“You are Peter,
and upon this rock I will build my church,
and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it.”
(Matthew 16:18)
Dear Friends –
Jesus is the Gate to heaven, and all Christians who incorporate His Holy Spirit into their being and follow the image He modeled, can rest assured, short of committing a mortal sin, of their entrance into an eternal heavenly abode. While just the opposite in being is that the Devil is the Gate to hell, and all nonbelievers who incorporate his vile spirit into their being 
and follow his urgings, can rest assured by their sinful life of their entrance into an eternal hellfire abode. Almighty God may allow the devil to roam this earth creating havoc in his wake, but never, absolutely positively never, will the devil prevail or overcome God’s efforts, and Jesus Christ proved that for us by His triumphal confrontations with Satan himself. After fasting in the desert for forty days, Jesus was tempted three times by the devil and each time He did not give in but retorted with His marvelous rebukes which the devil could not countermand. (See Luke 4:1-13) The devil tried to goad Jesus into demonstrating His powers to prove He was the Son of God, as well as deny God The Father and worship him… how utterly vain and stupidly ignorant of Satan to think his enticements could intimidate the Son of God! On several occasions, “Many who were demon-possessed were brought to Jesus, and He drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick.” (Matthew 8:16) By His spoken “word” Christ obliterated evil spirits right then and there on the spot, and even one time He extracted the demons from a man and sent them into a nearby herd of swine for destruction, but never, never did they eluded Him and they knew exactly who He was.
It is hard to imagine we can follow in this image Christ portrayed for our benefit, but it is true, we really can! Christ stressed that when He said “truly” twice for emphasis: “Truly, truly, I tell you, whoever believes in Me will also do the works that I am doing. He will do even greater things than these." (John 14:12) Easier said than done I know, for being Christ-like is extremely difficult when you are confronted by one of the vilest creatures the devil ever created. You stand there scared-to-death, sure 
your knees are knocking while trying to be assertive, and so you say a silent quick prayer… please Dear God help me, Jesus give me courage, Holy Spirit put the words into my mouth… and then, you take a deep breath and steadfastly proceed, getting braver as the tension mounts. No, you will not expel evil demons on the spot as did Christ, but in time and with persistence, you will not let evil prevail! Whether it’s being tempted by evil nonbelieving people to sin and rebel against God, or if it’s those blaspheming demons who hate God, trying to intimidate you, by all means, and with the graces that Almighty God will send you, stand your ground and do not let evil progress.
When Christ told Peter that they would build a Church, a Church that would succeed because He was the builder, for no greater power existed that could destroy His effort. After Christ’s death and resurrection, the Apostles were eager to go out and spread The Good News, The Gospels, which would build that Church, but it was certainly no easy task, for many endured martyrdom
for the Truth they could not deny. That is still the task of every Christian, to build up the body of Christ, The Church, so that Jesus predominately walks the street of our world and not the devil. But we have been slack in that commitment to spreading The Word of God and that is why evil has taken over with strength… we have forgotten, that the gates of hell cannot prevail WHEN WE ATTACK IT… but we aren’t attacking it by Evangelizing and Exorcising… we are keeping Jesus to ourselves when He wanted us to share Him with the world. Our silence offers the devil no resistance… and so his realm grows and we have hell on earth… when it should be The Kingdom of God.
THE POWER OF ALMIGHTY GOD
When you read the first pages of The Bible, you get a fascinating account of Almighty God creating the world and all that’s in it, including us… in six days! Right away, you get a picture of The Supreme Being that He is in all His complex magnificence, including the omniscience required to create a completely perfect world 
for His human creatures fashioned by love. We are not given the production details only that He spoke balanced existence into being… BY HIS WORDS LIFE BEGAN. That is a quick, and astonishing concept to comprehend by we mortals, and so skeptics are generated who find it impossible to relate to such divergent logic. Once you get past this initial introduction to an eternal Supreme Being, you must vow to keep an open mind as you continue through the rest of the pages of The Bible. The more you learn of His interaction with His creation the more you will glean insight into His character and bountiful powers that are always in complete control of His creation. His ways are often shrouded in mystery beyond our reasoning powers, and therefore through historical accuracy, we are blessed by faith to intuit the true reality of His Being.
Almighty God should be seen as the benevolent Heavenly Father that He is… alive, very concerned, and interacting with His loved ones daily… only fools relegate Him to a historical figure of the past. Time after time in the pages of the Old Testament we are 
given accountings of His personal relationships with His chosen people, and the measures He took, directly or through His prophets, to reveal His cognizance and concern for all behavior. His reality was made even more obvious by His immediate dispensation of reward or punishment… nothing got past Him. Sinful behavior earned famine, plagues, banishment, combat defeat… all punishment brought forth by HIS WORDS. And just as distinctly was His favor recognized when His love and power rescued them from their enemies, fed them in the desert and parted the sea for them to pass through on their journey to the Promised Land… all by HIS WORDS, because they spoke the love of His Will for His people.
In The New Testament, we find The Word became flesh so that Jesus Christ could make evident The Father’s Will to redeem humanity from all the sinful ways they seemed bent on committing. Just like His Father, The Son commanded by HIS WORDS that the blind see, the lame walk, the deaf hear, and even raised the dead Lazarus from the grave by crying out, “Lazarus come out!” This man had been in the tomb four days and thus his body had begun corruption, yet he “came out” whole! Similar miracles have been performed in our time particularly at the site of the appearance of Our Lady of Fatima. Well-documented investigations have proved miraculous occurrences for diseased bodies recovering completely in tack; some with bones in the place where previously they had been destroyed by the sickness! 
This is The Power of God, the God who is alive and interacting everyday with His creation that He will never let the devil destroy. There is a marvelous interaction between Christ and a Roman Centurion who, by the way, was very accustomed to having his words obeyed by his underlings, and having much compassion for one of his gravely ill servants, approached Jesus and appealed to Him for a cure. Of course, Jesus said He would go and heal him, but the humble Centurion replied: “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant will be healed. When Jesus heard this, He was amazed and said, Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith.” (Matthew 8:5-10) Such a rarity it was in that day, and still today, for people to believe that Almighty God speaks His mind and heart and things happen! Some mortal men can’t relate to such power, so it must not be possible think the fools. People all over this world, every moment of every day are praying to Almighty God for help to save their sick or wayward child, their marriage beset with problems, new love, work, success, direction or purpose to their life, and on and on all wanting His answer… and some get it through unshakeable faith… and they recognize that the receipt of prayer answered is only through The Power of God. Quite often the desires of our heart are not of our own doing but are seeds of aspirations planted there by Almighty God because that is what He wants to give us, but he wants that longing to grow and germinate into our recognition that it was a gift from Him… the work of His hands… a miracle, for His beloved.
