More than what meets the eye

Illustration on fighting the unseen battle

As we begin tonight, I want to paint a picture in your head.

Imagine you are standing in front of a curtain. A tall curtain and you know there is something on the other side. You are not sure what it is, but you know its dangerous, and it can harm you.

But it looks intriguing. From where you are standing, all you can see is the carved out imagine of what looks to be a nice person.

You know it is dangerous because others have told you it is, but without pulling back the curtain to reveal its true dangerousness - you really will never understand it.

Fighting the devil and its evilness, is much like I just described.

We know that sin is wrong, and we know that all the devil wants to do is ruin our lives.

We know that sin is dangerous, but we also know that sin can be intriguing at times, but what we also know is sin always leads to death.

And the truth is, if we are not properly prepared to fight the temptatous lies of the devil that tell us we can continue in sin, and it wont impact our life- we will ruin our life real quickly.

If we do not expose the lies and the strategies of the devil then we will be content to sit on the other side of the current and be entertained by the sins of this world.

We can not know what is behind the curtain if we do not remove the curtain.

Over the next 5 weeks, we are going to pull back the curtain, pullback the unknown of the devil and expose his lies and strategies so that we are prepared to fight a faithful fight in glory, while using the Holy Spirit has our guide.

I just want to prepare you all before we break into this passage tonight and the next 5 weeks.

The Holy Spirit, the things that we can not see, the devil, temptation, spiritual warfare, and lies. These are all big words that can be scary. But I want to encourage you to focus on what scripture says about these things, my encouragment to you is to lay aside any pre coinvicinced notions and let the word of God speak to you and show you what is true.

Secondly, I want to encourage you to ask questions. Be curious.

Ask me questions, most of you all have my phone number - ask me questions about these things. I can not promise all the anserrs but my hope is to push you closer to Christ.

So, let us not be distracted by what we do or do do not know about the Holy Spirit, but let us be learners who seek to learn from his word and walk in holy obedience.

Romans 8:9 “You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.”

We have been given the holy spirit to fight against the devil.

It’s going to be a deep, hard, and uncomfortable 5 weeks. But, I look forward to seeing the Lord grow our hearts in faithfulness unto him, while removing any power that we may give the devil in our life.

Let us pray.

We are going to be in Ephesians 6 this evening, so if you have your Bible you can go ahead and turn there. Ephesians is the 10th book in the New Testament, placed right after Galatians. If you have gotten to Revelation, then you have gone too far.

Ephesians 6:10-14 is where we will be.

Just a little background on Ephesians.

Who knows who Ephesians was written by? Paul

Who knows who Ephesians was written to? Church of Ephesus

The first three chapter of Ephesians focus on the Gospel story.

Then there is one word that sets the stage for the last three chapters of Ephesians.

Does anyone know what that word is? ‘Therefore”

So we have the Gospel story in the first three chapter and in the last 3 chapters Paul sets the stage for how we are to live out the Christian life. In Chapter 4, Paul implores the church to live with, “all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love,” easy, right?

There is this theme that we will see throughout these chapters of taking off the old self and putting on the new self.

Take off and put on

Take off lies and put on truth

Take off anger and put on peace

Take off theft and put on generosity

Take off gossip and put on encouragement

Take off revenge and put on forgiveness

And now we find ourselves in Chapter 6 verse 10.

Let’s read together.

Ephesians 6:10–17 “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,”

Let’s pray together.

The sermon this week is titled, More than what meets the eye. I choose this title because we face a battle that we can not see. A battle, that is one of the most important in our life, but something we can not see with the human eye.

Paul says of this battle, in verse 12.

Ephesians 6:12 “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”

How does that make you feel? How do these words make you feel? I want honest answers…

When I say the words

“For we wrestle against cosmic powers over this present darkness”

“against the spiritual forces of evil”

How do they make you feel? OR what questions do you have?

Students, Paul does not say

> Some of you will be in a spiritual battle and some of you wont

> Some of you will have to fight against the devil but others wont fight is as much

No

Paul makes a very clear statement > For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against rulers, authorities, spiritual forces of evil etc.

No exceptions, not for certain people, but for all people.

You are in a spiritual battle.

Right now.

Tomorrow you will be in a spiritual battle.

When you share the gospel with your friends, you will be in a spiritual battle.

When you choose to say no to sin and put on Christ you will be in a spiritual battle.

And if you choose to ignore that, or think you are not > I would almost guarantee you that you are losing the battle.

Our first point tonight is this.

We are in a spiritual war, and if we choose to ignore that reality, we will lose every battle.

For those who know history, what is a war made up of? Battles

Life is a spiritual war, but every day we will face spiritual battles that we must be prepared to fight.

Students spiritual battles matter because God is perfect and holy and their is an enemy who thinks otherwise.

We will talk next week about common battles we face but this week - I want us to work on understanding the reality of evil. But the story does not end there. There is a Spirit who has been given to us, to fight every battle.

We are in a spiritual war, and if we choose to ignore that and not deploy the Holy Spirit in our fight, we will lose every battle.

Billy Graham said, “the moment you receive Christ as your savior you will know the devil is very much alive”

This battle that we will come to see and fight is often known as spiritual warfare.

Let’s break this definition down.

Definition of Spiritual - Jerry Root had this to say about the definition of the word spiritual. It is the immaterial part of human life.

So we have material things like our Bible. This microphone.

But the word spiritual is the immaterial part of life, the things we can not see - the soul, which consists of reason, which we would call that thinking, emotion, or feelings, and volition, or choosing.

Meaning it helps us to make decisions or choose things and all of these impact how we relate to God and experience moral and spiritual realities.

Definition of warfare -

engagement or activities involving war or conflict

So, we put this together and the definition of spiritual warfare that we get is…

Spiritual Warfare - The immaterial battle that we fight, that we cannot see, a battle that exists within the soul and involves thinking, feelings, and choosing.

How about when you know you want to do something you should not do?

Maybe you feel like you need to share the gospel and your story but there is a voice telling you not to do it?

Maybe you feel tempted to gossip about someone.

This spiritual warfare that we fight, often shows itself by way of temptations.

When we are faced with temptation, we must be ready to fight spiritual warfare.

But, I want to to note to you that spiritual warfare is more then just temptation.

Lies from the Devil that are planted in your head.

It would be good for you to indulhe in this.

Accusation or condenmation

You are a loser, who no one likes

Distractions from God’s purposes in our life

That is our 2nd point this evening.

When we are faced with temptation, we must be ready to fight spiritual warfare.

These temptation which include

Temptations

Say things we should not say

Do things we should not do

Do not do things we should do

Temptations to indulge in things we should not

It is when we give way to these temptations, when we choose to give into the desires of the flesh, when we choose ourselves rather then God. That is what takes us further from God.

So with these things in mind, let’s look at Paul’s message to the Church.

Look at verse 10 and 11.

Ephesians 6:10–11 “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.”

Paul leaves the people of Ephesus with guidance on fighting these battles saying

“be strong in the Lord, and in the strength of his might”

“Put on the whole armor of God”

I want us to notice the word “whole” in chapter 11.

Paul says, Put on the whole armor of God.

God does not merely give us a couple of things to fight temptation. He does not leave us with 10 tips and tricks for overcoming sin and walking in holiness.

He has left us the whole armor.

Isaiah 59:17 describes this armor saying, “He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head; he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and wrapped himself in zeal as a cloak.”

Picture of armor.

This knight, is covered in armor.

He has

a breastplate

a helmet

a cloak

He is covered in head to toe in armor. This is the armor of God that Paul implores us to put on.

That when we put on these things we may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.

When we do this, when we put on the armor of God - the schemes, and the tricks of the devil will die, they will fade.

Obviously, I am not imploring you to go and dress up as a knight, so let us look at what this armor actually is.

Let’s pick up in verse 13

Ephesians 6:13–17 “Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,”

Paul has given us the whole rundown.

Go ahead and shout out the parts of the armor that God has given us.

Truth

Righteousness

Readiness

Faith

Salvation

Word of God

Students, we must equip ourselves with this things, in order for us to respond to Spiritual warfare.

Consider arriving to your basketball game without your shoes…. what would happen?

Late

Automatic Loss

Maybe showing up to school without your backpack?

Not prepared for a test or a quiz

Will not have all the right books

The same thing is true for spiritual warfare.

If we want to “stop” sinning, if we want to win the battle that is against the spiritual forces of evil.

We must be prepared.

We must be equipped.

So let’s look 1 by 1 at the six things that Paul leaves us with.

Maybe there is 1 or 2 you need to grow in.

Maybe you have not even thought about these things.

Maybe you do not even understand spiritual warfare.

Listen to these things that God has left us as weapons against evil.

Truth -

The definition of truth is something that is true.

Students, we must put on truth from the word of God.

We must be equipped with the basic doctrines or ideas of our faith.

Some of these include…

We are sinful people in need of a savior

Our sin deserves a punishment, so God, in his love and kindness, sent Jesus to be born, live a perfect life, and die for the sake of our sin.

We are saved and called to Bless the Lord with our life (we bless the Lord by living faithfully, and being obedient to his word)

Righteousness -

What does the word righteousness mean?

the quality of being morally right or justifiable.

That is not us.

But for those who have been saved by faith in Christ alone - he has made you righteous.

2 Corinthians 5:21 “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

We have become the righteousness of God

How do we put this on?

We stand firm in that believe.

We defend who we are in Christ.

Not what we have done, but what God has done in us.

We stand in this belief, knowing when the lies and temptations come - our identify does not come from what the world says about us, but who God says we are and he has made us righteous in him.

Readiness -

Paul says that readiness comes by the gospel of peace.

We become ready to fight the battle, by being encouraged by the gospel

Students, the gospel is our greatest weapon when we are faced with spiritual warfare.

We must ready ourselves for this battle, by bringing the gospel of peace with us.

If we neglect to be ready, if we neglect to bring this truth with us > we will not be able to stand firm in the face of spiritual attacks

Readiness also means that we are always ready to fight against spiritual warfare. It means we are aware of the reality of spiritual warfare and known that it comes at any moment.

2 Timothy 4:2 “preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.”

The devil is always waiting to pounce and distract- we must be ready.

Faith -

Students, faith is the belief and confidence in something greater.

Faith is choosing to believe in what is true.

When we are attacked with lies, and temptation we must choose to believe in what is true.

Putting on faith means that when we are attacked by the devil, we choose to tell the devil no.

We choose to have faith in Christ, knowing his way is better

Salvation -

We have been saved from evil!

We have been set free, we have salvation in Christ.

Students, to put on salvation means we constantly embrace the freedom we have in Christ.

It means when we are in the midst of the battle, we remind ourselves that we are not slaves to sin, we are not destined for hell.

We have been saved, and we have been set free from our sin, we must remind ourselves of this in the midst of the war.

Word of God -

Lastly, we must equip ourselves with the word of God.

God has left this book for us, as a battle a defense in times of war.

Open the Psalms! It is so easy for us to fall into the lie that “I know God understands, but I just don’t understand and there is nothing that feels encouraging to me in this time”

The Psalms is full of encouragement, full of hope in the midst of trials.

Putting on the Word of God means we choose to spend daily time in his word.

It means we choose to set aside distractions and spend unintetruoted time in his word everyday.

It means we read and cherish it, praying that Christ would use it to equip us.

It means we prioritize Scripture memory.

Students, we must cover ourselves with these things.

There is an enemy out their who hates you, and wants to steal, kill, and destroy our loives, if we want to win the war - we must be prepared.

The band will come up. I want you to spend some time in prayer.

Consider which of these you do well

Consider where you struggle.

What spiritual battles are you fighting now?

Come, worship, ask for prayer.

Don’t be afraid.

Let’s pray