At the Cross, Jesus Disarmed the Powers of Evil

Introduction

The message of Easter doesn't play out only at the empty tomb. It's already playing out at the cross. Mélanie Ehrismann invites you to read Colossians 2:13-15 as a battlefield: right where everything seemed ruined, humiliated, lost, Christ actually disarmed the powers of evil, erased the record that stood against us, and sealed the victory. A text that moves you from death to life and changes the way you live out your fight today.

Message outline

1. At the cross, a battle against the true enemy

• Having already looked at justification, redemption, and reconciliation, we now step onto a battlefield: the cross as the place of Christ's triumph.
• Paul speaks of "the principalities and the powers" - not first of all human authorities (Pilate, Caiaphas, the crowds), but spiritual powers, the demonic forces hiding behind those faces.
• "The Son of God was revealed for this purpose, that he might destroy the works of the devil" (1 John 3:8). From his birth, Jesus disturbs human authorities and the devil alike - healings, exorcisms, the temptation in the wilderness, Gethsemane. He's the only man who resisted the grip of evil his whole life long.
• Jesus didn't fight against Pilate or Caiaphas. He died for them too. He fought against the sin behind the sinner, against the spiritual powers hidden behind those human authorities.

2. Appearances deceive - the reality is a triumph

• At Golgotha, there's no visible sign of victory. A weak, dying, humiliated man. A promising leader who seems to fall before he ever reigns. How can you call that a victory?
• We're facing a tension between appearances and reality. What the cross shows on the surface (defeat, shame) hides what's happening underneath (triumph, victory).
• Theologian Daniel Reid puts it this way: "Christ overturned the powers of evil and their schemes, publicly displaying their true, shameful nature. Just as a criminal justice system is exposed in its failures when it executes an innocent person, the cosmic powers were exposed and defeated when they crucified the sinless Lord of glory."
• At the cross Jesus did what we all long to do: expose the real intentions of those who do evil. Satan is unmasked, exposed for what he is.

3. How Jesus won: the record nailed to the cross

• "[He] wiped out the handwriting in ordinances which was against us... he has taken it out of the way, nailing it to the cross" (Colossians 2:14). That record is our debt: our failures, our disobedience, the ground of hostility between God and us, the document that proves our guilt.
• Of course, it's Jesus who was nailed to the cross. But by being nailed there, he took the place of that document. He, sinless, debt-free, gathered into his hands that very long record charged against us.
• Satan, the one called the accuser, is stripped of his weapon: he no longer has any ground to accuse us. He still tries, but our failures have been wiped out.
• Jesus bound the strong man so he could plunder his house, so he could set us free from his grip. It's a total reversal.

4. Jesus fights with different weapons than Satan's

• This isn't a "force against force" battle, as if God and Satan were fighting on equal footing. The weapons aren't of the same kind.
• Satan's weapons: sin, death, destruction, violence.
• Jesus's weapons: humility, truth, love, suffering, service, sacrifice.
• Christ didn't borrow his adversary's methods. He won by carrying, not by crushing.

5. The cross as triumphal chariot - the resurrection as its confirmation

• Paul alludes to the Roman military triumph: the victorious general's chariot entering the city in glory, cheered by the crowd, dragging the captives behind it. That's how Paul describes the cross.
• The cross isn't a sign of defeat but the banner of victory. "The instrument of the condemned man's torture becomes the victor's chariot." We're proud of the cross.
• Cross and resurrection aren't two separate works but one. We sometimes jump too fast from Good Friday to Easter Sunday.
• The resurrection makes visible what happened invisibly at the cross. It confirms, attests, demonstrates, proclaims that Jesus is the victor. Satan tried to kill the Son of God - and he lost. Death couldn't hold Jesus.

6. Already and not yet: between D-Day and VE Day

• Because of the cross, we've passed from death to life. We were dead because of our offenses; because of God's forgiveness, we live. In a sense, we're already raised spiritually.
• This spiritual resurrection is a beginning. It calls us to keep dying to ourselves so we can keep coming back to life in Christ.
• What was begun at the cross will be perfectly completed at Jesus's return. Our resurrection will be full and complete, spiritual and physical.
• Like the difference between June 6, 1944 (D-Day, the Normandy landings, the decisive turning point) and May 8, 1945 (VE Day, the war's official end): the final victory is guaranteed, even though the war isn't over yet. Jesus's death and resurrection are a spiritual D-Day.
• Michael Green puts it well: the powers "received their death-blow at the cross, but like a conger eel that has been mortally wounded and continues to thrash about for hours in the bottom of a fishing boat, they refuse to lie down and die. They only acknowledge their defeat in the name of Jesus Christ." Satan is defeated, but he hasn't yet admitted it.

7. Sent into battle, but at peace

• We're called to fight the way Jesus fought: with humility, truth, love - not with the enemy's weapons.
• The church is called to be engaged for the sake of this world while also being unshackled from it. Fighting, yet at peace.
• Engaged because Christ is risen and the victory needs to be spread. At peace because Christ is risen and the victory is already secured.
• "If then you were raised together with Christ, seek the things that are above... your life is hidden with Christ in God" (Colossians 3:1-4). Celebrate it now, not tomorrow.

Key takeaways

• The cross is a battlefield, and Jesus walked out of it victorious. The real enemy wasn't Pilate or Caiaphas, but the spiritual powers behind them.
• Appearances deceive. What looks like defeat (a man humiliated on a cross) is actually the greatest triumph in history.
• Jesus erased the record that condemned you by nailing it to the cross. Satan, the accuser, is stripped of his weapon: he has no ground left to accuse you.
• Christ fights with different weapons than his adversary's: humility, truth, love, sacrifice - not violence, lies, destruction. Follow him on that path.
• We live between the spiritual D-Day and VE Day. The victory is secured, but the enemy is still thrashing. Fight, but do it at peace.

Personal application

1. Where in your life are you tempted to read the appearances rather than the reality of Christ's victory? What circumstance is shouting "defeat" at you when the cross declares you "victor"?
2. On what point does Satan keep accusing you, even though your record has already been nailed to the cross? How can you take seriously that your debt is erased?
3. Which weapons do you reach for instinctively in your conflicts - Satan's (harshness, lies, crushing others) or Jesus's (humility, truth, love, sacrifice)?
4. Are you fighting today at peace, or are you fighting as if the victory weren't secured yet? Where do you need to remember that Jesus has already won?
5. How do you want to celebrate Christ's victory "now" rather than "tomorrow" this week - in prayer, in communion, in serving, in a relationship?

Verses cited

• Colossians 2:13-15 - He made you alive together with him... having stripped the principalities and the powers
• Colossians 3:1-4 - If then you were raised together with Christ, seek the things that are above
• 1 John 3:8 - The Son of God was revealed to destroy the works of the devil
• Revelation 19 - The marriage of the Lamb, hallelujah, our God the Almighty reigns

Frequently asked questions

Why say Jesus is victorious at the cross, when he dies there humiliated?

Because appearances don't tell the truth about reality. On the surface, Golgotha looks like defeat: a weak, dying, mocked man. But what's happening underneath is a triumph. There Christ disarms the spiritual powers, erases the record that condemned us by nailing it to the wood, and publicly unmasks Satan. Paul draws on the image of the Roman triumphal procession: the cross becomes the banner of victory, "the instrument of the condemned man's torture becomes the victor's chariot." The resurrection then makes visible the triumph that was accomplished invisibly at the cross.

Who are the "principalities and powers" that Christ stripped?

In the context of the letter to the Colossians and the rest of the New Testament, Paul isn't first of all talking about human authorities but about spiritual powers, the demonic forces hidden behind those visible authorities. Jesus didn't fight against Pilate or the religious leaders - he died for them too. He fought against the sin behind the sinner, against the spiritual enemy holding humanity captive. Satan, called "the accuser," is stripped of his weapon at the cross: he no longer has any ground to accuse those who are in Christ, because their failures have been wiped out.

If the victory is already secured, why does evil keep existing?

This is the tension of the "already and not yet." Michael Green compares the defeated powers to a mortally wounded conger eel that keeps thrashing about: they received their death-blow at the cross, but they refuse to lie down and die until Jesus returns. Another image: the difference between June 6, 1944 (D-Day, the Normandy landings, the decisive turning point) and May 8, 1945 (VE Day, the war's official end). The victory is secured at Easter; it will be fully revealed at Christ's return. In the meantime, the church is sent into battle - but at peace, because it knows who has already won.