Helmet of Salvation (2)

We are back. How many of you are enjoying being back to school?

How many of you enjoyed our back to school party?

We loved watching you all just hangout and have a good time. We prayed that it would be a fruitful night, that you would all get to talk with one another, hangout, and grow closer together through the jousting and the dunking each other in the dunk tank and through all the things that we did.

But tonight we are stepping back into our ‘Front Lines’ series where we are talking about the war, the spiritual war that we all are in and the victory we already have in the battle through Christ and that we don’t have to worry or wonder about how the battle will end because the victory is already won.

We don’t have to fight for the victory,

we don’t have to stress or be anxious about the outcome because the war was won on the cross at Calvary.

BUT

It is up to us to endure and persevere as a ‘Soldier of Christ Jesus’ by remaining faithful to him because like we talked about two weeks ago, there is an enemy in this war that we’re in. While that is true, that we do have an enemy, I want us to focus not on that but instead on what Jesus says in John 10:10.

John 10:10 ESV

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

From the mouth of Jesus, He says that He has come so we MAY have life.

Not so we will have life but that we MAY have life.

We are going to talk about that life tonight as we begin looking not just at the war that we are in but looking at the armor that Paul tells us to fit ourselves with in this war.

When going to war we know that it is not just important to go in with the mindset of taking out the enemy or coming out the other side victorious but there is something engrained into us that we want to protect ourselves because we know we are going into crossfire.

You are in the fight NOW and so what armor are you putting on to protect you in this fight?

How many of you have played paintball?

When I was growing up I got to hangout with the youth group at my church all the time. From the time I was born until I was able to be apart of it myself I was an honorary member of the youth group because my dad was the youth pastor at my church. For a long time I had to sit back and watch as the big kids got to do their big kid things but one day, when I was old enough I got to join in on the tradition of paintball.

The youth group would come together all the time and play these games of paintball and I was never allowed to join because I was too young. I wasn’t ready or prepared for the fast paced projectiles that would cross my path or come directly at me and I wasn’t ready for the impact they would have when they would hit me.

But eventually the day came.

My dad was getting ready to load the youth group on the bus and take them to the nearest town that had a paintball course.

As the day came closer I begged, BEGGED my dad to finally let me come and play with them. Finally he let me come.

HERE IT WAS.

The day had come, I got to play with the big kids! I was so excited to finally be apart but I was also scared.

Scared of the sting of the paintball hitting me.

Scared of being found in the sights of anyone and everyone

but I had made my choice, I was in this game.

Out of excitement and fear I put on my

thickest pair of jeans,

the only plastic armor that was at the bottom of the bucket of paintball gear

and topped it with my thickest hoodie and hopped on the bus.

I was ready. TERRIFIED. But ready.

We get to the course and I was ready to go.

I had my gun filled and my mask on and I sat waiting nervously as everyone else casually got their stuff together.

Finally I go out and huddle up with my team as we come up with a strategy to take the other teams flag and return it to our base and as I was sitting there trying to pay attention I kept getting distracted by the fear of getting hit with a ball of paint being fueled by a can of compressed air coming at me.

Next thing I know the buzzer goes off.

I knew that meant GAME ON.

I leave our base, shaking, I find trees for cover as I make my way to the other side until I get to this clearing.

I look out as the dumb and frightened 10 year old boy that I was and thought to myself “Nows the time”. So I go for it, As fast I can with purpose and everything to lose I begin running to the other teams flag before I knew it I realize that I AM EXPOSED. None of my team is with me, there’s no more cover, and as soon as that thought hits me, so does something else.

A PAINTBALL hitting my face at the speed of light nearly knocks me off my feet.

I can’t see,

I don’t know what’s going on,

but what I did know is that all that worrying I did was for nothing. I still remember feeling the relief that there was something between me and the ball of paint that had exploded all over my mask.

The mask I was wearing protected me from the thing trying to take me out. I felt protected and more than that I felt ready to keep going.

The fear that I had,

the thoughts that I let consume me before I even got on the bus that day,

all of the things that I let affect me and how I made my choices were all gone

because I realized that what I was equipped with was there to protect me from something I couldn’t protect myself from. It gave me assurance that I was okay.

That’s what the armor of God does. It equips you and protects you in battle in a way that you couldn’t on your own. That’s the importance of the armor of God that we will be talking about tonight.

Ephesians 6:10–13 ESV

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.

The Battle Is Real

This passage is not about people. It’s not about how to win the battles your are facing by yourself it is about recognizing that the battle is real and it has already started. It’s about putting on the armor. Taking what God supplies and clothing yourself in that because it protects you from what’s on the line.

In a fight there are stakes and in this fight the stakes are high.

The enemy is trying to attack your…

identity

insecurities

…and fill your life and your mind with…

temptation

doubt

This is the battleground for this war. The way you see yourself and the way the devil wants you to see yourself. He wants you to think that you are

broken

too far gone

depressed

not good enough

damaged

alone

and worthless

These are the lies he tells you.

He tries to convince you that this is where your identity is and that’s not your identity anymore.

You’re none of those things.

You can be made new in Christ. you have value and purpose, and you belong.

You can now belong to Christ. You no longer have to be someone trying to find their place and find where you belong because you can belong to Christ.

Those labels that you used to think define you is not what defines you. Rather what you choose to let define you will affect how you think, how you act, and how you live.

A new identity does not mean no more screw ups it only means that those screw-ups are not what defines you. It means that your sin no longer gets to define who you are.

A Christian will still struggle with

temptation,

anger,

insecurity,

doubt,

pride,

But those struggles aren't your identity.

Your identity is is found in Jesus and He say’s you have purpose and value.

BUT one of the biggest places the enemy will attack us, one of the biggest wars in our life that can move us farther from Jesus and where we can become captured by isolation and loneliness is the war in our MINDS.  

Your spiritual battleground starts in your mind

That is why we need to equip ourselves with the helmet of salvation found in verse 17 of Ephesians chapter 6. Satan knows that he can grab ahold of your life and the way you live by sowing seeds of doubt and of lies in your mind.

He knows these lies, that if you let them, they will directly affect your relationship with God. You have to protect your mind otherwise you will be overcome by your

doubt

fear

feelings of worthlessness and loneliness.

How many of you today are struggling with loneliness?

How can so many of you in a room full of people feel so alone?

How can so many of you in a room full of people seeing others struggling with feeling alone be so hesitant about making them feel welcome and showing them that they belong?

Satan gets in your head too. He convinces you that if you go up to these people you don’t know yet or aren’t friends with yet that you will be seen as weird. Or that it’s not something you can do because you’re too awkward, or they’re too weird or they’re not gonna like me because they’re gonna think I’m weird.

All of these things are all lies from the enemy that you have let define your life for too long. You have to follow the command in 1 Thessalonians 5:8

1 Thessalonians 5:8 NLT

But let us who live in the light be clearheaded, protected by the armor of faith and love, and wearing as our helmet the confidence of our salvation.

Why the Helmet Matters

This helmet protects your mind. The place where you will get attacked the most. Convincing you how you feel about yourself, about God, and if you’re really loved, seen, and forgiven. The helmet of salvation is not just a one way ticket to heaven when you leave this life behind but it is protection for you and for you mind TODAY.

For here and for now.

So before we talk more about putting on this helmet of salvation let’s talk about and make it clear what that salvation actually is.

Salvation means being saved from danger or from harm. The very idea and concept of needing saving means that there is something that we need to be saved from. So what is it that we need to be saved from?

We all know the answer, the answer is we need to be saved from our sin.

Well what is sin?

What does it do?

Sin isn’t just an action. Sin isn’t just breaking the rules. It’s not just about not doing what you’re supposed to do. SIN means you have missed the mark.

It not only means that you have just not hit the right target but that when you have missed the right target that you have instead hit the wrong one. It is sin that leads you away from God and it is sin that becomes a barrier in the relationship between you and God.

Isaiah 59:2 NLT

It’s your sins that have cut you off from God. Because of your sins, he has turned away and will not listen anymore.

Your sin separates you from God. The creator. The one who created you, IN HIS IMAGE. And this is not just some of you this is all of us, starting with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. They walked in the garden with God until they disobeyed Him and they were kicked out of the garden and separated from that relationship with Him. And if it wasn’t them it would’ve been you because we are all sinners, we are all guilty of missing the mark.

Romans 3:23 NLT

For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.

We have all missed the mark in our life, and because we all have missed the mark we are now separated from God by this thing we call sin. The bible tells us that there is a price that has to be paid for our sin. Romans 6 says that the wages of our sin is death. A wage is a payment based off of and decided by the work done by an individual.

That means that when we sin the payment for that is death. That when we sin we deserve death.

Since we are all sitting here in this room very much alive that means we have a debt to pay.

This means that you have no claim to the righteousness that is found in Christ Jesus based on our own obedience because we all have missed the mark of what God commands of us.

But there is good news.

Romans 5:8 NLT

But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.

That death that Christ suffered was payment for the debt that we owe because of our sin. Jesus died in our place. It was our sin that deserved death, it was our sin that demanded death and it was Jesus who put on our sin in His death and paid the price for the debt that we owe.

He is the son of God and that death bought our freedom when we make the choice to make Him the Lord of our life. And we can have confidence in this because the tomb is there and it is empty. No one lays in that tomb today because 3 days after Christ was crucified he rose from the dead to show us that He was who He said He was and He still is today.

And today he offers us a gift.

He offers us grace that when we believe in Him we are saved.

Not by becoming good enough.

Not by living a cleaned up and holy life

Not by the works you can accomplish in your life

But by Him and Him only can you be saved.

Ephesians 2:8–9 NLT

God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.

The Gift

Salvation is recieved not earned.

It is a gift not a performance.

Salvation is God doing for you what you could never do for yourself.

It has nothing to do with what we have done or what we could do but how we choose to respond to His invitation

Satan can destroy the assurance and the confidence we have that we are saved. Our salvation, our standing with God, does not change and is not minimized by our success or failure in our obedience. But Satan is determined to convince us that it does.

So if it's a gift — how do you know if you've actually got it? That's where a lot of people begin to doubt.

How Do I Know?

Almost every believer at one time or another begins to doubt and begins to ask "did I really mean it? Am I really saved?"

But we don’t have to ask ourselves that because God’s word is true. Our assurance is in His word not in our feelings because our feelings manipulate our minds and deceive us.

(Band can come up)

Romans 10:9–10 NLT

If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are saved.

It is by belief and confession that you are saved.

Not your feelings on a certain day.

Not your moments of weakness

but how He has strengthened you by the power of His Spirit. We are to live this life with the confidence that God’s promises are true. They take place over our feelings and struggles of doubt and failure.

1 John 5:11–13 NLT

And this is what God has testified: He has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have God’s Son does not have life. I have written this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know you have eternal life.

This not a hope so.

This is a know so.

This is what the helmet of salvation is, this is what it does. This is the helmet doing it’s job.

It’s not being led by your feelings, your thoughts, your doubts, your “truth”

It’s about placing God’s truth, the real truth, and His word over all of your doubts and struggles. When doubt attacks truth protects your mind.

Salvation is not just a decision. It is not just a stat of being, it’s not just something you believe quietly in your head but it shows up in a way that is evident on the outside.

You have to spend time in scripture everyday so you can recognize God’s truth over the enemy’s lies

You have to surround yourself with friends who share your identity in Christ

You have to stop watching TV, movies, and listening to the music that doesn’t align with how God has called you to live

Maybe this looks like memorizing scripture, or writing it down and putting it in a place where you will see it everyday.

Maybe this looks like listening to worship music and giving God praise throughout your day not just on a Sunday morning or Wednesday night.

Maybe this looks like finding friends who share your new identity or even being in a season where it is just you and God for a little while.

Your salvation shows up in how you act, how you live, it shows up when you declare to the world that Jesus Christ is the lord of your life and take on that confession into the waters of baptism.

The Next Step

Baptism is not the thing that saves us but it shows the world that there is something that has happened to you. That you have been made new by the power and the blood of Jesus Christ.

Romans 6:3–4 ESV

Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

When you go under the water you are declaring to the world that the old you, the one that was ruled by sin and led by your own desires, the one that was defined and labeled by what the world has convinced you of, that you are not defined by that anymore.

You are not the person you used to be.

You have been resurrected into new life and you have been made new in Christ. You have been saved from sin and death and brought into the saving grace that Christ offers.

When you have been given new life from Christ you are supposed to show that to the world through the waters of baptism because baptism is not a someday thing, it is the next thing. Acts 2:41

Acts 2:41 ESV

So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.

When Peter shared the good news , the gospel of Jesus Christ to the world on the day that His spirit came down and was made available to all people everywhere they were baptized as a response to their new identity and their new life in Christ. That the old was washed away and they were a new creation in Christ.

2 Corinthians 5:17 NLT

This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

Putting It On Out Loud

That new life can begin today.

You can call his name and be saved.

You can call on His name and be set free and delivered.

You can walk in newness of Life not led by and dragged down by your sin but renewed and empowered by the Holy Spirit. Because what happens when you receive salvation is found in…

Romans 8:11 NLT

The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.

That very same Spirit can live inside of you and you can be made new.

free from your sin.

Free from death

Made whole from your brokenness

delivered from your depression into joy

released from your anxiety and given peace that you can never understand

When you confess and believe in Jesus and what He has done for you your life will be changed drastically.

The world will leave you broken, empty, and alone but Jesus can give you life and He will give it abundantly.

You can call his name right now and be saved.

You can call his name right now and be delivered

You can call his name right now and be rescued.

You can call his name, that’s all you got to do.

If you’ve never trusted in Jesus today can be that day.

If you already have, but you've never been baptized you can make that decision today.

Putting on the helmet isn't private.

It may feel like the most uncomfortable thing in the world to get out of your chair and put it into action but that feeling of discomfort will not compare to the comfort that you will feel when you get to the altar of your life.

Put on the helmet of salvation today.

Put on the helmet before you walk out the door.