The Battle Plan

Intro

Earl Weaver, former manager of the Baltimore Orioles. Sports fans will enjoy how he handled star Reggie Jackson.

Weaver had a rule that no one could steal a base unless given the steal sign. This upset Jackson because he felt he knew the pitchers and catchers well enough to judge who he could and could not steal off of. So one game he decided to steal without a sign.

He got a good jump off the pitcher and easily beat the throw to second base. As he shook the dirt off his uniform, Jackson smiled with delight, feeling he had vindicated his judgment to his manager.

Later Weaver took Jackson aside and explained why he hadn't given the steal sign. First, the next batter was Lee May, his best power hitter other than Jackson. When Jackson stole second, first base was left open, so the other team walked May intentionally, taking the bat out of his hands.

Second, the following batter hadn't been strong against that pitcher, so Weaver felt he had to send up a pinch hitter to try to drive in the men on base. That left Weaver without bench strength later in the game when he needed it.

The problem was, Jackson saw only his relationship to the pitcher and catcher. Weaver was watching the whole game. We, too, see only so far, but God sees the bigger picture. When he sends us a signal, it's wise to obey, no matter what we may think WE know. 

Perspective matters!

He is a young man, yet experienced in vice and wickedness.

He is never found in opposing the works of sin.

He takes delight in the downfall of his neighbors.

He never rejoices in the prosperity of his friends.

He is always ready to help in destroying the peace of society.

He takes no pleasure in serving the Lord.

He is uncommonly active in spreading hatred among his friends.

He takes no pride in helping to promote the cause of Christianity.

He has never been careless in trying to tear down the church.

He makes no effort to overcome his evil passions.

He strives hard to build up Satan’s kingdom.

He lends no aid to the support of the Gospel among heathen people.

He contributes largely to the devil.

He will never go to heaven.

He must go where he will receive his just reward.

He is a young man, yet experienced.

In vice and wickedness, he is never found.

In opposing the works of sin, he takes delight.

In the downfall of his neighbors, he never rejoices.

In the prosperity of his friends, he is always ready to help.

In destroying the peace of society, he takes no pleasure.

In serving the Lord, he is uncommonly active.

In spreading hatred among his friends, he takes no pride.

In helping to promote the cause of Christianity, he has never been careless.

In trying to tear down the church, he makes no effort.

To overcome his evil passions, he strives hard.

To build up Satan’s kingdom, he lends no aid.

To the support of the Gospel among heathen people, he contributes largely.

To the devil, he will never go.

To heaven, he must go, where he will receive his just reward.

Perspective matters in our understanding and getting ready for our spiritual journeys

It’s why Jesus reminded us that there would be hard times, it’s why Peter has been talking at such length about suffering, the point?

Don’t be surprised by what life demands of us, what Satan throws at us, or what comes our way!

So what is your perspective, how do you operate in day to day mode?

To put it in another way, how do you view your spiritual walk, your spiritual disciplines?

If you view it as a chore, a chore it will be

If you view it as a need, a need it will be

What if you viewed it as a war, a battle?

As Peter ends his extended section on suffering and submission, he brings it back to Jesus

Since Jesus suffered, we need to change our mentality, suffering should be expected

The reason this is laid out this way, is that it helps us prep for what to expect

It would be akin to going to bootcamp, and then simply watching Band of Brothers before you are deployed, not very helpful!

So today, let’s consider this, Peter is laying out our battle plan strategy for how we live in this life that is enemy territory, and always seeking to bring us down

That’s broken into two parts, outward and inward

How we deal with the enemy at the frontlines, and how do we live when we are at home base!

Living for God in Enemy Territory (v.1-6)

War is a Mindset (v.1-2)

So the very first thing that Peter says is we have to have that mindset of going to war!

Christ knew he was fighting a war, and you saw the cost on the cross, it was his very blood, yet that is our greatest hope, the war is already won, we are just waiting for the news to reach the frontlines

Peter wants us to arm ourselves with this mindset, that when we suffer from our sinful desires, we are done with sin!

Peter is using intentional military language, it is the term used of a soldier strapping on their armor, and is much of the same that Paul speaks of when considering the armor of God

Let’s look at a Paul really quick, in Ephesians 6:10–18 “10 Finally, be strengthened by the Lord and by his vast strength. 11 Put on the full armor of God so that you can stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this darkness, against evil, spiritual forces in the heavens. 13 For this reason take up the full armor of God, so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and having prepared everything, to take your stand. 14 Stand, therefore, with truth like a belt around your waist, righteousness like armor on your chest, 15 and your feet sandaled with readiness for the gospel of peace. 16 In every situation 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 Pray at all times in the Spirit with every prayer and request, and stay alert with all perseverance and intercession for all the saints.

Unfortunately, the thing is we fall into two traps that prevent us from the arming of our brains

First we might not arm our brain

Look, arming your brain takes work, and effort, and that is not always enjoyable!

When we have a long day at work, or a long week even more, our default today is to do something to numb our brains, to let our brains go into zombie mode

We want to binge watch Netflix, just go and have fun with friends at the bar and drown our sorrows in social escapism, and the bottle of alcohol, or just copious hours of playing video games, etc

You get the point, it’s simply letting our brains go on auto-pilot so we get a break!

Second we might not know how to arm our brain, or are unwilling to

So what does arming ourselves look like? What does putting on God’s armor look like?

The first part is remember you are in a battle against sin, that sin is in you, that sin is outside of you, and that sin is in your friends, family, and every other person in this world

If you daydream on a battlefield, you are going to wake up from that daydream face to face with Jesus, and for us, it’s even worse, because our daydreaming will take us away from Jesus, and right into the enemy camp as a POW

When we realize that we are in a battle, then we realize that the things we are watching, listening to, pondering on, none of them are neutral. I hate to break it to you, neutrality is a myth!

When we listen to music we can tell if they are in line with Christian values, and desires. It doesn’t take a lot to realize that Nikki Minaj is not writing music that is honoring a view of people that Christians would hold to

I did look at the top 100 billboard chart and several of the lyrics, and surprise, it is the same stuff it’s always been,

demeaning women as sexual conquests to be had, and your worth is how much you make men thirst over you, in person or the gram

When we consider things like media, how much do we let in that we shouldn’t?

I remember when Game of Thrones was all the rave, but I never watched an episode. Not because I don’t love dragons and high fantasy, but because I knew that in reality it was simply an excuse for excessive violence and softcore porn

This is not simply a sex, or swearing issue, it is a topic issue, we should have equal issue with our news channels and political commentary, and how they speak of people, how truthfully they speak, and that is equally problematic for both sides of the aisle!

Movies and TV shows are much more nuanced in their goodness and badness, than a 3 minutes pop song is, but we need to be thinking critically, using our brains to work through it

Perhaps a good question, is would you invite Jesus over to watch that show with you? Or would you have an issue if Jesus came back and raptured us and you were watching that piece of media?

So we need to have our brains on when we engage with media, they are always trying to sell us a message, we can’t simply accept that without using our brains!

Arm yourselves knowing that we are fighting a war, and so it will not be easy, we need to allow our minds to be on, to filter the utter garbage that would otherwise come into our minds

It means that you might have to put in some work, you might have to suffer a little by being more selective about the media that you choose to watch and listen to

Notice in v.2 that Peter tells us there should be change, we should want the things of God, and not the human desires that we had before!

Put this in context, Peter is writing to people that went to pagan temples full of innumerable wicked gratifications.

Temple Prostitution, including wickedness done to minors, and you didn’t generally choose the prostitution lifestyle

Killing for entertainment aka Colosseum

While killing babies was outlawed, they were abandoned and picked up and made into various types of slaves if they survived, particularly the young women

Perverting justice by bribery, and torture for people to say what they wanted them to say

So Peter is saying, you had your time, you should be concerned with what Jesus wants you to do now, not being led by your base instinct as an animal

We don’t accidentally get drunk, or end up engaging in wickedness, we walk towards it, and keep walking towards it, much to our failure

So it will be painful, and it might even cost us friendships, in order for you and I to keep our character!

Are you prepared to suffer a little bit to stay faithful to Jesus who suffered the universes’ sin upon himself to break you free from that life?

Are you going to view this as a bummer, or is it a chance to grow and refine yourself?

Story of Dad and his arm broken and unset/improperly set and correlation to faith journey

Disengage Contact with the Enemy (v.3-4)

Which leads us to the second point, we need to listen to the commander, and he’s calling a break off of fighting with the enemy!

We had enough time, we were actually in the enemy camp as POW, thinking things were great, but they were anything but!

Peter says that time was sufficient for us to experience the non-Christian life, full of that list we have in verse 3

So if you are changed by the grace of Jesus, and don’t want to do those things, don’t want to get drunk at work parties, or suddenly change your sexual ethic, people notice, and people ridicule

Just think of the names, ‘goody-two-shoes’ or ‘prude’ or ‘you’re not a real man because you are still a virgin’, ‘bigot’, ‘judgmental Christian’, etc

I know of more than one friend who has come to Christ, or started to really take their faith seriously, and when they take the step to start honoring Jesus by how they live, these things happen

In fact, they lose friends, and entire friend groups, all because they find out their friendships are simply based on drinking, drugs, or womanizing, so they don’t actually have anything in common with them, even if they try to keep it going

In essence, those you partied with, will now mock you for walking away from it

But this is not about dramatic testimonies, as awesome as those are, just watch the “I Am Second” films, from like Brian Head Welch, or Lacey Sturm!

You see, you might be like me, a church rat, or a typical ‘good’ kid, that doesn’t really rock the boat

You might not even be old enough to drink, but certainly would not do drugs, you are the apple of your parents eyes, and the list here, sounds about as far away from you as a failing grade at school!

I remember, coming to faith at 4, i would have times of being jealous that these other people got a chance to sin!

Yet what I realized is that those of us that are church rats, or good kids, we have the same problem, it’s simply the same heart issues flowing out another way

Instead of following Jesus, we were following ourselves

A life marked by quiet pride, smug self-righteousness, lazy comfort-seeking, and poisonous people-pleasing is equally empty, asinine, and keeps you an enemy of God

You can have a good life, without God in the center

It’s not about what you did or did not do, it is about who is ruling and reigning from the throne of your life!

This is what Peter pushes back against!

Kingdom of Self, which is unhelpful, particularly on a battlefield, since that will get people killed and captured!

What does it look like to be vilified, or slandered, when you don’t rush into the same things that everyone does?

I think Jen is a good example, we can all congratulate Jen on his retirement!

He had several people really urge him to not retire quite yet, and they tried to keep him in various ways! After all, who wouldn’t want a raise or to build up that retirement account a little bit more!

Yet Jen took that pushback, which is not vilifying him, it’s just they can’t really comprehend by worldly standards why he would do this now, and Jen’s answer? God has set it as this is my time, so I’m going to listen to God

I also had an experience like this in High School

I had my Advisor come and push against me going to Bible School after HS! When I was a senior, I knew I was going to Moody, but he was like you should do all these other things and apply to these other schools for non-ministry degrees.

My math teacher that year in Pre-calc also did the same. At Parent-Teacher conferences she begged my parents to try and get me to change to engineering, because she knew I would probably excel at it!

They were both non-Christians as far as I knew, and both pretty good people, but they couldn’t figure out why I would pick church work over a lucrative job like engineering!

We will stand out, sometimes what God calls us to is not logical by this world’s standards, but God works it out!

So we have to ask ourselves on the battle lines, are we fully committed to the battle?

Are there things we still cling to from our old ways of lives, old sins we don’t want to quite let go of?

Doesn’t means simply dramatic ‘big sins’ like Peter lists here, but perhaps the things that cling to you are the quiet sins of respectable selfishness

Things like being career first

Follow Jesus as long as it doesn’t cost you upward mobility, college or career dreams, etc

People Pleasing

All so you appear kind or compliant, but it is the fear of rejection that drives you, rather than the love and acceptance of God.

You avoid the hard things for comfort, and you are a peace keeper, rather than Peace Maker that Jesus calls us to be!

Selective Obedience

Perhaps you like Jesus, but you don’t like all the stuff he commands us to!

So you can say this command or that command or this passage or that passage doesn’t apply for various reasons

You get to be the arbiter of truth, and you get to determine how much God demands out of you!

Ultimately, we might have had a wild life of sin, or a quiet life where you were the silent king/queen of your own life

Ultimate Jesus did not come simply to forgive our sins, but to take the very throne of our hearts for himself, and that is how we are able to live a life for Jesus!

Remember the stakes of the Mission (v.5-6)

In this final section here, we have to remember the mission stakes

If you were on seal team 6, and you knew you were going to take out Osama Bin Laden, you would take that mission seriously.

If you were on a mission of mock training back in the US, the stakes are not as high, and the involvement for even the best will be lowered!

So we need to remember that God gets the final say, and not the world!

This allows us to fight against the rejection that we face from those that we called friends, or even family that can’t understand why we are crazy about that ‘Jesus’ stuff

In fact, this is one of the joys those who love Jesus, yet have died have already experienced, they are found to be not wanting before God

Story of Cam and what I thought needed to be changed, is what God used to spread his name

Cam might have been judged by the flesh, but now he lives spiritually by God’s standards!

What this reminds us is that we should not live lives that are based on approval of those here on earth!

To go one step farther, if we do live that way, we cannot have an effective walk with God

Peter is reminding us here it is not just a call to endure, but a call to evangelize

Life is short, but our eternity is a long time

When we keep the end, and return of Jesus in mind, it doesn’t make us paranoid, but passionate in our fight and our mission

All so we can get as many POW as possible from the enemy!

Living for God in Home Base (v.7-11)

Patrol the Base in Prayer (v.7)

So we have a battle plan when we are out there, in the fight, keeping ourselves reigned in and self-controlled, keeping our eyes on our mission, and our commander who asks nothing of us that he has not done

So when we come back to base, we still have to remember we are in a war zone

No easier way to make the enemy fold and retreat than taking out the forward operating base!

Peter says since Jesus returning is near, it helps us make the main thing, the main thing, and it does!

There are a few things listed here, the first being sober-minded, self-controlled, all so we might pray some more!

This is in direct opposition to what we used to live like, simply thrown to and fro with our instincts, let revelry run the show!

We are self-controlled, and sober minded so we might best arm our minds!

You don’t want the bomb squad shaking off a hang-over when they got work to do right!

The reason this mindset is so important, is because it helps know we are in our right mind when we communicate with God

We are not working with compromised mental faculties, but we can do our best to communicate to God, and he to us, we have a clear comm line to HQ

So we have to ask, is your spiritual life like that? Is it sober, self-controlled?

Are you numbed by distraction?

What does your prayer life look like?

Love is the bond that keeps us going (v.8)

The second ideal for our home base interaction is that we love intensely, so we might forgive radically

Loving each other in the church passionately is not ignoring sin, it is often confronting it, but with grace, kindness, and tender care

As Warren Weirsbe said

Truth without love is brutality, and love without truth is hypocrisy

When we go through suffering, we tend to get short with those closest to us, and love helps us to let them roll off our back, rather than take root and allow bitterness to grow

You can think of almost any war movie, and the thing that gets those people through the impossible mission is the love of their squad, it’s the same for us

So the question here is does your love cover a multitude of sins, or when things happen to you, does it expose your pride and ego?

Serve without reservations (v.9)

In verse 9 we have hospitality, which is harder to do the more things are difficult

When life gets hard, and church gets hard, our base reaction is to generally withdraw!

Yet, hospitality rejects that, hospitality is an outpouring of love, it is sacrificial by nature, it will cost you something

It is not simply having people over, it is opening up our lives to real life together!

The question we must ponder on hospitality is: Who needs your home, your presence, your care, and what is stopping you from doing it?

Fighting Together: The Roles in God’s Squadron (v.10-11)

Finally, we reach the final expectation while we are on home base, and that is to serve and glorify Jesus, by serving and helping bless others

God gives every single person in his church a gift, and there is no definitive list, but there are general categories: serving or speaking

Whether God has given you the ability to teach, or to have a heart of helping stack chairs, it is to glorify God, not what we do

Paul speaks of this even more in depths to the church in Corinth, and reminds them that there is no forgotten, unseen, or unuseful gift in the church, but we are all needed to do our part to help God be glorified.

The struggle then is are we freeloading, are we simply along for the ride?

Do we come and consume our spirituality the same way we might consume Netflix, or a movie, or copious amounts of food? Or are we building up the base, helping fortify the perimeter, helping train the recruits

We are at war after all, we are not in the HQ, we are simply a forward operating base, so we can’t let our guard down!

Conclusion

We have a battle plan!

First, we are at war, whether we like it or not, so don’t be surprised!

You serve God, so stop mingling with the enemy! Stop being treasonous!

Remember what is at stake, our very souls, as well as those we love, so we might give our all to the mission we have, take down the kingdom of Satan as much as possible

We also have a base we can retreat to, but we have expectations!

We need to be ready to pray and patrol, to be in a mindset of readiness to wherever we might be deployed to next on the field!

We need to love deeply, openly, and authentically, so that we can get through this war together. The road is long, and difficult, so we need that grace and love for each other

Fight with your skillset that God has given you to support others with. Whether you are a recon, a medic, a heavy machine gunner, you are in the Lord’s army, and you are needed! So use your gifts!

Benediction:

“As you go, remember:

You are not wandering aimlessly — you are sent on mission.

You are not standing alone — you are fortified by the love of Christ and the strength of His people.

Therefore:

Arm yourselves with the mind of Christ.

Live for the will of God, not the desires of the world.

Love deeply, serve faithfully, and speak boldly.

And may the God of all grace — who called you to His eternal glory —

strengthen you, fortify you, and empower you until the day you and I see Him face to face.

Go now in His great, inexhaustible strength and incomparable peace.

In the name of Jesus, the one who fights for us, and before us, Amen.”