Good Morning! Thank you so much for being here today to conclude the spiritual battle portion of the summer series. Last week we talked about the first three pieces of armor, the belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, and readiness of the gospel of peace. This leaves us with the remaining 3 pieces of armor; the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the spirit. To start with lets read the whole passage from Ephesians.
Ephesians 6:10-18
Let’s jump into the shield of faith. Historically the shield was a huge piece of wood covered in leather. This was more of a portable bunker than a one-arm shield we often see. The shield was large enough to hide behind and had hooks on the side so you could connect them to other and create a great wall. The Romans would create something called the turtle that could protect an entire regiment. Because sometimes you need the help of your friends to shield you. The leather covering was used to extinguish the flaming paste that was commonly found on arrows of that time period. 1 Peter 1:3-5 gives us a picture of the spiritual shield. “Shielded by God’s power.”
Our faith in God’s power is our shield. Our faith must be an active faith and not a one-time prayer faith. Our faith is lived out in our everyday lives. It grows with us as we learn more about God and is lived out through our actions with other believers, not-yet-Christians and the world we are called to love. Our faith is a faith in God’s power and promises. The Bible contains over 1200 promises from God to his people. This faith protects us from the flaming arrows of the evil one. The flaming arrows are lies of the Devil that challenge God’s promises. The shield is not there to protect us from physical harm like skinning our knees or other troubles like bad money management. The shield is there to protect us from falling prey to the devil’s lies.
The next part of armor is the helmet of salvation. Back when I was living in Canada one of my responsibilities was to take people climbing. Part of there equipment was a helmet. This was in case rocks fell from up above. If you heard someone yelling “Rock!” You had to get as small as you could and get under the helmet. The helmet would deflect rocks away from your body. It would make noise but as long as it hit the helmet you were going to be ok. The helmets primary purpose is to protect your head. So much of spiritual battle is waged in your thoughts. Romans 12:2 and Philippians 4:8 tell us of the importance of what we think and how it controls us. We need to be thinking about the things of God. As we drive in our cars walk between classes we should be thinking about the promises of God and the things we can be doing to better glorify God. A second aspect to the helmet is found in 1 Thessalonians 5:8. This verse tells us that the helmet is the hope of our salvation. When it comes time for battle our thoughts should be focused on positive things, scripture, ways to love. Then the things of this world that tempt us will not seem as attractive. Things of this world will all turn to dust. My uncle was trying to calm his wife down before surgery one day and he said, “Relax, the worst that can happen is I end up in heaven.” He came through just fine but he showed my family a mentality that the things of today pail in comparison to the eternal things in store for us as believers.
The final part of the armor is the sword of the spirit. So far we have five pieces of armor that are all defensive in nature, unless we are about to bum rush and tackle the enemy like a tank, the sword is the only offensive weapon we have. Both offensive and offensive. It is offensive in that we can attack with it and offensive in that we can offend with it. Hebrews 4:12-13 tells us that the sword is sharper than any real sword and can cut soul from body. Let’s compare a sword of steel with the sword of the spirit. First of all, a sword of steel gets damaged and dull as you use it. However the more you use the sword of the spirit, the sharper it gets. You get faster and it be comes a more powerful tool in your hands. The second point of contrast is that a sword of steel cuts flesh, whereas the sword of the Spirit pierces the heart. This is the offending part of the sword. When people come to church the Sword of the Spirit is what cuts inside and calls people to change and makes people uncomfortable.
THE BATTLE
Growing up I had an acronym, HALT. It stood for Hungry, Angry, Lonely, and Tired. Halt reminded me that if I was feeling any of these things I needed to stop and refocus on God because I was more susceptible to the devil’s lies and attacks. In Matthew 4 the Bible tells us that Jesus is hungry. I’m guessing that after 40 days in the dessert by himself that lonely and tired would also describe him. So physically Jesus was not at his best but he was spiritually ready to battle. And Matthew 4 is the story of one of the greatest battle scenes between Jesus and the Devil. To set the stage for this battle let’s recall Matthew 3. Jesus has just been baptized and the heavens had opened, the holy spirit descended and the Father said, this is my son in whom I am well pleased. And at this point he left for the desert. God had just made a promise to Jesus and given him his identity. Now let’s walk through the battle scene noting how Jesus uses the elements of spiritual armor.
Matthew 4:1-11
Scene 1: Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread."
See, right away the devil takes a promise of God and puts that big word “IF” in front of it. The devil is trying to play off doubt in the promises of God. The Devil than tries to make connections that don’t really exist. IF you are the Son of God, Why are you hungry? There is no promise that Christians will not be hungry or not be unattractive or have the perfect life. In fact kind of the opposite. To us maybe the devil says; If you are loved by God, if you are wonderfully made, if you are worth dying for then why doesn’t your dad spend time with you, why do you have to work so hard at losing weight, why are you lonely and the list goes on. But when the Devil attacks Jesus, Jesus pulls out the shield of faith and doesn’t believe the lies of the devil but holds firm to what God has told him. He stays poised for a return shot at the Devil.
4Jesus answered, "It is written: ’Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’"
Some people use tae-kwon-do, and a few use Rex-Kwon-Do, but Jesus is the master of Scripture Kwon-Do. He wields the sword of the spirit and cuts down the Devil to win scene 1. Let’s move on to scene 2.
5Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. "If you are the Son of God," he said, "throw yourself down. For it is written: " ’He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’ " 7Jesus answered him, "It is also written: ’Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’ "
Scene 2 brings us to another scheme of the devil. He again attacks the identity, casting doubt on a promise of God. Next, the devil quotes scripture, Psalms 91:11-12 to be exact. The devil is very attractive and the use of scripture has the appearance of making him seem even craftier. However, the devil only uses half-truths, one of his great tricks to sound sweet but not tell the whole story. If the devil had finished the paragraph from Psalms 91 he would have read that our feet would trample the lion and the serpent. He would have slit his own throat! Trample the head of the Cobra! Again we see Jesus wield the shield of faith and believe the promises of God and not doubt his identity. He keeps a cool head and again masterfully replies with the sword. Jesus knew the real promise of God and the entire truth and used it to counter the half-truth of the devil. Scene 2 goes to Jesus.
8Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. "All this I will give you," he said, "if you will bow down and worship me."
Jesus said to him, "Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ’Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’ " Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him.
The third scene shows us the Devil offering worldly goods. The Devil offers power, material wealth and appeals to people’s pride. The Devil offers these things because this is all he has to offer. All these things will turn to dust someday, the devil has no control over the good things because these are for God alone to control. Jesus had the Helmet and hope of salvation on his head and his thoughts fixed on the eternal. When we are thinking about the things we looked at in Philippians 4:8 then things of this world become less attractive. Sex outside of marriage looks foolish, shoplifting the styling shirt seems like a waste of time and the expensive car is replaced by the faces of widows and orphans that could be helped with the extra money. Thanks to the helmet of Salvation and the masterful use of the sword Jesus wins yet again. Three strikes and the devil is out.
At this point you may be thinking, yeah, Jesus was the man, hooray for defeating the Devil. But he had this ace up his sleeve, he’s also God. What does this have to do with me? Well, in my bible the passages have titles and the one over Ephesians 6:10-18 is The Armor of God, emphasis on OF! Let’s flip to the left until we get to Isaiah 59:15-17. God wears the same armor of God that he gave us! It’s not like God was in his chariot and sent us out on foot. Or God has a Mercedes SLK and we get a Chevette. We are all equipped for battle in the finest possible armor ever! When we dedicated our lives to living in relationship with Jesus we joined God’s team. And when we joined God’s army he gave us the best possible armor so that we are fully equipped to do battle! Wow. But there’s still one more verse in the passage from Ephesians. Verse 18. The verse tells us to pray and it uses all 3 times. This shows that prayer is another powerful weapon and that it is a way of life. This is the first of the three take home ideas from today. Pray for all people at all times in all ways. Second, keep the spiritual perspective. Set your priorities on heavenly things. And third, remember who you are. Know the promises of God and the scriptures. Then it will be easier to distinguish the lies of the devil. And the best way to do this is to spend time in your bible. This is where you find all those promises and you can go to sharpen your sword. So this week, I pray that you all wear the full armor of God, that you pray, that you set your mind on Godly things and that you spend time in the Bible so that you are all ready to withstand the Devil’s attacks.
