Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes
Notes
Transcript
Do you remember that old kids song, Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes?
Do any of you think you could do the motions for it? I can touch my head, my shoulders and my knees. If I were standing I could lean over and wave at my toes. I know they are down there, but there is a little fluff in the middle that would stop me from touching them!
That little song was used to teach kids about the parts of the body.
Today we come to those two final pieces of God’s Armour.
These final two pieces are the Helmet of Salvation and the sword of the Spirit.
In these 4 short verses Paul has told us that God has us covered. Remember this is not our armour, this is God’s armour.
My mind conjurers up what David must have looked in Saul’s armour.
David’s brothers looked at him as joke. Here is the teenage boy in a mans suit of armour. What a sight he must have been.
That is the picture that I try to recall when I think about trying to live this Christian life by my own strength. It is like that little boy who tries to wear his dads clothes and shoes. It is cute, but he can’t walk well with those big shoes on his feet. The oversized clothes get in his way of doing anything.
When we try to live this Christian life, when we try to engage in battle with the enemy it is like putting on someones clothes that do not fit us.
We must remember that God has got this.
3 Bless the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! He has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing that comes from heaven.
One thing that troubles me when it comes to reading scripture is that we are prone to taking scripture out of context or twist it to make it say what we want it to say.
This is a verse that could be changed by removing two very important words.
Do you see what those two important words are?
Ephesians 1:3 (CEB)
He has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing that comes from heaven.
In Christ. If you leave out those two important words the meaning is changed.
Leaving out Christ leaves out all that Jesus has done for us.
There is no other way to God but through Jesus. He said it, I didn’t.
6 Jesus answered, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
No other way to get to the Father but through Jesus.
If we leave Christ out of what Paul wrote we could make this apply to everyone. It does not apply to everyone, those spiritual blessings are those who are in Christ.
If you are living with known sin in your life, then you are not living a spiritual life, you are living a carnal life. We don’t use that word carnal much. That word is talking about the worldly things and desires. Webster has 3 definitions, the primary one is
relating to or given to crude bodily pleasures and appetites (1)
That is the antithesis of what it means to be spiritual.
People often ask me to pray for them and their partner. They are wanting God’s blessing on something that God has called sin.
Folks you cannot expect God to bless you in something that God has already called sin.
Will I pray for them? Absolutely, I pray that God will open the eyes of their heart will be opened to see what God wants to do in their lives. I cannot pray for God’s blessings in the sense of what Paul has written about. I can pray for their good will, I can pray for their health, their salvation.
I cannot pray for God’s blessings on a sinful condition. That is an oxymoron, that goes against God’s nature and God is simply not going to bless sin.
Let me ask this, do you feel like you are missing out on the blessings of God?
You don’t need to answer that out loud. Do you feel like you are missing something from your relationship with God?
If so, have you asked the Holy Spirit to point out any sin in your life that is blocking those blessings?
When there is known sin in your life and you are happy in it then you have thrown up a huge road block to your spiritual life.
There is no way around it, there is no way to go through it. You have to stop the sin and seek God’s forgiveness.
I am not talking about people out in the world, I am talking about people in the Church. You simply cannot live with known sin in your life and expect God to bless you and your sin.
These blessings that Paul is writing about are ours In Christ.
Just in this letter to the Ephesians, Paul uses the phrase “In Christ” 15 times. It is used 89 times in the entire New Testament. Must be an important phrase.
Listen to some of Paul’s In Christ sentences
Ephesians 1:1 From Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by God’s will. To the holy and faithful people in Christ Jesus in Ephesus.
Ephesians 1:3 Bless the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! He has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing that comes from heaven.
Ephesians 1:4 God chose us in Christ to be holy and blameless in God’s presence before the creation of the world.
Ephesians 1:10 This is what God planned for the climax of all times: to bring all things together in Christ, the things in heaven along with the things on earth.
Ephesians 1:11 We have also received an inheritance in Christ.
Ephesians 1:12 We are called to be an honor to God’s glory because we were the first to hope in Christ.
Ephesians 1:13 You too heard the word of truth in Christ, which is the good news of your salvation. You were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit because you believed in Christ.
Ephesians 1:20 God’s power was at work in Christ when God raised him from the dead and sat him at God’s right side in the heavens,
Ephesians 2:7 God did this to show future generations the greatness of his grace by the goodness that God has shown us in Christ Jesus.
Ephesians 2:10 Instead, we are God’s accomplishment, created in Christ Jesus to do good things. God planned for these good things to be the way that we live our lives.
Ephesians 3:6 This plan is that the Gentiles would be coheirs and parts of the same body, and that they would share with the Jews in the promises of God in Christ Jesus through the gospel.
Listen carefully to this one.
Ephesians 3:12 In Christ we have bold and confident access to God through faith in him.
Ephesians 3:21 glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus for all generations, forever and always. Amen.
Ephesians 4:15 Instead, by speaking the truth with love, let’s grow in every way into Christ,
Ephesians 4:32 Be kind, compassionate, and forgiving to each other, in the same way God forgave you in Christ.
So you might be thinking, where is Pastor Nathan going with this. How does this relate to God’s Armour?
Remember that picture of David in Saul’s armour?
David came to visit his brothers and bring them some food and supplies.
He hears this giant of a man, Goliath. Saul and his men are in the backroom trying to figure out how they are going to get out of this mess.
David says, let me at him. They grab David and put Saul’s armour on him and tell him, Have Fun! We’ve got your back. Go get him.
There was no way that David could approach Goliath with this armour on. It didn’t fit him, not only did it not fit him, but he couldn’t move.
He takes the armour off and then picks it 5 little stones. He only needed 1, but he took 5.
David believed that he plus God was all that it was going to take. I love the holy boldness that David had. Goliath comes out and laughs when he sees David.
David mustered up all the strength that he knew was his in God and said to Goliath:
1 Samuel 17:45–47 (CEB)
45 “You are coming against me with sword, spear, and scimitar, but I come against you in the name of the Lord of heavenly forces, the God of Israel’s army, the one you’ve insulted.
46 Today the Lord will hand you over to me. I will strike you down and cut off your head! Today I will feed your dead body and the dead bodies of the entire Philistine camp to the wild birds and the wild animals. Then the whole world will know that there is a God on Israel’s side.
47 And all those gathered here will know that the Lord doesn’t save by means of sword and spear. The Lord owns this war, and he will hand all of you over to us.”
That was God working through David.
When we come against the enemy we had better not try it based on our own strength. We come against the enemy through the strength and power of God.
We put on God’s armor so that we can make a stand against the tricks of the devil. To make a stand is to stand in opposition to Satan.
We we come against the tricks of the devil we come like David, we come against the devil in the name of the Lord of heavenly forces, the God of Israel’s army.
We point on God’s armor because it is designed by God and fits us perfectly. God has covered from the tops of our heads to the souls of our feet.
Paul says there in verse 17
Ephesians 6:17 (CEB)
17 Take the helmet of salvation
We’ve got to protect our heads. Paul calls it the helmet of salvation.
The Bible tells us about God and his mission to redeem his creation. From Genesis to the Revelation we read about salvation.
Moses and the Israelite sang a song of praise to God for His protection from the Egyptians.
They sang
2 The Lord is my strength and my power; he has become my salvation. This is my God, whom I will praise, the God of my ancestors, whom I will acclaim.
Their is no salvation apart from God. It is what God does for us.
Isaiah wrote about this helmet of Salvation. It is a part of God’s armor here.
16 Seeing that there was no one, and astonished that no one would intervene, God’s arm brought victory, upheld by righteousness,
17 putting on righteousness as armor and a helmet of salvation on his head, putting on garments of vengeance, and wrapping himself in a cloak of zeal.
Paul in his first letter to the Thessalonians mentioned this helmet of salvation
8 Since we belong to the day, let’s stay sober, wearing faithfulness and love as a piece of armor that protects our body and the hope of salvation as a helmet.
Paul calls it here the hope of salvation. What is he talking about?
You need to read all of this chapter from 1 Thessalonians 5. He is talking about the second coming of Jesus. He is saying that that day will come like a thief in the night.
What he means is that we don’t know when Jesus is coming. It will be a surprise, it will be a time when we least expect it. We have to be prepared.
This concept ties in to this chapter on the armor of God. We have to be prepared. The closer it gets to Jesus coming, the worse sin is going to be. Jesus said it would be like in the time of Noah. People were doing whatever they wanted. Wickedness was very prevalent.
Paul says that we have to stay sober, meaning clearheaded, alert to what is going on around us.
We need all of the armor of God to keep us safe and enable us to fight the fight of faith.
The helmet of salvation, the helmet of the hope of salvation protects our thoughts. It gives us the hope to go on.
Without hope, people will give up. When a person who struggles with a chronic disease gives up hope they often succumb to the disease.
When people think that there is not hope, they give up and give in. I hear that very frequently from my patients at work. Many struggle with no hope in life. All they have heard in their lives is that they are worthless, that they will amount to nothing.
When you hear that all the time it can take all the hope out of your life.
As Christians, we have hope. Our hope is secure in what Jesus has done for us. When we come to Jesus we come empty handed. Our righteousness is but filthy rags.
When we come to Jesus we put on Jesus, we are clothed in Jesus. Our victory is Jesus is secure as long as we walk with him daily, taking up our cross and following him.
The final piece of God’s armor is this
Ephesians 6:17 (CEB)
the sword of the Spirit, which is God’s word.
The sword of the Spirit, God’s word.
When Paul wrote this, the Bible did not exist. The Old Testament writings had been collected, but the New Testament was still a work in process.
For Paul to say that the sword of the Spirit is God’s word, he is talking about the truth of God. This ties back to the first piece of God’s armor. The belt of truth.
God has provided us everything that we need. David Watson in his book Discipleship wrote
Believer’s Bible Commentary E. Exhortations concerning the Christian Warfare (6:10–20)
God gives us all the protection that we need. We must see that there is a “ring of truth” about our walk with the Lord, that our lives are right (“righteous”) with God and with one another, that we seek to make peace wherever we go, that we lift up that shield of faith together to quench the flaming darts of the evil one, that we protect our minds from fears and anxieties that easily assail, and that we use God’s word to good effect in the power of the Spirit. Remember it was by the repeated sword thrusts of God’s word that Jesus overcame his adversary in the wilderness.43
How did Jesus deal with Satan when he confronted Jesus there in the wilderness?
Jesus said to Satan three times “It’s written.”
Satan tried to tempt Jesus, but Jesus overcame him by the word.
Folks you have to know what God has to say. That doesn’t mean that you need to memorize the entire Bible. It does mean that you spend time reading and studying it. You need to know what it has to say. Don’t depend on me to do all the hard work. Pick up the Bible and read it for yourself.
The apostle John addressed this idea of being overcomers.
1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Messiah is God’s spiritual child and has been fathered by God himself. And everyone who loves Father God loves his children as well.
2 This is how we can be sure that we love the children of God: by having a passionate love for God and by obedience to his commands.
3 True love for God means obeying his commands, and his commands don’t weigh us down as heavy burdens.
4 You see, every child of God overcomes the world, for our faith is the victorious power that triumphs over the world.
5 So who are the world conquerors, defeating its power? Those who believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
Folks, this armor of God begins and ends with Jesus. This armor is God’s. He has provided all the tools that we need.
He has provided all the pieces that we need to overcome the evil one.
Hear me, when John writes about obeying God’s commands that is not is some legalistic manner. Legalism will not make you a strong Christian. It will in fact make you a weak believer. You’ll be week because you are trying to do it all on your own.
Being a strong believer, being a conqueror means that through the power of the Holy Spirit you obey God’s commands out of love.
It means doing what God is calling you to do because of God’s love for you and your love for God.
I love the translation that I read from. John asks the question:
5 So who are the world conquerors, defeating its power? Those who believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
There you have it. Do you want to be an overcomer or do you want to be overcome.
I don’t know about you, but I want to be an overcomer. I want to be on the side of strength and victory. I want to see sin and evil defeated.
I want to see the church infused, just oozing with the power of the Holy Spirit.
I want to see being set free from sin by the liberating power of the blood of Jesus.
I want to see people being healed of disease, illness, mental illness, addictions, what ever is troubling their lives by the power of the Holy Spirit.
I want to see the Church set ablaze by the Holy Spirit that will see our unsaved family members and friends being brought into the Kingdom of God.
Paul said back there in verses 10 and 11.
10 Now my beloved ones, I have saved these most important truths for last: Be supernaturally infused with strength through your life-union with the Lord Jesus. Stand victorious with the force of his explosive power flowing in and through you.
11 Put on God’s complete set of armor provided for us, so that you will be protected as you fight against the evil strategies of the accuser!
Are you standing victorious today?
(1) Merriam-Webster. (n.d.). Carnal. In Merriam-Webster.com dictionary. Retrieved July 24, 2021, from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/carnal