our experience in this place of worship. We were encouraged to give/do things in order to receive from our heavenly Father who gives us all things freely with Christ according to Romans 8:32. We were taught to do our best to obey the law in order to be right with God when Romans 5:19 says “.....so also by one Man’s obedience many will be made righteous.” Plus "For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." See 2 Corinthians 5:21.

The funny thing is, we were led to believe that we had to obey the law and do works of righteousness in order to get into God’s good books, but we used to sing this song a lot “It’s not by works of righteousness but by His grace ALONE...I AM COMPLETE IN HIM.”

In essence, we were taught to profess Christ but not believe Him; not believe that He accomplished the things that He did to set us free indeed. We had to accomplish these things on our own. It was an exhausting cycle of accusations, guilt, condemnation and looking over one's shoulder to see who or what evil was going to jump at one. I got so exhausted trying to get right with God and get the blessing through the law that the purpose of the law that I was trying to obey was fulfilled in me without me realising it:

“19 Obviously, the law applies to those to whom it was given, for its purpose is to keep people from having excuses, and to show that the entire world is guilty before God. 20 For no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are.” Romans 3:19-20.

Today, I look back on those years and thank our Lord Jesus Christ for causing me to see His grace and the futility of getting right with God through works of the law/my filthy rags righteousnesses, an action that only cuts one off from Christ and causes one to fall from God's grace, “For if you are trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you have been cut off from Christ! You have fallen away from God’s grace.”(Galatians 5:4)

Bear in mind that law-keeping is ANYTHING that one does in order to get right with God or get the blessing of Abraham. Such who are under law do not believe Romans 5:19- “By one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man’s obedience many will be made righteous.” Such do not believe Romans 8:32- “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?”

Like the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that Adam and Eve ate of in order to be godly but they ended up seeing that they were naked, the law simply shows us how sinful (devoid of righteousness) we are. Let’s not be found thinking that our human-effort acquired richness in obedience to the law and good works can cover our nakedness. Christ counsels those who think this way in Revelation 3:

“17 Because you say, “I am rich, and have prospered and grown wealthy, and have need of nothing,” and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked [without hope and in great need], 18 I counsel you to buy from Me gold that has been heated red hot and refined by fire so that you may become truly rich; and white clothes [representing righteousness] to clothe yourself so that the shame of your nakedness will not be seen; and healing salve to put on your eyes so that you may see.”

My experience with the taped message, hilarious as it seems, does not in any way discount the fact that people can be under bondage and oppression because of what their fathers did. This curse is absolutely certain for those who are under Law and not under Grace. See God's word concerning this in Numbers 14:18 -

‘The Lord is slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but He will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generations.’

This is God's word according to the Old Covenant (the Law) and it will not return to Him void. Under law, He remembers and will punish every sin to the uttermost, even to the third and fourth generations. Under the New Covenant of Grace: Hebrews 10:

17 Then He says,

“I will never again remember

    their sins and lawless deeds.”

Bear in mind that Satan the Accuser does not have any power apart from being the Accuser of the brethren. This is how he kills: He encourages people to keep the Law in order to be godly (just as he did with Eve, telling her she would be like God if she ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, a picture of the Law.) Keeping the Law in order to be godly (be like God) still seems good to many as it seemed good to Eve in the Garden of Eden. But the Law only makes all guilty before God. See Romans 3:19.

Once such are under Law, cut off from Christ yet professing Him, Satan's fiery darts of accusations thrown at people reminding them of their sins (even from the pulpit) can hold water; and the punishment after condemnation is death, preceded by the curses in Deut 28. Those who depend on works of the law for their righteousness,"thus rejecting that which comes by "one Man’s obedience," are condemned and will face punishment spread across generations as there is no blood to cover their sins.

With Christ as our Righteousness and Advocate, not under Law but under Grace, the devil has been DISARMED and can no longer wield the power of death over us. See Colossians 2:

“14 He canceled out every legal violation we had on our record and the old arrest warrant that stood to indict us. He erased it all—our sins, our stained soul—He deleted it all and they cannot be retrieved! Everything we once were in Adam has been placed onto His cross and nailed permanently there as a public display of cancellation. 15 Then Jesus made a public spectacle of all the powers and principalities of darkness, stripping away from them every weapon and all their spiritual authority and power to accuse us.”

“Ha Satan” is literally “Prosecutor at law” in Hebrew. Satan accuses people of not measuring up to the standard of the law (duh! No one can, yet many try) and seduces the flock to do more law-keeping in order to be godly (be like God) so the people can face the curse like Adam and Eve did when they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and so that sin can have dominion. Remember “For sin shall not have dominion over you for you are not under law but under grace." Romans 6:14.

The law condemns the best of us. Grace saves the worst of us.

For all who are in Christ, under grace, having Christ as our righteousness, Satan has been stripped of this weapon that he uses to accuse.

In Christ, we are children of the New Covenant (Hebrews 8 & 10). With Christ as our Mercy Seat and our Righteousness, our heavenly Father does not remember our sins, including the ones we inherited from our fathers! See the promise fulfilled for us in Christ in Hebrews 8.

"10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 11 None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. 12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more."

13 In that He says, “A new covenant,” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away."

Do you see the contrast? In the Old Covenant "He will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generations."

In Christ, under the New Covenant of Grace, God says of us "For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more."

If God does not remember our sins and will not punish us for them because they have been punished in the body of Christ, who are we to remember our sins and expect punishment?

Every believer desires to live a life of moral excellence but how to get from one point to the other is where many miss it. Many choose the path of the Law which kills, which leaves one open to accusation by Satan and whose deeds cannot make any righteous in God's sight. See Romans 3:20.

Believers, we are made righteous by "one Man’s obedience." It is Christ's "Neither do I condemn you" that makes us "Go and sin no more." God hates sin but loves the sinner, far more than how an oncologist hates the cancer in his sick but beloved child. He fills us with the only effective sin "chemo" that He made available to believers -the Holy Spirit. His eyes burn at and destroy sins and addictions but radiate perfect love for the sinner, loving him into right–living and wholeness. In Christ, we get to " produce a harvest of good deeds for God." (Romans 7:4)

The Holy Spirit will Spirit will teach you all things.

Believe Right and you will Live Right