Sermon Tone Analysis
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Barbed-wire Hackers
When the phone was introduced in the early 1900s, one of the last places to get phone service were the rural areas.
We still have problems communicating in out of the way places.
Elon was here this week promising satellites that would blanket the world with cell service and wifi.
Cell service anywhere anytime.
There have always been places where communication was hard to come by.
Ranchers were among the first to figure out how to get phone signals over longer distances.
They hacked the miles and miles and miles of barbed wire.
They figured out they could connect a phone wire to barbed wire on one end and a phone wire to the other end and have a phone conversation.
Overnight, phones were all over the ranches.
Phone companies began using similar technology developed by the ranchers to build out their phone systems from coast to coast.
Of course, with the ranchers… the moment a bull goes through the fence is the moment the phone goes dead.
That’s a good chuckle if it’s two gossips on the phone, but it’s not so funny when safety is at stake.
In fact, Elon brought up the fact that a cell signal that is always on can save lives.
When it comes to doing battle with the devil and evil, we cannot afford to be cut off from the Only One who can provide us help.
What would happen if we decide to call for help and found that the phone line is dead?
We’re in Ephesians again this morning.
That possibility of being hung out to dry is on Paul’s mind.
And he will not finish what he is saying to the congregation in Ephesus until he has addressed this.
He began the book by telling us that Jesus has conquered the enemy is now using the church to fill all things with himself:
Ephesians: Jesus is filling all corners of our lives with Himself through the church
Ephesians 1:22-23 “God subjected everything under Jesus’s feet and appointed him as head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of the one who fills all things in every way.”
The church was made for more.
More Jesus where we live, work, play, and learn.
There is an Enemy trying to stop the church from filling every corner of society with Jesus and His gospel
Ephesians 6:12 “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this darkness, against evil, spiritual forces in the heavens.
Satan wants to stop the church from filling every area of our lives with the gospel.
Satan hates the gospel, and he will do what he can to keep us from filling our lives with Jesus.
It’s no accident that Paul talks about spiritual warfare with the devil and his followers immediately following instructions for husbands, wives, children, parents, employers, and employees.
Where is it that you will face the enemy?
Where you live.
In your home.
In your school.
In your workplace.
In your free time.
We have the armor of Jesus in the Gospel to stand and resist the Enemy
Ephesians 6:13 “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.”
God gives us what we need for the battle.
This armor used to resist the devil was first worn by Jesus when he conquered the devil at the cross.
And this armor is made up of all of the elements of the gospel.
Righteousness, salvation, faith, truth, peace, the Word, and the gospel itself.
The devil hates the gospel.
The church uses the gospel to resist and stand against the devil.
The Good News of what Jesus has done for us on the cross and resurrection is our armor.
We put on Jesus every day in doing battle with the enemy.
Prayer as a complement to the gospel armor
But putting on armor isn’t the only thing that Paul says we need in our fight against the devil.
There’s one more thing.
And that’s what we’re going to spend our time talking about this morning.
In fact, if there’s any one thing we can be doing in our ongoing battle with evil and the devil, it’s this one thing with which Paul finishes the entire paragraph.
He says it three times: Pray.
Talking to God.
The Christian phone line to God has been promised.
We aren’t hung out to dry.
There will be no break in communications.
We pray.
Ephesians 6:18 “Pray at all times in the Spirit with every prayer and request, and stay alert with all perseverance and intercession for all the saints.
The armor is only as effective as the church is in its prayers.
The armor is a gift.
It has to be.
The gospel is a gift given to us to withstand the onslaught of all the temptations that come our way.
The armor is a gift because we have no ability whatsoever to come up with the armor.
And prayer is an acknowledgement that we are totally helpless.
We can say a lot of things about prayer, but the one thing that is at the root of all prayer is that we cannot save ourselves.
We cannot help ourselves.
We need someone else to battle Satan for us.
We need Someone else to give us His armor.
The Righteousness, the faith, the salvation, the peace, the Word, the truth… all of it is outside of our reach.
If we need those things to defeat Satan, then we need someone to give them to us because we will not be able to come up with those things, at all.
And so we pray: Jesus, give us your armor.
Jesus, give all the saints your armor.
Jesus help all of us against the schemes of the devil.
Prayer poises us to fill all things with Jesus
In talking about prayer, Paul brings us the main theme of Ephesians, that Jesus will use his people to fill all areas of life with Himself.
Note the superlative language again.
Pray at ALL times
Pray with EVERY prayer
Stay alert with ALL perseverance
Stay alert with intercession for ALL the saints
All, every, all, all.
This is Paul reaching into the theme of Ephesians again.
Jesus filling all things.
And the church, in order to fill all things with Jesus, against an enemy trying to stop the church from doing so, must fill every area of life with prayer.
The FULL armor is bolstered by ALL prayer in ALL of life for ALL of the saints… ALL of us.
The enemy is met in prayer.
This is what led Luther to quip that the devil is only beaten through prayer.
In fact, someone asked him just how it was that the Good News of Jesus was able to rock Europe in just a short period of time and Luther said it was prayer.
The Reformation’s success lies in the fact that people prayed for it to happen.
Prayer take the danger of the enemy head-on.
This is the danger with the enemy: the danger with the enemy isn’t that I would break any of God’s commands.
We often think about spiritual warfare in those terms.
We are sinners.
We’re already lawbreakers.
No…
This is why Paul prays for boldness.
Boldness that is an expression of faith.
Listen to what Paul says:
Ephesians 6:19 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.
Paul already has the message.
And one would think Paul already has boldness.
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