Who are you fighting?
Notes
Transcript
Handout
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 tactics of the Devil. 12 For our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world powers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavens. 13 This is why you must 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 the shield of faith, and with it you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is God’s word. 18 Pray at all times in the Spirit with every prayer and request, and stay alert in this with all perseverance and intercession for all the saints. 19 Pray also for me, that the message may be given to me when I open my mouth to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel. 20 For this I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I might be bold enough in Him to speak as I should.
Intro:
Intro:
So where in Ephesians 6:10-20, which by the way, is an extremely popular passage for most Christians, right? Most have heard of the Armor of God, been pointed to this passage of the Bible, heard many sermons on it, etc… Frankly I think we are saturated with sermons on the Armor of God, I’ve preached on this passage before, and I in fact last time focused on the Stance Paul talks about here right, specifically how we are called to stand, how important our spiritual posture is, and so on. So this time, I want us to take a closer look at something else from this passage, I want us to answer the question, who are you fighting?
This is an important question isn’t it? Let me explain, many are fighting the wrong fights, the wrong people, the wrong enemy. Its dangerous when you fight the wrong enemy, we as believes must hone in on our fight.
Illustration: I remember the old Rock IV movie, he’s training to fight the Russian who killed his friend right, and in his training montage, he’s got this picture of his enemy up that he’s zeroed in on, he’s ready to fight and he’s training for that enemy.
That is exactly what we need to be doing my friends, we need to be honed in on who the real enemy is. It’s not your kids, it’s not your parents, it’s not your family or friends or co-workers. Sometimes they may feel like your enemy, but they are not.
11 Put on the full armor of God so that you can stand against the tactics of the Devil. 12 For our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the world powers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavens. 13 This is why you must 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.
Friends there is alot of evil going on in this day, it’s evident, we see it, we here about it, but some of it has creeped into our society and our culture masquerading itself as tolerance. Tolerance can be a good thing right? sure, but when we start to tolerate the things that contradict God and His Word, how can we possibly resist the evil of the day? The answer is, we can’t.
Know who your fighting, otherwise there will be a lot of collateral damage.
Our military is trained to recognize the enemy, to know who is a threat and who is not, and to train to take out the threat. When they lose sight of who the enemy is, their can be some serious and unfortunate collateral damage.
If you’ve ever seen or heard about the Marines in the battle at Haditha, you know how devastating it can be. Marines attacked in November 2005 convoy opened fire killing over a dozen innocent people. In the midst of the Chaos, everyone was deemed a threat and enemy, and innocent people became collateral damage. It was a sad day in Marine Corps history, but a perfect point to what I am saying today.
Our text tells us, so we need to zero in on , who that proper enemy is.
So who are we fighting then? The spiritual forces of evil.
Your enemy has a name, it is Satan, he has an agenda, it is worked out through rulers, authorities, world powers. And he is the enemy of your soul seeking to destroy you, your family and God’s Truth.
Pillar New Testament Commentary
The Letter to the Ephesians F. Spiritual Warfare, 6:10–20
Here the apostle looks at the Christian’s responsibility of living in the world from a broader, that is, cosmic perspective. The moral issues with which he deals are not simply matters of personal preference, as many within our contemporary and postmodern world contend. On the contrary, they are essential elements in a larger struggle between the forces of good and evil.
My friends, we could go into this topic very deeply, and very exhaustively, but I’m gonna sum this up very easily.
We as a culture have had a moral line in the sand, it continues to be pushed further and further back, things that were once not ok, are now celebrated, things that were once ok, are now demonized. The Bible warns of this:
20 Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!
This doesn’t mean we become religious bigots. It is so easy to stand on truth, and use it as a way to point our finger in the direction of others and shame them, and that’s not at all what I am getting at.
You will find no progress in doing such things, you’ll merely become a hypocrite. We need to know our enemy, so that we can put ourselves in check, and square our selves away.
2. Know what to bring to the fight, gear up!
If we know who we are fighting, that's great, but if we aren’t equipped for the fight, we are in trouble anyway.
In a world full of evil, it can be easy to say, I just can’t resist the forces of evil, its to much for me, its to powerful, and you’d be right to say this. Accept for the fact that God has provided us with the very armor we need to do so. The book of Ephesians is about power for living in Christ, that power we draw from the Lord.
Some commentators point this passage and the Armor back to Isaiah, and the Armor God and the Messiah wear Who’s armor are we putting on? It’s not our own, its the Armor of God.
You can’t resist the evil of this day on your own, you need to be wearing His Armor.
So what do you bring to this spiritual fight? The Apostle Paul tells us:
Truth-
The Holman Christian Standard Bible Chapter 1
13 When you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and when you believed in Him, you were also sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.
Truth, what you bring to the fight friends, is the truth about who Jesus is, and what He has done for you. To many people are fighting the wrong fights, against the wrong enemy, but some are fighting without the truth of Who Jesus is, and what He has done. He has saved you, and that truth is a liberating fact in the midst of the lies your enemy will attack you with.
Here Paul is not likely separating truth into two thoughts, truth about Christ through the Gospel, and our choice to live out God’s truth. It is more likely both, because of what Christ has done, we resolve to live out the truth that is God’s Word in our actions.
Righteousness-
24 you put on the new self, the one created according to God’s likeness in righteousness and purity of the truth.
We are clothed with the righteousness of Jesus, but remember, you need to be putting it on, The Apostle Paul has called us to walk in a manner worthy of the calling which you have been called. Ref Ephesians 4:1 Simply put, be like Christ in our actions, do what is right.
The Gospel of Peace-
in my house, I don’t know about yours, but in mine when we are “ready” to leave, that means pretty much everyone has their shoes on. None of my kids can tell me they are ready to go, if they don’t even have their shoes on.
We are to be prepared with the Gospel of piece. This means we carry the Gospel with us everywhere we go, we then are careful to what we say, and do, that we can promote peace, love and hope to a world that needs it.
Faith-
Now do not mistake this as meaning your more protected by your own power to believe. The Armor comes from God, we draw upon His power, not our own. To speak faith is to speak of the faithfulness if God. Remember always the faithfulness of God in the midst of the fiery attacks of your enemy, because God is faithful.
Salvation-
In battle, a helmet is worn to protect, damage to the head is incapacitating. But the Helmet of Salvation is God’s assurance for us that we are ultimately protected by Him. He has already won, He is the claimed victory, and our future is assured by Him.
Sword which is God’s Word-
Ephesians: An Introduction and Commentary a. The Christian Conflict (6:10–20)
Finally there is the sword of the Spirit. The Old Testament often refers to speech as a sword. The words of the wicked are said to wound as a sword (e.g. Pss 57:4; 64:3). But in the Bible God’s own word is also as a sword in his hand, a sword that lays bare, separating the false from the true (Heb. 4:12), bringing judgment (Isa. 11:4; Hos. 6:5) but also bringing salvation.
The enemy works at great length to lie to people. To spread his lies, and like I shared earlier, to make evil seem good, and good seem evil. We as believers in the fight need to wield the Word of God as a way to separate truth from what is a lie, parrying the attacks of the enemy.
Prayer-
Which is why the final piece of equipment we must be geared up with is our Prayer. Prayer that is continual. It is continual because my friends, the forces of evil will not stop in this life, not until the Lord has returned and finally completed His Work, so we must be in an ongoing pattern of prayer for ourselves, and for each other in this fight.
So let us put on God’s Armor, being alert to the evil of this day, and instead of tolerating it, let us suppress it by drawing on the strength that comes from our Lord.