Sermon Tone Analysis

Planes.

Oh!

I love them!

But this time everything was different.

It was the evening of July 15th, 1988.

I boarded a Lufthansa Airlines flight out of Frankfurt, Germany, in company with 12 others, to fly /East/.

Once on board, we dispersed and sat alone in silence.

The time for smiles and laughter was over.

My throat was dry, my palms sweaty.

I had never traveled behind that forbidding Curtain before.

A multitude of questions whirled in my head: Would we make it through customs?

Would our Bible commentaries with their phony covers be detected?

(Some of the more fearful had already jettisoned their books in Frankfurt.)

Would our teaching outlines hidden in our money belts be discovered?

Would we be followed?

Would our hotel rooms be bugged?

Our seasoned leader, of Italian descent, a tile-setter by trade, had spent hours briefing us on what do at every juncture.

Step by step he drilled us on strategy.

But nothing he said prepared me for the wave of fear I was feeling.

It didn't help when the plane made sudden, sharp turns as if to miss unwanted air space.

I wondered what was I doing traveling to a country whose very name evoked ancient memories of the Roman Emperor Trajan.

His territorial expansion, in the first century A.D., had given the nation its language and culture.

It had also given it its initiation into bloody persecution.

The reigning emperor of this land had followed in Trajan's footsteps.

He had starved his country to feed his belly, and built his palace on the blood of thousands of martyrs.

He had no use for religion.

He confiscated Bibles and turned them into toilet paper.

An anti-Christ supreme, he had organized a network of secret police whose web covered all of society in a stranglehold.

One out of every three citizens was an informer.

His secret police, hand-picked from orphanages in Libya, Iran, and Iraq, were absolutely loyal to him.

He had nurtured them and schooled them in intimidation and brute force.

They knew no morals; they had no ethical base.

Their reward was a life of ease and profit for a job done well.

And here we were, 13 foreigners, a threat to everything the dictator stood for.

We would be monitored night and day.

Any contact with nationals was forbidden.

If we were caught in their homes, they would pay a high price: a year's wages.

The plane touched down.

Here we were at last in enemy territory--Communist Romania!

Would God really do battle with us?

I wondered.

Paradoxically, it was here, in the most dangerous place I had ever ministered, that I discovered the true joy of putting on the full armor of God.

In the words of a contemporary theologian, "One is safest in the fight."

Today we come to our final study in the apostle Paul's letter to the Ephesians.

Our text, from the closing verses of this marvelous epistle, expounds the Christian's call to battle.

Every day the Christian must don his spiritual clothes, leave his home, and enter into enemy territory.

As we study the inspired words of this text this morning my prayer is that you will learn to put on the armor of Christ every day before you enter out into the fray.

We must do this, for Paul says that life is a constant struggle with the devil himself.

In these closing texts from Ephesians now, the apostle will instruct us on how to implement God's strategy for dealing with an extremely wily and potent enemy.

Paul writes:

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*Stand firm therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; in addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming missiles of the evil one.

And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

*(Ephesians 6:14-17, NASB)

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In earlier studies we learned that the apostle wrote this letter while he was imprisoned in Rome, chained day and night to a member of the Praetorian Guard.

Paul did not have to look far for an analogy to help him illustrate his call to battle.

His exhortations here are based on the battledress of a soldier about to enter the fray.

The first thing to notice is that the initial three pieces of armor are to be put on prior to entering into battle.

(Note that the verbs are all in the past tense.)

The next two pieces of armor, on the other hand, are taken up as the Christian advances into enemy territory; while the last weapon (which, incidentally, is the sole offensive weapon) is used when contact is made with the enemy.

!! I. Preparing for the Battle (6:14-15)

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*...having girded your loins with truth...*

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!!! (a) A Soldier's Belt: The Readiness of Integrity

A Roman soldier's belt was fashioned from a piece of leather 6 to 8 inches wide.

This belt actually was more a part of his under-garments than his armor as its function was to gather up his long tunic in order to help make him ready for battle.

Today, we would say that he was "rolling up his sleeves" in readiness.

What is it that enables Christians to be prepared for the spiritual battles we face every day?

According to Paul, our belt is "truth."

His words are a direct quote from Isaiah 11, describing the clothes which would be worn by the coming Messiah.

(The Greek word "truth" is a translation of the Hebrew word for "faithfulness.")

Isaiah 11:5: "Also righteousness will be the belt about His loins, And /faithfulness/ the belt about His waist."

Christ always wore the belt of faithfulness.

He was utterly sold out to his Commander-in-Chief.

The first thing that makes us ready for battle is our willingness to be true, faithful people.

If we insist on going into battle half-heartedly, we'll get blown away.

It's impossible to fight the deceiver if we are holding onto deceit.

Whenever Israel had to go into battle, draft dodgers didn't have to look hard for an excuse to stay home.

Anyone who had built a new house, or had just planted a vineyard, a recently engaged man, or anyone who was fainthearted was excused from the battle to come (see Deut 20:5-7).

The issue is clear: God's battles are won by faith.

Anyone entering the fray with a divided heart, or lacking integrity, is doomed.

A Christian, then, must first "gird his loins with truth," donning his belt of Christ's faithfulness, before he goes out into the world to join the spiritual battle.

Here is the second thing he needs:

!!! (b) A Soldier's Breastplate: The Assurance of Righteousness

The soldier's breastplate was constructed of leather- covered metal and shaped like a sleeveless vest.

It protected his vital organs from both the front and the back.

Again, we find a reference in Isaiah to the clothing of the Messianic King: "He put on righteousness like a breastplate" (Isaiah 59:17).

This is a frequent theme in the Psalms.

The king did not feel free to go into battle unless his relationship with the Lord was on a solid footing.

Often, that relationship came under attack.

For example, if difficult circumstances were causing the king to suffer, he could be open to ridicule.

In such times he would pray,

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*The Lord judges the people;/ \\ Vindicate/ me, O Lord, */*according to my righteousness*/* \\ And my integrity that is in me... \\ My shield is with God, \\ Who saves the upright in heart.*

(Psalm 7:8, 10)

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Here, the king was saying, in effect, "God, I have done right by you.

Will you now do right by me?

Take up my cause and vindicate our relationship."

Christians, too, come under attack and ridicule.

The devil will question our relationship with God and accuse us before we even reach the battleground.

Unlike the king, however, when this happens we must pray, "Vindicate me, O God, before the accuser, according to /your/ righteousness"--according to Christ's righteousness.

We can pray this with confidence because we know that we are accepted in the Beloved.

This assurance gives us a clear conscience, enabling us to do battle.