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Being a pastor and having my Saturday and Sunday completely full, I do not follow football as closely as I once did when I was a child. There was a time in my younger years that I could name you the entire defensive line of the New Orleans Saints. Forgive me for beginning this message with such a carnal analogy, but if the Apostle Paul could use the sports of his day -- running -- as a spiritual teaching tool then surely I get for a moment draw somewhat of a spiritual lesson out of the American sport of football.

There was an old saying where I grew up that they would be installing air conditioners in hell before the Saints won a Super Bowl. In fact, I was born into Louisiana just after the Aints era where the fans would show up with brown bags on their heads to show their disgust. "The Aints," as they are lovingly called around N'Awlins, have been a hard luck story as far as football success goes. At the time of my youth, their defense was incredible. I can still without having to look it up name by memory their starting three linebackers: Rickey Jackson, Patrick Swilling, and Sam Mills. All all-stars and solid as a rock -- they anchored a defensive line that was second to none in the NFL of that time.

But they never were very successful despite such stellar defense. The issue with their team was their inability to score. They had all-star linebackers on one side and a quarterback with a wet noodle for an arm and antsy feet on the other side. And he was throwing to receivers who got up every morning and put butter on their hands. And many a time I heard a Cajun fan rave on a talk show after the game, "Awm tawrd of hearin bout how we got de bess defense; the bess defens is a good quarttaback!"

Thibodeaux didn't realize that his little rant is true for another team of saints, the saints of the most high God. Don't get me wrong, we need a defense system. The scriptures are full of the importance of being sober and watchful for the devil's attacks. We are commanded to guard our eyes and our hearts and our footsteps. We must buy the truth and guard against selling it out. And we must:

We are going to guard against letting traditions of men sell us short on our doctrine and understanding of who Christ is! We need walls and we need gates in our life. We need a shepherd helping to protect us and we need the protection power of God. Defense is very important.

But at the same time, we must realize that the Bible teaches that in spiritual warfare and when God is involved, just standing still and trying to maintain with a good defense is going to lead to defeat! Think of Jericho for a moment: the biggest walls in the world, so secure, strong, and wide that they ran chariot races around the tops. The city wasn't the least worried about Israel because they knew that they had the best defense, but you know how the story turns out -- the best defense crumbled when they refused to become active! Think of Samaria shut up because the Syrians were camped around it. When the city of God with the man of God in it was on the defensive, things got worse and worse, but when Elisha prayed for the servants eyes and he looked out and saw what the prophet saw, he realized that there was an entire army of heaven surrounding the enemy from the mountains! Deliverance came when the armies of God attacked!

Think again of David facing Goliath -- a story that I can't seem to get away from lately. Goliath had a shield so big that he had another guy there to hold it for him. The Bible goes into detail in describing how large and strong his armor was. Goliath had a great defense system. When David volunteered to fight him, the Bible says that King Saul took him into the palace and gave him his armor. But David said "I don't need this" because David wasn't planning to sit there and defend against the Giant's sword attack, he was planning to attack and get victory before Goliath had a chance to attack! David had no armor and little defense, but when he attacked in the name of the Lord, even a little sling shot defeated Goliath's great armor! The best defense is a great offense!

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The truth is that the people of God were not designed to just sit and defend. The church of God is designed to be an offensive force! In our text, in Matthew 16, we find that Jesus is trying to teach His disciples and to make sure that they have the basics down pat. He began with making sure that they knew who He was, and then after Peter answered correctly that He was the Son of God, or God in flesh, Jesus said:

This is got to the be one of the most misused and abused scriptures in the Bible. The Catholics base their entire "popedom" on this one verse of scripture, ignoring hundreds of others and twisting it in interpretation to fit their needs. But just as misapplied is the latter half of this verse by many Pentecostal preachers. Jesus said "I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it!" And just about every time that I have ever heard somebody preach this verse, they are saying "when hell comes against the church, she will survive." "When the devil does his best, the church built on the rock will take it." And then they like turtles pull their head in their shell and began to rock back and forth and focus on surviving, singing "the anchor holds!"

Wait a minute! First of all "the gates of hell" don't move; the church is the one spoken of on the attack here! If gates do not win, then that means that the people attacking them break through! And second of all, the term for hell here is hades which refers to the resting place of the dead, not the abode of Satan. Satan never goes to hell in the Bible. He is cast into the lake of fire into which the unrighteous part of hades is cast, but Satan never goes to hell -- he doesn't want to! If we would submit to God like we should be, Satan would be powerless to stop us and Jesus knew Satan is not the issue. The greatest enemy of the church is not Satan but time and the ending of life. Because our mission is to reach as many souls as possible before they slip into eternity and find themselves on the wrong side of hades. Our mission is to "while breath remains" reach as many as possible. That's why the Bible says that "a sleeping dog is better than a dead lion" because as long as there is breath there is hope.

Too many Christians and churches have the turtle mentality. We sing "I'm still standing" and I thank God for that, but let it be a praise and move forward! Because too many of us have the attitude of "I survived living for God another week!" "I maintained my spiritual level." Whoohoo! And you wonder why the preacher and God is not excited about such a testimony, because you don't realize when the devil tricks you into believing that you've got to focus on nothing else but surviving, then he has won even if you survive, because while you are in your defensive shell patting yourself on the back at having made it living for God another week, the devil has taken more and more people around into eternity that never heard the Gospel from your lips! And some of us brag on our defense and I'm glad you have a defense, but we say "look at me, I didn't drink anything I wasn't supposed to and I didn't do anything overly sinful this week, and I didn't cuss, and I didn't go such and such place." That's great -- that's all that you didn't do for the devil, but what did you do for God!? And too many times the answer is "nothing." Our defensive mindset has caused us to not step out on any of the promises of God. Our defensive mindset of just surviving has caused the gates of hell to not be in any danger whatsoever.

In our other text, Jesus said:

Most casual readers don't grasp what the KJV is saying there; maybe the NIV would be a little clearer:

The law was about maintaining. The law of Moses was about just keeping what God had given and no more. But the days of law and Moses are over! Now the kingdom of heaven forcefully advances and those who will be a part will be those who are constantly moving forward! Those who are on the attack. God is looking for some people with a great defense, but that don't get so caught up in just surviving that they forget that they are a part of an advancing army!

And so I ask the question of you: "where are you spiritually compared to last week, last month, or last year?" Where is your commitment level? Where is your involvement level? Where is your knowledge of the Word of God? Where are your relationships with other people? Where is your personal holiness and separation from the world? Where is your level of prayer life? Where is your fasting? Where is your worship? Where is your church attendance? Where is your burden for souls? Where is your passion for the things of God? Where is your hunger? Where is your spiritual sensitivity? Where are these things ranking with yesterday? If it is not going up, then we are an easy target for Satan and nowhere near grasping all that God wants us to grasp! We are to be offensively-minded warriors. The kingdom of Satan should tremble at our advance, not laugh as we pat ourselves on the back for surviving and maintaining for another week! The best defense is a great offense!

"Well, I know the doctrine pretty good and I've got the Holy Ghost and I've learned the ropes on the important stuff so that I'm comfortable. I pay my tithes and I come to church and I pray every day." That's great! All of that's the foundation and we need a solid foundation, but nobody comes and admires a pretty foundation. The point of a foundation is to build something on it! God has given you that foundation so that you can do something for Him! So that you can be an offensive force in the kingdom of heaven! Thank God for all that you have received but what are you doing with it!?

I've known preachers and churches and saints that were defensive minded. I've known churches and pastors that had the mentality, "God has given us this group of people, know we are going to do our best to keep the world from having them." I understand that sometimes you have to be on the defensive and you have to counter attack and as the shepherd, you see danger coming and have to be the voice of warning. But I'm speaking of churches where every message is "warning don't be like them and don't do that, and keep yourself from this" and you never hear of "win somebody else and teach somebody a Bible Study and pray for people to see the need to win souls." I'm speaking of churches where it has been years since someone received the Holy Ghost or was baptized because all they have done is maintain. And what I have found is such churches are always in danger of losing out with God. Because the Spirit stops moving freely. The liberty of the Holy Ghost is usually not there. And so they become easy targets for sin and depression.

In the football Saints when I was a kid, one of the biggest gripes was that when they actually had a lead, their great defense would go into "prevent mode" and instead of attacking, begin to try to survive and they would end up losing by giving up the big play in prevent mode. And such is it when churches go into defense mode only. Usually they lose the very thing that they were trying to protect. They are offensive only in the sense of pushing people away from the Gospels.

And with Christian saints it is the same way. The ones who pat themselves on the back because they survived another week and that their testimony is always "I made it here again and Satan did his best and yet I fended off his attacks" are always the ones who are the closest to walking out on God. But it is not because that they can't make it living for God, but rather their attitude of defense only. They are standing dodging the spear of Goliath in their armor that Saul gave them rather than taking the name of the Lord and charging forward! When you stop advancing in the kingdom of God, you begin to lose! In the things of the Spirit, the best defense is a great offense!

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"Okay, preacher I need to be more active and offensively minded." "I see the need to survive living for God whose kingdom is going forward, I've got to move forward." "But how do I get out of defensive mode only and get into offensive mode in the Spirit?" I'm glad you asked! Because that's exactly how I wanted to end this sermon -- by showing you how to get back on the offensive where God intended for you to be!

There are four things that you can do that will guarantee that you come out of your defensive shell and become an offensive weapon in the kingdom of God. Four things to help your becoming a mighty warrior moving onward:

1. Worship God vocally!

The greatest defensive fortress of its time -- the wall of Jericho -- couldn't stand up to the vocal praises of God's people! When they began to express their worship with their mouth, is when the walls began to come down. I have nothing against silent prayer, but we must also remember that when it comes time to fight, "the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much!" I have nothing against worshipping God in your mind or heart, but when you want to advance, it must come forth vocally!

But just as the biggest enemy's wall is no match for vocal worship from your lips, so is God's greatest defense no match for negative worship from your lips. When we worship God vocally, we say things like "He is great! There's nobody like Him! Nothing can stand in His way!" But we forget that the opposite of those statements are worship too, but worship of a negative sort. When we say "well I don't know if I can make it" we are still worshipping vocally but we are worshipping the enemy. When we say "well, I'm not sure God can do this." "I don't know any more." And when we speak negatively, we express negative faith and in a negative way we begin to worship hardship and the devil's tricks and put our faith in his goal, and there is not a wall of God that can stand to such negative praise!

And so the battle for victory begins with your mouth! What are you exalting vocally? God or your situation? What are you lifting up and magnifying? Your predicament and what the devil wants you to think or God's report? The Word of God is a powerful sword, but it needs a voice! Written, it lays dormant, but when it is spoken, then you unleash the very power that created the universe. Hit your situation physically with your Bible, and it does nothing, but let the Word of God flow through your mouth, and things begin to happen. If you are going to be victorious, then you must get victory in your mouth, first! We must begin to worship God vocally more than anything else!

"Proactive" means to take the initiative by acting before rather than in reaction to events. Saul and David were both kings of Israel. Both of them were mighty warriors, but the biggest difference between them was that Saul only fought after the enemy had attacked him or gathered for battle, whereas David would attack them first! One was proactive and the other reactive, and I don't have to tell you of the vast difference of the eternal end of the two men!

I think of Samson as the greatest case study for the dangers of being reactive only in matters of spiritual battle. God began to move upon Samson in his youth and he was well aware that a great anointing bringing great strength was upon his life. But the scriptures say that God had to bring about negative situations in Samson's life to get him to engage the enemy in fights. A lion had to attack Samson before he would use his power in battle. A bunch of Philistines had to tick him off before he attacked the enemy living in the land of God. And that bad situation led to the entire Philistine army coming after him and his whipping them with a donkey's jawbone! Listen to the scripture that started all of this:

God had to allow negative situations to come into his life for him to realize that the power that he had been given was for a divine purpose. Samson never learned the lesson and stayed reactive all of his life. He only sprang forth to attack when Delilah would say "the Philistines are upon you." In other words, he only attacked the enemy when he thought that the enemy was attacking him! And even at his death, he only asked God to let him push over the pillars to "avenge my eyes" that had been put out.

How different things would have been if Samson would have realized "God's power and might is upon me to get rid of this enemy!" And how different things would have been instead of only attacking them when they made him mad or attacked him first; if he had become the Philistine hunter, looking for armies to wipe out! If Samson would have become proactive, you would read about many, more great victories and there wouldn't have been a Philistine man or woman left in the land because they would have all fled from him. And that means that there wouldn't have been a Delilah in his life. And that means that He would have ended up victorious instead of blind and revengeful. Samson became a victim of a defensive, reactive mentality! How different things would have been if he would have been proactive! There wouldn't have been a Goliath to fight against David!

Jesus said "you shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you" (Acts 1:8). But too many Christians only use that power in a reactive sense. Like Samson, we have great strength when the Spirit of the Lord comes upon us. But like Samson we too often only use it when we are being attacked. Some Christians only come to church when they are going through something. They only pray fervently when they are in trouble. They only get mad enough at the devil to subdue their flesh and fast when the devil has given them a good lick. They only get passionate about praise when the devil has been messing with their family. They are reactive, only using the power that is available to them when the enemy attacks first!

But it is time for the children of God to be proactive! Why don't we use God's power at all times!? Why don't we fervently seek His face even on the good days!? Why don't we praise Him passionately even if we cannot see an immediate reason to need to do so? Why do we wait to submit until we are in dire straits!? Let's get proactive in this thing! Let's reach for souls before they are at their wit's end. Let's get a burden for people before we fully know the desperation of the situation. When we see evil or sin hanging around in our life, why don't we get it out and defeat it before it rises up in our heart and attacks us! Let's get on fire for God before the revival happens! The best defense is a great offense. Be proactive!

This is probably the primary reason why more saints are not proactive. We get satisfied where we are spiritually and content with our level of growth. And when we get satisfied, we stop pressing forward. Here's how you can tell if I'm preaching to you, when these words creep up in your conversation: "well, I've come a long way." When you start bragging on yourself on how far you've come, you are usually justifying why you aren't going any further! Thank God that you've come a long way, but what about where God wants you to move forward today? The kingdom of God is forcefully advancing, if you want to be a part, you'd better keep up!

Go read Philippians chapter 3 sometime. In the first part of the chapter, Paul talks about how far he has come in God. He talks about being born of the tribe of Benjamin and how that he was a Pharisee extraordinaire and how that he had all of the spiritual pedigree and how that God found him and changed him and made him an Apostle and yet he ends the chapter with this:

Paul said "I may have come a long way, but it is nothing." In verse 8, he said that he counts the past as refuse -- as trash to be thrown away. And that "forgetting the past behind" he presses on towards the goal of the high mark set by Jesus Christ! We must remember that no matter how far we have come in God, we cannot get satisfied because there are still much that needs to be changed in our lives for us to become like Jesus in everyway! Paul -- in my opinion the greatest theologian and missionary that ever lived -- was still pressing forward for greater things in God. And so the reason for his greatness becomes clear: Paul wasn't content to sit around and congratulate himself for how far he had come, but rather Paul was moving forward and advancing forcefully into greater heights in God!

And as a result, the devils knew who Paul was. Remember when the seven sons of Sceva tried to cast out the devils? The demon said "Paul I know and Jesus I know, but who are you?" You'd better believe that the devil knew who Paul was! Because the devil had tried to stone him, discourage him, attack him, dissuade him, shipwreck him, beat him, and everything else and yet Paul never got on the defensive and just kept moving forward in the kingdom of God and kept fighting forward offensively! On his missionary journeys, we find that for the opposition to attack him, they had to follow him from city to city to try to catch up to him! Because Paul was going forward!

I want the devil to know who I am! The seven sons of Sceva were the sons of priests and were regulars at the house of God but they were not known or feared by the devil because they had done nothing offensively in the kingdom of God! I want the devil to know my name and get fearful when I walk into a place! But the only way that it will happen is to become an offensive force storming the gates of hell! The only way to be feared in the enemy's camp, Samson, is to attack!

This is the most sure-fire way to make sure that you are advancing in the kingdom of God and that the devil fears you. The devil hates a soul winner more than any other things. Because a soul winner is a true soldier in the battle field. Remember our enemy is time and the grave and our mission is to win as many souls as possible. Our mission is not to have a new church building for new church building's sake. Our mission is not to have a strong church just so we can brag on ourselves. Our mission is not to have "good church" although if you are going to have church, it might as well be good. Our mission is not to come fellowship with each other. But all of those things are the means trying to bring about the end of winning souls. If we have new church, we can hold more people. If we have good church, more people are likely to come back. If we have a good time in fellowship, somebody might drop the walls and allow God to move in their life. Our fundraisers to help men and women and young people go to camps is so that they can go and have their lives changed by God. To have their lives changed so that others will see the change and come to God. It's all about souls. If the church loses that focus, then we have lost our reason for existence in the world.

You were born again to reproduce spiritually. Why don't you win somebody to God this year!? Oh, don't wait for them to come to you, but get proactive about it. Instead of praying all the time about your family and your needs, why don't you get a prayer life that consists of praying for other people that you may not even know? When's the last time that you spent a moment in prayer for the lost of our city that are not kin to you!? When's the last time that it even crossed your mind?

When you are trying to win somebody else, you will fast without the preacher having to call you to it. When you are trying to win somebody else to God and invite them to church, you will be at church because you want to see if they show up. If you've got a guest in the house that is hungry for God, you will worship with all of your heart because you want God to do something great. If you've got someone that you've won to God watching your every move, you will live right and holy day in and day out. About 99.99% of your issues could be solved by winning others to God. Soul winning: you cannot move forward in God without it!

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And so I close with this:

When you become a Christian on the offensive, you will find that everything else in God comes much easier. When you are advancing, the fundamental things that you worry about will take care of themselves. It's easier to steer a car and change direction if the car is already moving than it is to turn the steering wheel with the car sitting still. And so it is with God, if you are advancing, it is much easier to discover the will of God for your life, because as you are moving, God can just say "okay, a little this way."

It's also easier to speed up if you are already moving forward. When it comes time for a special harvest and a deep move of the Holy Spirit, you can catch up to what God is doing much easier if you were already heading forward in the right direction.

And it is much harder to hit a moving target than one that is still. When you are advancing in God, you will find that you are hit less with the potshots that the devil and doubt tries to bring in life. Sit still and try to maintain and you will find that the enemy will zero in on your position and you are going to have it coming at you from all sides. But move forward and you'll still get shot at but fewer of them are going to find their mark! That's why the devil doesn't want you advancing and wants you in defensive mode as a Christian, because it make his job much harder when you get on the offensive!

It's much harder to get depressed about the situation that you are in now if you are constantly moving forward. Why worry about a situation that I'm moving on from?! Why get stressed over what I just left behind!? And when you are moving forward who has time to stress out about stuff? Only those sitting and doing nothing have time to truly worry!

It's time to become a true part of the kingdom of God, and that kingdom is forcefully advancing! Take heart and pick up your weapon of the Spirit, and let your faith arise! We will win, if we will attack! Truly the best defense is a great offense!