Surfing with a Purpose

Become 4

4:1 Enemies Oppose the Fellowship

The evil one was very angry and fearful when he learned that we were building a fellowship. He flew into a rage and began to sneer at us and mock us. He wanted to make us have doubts by whispering things like "What does this bunch of poor, feeble Surfers think they are doing? Do they think they can rescue this Generation in a day if they call on the name of Jesus? Look at the people they are trying to reach out to, pieces of unusable rubbish!"

2 An agent of darkness, who was standing beside him, remarked, "Their fellowship would collapse even if we send

our weakest agent against them! Not to mention they would lose heart and just give up on each other."

3 Then I prayed, "Hear us, Jesus, for we are being mocked. May their sneering fall back on their own heads I send them to judgment at the seat of Christ and make them captives to His Authority! Do not ignore their threats, Do not leave us to fight alone, for they have rejected your command of love and provoked you to anger in the presence of your servants."

6 Eventually the fellowship reached half of its potential, the saints had prayed very hard. The Evil One and all his agents of darkness heard that the fellowship was taking ground and becoming who they were meant to be and it made them furious. They all made plans to come and fight against the fellowship and to bring about confusion amongst us. But we prayed to our God and guarded each other day and night to protect ourselves.

10 Then some in the fellowship began to complain that they were becoming tired. "There are so many in this Generation that we could not possibly reach them all, besides who are we to do this when we can’t even stop sinning ourselves." Meanwhile, our enemies were saying "You will not succeed, you are losing this battle and everything you are working for is meaningless. You won’t even know what hit you when we attack or even see it coming."

12 Friends and family that didn’t understand came to us and told us again and again "You’re so single minded, and do you think you are better than the church to try this". So, with the opposition coming from every angle, I asked the soldiers to guard the weaker parts of the fellowship and to constantly check in with each other. I asked them to fight for those around them, armed with the word of God, love, faith, salvation, righteousness, and prayer.

14 Then I looked over the situation, decided it was necessary to call the leaders together and say to them "Don’t be discouraged because you are opposed! Keep your thoughts on the Lord, who is great and glorious. You must fight for your friends, your families and your homes, because it’s not about you!"

15 So it came to pass, the enemy heard that we knew of their evil schemes and that God had defeated their plans. Then all of us came back together, and continued building our fellowship. But from then on, only half of us worked while the others posted guard, armed with the word of God, love, faith, salvation, righteousness, and prayer. The strongest soldiers even placed themselves in the gap, interceding for this Generation, who are chosen for God. Even as they worked, the guys building the fellowship would do their daily task with one hand and carry the sword of the spirit with the other, in fact every one kept the word of God with them at all times. I told them "if the saw the enemy, they must alert the rest of us." I explained to the Leaders "The work is spread out over such a great distance that we can become separated from the fellowship, so if you hear an alarm sounded, gather around that person, God will fight for us. We won’t know where to fight unless you allow us to know the enemy is coming against you." So every day from dawn until the stars come out at night, half of us advanced the fellowship, and half of us stood guard and prayed.

22 During times of heightened alert we made special arrangements so that we could grow as a fellowship during the day, and pray through the night. We do not rest or give up, even at night we do not let our guard down. And we keep our weapons at hand, and no one gets left behind.