1. WHAT IS THE WORLD AND WHO CONTROLS IT?
• We live in a physical earth created by the Almighty God where Jesus has all authority over all that is on earth and in heaven [Matthew 28:18] But there is a spiritual reality, a kingdom of darkness, that is controlled by the devil and his army of demons and principalities, as Paul declared [Ephesians 6:12], and warns us that with that spiritual reality, we have our fight. That kingdom of darkness is controlling the spiritual reality of the world in all its many different institutions, governments, nations, and peoples. Nevertheless, that kingdom of darkness will be totally destroyed when Jesus Christ returns in His Second Coming to rapture the believers and administer God’s wrath against sin and against the devil’s kingdom.
• Today there is a false teaching that many churches are following, which declares that the church has been given the authority to control this world in all its many institutions. They erroneously declare that with the leadership of end-time prophets and apostles, God is giving new revelations, as to how the church will take over the world. This is a heretic false teaching because no new revelation can contradict the revelation given in the Scriptures.
• This is what Paul explains regarding the spiritual reality of the kingdom of darkness: For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Eph. 6:12
• Only Jesus Christ with His angelic army has the power and authority to destroy Satan’s kingdom of darkness and all his principalities and powers. The church has not been given that power or the authority.


2. JESUS PRAYS TO THE FATHER TO PROTECT HIS DISCIPLES AGAINST THE WORLD AND AGAINST THE DEVIL :
• I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world.
• They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.
• I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours.
• Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me.
• While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name.
• I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
• I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one.
• They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. [John 17:6-16]

Jesus makes it very clear that He is not part of this world’s system controlled by Satan and his kingdom and that his disciples are not either. And that they will need the Father’s protection when He leaves the world.

3. THE APOSTLES WARN ABOUT THE SPIRITS THAT CONTROL THIS WORLD AND HOW THEY ATTACK THE PEOPLE :
• Paul’s warnings :
  • In which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience. Eph. 2:2
  • Whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. 2 Cor. 4:4
  • For Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world, and has departed for Thessalonica. 2Tim. 4:10
• John’s warning about the attraction and luring spirits of the world :
  • Do not love the world or the things in the world .
  • If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
  • For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life — is not of the Father but is of the world.
  • And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever. 1 John 2:15-17
• James’ warnings :
  • Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? James 4:4-5

* All biblical verses from the New King James Version