The Lord is the Ultimate Ruler of the Universe

 The following is from the book Our Inheritance in Christ  by T. Austin-Sparks:

"Man, in the eternal purpose of God, is bound up with the government of this world for God's own glory. Since the Lord Jesus sat down at the right hand of the Father, all the powers and forces of evil and good are under His control. Satan is out to impress us that he is still Prince of this world, but he is not ultimately and finally so, and now  there is ONE over all his working, overruling and directing it to the glory of God. Satan's regime is now within the compass and control of the Lord Jesus; and we being in Christ are translated out of his authority and out of the power of darkness and being in Christ we inherit that which He has recovered. This inheritance is only on the ground of and by the way of the wilderness, the place of spiritual discipline, by which the flesh [under the dominion of Satan] is entirely ruled out; for where the flesh is the enemy makes a terrible mess.

". . . The fact brought out in Acts is, Satan is not really lord; the Believers know ONE, the LORD JESUS, over all the authority of Satan, Who is going to make the workings of Satan serve HIS ends. This is the faith that gets outside of the authority of darkness, which in the face of all the suffering refuses to accept the authority of Satan, but stands in the faith of HIM Who truly reigneth; 'the SON of MAN' to whom all authority hath been given in heaven and on earth (Matt 28:18).

". . . In the wilderness the whole of our natural life is brought out, and we come to know our weakness and emptiness; that we have nothing. Thus it is that we now find everything in Christ and so can go over and possess. What is the secret of possession, of coming into our inheritance? It is that we have come to the place where all things are 'in Christ' and HE is everything--our very life and being. Our flesh is cut off and we know as the deepest thing in our being, that unless God does everything in us by His Spirit, all is of no value. We must come to an end of our own working in order to come into His fulness.

"It is so easy to sit down in our weakness and nurse ourselves, but the Lord says at that point, 'Arise and possess.' Your inheritance is not here on earth, it is in Christ in the heavenlies; not in yourselves, your fulness is in Him. It is ever HIS FULNESS over against your emptiness; HIS STRENGTH over against your weakness; your inheritance is ALL HE IS, as typified to Israel by the land flowing with milk and honey.

"Paul says of Timothy, 'he worketh the work of the Lord' (1 Cor. 16:10). There is to be an end of our works so far as we are concerned, nothing of us, as out from ourselves; but God says, in effect: 'with your nothingness I will possess the heavens and the earth.'

"Oh! to be such a people, chastened and emptied of self [centeredness] for the Holy Spirit by His energies to display the moral glories of the Lord Jesus in us and so through us. 'To the intent that now unto principalities and powers might be made known through the Church the manifold wisdom of God.' (Eph. 3:10,11). 'That in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace . . . for we are His workmanship.' (Eph. 2:7,10)."