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Welcome to the Daily Blade. The word of God is described as the sword of the spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson. And they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

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But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb taking the spices they had prepared, and they found the stone rolled away from the tomb. But when they went in, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you while he was still in Galilee that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified. And. And on the third day, rise. That's Luke 24, verses 1 through 7. So the stone is placed in front of the tomb and Satan is convinced that he has won the war. He thinks he has gone from being a cast out, defeated angel to thwarting God's redemptive plan for humanity. He soon realizes God had him on a leash the entire time. God had orchestrated the exact thing that happened. Satan had orchestrated the exact thing that would be his own undoing. So for the last four days, we have focused on the sovereignty of God. We've talked about a demonic spirit from the Lord tormenting Saul, Lucifer's fall. And you know, we go to the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve, we go to Job, we go to the upper room and you know, Jesus talking past Judas to Satan. And every single time, Satan was actually operating under God's control. But he was confused about God's ultimate goal and timeline. And today we're going to close the loop on the empty tomb, or at the empty tomb rather. And I'm going to give you one phrase I want you to walk away with from this whole series. So let's go back to the tomb right after the stone was rolled in front of it. We have to try and see this from Satan's perspective at that time. He had been at war with the human race since the Garden of Eden. He tried to kill Jesus through Herod when he was an infant. When Jesus was an infant, he tempted Jesus in the wilderness for 40 days and 40 nights in order to get Jesus away from the mission God had for him. But then he took his best shot yet. And it worked. He was able to get someone from Jesus's inner circle to betray him. Now Jesus's lifeless body lay in a tomb with a stone sealing it. And as we said yesterday, Satan had to have thought checkmate. He had to have thought he had won the great battle. But here's the thing. He had absolutely no idea that he had just executed the most important part of God's Plan A. There was no Plan B. There was no cosmic struggle between forces of good and evil. This was not God's way of doing damage control after things went sideways, since before the creation of anything. God had a Plan A in place for the redemption of those that bore his image. So in order for Satan to be the father of lies, he has to know what truth is, right? And so Satan knows the scriptures better than any human being who had ever lived up to the point of the crucifixion. He knew all of genesis, including Genesis 3:15 by heart. But here's the key. He simply didn't understand it. He had no idea that the cross on Golgotha wasn't his trophy. But it was instead the precise mechanism God was using to crush his head. The crucifixion was always headed towards the resurrection. Always. No deviation. Satan managed to bruise the heel exactly like Genesis 3 said that he would. But the heel got back up after three days, fully healed, ready to crush the head of the dragon. And guys, listen to me. It does not end well for the dragon. Revelation 20 lays out the final chapter of Satan's life. Satan's bound for a thousand years. He is released for one last deception, and then he is ultimately thrown into the lake of fire forever. He is going to be tormented day and night. There will be no coming back, no appeal, no surprise twist where he's able to win in the end. The outcome was decided before war ever started. And we've gone from a tormented king, to a fallen angel, to a garden, to a righteous man suffering, to a cross, and then to an empty tomb. God never once lost control, not for a single second. He is not surprised by anything that it has happened in the entire span of human history. And here's the main point of this week, guys, because God is sovereign, overall, we can trust him. I'll say that again. Because God is sovereign overall, we can trust him. So if you just got a bad diagnosis from a doctor, you can trust him. If you were betrayed by someone very close to you, someone that you love, you can trust him. If you were kicked out of your own business against your will, you can trust Him. If you have a kid that's gone sideways or gone fully prodigal, you can trust Him. If you have no idea how you are going to pay the bills next month, how you're going to feed yourself and your family, you can trust Him. And here's the thing. If you have never put your trust in Jesus, if you've never placed your trust in the finished work on the cross, if you have never taken him as your Savior and your Lord, do that now. You don't have anything to earn. You don't have anything to prove.

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You don't have.

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You just have to receive the free gift of grace. Jesus paid a sin debt that he didn't owe for a debt that none of us could pay. And he's offering you that gift freely, by grace through faith. And if you are a believer listening to this, then here's my message to you. What's keeping you from sharing your faith? I want you to be haunted by that question. We are called to be bold in our proclamation of the good news of the Gospel, which I just laid out a second ago. Don't be afraid to share your faith. It's what you were called to do. Because you may not know the outcome, you should be able to rest easy in the fact that the outcome's not up to you anyway. God has a plan A. You are part of the rescue team. Satan is on his leash and you can put all of your trust, all of it, in the mighty King who never once in the history of everything loosened his grip nor changed his plan. Thank you all for your attention this week. Stay sharp.

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Thank you for listening to today's episode. Before you go, if you want to help, equip other men for the fight, share this podcast around and leave us a five star rating and review. Stay sharp.