Ministry: The Work of God’s People - 6 - Strengthened to Share

Scripture: Ephesians 6:10-20

Ephesians 6:10–20 NIV

10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14 Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15 and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16 In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. 18 And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. 19 Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, 20 for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.

8/25/2024

Order of Service:

Announcements

Ministry Celebration

Opening Worship

Prayer Requests

Prayer Song

Pastoral Prayer

Kid’s Time

Offering (Doxology and Offering Prayer)

Scripture Reading

Sermon

Closing Song

Benediction

Special Notes:

Week 4: Ministry Celebration

Opening Prayer:

Source of life,

you feed us with the spiritual milk of your love

and deliver us from darkness to light.

Encompass us in the circle of your protection,

that, secure in your sustaining power,

we may find the wisdom and strength

to challenge the evils of our time. Amen.

Strengthened to Share

Ambassadors for Christ

One of the most simple yet powerful phrases used in the letter to the Ephesians is two words: “in Him.“

Paul weaves this phrase throughout the entire letter as he shares about the love and power that comes from Jesus. We have access to this power when we locate ourselves “in Him.” And so, as Paul concludes this letter by showing us how we glorify God when Jesus works through us in the power of salvation and redeems us by building us into his body here on earth, we get our final marching orders.

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.”

Do you hear the echoes of “in Him” in that verse? In the Lord… In His Mighty Power. Here, at the end of this letter, Paul still encourages us to find ourselves “in Jesus.”

Jesus is the Lord of all. Many of you have had some trying times these past few weeks and months this year. In those times, we want to know that Jesus is still on the throne and in control, especially when so much of what we see around us seems to be evidence to the contrary. Not only are we called to believe it, but we are also called to live that belief out by being strong Ambassadors for Christ—representatives of Jesus and His Kingdom in this world.

Be strong in the Lord’s power, Paul tells us. Not just for our sakes but because Christ calls us to bring the rest of creation into redemption “in HIm” just as we are redeemed “in Him.” And so we find ourselves here, at the end of this letter to the Ephesians, that Jesus is Lord of all, and He gives us everything we need to stand with and share Him with the whole world.

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The Challenge

One of our biggest challenges as Ambassadors of Christ is advocating for and representing an unseen and unremembered world. We are all like the children of immigrants, who may be judged by others as if they grew up in another country that they have only heard about in stories from their older family members. Like those children, we know God made us for heaven, but we have never seen it. We know we will go home to heaven eventually, but we don’t know when. More importantly, we know that we belong to God and His kingdom first, and everything else: our families, our communities, our political loyalties, and our ideas about the world fall below. This world is not and will never truly be our home.

Paul takes us even deeper, though. Not only do we belong to another kingdom, but our actual battles also happen on an invisible battlefield with enemies that are not human beings. The actual battles are spiritual battles between powers that make emperors and presidents look like preschoolers and nuclear missiles look like shiny matchsticks.

Thankfully, we are not strangers to the idea of invisible worlds that affect our lives. Watson and Crick were credited for discovering the double helix shape of DNA from a photograph by Rosalind Franklin, long before we had the tools to see DNA strands more clearly. Long before that, the Philosopher Democritus, who lived 400 years before Jesus, theorized that all matter was made up of atoms. He discovered this idea well over a thousand years before anyone saw an atom. And we continue to fight battles with those frustrating invisible germs that plague our lives. So, it is relatively easy to consider invisible players on a spiritual level far above us, fighting for our eternal souls.

It is not hard for us to realize that we are not fit to fight those battles alone. God made us for that world, and we will return to Him someday. But we are not equipped to fight against the powers of darkness that have corrupted creation since the dawn of time. We are grateful that God is greater than them all, and He stands in Jesus above all as Savior, Redeemer, Victor, and King. But what can we, tiny ants on the ant farm, possibly do in this battle in the heavens, far beyond our reach and view? Paul says, our challenge is to stand firm.

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Armor Parts

We are not left unequipped to stand firm in this incredible battle. Jesus gives us gifts to keep us individually capable of being his standard bearers in this battle. He gives us the whole armor of God, the spoils of war reforged in the fires of His love and passed down to us as an inheritance that marks us as the emissaries of His Kingdom wherever we stand. The borders of the kingdom of God are at our feet, and we stand as living signposts that our King is coming soon, and we prepare for His arrival. Those still lost in darkness need only look up to see the great light of Jesus coming into their lives.

We have truth that holds our armor together like a belt, keeping everything in its proper place and allowing it to both move with our body and become a vital extension of our body when we plant our feet firmly in place. Righteousness protects our hearts, the sources of our life, like a breastplate. Paul says Jesus fits our feet with a readiness from the gospel of peace. So, the part of us that God made to move to move is always ready to bring the peace that only comes from Jesus.

Paul tells us not to wear our faith like a badge of honor but to hold it up as a shield when the army of darkness fires flaming arrows toward us. Our faith deflects the doubts and lies fired our way. And we have our salvation that protects our head like a helmet, keeping our mind safe when our faith is too small or too slow to stop the enemy’s attacks. Or, to put this another way, we have the assurance that Christ has saved us so that we will not be led astray by the lies that would come at us through our ears and eyes.

And when we need to cut through the attacks sent against us en masse, we have the sword of the Spirit, the word of God. We understand this as scripture, even if the New Testament did not exist when Paul wrote these words, because the Word of God has always been the account of what God has said and done. Nothing cuts through lies like the truth, and there is no greater truth than that found in God’s Word given to us.

For centuries, the greatest generals and war strategists could tell you that communication is essential to win a battle or a war. If you cut off a soldier’s communication, they lose access to every other resource they have from their home base, and it is only a matter of time before soldiers are defeated, no matter how big, strong, or well-equipped they are. So Paul tells us to pray in the Spirit (remember we do everything “in Him”) on all occasions, with every kind of prayer and request we have. And that connection to God also connects us to each other, so we pray not only for ourselves, but we stay alert and pray for all our brothers and sisters who face their battles fighting to stand with Jesus, standing in Him as well.

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Stand Firm

So what do we need to do? We need to stand firm. Jesus does not ask us to fight for Him. God does not want us to take on the forces of evil in the world or our lives. He does that for us. Like Moses and the battles the Israelites fought while wandering in the wilderness, our job is to stand and lift Jesus high for all to see while the Spirit of God fights for us and wins the victory in our place.

God does not depend on us. It is good that He doesn’t because we would find ourselves unable, incapable, and unwilling to stand in His place. We like to imagine ourselves casting out demons like Jesus and the disciples in the Gospels and that we could go to war against sickness and darkness with some holy flamethrower. Sometimes, we forget that Paul healed people and cast out demons. But he didn't write any instructions on how to wage those battles. Instead, he showed us how Christ already won them, particularly when he faced sin and death for us on the cross and in the empty tomb.

We wouldn’t take those battles from Jesus, either. We do not sing songs telling Jesus we would take His place on the cross because we know we could not win that battle. When it comes to these spiritual battles, only Jesus can claim victory. He calls us to follow Him as He claims victory, but we are helpless. When He asks us if we are able to be crucified there with Him, we find ourselves unsure how to answer that question. When He goes to war, we don’t want to go in His place, and we don’t want to be with Him when he faces sin and death. We want Him to go instead of us.

But the truth is, we do face sin and death. Sometimes, we face them daily. When we do, we do not face them alone. Paul does not tell us to go ahead of Jesus in those battles. He does not ask us to hide behind Jesus or stay beside Jesus. No, Paul tells us to stay “in Him” when we stand against those forces of darkness in our lives because He is the armor that surrounds and protects us. His Spirit will cover and protect us. His words and Spirit will guide us. He will give us every word to say and action to take, and most importantly, He will be the one to speak, act, and work in, around, and through us.

So we stand with Jesus at the edge of the darkness, holding Him up because He is the light, the truth, and our only hope. He surrounds and protects us, covers us in His mercy and grace, and “in Him,” we find ourselves transformed, growing into that armor He fits us with, able to stand with Him in the darkest times... and not just for ourselves. We can see each other through His eyes and know that there is corrosion, corruption, brokenness, and pain that needs to be addressed, corrected, removed, and disciplined so that it does not come back tomorrow ten times worse than it is today.

We can only be good to one another when we are planted firmly in the love, wisdom, truth, and power of Jesus. We will only see people truly change in His grace when we stop trying to fix the problems ourselves and bring the presence of Jesus into their lives because it is not you and I that they need. It is Jesus. If they are to receive eternal life and learn to live it today, they have to contend with Him and find themselves “in Him.” We cannot offer them anything more or let them settle for anything less.

Closing Prayer

Lord Jesus, You are the Rock we stand on in the middle of the storm. You are the Grace that holds us fast when we are not in control. You are the Air we breathe and the water that gives us life. You are the nourishment that helps us grow, and you are the image and model we seek to grow into. Without You, we are nothing, but In You, we find everything we need every single day. Lead us today to the place You desire us to stand. Fill us with Your Spirit of wisdom, love, mercy, and truth. Do not let us content ourselves for less than what You desire. And give us the strength to stand there as a picture of what it means to be a light in the darkness, showing the world what You have in store for it by what You are doing in our lives today. Bring your redemption, Lord Jesus, and start in my heart, in our hearts today. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

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