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Waging Warfare for Love of the Kingdom
Episode #526
January 1, 2017
With Martha Kilpatrick and hosted by John Enslow
This is the continuation of a series of Podcasts started in Episode #523.
(John) This is an interesting thought that I would love to know the correlation of love and warfare. I can’t say that I’ve ever had a, “You shall not pass,” moment that there wasn’t love completely involved.
(Martha) Right.
(John) Not only love for Him and His position, His hunger, His desire, but also the love for whoever the, “You shall not pass,” you know. Yeah.
(Martha) I want to be available to the Lord of Hosts, which is really… When— see that word, it means the Lord of heaven’s armies.
(John) Hmmm.
(Martha) The Lord of Hosts is the One at war, and I want to be available to Him in this dimension of love. I’m glad you brought that up, because it opens up a whole world for me that I want to love Him enough to go to war. I want to love His loves enough to go to war. I want to see His victory manifest in this earth, and people to know that it is His love that wins, that won everything, His love that went to the cross.
(John) You know the hippy sign, “Love, not War,” but love in war, love for war, love because of war.
(Martha) Right. That’s why men go in and are willing to die; for love, love of country, love of freedom, love of family, whatever, whatever.
(John) Well, that’s what you originally saw with Braveheart, remember?
(Martha) Yes, yes.
(John) Everyone was saying it was vengeance, it was vengeance. And you said, “No, it was for love.”
(Martha) No. It was love.
(John) Yeah.
(Martha) His beloved was murdered.
(John) And his country was being raped.
(Martha) And his country was being raped.
(John) And he did it for love.
(Martha) He did it for love.
(John) Love of his country, love of his kinsmen and love of that woman. Love, it’s got to be paramount for war.
(Martha) Love is the power.
(John) Yeah.
(Martha) To do it, to stay in it. So, I’m asking, “Give me more love for You, Lord.”
(John) Well, then that changes the whole thing completely in that if the passivity for warfare is there, then there needs to be an increase of love.
(Martha) The passivity is an attack.
(John) Hmmmmm.
(Martha) It is an assault. The enemy’s going to assault the very places where there are strongholds for Christ.
(John) Hmm.
(Martha) And yes, the increase is love. I’m so glad you brought that up. I’m glad the Lord gave you that, because that is the central thing. It’s the motivation for everything. And it’s the motivation to be willing to die. If the defeat of the enemy depends on that third issue, “They loved not their life unto death,” it says, “Loved not their life unto death.” So, what do you love more than your own life? Christ. There’s no effective warrior who doesn’t love something more than self. And our spiritual warfare is to love Him and His cause and His purpose more than self. You look very deep in thought.
(John) Well, see the warring Bride thing, I’ve always kind of resisted that, but I understand now if you war because you’re in love, and you war out of love, that’s truly powerful. That’s true power and that’s true… The force of this world, the force of this world, the power of this world is love. So then, war and love have to be synonymous. They have to be…
(M) Jennifer discovered a book, and I’ve only read part of it. It’s a big book, but it’s called, The Soul of Battle. And this historian has written a number of things with a unique view of warfare. I really, really need to go back and read him.
(John) Is it Victor Davis Hanson? Was that who it is?
(Martha) I believe so. I believe it is Hanson. And he goes through a number of world wars, and he shows that the warring party that set out to enslave was opposed by a warring party whose objective was to make people free. And if you went out to enslave, there would be an inevitable defeat. The army and the general and the leaders who purposed to go against the enslaver inevitably won. Isn’t that fascinating?
(John) Absolutely fascinating.
(Martha) Then that goes down to the motive of the individual. Why do we war? So I can get my way? No. For Christ’s sake.
(John) Because of love.
(Martha) And because of love, because of His love for us. He motivates us to do that, because of His love for others.
(John) Wow.
(Martha) It’s so huge. And in your question was your revelation. “What is the connection with love and warfare?” It is the same. It is a connection.
(John) The incredible responsibility of what Billheimer is saying here is that, you know, if you lay back on your laurels, so to speak, and you don’t do anything, that’s the responsibility of… You are the one who is to engage with the warfare and to bring in the Kingdom. Wow! I mean, that’s frightening. That’s what I get out of what you’ve read to me about this is that it makes me responsible. It makes me culpable. It makes me… I’m dependent. Yeah, obviously. But I can’t just haphazardly go through it. If there is an issue, I have to listen. I have to stop and listen and hear what He’s saying and hear what He wants to do. I’m required to do that.
(Martha) I’m accountable.
(John) See, now there’s the huge word. Accountable and responsible.
(Martha) And in the Lord’s Prayer, which is what I spoke on, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” There’s the warfare section, right there. And that comes before my own needs can be prayed about. My first need is for the Kingdom, for Christ to reign and His government to be increased through standing for that government and living instead that government myself. So, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done,” for me is a declaration that I am in a war for the Kingdom, which means I’m in the war for His rule.
(John) I am in.
(Martha) I am, when I pray that, I am entering the battle for His rule.
(John) Well, I’m in a battle regardless. I live in a battle zone.
(Martha) Exactly.
(John) This earth is a battle zone. And, you know…
(Martha) Umhmm. So, I can live and just be continually defeated, or I can take on the job and the adventure.
(John) Phew! It’s shocking!
(Martha) Do you know that men come home from war and they’re lost because the camaraderie and the purpose they had was so consuming that they find it’s hard to live without it?
(John) Yeah.
(Martha) And they’d rather be back?
(John) Yeah. I think it’s precious.
(Martha) I do too.
(John) It’s a need.
(Martha) It is a need. You wrote in one of your first writings…
(John) Yeah…
(Martha) …you wrote about men without a war. Is that what it was called?
(John) Warriors without…
(Martha) …without a Battle. It’s something in us that we don’t know and we don’t appreciate. That there’s something in us that needs a cause outside of ourselves and greater than ourselves. So, Christians who want only the benefits to themselves are going to be automatically defeated. What was the name of it?
(John) It was called – the picture’s hysterical on it, but – “Warriors without a Battle.” And that basically, there’s the picture. Remember the picture?
(Martha) Oh, yeah.
(John) And I love that one. It’s was an amazing one.
(Martha) It was one of your early, early revelations.
(John) I wrote it a long time ago, and then I put it on the blog. I resurrected it back in 2013.
(Martha) Umhmm.
(John) But, yeah, it was… We are warriors.
(Martha) And when you have a purpose, you have to rise up and live and fight and be positive and moving. You have to be moving if you live for a cause other than yourself.
(John) Thank you for being a vessel that always comes and challenges me to know Him. Thank you being that vessel that would woo and draw me to know Him more, to know Him greater. It’s amazing.
The NLT has an amazing and beautiful way of speaking Isaiah 54. Verse 5 says,
“For your Creator will be your husband; the LORD of Heaven’s Armies is his name!”
Thank you for this – the Love was palpable. Thank you and bless you.
Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?