OOTD: The sword and prayer

Intro: welcome to our last bible study of this series that we’ve been in for the past few weeks. I’ve really enjoyed this series studying for it and getting to go through it with you guys. and even though i missed last week i know maegan did a great job at going through it with y’all.

So our series title is The Kingdom fit, kind of playing of the idea of different outfits that we wear. And for the last few weeks we have been talking about the Armor of God. we’ve talked about the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of readiness, the helmet of salvation, and the shield of faith.

Question: what do all of these pieces have in common, What does armor do?

Answer: Armor protects right, its a defensive tool. When we are getting attacked by the enemy in any way, we use this armor to protect ourselves from the attack.

We’ve been talking about the armor in the context of you guys starting back to school. which i hope you’ve already been able to use some of what you have learned so far. Because school, for you guys, is a mission field. Your school is where you have the most influence and access to people that need to have what you have.

And when we are starting to do what Jesus wants us to do and spread his kingdom, Your actually pushing back the other side, which is the darkness, When you live like Jesus at school your exposing the darkness that other students are living in, and the enemy will want to fight back.

And this is were the armor comes in. When we get attacked, when we get made fun of, or excommunicated from friend groups, we can use our faith, our righteousness, our truth, to keep ourselves safe and continue on our mission.

Now, finally, I’ve been drilling it into your guys that we are in an unseen battle, that there is more to this world than what we can see and we now know that there is armor to protect ourselves in it. Well, is armor all you need in a battle.

Absolutely not right, we need weapons and fortunately for us there are two weapons that we have to actually fight back against these unseen evil powers that surround us. Let’s look at the Verses that give us those weapons.

Ephesians 6:13–18 ESV

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, praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,

Question: from reading these verses what are the two weapons that God has given us to fight with

Answer: He’s given us the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God and He’s given us the ability to pray. These are our weapons for fighting against the enemy. prayer and the word of God is called the sword of the spirit. This is our access to the unseen world and the ability to fight in that place.

prayer and the word start first in the unseen and manifest into the physical world. So let me explain this in a simple-ish way. the word of God is like our bullets, our ammo, and prayer is our gun. We use prayer and the power we have in Jesus name to proclaim the word of God as judgement against the enemy.

So let’s focus of the word of God first. There is a great example of the word being used to fight the enemy in:

Matthew 4:1–11 “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” But he answered, “It is written, “ ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ ” Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, “ ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’ and “ ‘On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’ ” Jesus said to him, “Again it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’ ” Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “ ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’ ” Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him.”

Question: How did Jesus beat the devil in the wilderness when He was being tempted by him.

Answer: Jesus used the word of God to fight against the devil.

The devil is not creative, He can’t make or create anything. He’s been tempting humanity with the same things since the beginning of time and the God has given us, in his word, everything we need to stand against his schemes.

Every attack that the enemy can bring against you, God has an instruction for how to handle it, this is why the bible is called the sword. It is able to cut through all the lies and schemes of the devil and strike him down.

The devil comes to steal, kill, and destroy. And God does the opposite of that, He gives generously, he brings life, and builds us up. and the Bible is a primary way He does this. The bible counteracts the works of the devil.

So remember what i said earlier, the bible, also known as the word of God, is like our ammo. It gives us everything we need to fight back, so we have to store up as much as we can by actually reading it.

And this is pretty practical i think, How are we supposed to be sharing the Gospel and spreading the kingdom at school if we don’t know it. We can’t push back the darkness unless we have the light of the word of God shining through us

the word is full of God’s faithfulness which gives us confidence to fight as well as instruction for how to do it. So long story short we have to be reading our bible to be able to fight this battle and actually have success in it.

Next, we have prayer. Lets look at some examples of the power of Prayer

James 5:13–18 ESV

Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.

Question: What is this passage explaining to us

Answer: It’s showing us that prayer has many different functions, but in the most simplest form, prayer is how we interact with the unseen world and access God by agreeing with Him. there are many ways to pray. there is talking to God like a friend, there is asking him for things that we need, and there also declaration prayer, where you agree and stand of a promise of God, and there is warfare prayers where your in agreement with God to pray against the enemy.

This is how you push back on all of the set backs and struggles that you may go through as you walk out your faith at school. When we are made fun of, we pray, when we are shunned by our friends, we pray, when we are not seeing the breakthrough that we want in our school, we pray.

Prayer will go ahead of you and prepare the way. Remember that God is outside of time so you can be praying for the future now. We have to be strategic in how we approach our mission and we have the most powerful being in existence empowering us, we just have to use it by praying.

Prayer can empower you, and it can affect others. I want to be clear that prayer with be the make or break of your christian walk. if your don’t pray our like a soldier without a weapon in the middle of the battle field.

Conclusion: like i said earlier prayer is like the Gun and the word of God is the ammo. You can not go into battle without one, you need both to be able to fight. And i want to be clear on a few things as well. God is loving and merciful and graceful. He will guard us and protect us and keep us safe.

however He is clear that there is a battle between Christians and the unseen evil. And i know you may think, like i did when i was your age, that ill just t stay away from that so i don’t get attacked. well the truth is that when you accept Jesus and become a christian that you’re entering into the war.

If you are marked by Jesus the enemy is searching and studying us and fighting against us. But God is All-powerful and we know from the bible that We are guaranteed victory if we remain in Jesus and fight the enemy with our armor on and sword in hand.