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Unstoppable Faith: Unstoppable Faith Expects Spiritual Battles
May 19, 2026 · 29 min
What happens when a culture declares war on the very foundations of your faith? Pastor John Mark talks about this reality as he walks us through Paul's explosive encounter in Ephesus in Acts 19. Yet just as Paul's friends wisely counseled him against entering a hostile theater, God provides unexpected allies and divine wisdom for our spiritual battles.
Series "Pastor Talks" with John Mark Caton May 19, 2026 · 29 min · "Pastor Talks" with John Mark Caton
What happens when a culture declares war on the very foundations of your faith? Pastor John Mark talks about this reality as he walks us through Paul's explosive encounter in Ephesus in Acts 19. Yet just as Paul's friends wisely counseled him against entering a hostile theater, God provides unexpected allies and divine wisdom for our spiritual battles. ...more Show the full description Show less What happens when a culture declares war on the very foundations of your faith? Pastor John Mark talks about this reality as he walks us through Paul's explosive encounter in Ephesus in Acts 19. Yet just as Paul's friends wisely counseled him against entering a hostile theater, God provides unexpected allies and divine wisdom for our spiritual battles.
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John Mark is the Senior Pastor of the thriving Cottonwood Creek Church in Allen, Texas, where he has served since 1995.
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In this video 0:00 Spiritual Battles Are Real7:00 Satan's Strategy: Questioning God's Word14:00 Battle the Mind with Gospel Truth19:00 Ephesus Riot: Culture vs. Gospel28:00 Stand Firm: Communicate the Truth
Spiritual Battles Are Real 0:00 Well church family, are you glad you're in God's house? Amen. So such a blessing, wonderful, welcome those of you joining us online. Well if you are new here, we have been in the middle of a series entitled,0:12 Unstoppable Developing a Faith That Won't Quit. Which means sometimes we come into contact with a lot of things. We've been just journeying with Paul's life. We saw his conversion when he got saved. We0:23 saw his call. We saw Paul go through some conflict with other believers. From time to time we have conflict with other believers. We saw him go through some suffering seasons, when he was in prison and didn't understand0:35 why. Last week we talked about Paul and we saw Paul engaging in culture, how we as Christians need to engage in culture. And today, we're gonna talk about Paul, how he responded in spiritual0:47 conflict. You know a lot of times we can look around, what's going on in our world and see some things and you're like, man what are they thinking? Have you ever looked at someone or saw something online and you thought0:58 what are they thinking? And a lot of times, let's be honest, they're not thinking. Alright? A lot of times we don't acknowledge or understand the reality that it's not a physical battle we're in, it's a spiritual battle1:10 we're in. For ideas about who God is and how we should live and what is right and what is wrong. And so where do those spiritual battles take place? As we talk about these young seniors, they were all in the first1:21 service over here. They're about to head off either to college, to community college, or university way off or just head off into their career. They sometimes, Satan, when he attacks
1:32 us, it's in our mind that we begin to have doubts. We begin to have questions about what is right, and what do I really believe, and what is wrong. Sometimes it can be our friends. We talked to the students. Man, you're
1:43 about to develop, if you're going off, a whole new set of friends. And they may not all believe like you or what you're used to, but you have to learn to engage that spiritual battle and not be intimidated and not
1:54 imitate, and not isolate yourself. But say, listen, I believe that Christianity is true. Our world view is true. Sometimes media. It's a spiritual battle. Sometimes it's
2:06 media you hold in your hands. Sometimes you can have a spiritual battle at the mountain top of your greatest success. All of a sudden you go through a struggle or worry. Maybe it's in the deepest darkest valley that you
2:18 have sinned or you failed or you struggled and all of a sudden you are going through this spiritual battle. Spiritual battles are real. They're not anything new. What we're gonna see is Paul in
2:30 Acts chapter 19, he goes into Ephesus, he begins to preach the gospel. As soon as he begins to preach the gospel, people get converted, they stop worshiping the goddess of Ephesus, Artemis, and they stop
2:42 worshiping and they stop buying the idols. And so what happens is culture gets aggravated, and there ends up in this spiritual battle between the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the
2:53 culture that wants to hold on to their own sin, their own religion, their own space, and their own place, and they actually cause a riot. So we're gonna march through that today, and it's interesting enough, I think it
3:05 applies to what we see a lot today because as we read through Acts chapter 19 about this encounter that Paul has in Ephesus, it says a lot of people are getting angry, a lot of people are yelling. It actually says
3:17 a lot of them didn't even know what they were yelling about. I think that's a lot of what's going on in our culture right now. Is people see someone else angry so they're gonna get angry. Somebody else picket,
3:29 they're gonna picket. Someone else riot, they're gonna riot. And they don't even know what they're doing it about. And so as believers, when that happens, we can't isolate, we don't wanna compromise and imitate, nor do
3:40 we wanna be intimidated by it. We wanna stand firm in the truth. Alright. You say, Pastor, where did spiritual battles start? Genesis chapter 3. Everybody say it didn't take long. Didn't take long. Genesis
3:52 1 and 2, God created everything, it was good. It's called, the land, the animals, everything, it was good. Created Adam, put Adam in the garden and immediately looked at Adam and said, this isn't gonna go well
4:04 if I leave Adam alone. He said, it's not good that Adam be along brought along Eve, Genesis chapter 3, Satan shows up, alright? And here it is, here's the first spiritual battle. Genesis chapter 3, very much of what the
4:16 spiritual battle we're encountering right now is. Genesis chapter 3 verse 1 says, now the serpent was more crafty than any other other wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, satan said
4:28 to the woman, did God really say? Everybody say did God really say. That was satan's first sermon and I will promise you it's the same sermon he's preaching you today. Alright, if
4:40 he wants you to move into sin or compromise culture or do the Did God really say? That's his 1 and only sermon. He's just got 1. You must not eat from any tree. Notice what he said, he twists God's word. You
4:51 must not eat from any tree in the garden. Notice what Satan does. When in that phrase, he questions God's word, he exaggerates God's restriction, and he plants doubt
5:03 about God's goodness. Alright, so notice, Satan basically goes up and says, did God say you can't eat of any tree? How many of you know what God really did say? We're about to read it. No, God
5:15 said you can eat of any tree except for that 1 tree. So here's what happened, Satan comes in and exaggerates God's restrictions. We see that a lot today. And we live in a
5:27 culture that I'm okay, you're okay, live however you want to, you be you, it's all gonna be good. And that's become a disastrous for a generation a disaster for a generation of people. And what happens is he exaggerates
5:38 God's exclusions, limits his provisions. See what God did is he had very small exclusions and lots of inclusions. God
5:50 actually said you can eat from any tree in the garden. Man, that's provision. But not this 1 tree in the garden. But Satan comes in, twists the truth, he
6:02 did it then, he'll do it now. So let's continue to read on. He says, but the woman said to the servant, wait wait wait. We may eat from the fruit of any of the trees in the garden, but God did say you must not eat
6:14 the fruit from the middle of the tree that is in the middle of the garden and you shouldn't touch it or you will die. So here's what we see, God had abundant provision.
6:26 He does have exclusions, but when God excludes something, he always does it for our benefit. Everybody say our benefit. When God says here
6:38 are the guardrails, here are the guidelines, here are the 10 commandments, he's not doing it because he wants to hurt you or exclude you. He's doing it for your own benefit so you won't get hurt.
6:50 But just like in the garden we see today, let me tell you what, God has provided abundantly for us. And he says, go ahead, do this, absolutely go on,
Satan's Strategy: Questioning God's Word
7:02 follow your heart, but stay within the boundaries and realize there are some things that are off limits. They were off limits then and they're off limits now. So let's continue to read on. Then it says, you will not
7:13 certainly die, the serpent said to the woman, for God knows that when you eat of it eat of fruit your eyes will be opened and you will be like God knowing good from evil. Look at verse
7:25 6. So then the woman stopped, saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye. The eye is the lust of 1 And also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took it and
7:37 she ate it. So here's what satan does. He will also always question God's character, questions God's word, question God's goodness. And you can find that
7:49 going on in your mind from time to time that you have a temptation or you have something you wanna do that you think would feel good and you know God's word says no and then you question God's goodness. I can tell you if
8:00 God has excluded it, it's for your own benefit. Then I would encourage you to look at all the other things that God has included. And just like the temptation then
8:12 today, for Eve and Adam, it was their eyes, it was lust, and it was won. So a lot of times that the battle is in our mind. Look at
8:24 what Paul said. Look at Paul talks about the battle of the mind and this was long before we had social media. We we we have seen, the difficulties that has put on our younger generation. But notice, this is Paul talking
8:35 about the battle in your mind that happened over 2000 years ago. He says this, second Corinthians chapter 10 verse 3, Paul says for though we live in, everybody say in.
8:47 We live in the world. Let me just stop you right there. We are not supposed to live in isolation. The church is not supposed to live in isolation. We are
8:59 also not supposed to just adopt what culture teaches us. We don't want to live in isolation, but I don't want to also live in imitation. I don't want to say, well if culture says it's okay, or
9:11 if the university says it's okay, or politics says it's okay, or the supreme court says it's okay. If God said no, it's no. We don't ever wanna imitate culture. So we don't isolate, we don't imitate and
9:23 here's the third 1, we're never intimidated. See a lot of people want the church just to be quiet. Child of God, if the church
9:35 is quiet about the truth of God, who is going to speak up? Right? If we all of a sudden isolate ourselves and we start imitating
9:47 culture and we're intimidated when someone gets loud, let me tell you what, who's gonna speak the truth? And so our call how many of you have heard a guy named Jesus?
9:59 Most of you in the room online? Okay, remember what Jesus said? He says, you are the salt, everybody say salt. Salt of the earth. You are the light, everybody say light. Light
10:11 of the world. Does that sound like isolation? No, he says don't hide your light, don't keep the salt in the shaker. He says, man let it out. We wanna be that way. We don't wanna
10:23 isolate, we wanna communicate, we wanna share, and we wanna encourage culture to move forward. Alright. So here it is. He says, for we live in the world, but he says, we do not wage war as the
10:35 world does. Alright? How does the world wage war? Well today, it seems like they're just loud. How many of you notice that? If you don't like what someone's saying, you crash the party or you shout them
10:47 down, right? Notice how we're supposed to wage war. Notice, we demolish arguments Now let me just tell you this, how do we
10:58 demolish arguments? With better arguments. Got it? With better arguments. See, just because someone is loud doesn't make them right. So Paul says this,
11:10 we demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against what? The knowledge of God and we then take captive, by the way this is military language. We take captive every
11:22 thought that's in your mind and make it obedient to Christ. So here's what we wanna do, we wanna be the kind of people that when we hear a bad argument, we demolish that argument but we demolish it with a
11:34 better argument. I don't want to attack the person, I don't want to attack the people. I want to say, let's play that out and notice the end run or the end ruin. And so child of God, we were never told to
11:46 isolate man. We've got to be the kind of people that we're willing to go to war with the marketplace ideas with the truth of the gospel. And a lot of people want me and others in
11:58 the church to be quiet, don't say anything that could possibly be political. If we stop preaching the truth who's gonna step in the gap? Jesus says you're salt and
12:10 you are light. And that's exactly what we're gonna see. You know if you look around the world, I'll put it up on the screen. There are 4 basic world views that people live under. 4 basic world views that people live on
12:21 live under. Christianity, Atheism, Hinduism, and Islam. Alright so those 4. Now just before I even say this, I want you to know not everybody from India or South Asia, not everybody
12:32 there is Hindu. Not everybody from the Middle East is Muslim. But here's how they answer the question, every world view. Where did we come from? Why are we here? What's right and
12:44 wrong? Where are we headed? Now we live absolutely in the middle of a culture war. Can I can I tell you, there are a lot of these other places, there's not a culture war? If if if
12:56 you go to atheism. What is the greatest political system of atheism? Communism, alright? That's where it is. Basically, we don't know why we're here, we don't know what's right and wrong, but all we have to do is elect a
13:08 leader and whatever you do, don't say anything about the leader because then you're gonna end up in jail, right? That's atheism, right? Basically Russia, China, that's what you see.
13:20 Hinduism, a lot of it, you see it in India. Man, they believe there's this reincarnation cycle, it's just part of this ongoing cycle that based on how well you do in this life, you will go up, the stratosphere
13:32 will go down. Alright? They still absolutely have a caste system, and if you are if you're bad in this life, they think you'll come back as a rat or a rodent or maybe you'll be 1 of the untouchables. They still
13:44 believe that today, by the way. That this is not anything new. Mother Teresa, that's what it's all about. Or that's what they believe. Islam, Islam believes Allah created everything. Basically, you'll live according to
13:56 law. Notice the law that they talk about that determines right and wrong. Go look it up, it's called Sharia law. Anybody heard about that in the state of Texas recently? Can I just tell you this? I'm just gonna dead
Battle the Mind with Gospel Truth
14:08 level honest. I don't want my wife, I don't want my daughter, I don't want my granddaughter, I don't want my great granddaughter growing up under Sharia law. Or why? I
14:19 don't. Because go back to Genesis 1. God created them male and female, both in his image and he blessed both of them. This is a culture war,
14:31 folks, that we are in and the church can't be quiet, alright? You say pastor, you're sounding political, wait it's about to get worse. Just say, no seriously, let me just take some of
14:43 the things that are going on in our culture today. They're about to these these students, seniors are about to go off to universities. Can I tell you, some of these universities are saying some stupid
14:55 stuff? How many of you know that? You're like, everybody who's got eyes can see. That's not right. That's not right. Man, you can't look at young people that Man, I remember when I was in kindergarten, I thought I was
15:07 gonna be a professional baseball player. And I I should have gone to my parents and said, Hey, I just wanna quit school. I wanna do something else and be a baseball player. What my parents told me, go to school. You
15:17 could use school. Right? But now we say, hey if somebody at 5 or 6 or 7 struggles with their idea, transition. No. No. We destroy
15:28 kids because of dumb things that we allow. Let me go a little further. We've got a bunch of rallies going on right now. No Kings rallies, okay? I'm not anti everybody that went to a No Kings
15:40 rally. If that's what you want to do, great. But I don't see a lot of no ayatollah rallies over in Muslim nations. How
15:52 many Why, because you end up dead or in jail? You don't Y'all got real quiet on that, did I just kind of step into you? Are y'all a bunch of no kings, rally people? And by the way,
16:04 I'm not anti If they want to do that, do it. But you notice? Take that over to an Islamic country. How's that gonna go for you? Hey, take that over to Russia and China.
16:17 See how that's gonna go for you. Folks, we are blessed to live in this country. Everybody say blessed. Blessed. We are blessed, alright? We are rolling towards the 200 and fiftieth anniversary
16:29 birthday of our country and we need to celebrate the reality. Man, I would never say the founding fathers or all the first 13 colonies were all great and they were all godly and they were all Christian. They were flawed
16:41 just like we are. However, if you look around the world and you look at those 4 world views, you will see more freedom and more flourishing in any and every country that had a base of
16:53 a Christian world view. Give God a hand for that, alright? Alright. So now, spiritual battle, Paul rolls in to Ephesus and let me just show you a
17:05 couple of things. We've gotta hurry, everybody say hurry. I'm trying, alright easy, easy. Thought number 1, spiritual battles increase when lives begin to change. Let me tell you what, you stand up to tell the truth,
17:16 culture starts to back away from some of the stupid stuff we're saying, guess what, people aren't gonna be happy. Alright? So here it is, Acts chapter 19 verse 23. Paul goes into Ephesus, begin to preach. They turn
17:28 away from Artemis, which was their goddess. Alright? And, man, she had an incredible temple there. It says about that time, there arose a great disturbance, Paul's been preaching in Ephesus, about the way. Everybody say
17:40 the way. See, I love this. Early on, Christians were called the way because it wasn't just what they said, it was the way they lived. And they need to match up. See, we need to be the same way. We need the kind of
17:50 Christians. We tell the truth and talk lovingly and we live the truth and we live lovingly. So he says about that time, great disturbance about the way a silversmith named Demetrius
18:02 who made silver shrines to Artemis, alright? Artemis was the goddess, their goddess. It was their goddess. They had, by the way, a temple. I think we have an image of it we can throw up there. They
18:14 had a temple, she's also called Diana, to Artemis, which is considered, you can look it up, 1 of the 7 ancient wonders of the world, right there in Ephesus. So Paul rolls into
18:26 Ephesus, alright. The megachurch in Ephesus was Artemis. She was all about, sex, fertility, power, immorality, prostitution and worship. And
18:38 Paul rolls in and starts preaching the gospel and they are not happy. And he says, listen a silversmith named Demetrius who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought in
18:50 a lot of business from craftsmen there. He called them together along with all the related trades and said, hey you know my friends, we we receive a pretty good income from this business. And you
Ephesus Riot: Culture vs. Gospel
19:02 see and hear about this fellow Paul who has convinced and led many astray, large numbers of people here in Ephesus. And in practicality, the whole province of Asia. He says that
19:14 the gods that we make are no good at all, alright. Man, can you hear the spiritual battle about to take place? Look at verse 27, so what does Demetrius do? He he he calls in kind of the union, the
19:25 united idol worshipers, right? He calls them in, he says hey we make a pretty good living because here we set up around this whole temple to Diana or temple to Artemis. We sell idols
19:37 and then we also come out with a brand new model. Kind of like the way we buy cars, how many of you know? And say give me 1 of the limited model idols. I want leather in it and stuff like that. He says man, we're making
19:48 bank and man, these people are being converted in large numbers. They're no longer coming to the temple. They're not worshiping her. They're throwing away our idols and our business has been threatened. Look at verse 27.
19:59 There is danger not only that our trade will lose its good name, but also the temple of the great goddess Artemis, there it is, will be discredited. And the and the goddess herself
20:11 who is worshiped throughout the province of Asia and the world will be robbed of her divine majesty. So thought number 1, when people's lives change, people get angry.
20:23 Here's thought number 2. Satan uses confusion and fear to cause chaos. Let's just continue to read on, pick it up in verse 28. When they heard this, they were furious and began shouting. So they called
20:35 them all together and they started saying great is Artemis of the Ephesians. Soon it says the whole city was in an uproar. The people seized Gaius and, Aristarchus, Paul's traveling
20:47 companions from Macedonia and all of them rushed them into the theater. Look at verse 33. The Jews in the crowd pushed Alexander to the front and they shouted instruction to him and motioned for
20:59 silence to him so he could make a defense before the people. Now here's what happens. So they can't find Paul at this point. So Paul is out preaching the gospel. So they get some of his traveling companions. They take
21:09 them into the theater. They throw them out in the middle. Now the theater is full and they're just screaming like crazy. And finally they say, hey let's at least let them give a defense. So they push them out, let them
21:20 give a defense and notice what happens in order to make a defense before the people. Look at verse 34. But when they realized he was a Jew, they all shouted in unison
21:32 for about 2 hours, great is Artemis of the Ephesians. They really didn't want to hear his argument. They just wanted to scream at him. Child of
21:44 God, you and I will encounter people that they don't want to hear what we believe. They just wanna shout you down. You see, and the whole point of taking them to theater, this is very
21:56 common in the Ephesian day, is you take someone there so you can allow them to give a defense for the hope or the faith or the teaching that they have. So Satan always
22:08 uses fear and confusion to create chaos. Here's number 3. God God often sends help in unexpected places.
22:19 See, I've known a lot of Christians, I've been 1. How many of you know Christians, not I've been a Christian, I've just been 1 of them. I'm not finished, just hold on. Good grief.
22:31 I was a Christian when I started this sermon, now I'm not. I'm a finish up with an invitation. How many of you know Christians can do stupid things? Amen. I've been 1 of those Christians is what I was
22:43 getting at, okay? You think I've been a stupid Christian, say amen. I don't get y'all. We all need people in our lives
22:55 who will look at you and say, that is a terrible idea. Don't you How many of you know we need those? I can tell you when I look back, Gina will tell you, my mom will tell you, my
23:07 mom's watching online. Yeah, I always had a lot of energy at the kids. I was always the first 1 to the scene of the accident. How many of you know? I was usually driving the car. I could've used some friends from
23:19 time to time to look at me and go, you know, that is a terrible idea. And so here's what happens, we wanna surround ourselves with people who can be honest enough with you and say, listen, I know you love God, but this
23:30 is a terrible idea. So here's what happens, Paul hears his companions or in the theater, Paul says well I'm gonna roll down there. And they were like, I don't think so so read it. Verse 30,
23:43 Paul wanted to appear before the crowd but the disciples would not let him. Even some of the officials of the province, friends of Paul's, sent a message to him begging him, dude don't go to
23:55 the theater. Why? Because those people are nuts. He says, they've lost control. They don't want to hear your defense, they want to stone you, they don't want to kill you. They're they're not willing to have a discussion
24:07 because remember we demolish arguments with better arguments. But when someone doesn't have a better argument, they get loud. So sometimes child of God, when you're seeing what's taking place on media and the
24:18 news and you just see people being loud, let me tell you a lot of times people are loud because they don't have a better argument. And so notice what happens, Back to the assembly, the assembly was in confusion.
24:31 Some of them were shouting 1 thing, some of them another thing. Listen to this phrase and this is our country. And most of the people who are shouting
24:43 didn't even know why they were there. Child of God, I'll submit to you a lot of the shouting and screaming and hollering we see today whether it's rioting or whatever,
24:55 a lot of people don't know why they're even there. They just don't have a better place or a better space or a better argument. Say how do we respond to spiritual battles?
25:07 Don't isolate. Don't imitate, and don't be intimidated. You just
25:19 communicate the truth. If they asked you to give a reason for the hope that is in you, you just defeat an argument with a better argument.
25:33 We are in a spiritual battle. Jean and I talk about it all the time. We'll see something on the news or we'll see this or we'll see and and you just kind of say,
25:44 what are they thinking? Why would they do that?
25:50 Some of them, they're the idol makers that are whooping the people up. Whooping that's a Texas phrase, whooping the people up into a
26:02 frenzy and a fury so they can get them to riot. A lot of the other people,
26:11 they just don't have a better argument.
26:14 Child of God sometimes we have to look and see through the idol makers who are just protecting their own business and their own ideas. Whether it's a university
26:26 professor or some politician or some other person out there saying everything's okay, we have to see beyond the idol makers. To those who just don't know why they're there.
26:40 So we can share the good news
26:42 of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
26:46 So like in Ephesus over 2000 years ago, lives will be changed and people will stop worshiping their Artemis, their god of sex
26:58 or fertility or power or this or that. Then we share that gospel when you say, listen, listen, listen. They are saying today the exact
27:10 same thing Satan said in Genesis chapter 3. So God says you can't eat any of this. You say, yeah.
27:23 That's not what God said at all.
27:27 God says you can have any of this,
27:32 but stay away from this.
27:35 And when God gives an exclusion,
27:41 it's always for our benefit. Don't ever forget that. Let's pray.
27:47 God, thank you so much for this day. God, thank you for Paul teaching us and telling us how to operate in a spiritual battle. God, when we share the gospel whether it's at the office or in church or
27:59 school, these students that are going off to college, God, I pray that they would be bold in their faith, but they would find other brothers and sisters around them to encourage their faith. And when they find themselves
Stand Firm: Communicate the Truth
28:11 in that dorm room at night or or just in the office in the afternoon and they begin to have those doubts that they they they have those waging of wars that take place in the mind that they would then
28:25 go back to your truth and your word, celebrate your goodness and your grace. In Jesus name we
28:32 pray, amen and amen.
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