Difference between Holding and Wielding the Sword

Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.

My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist.

Today we are going to be in Luke chapter 4.

So if you want to open your Bibles and go to Luke chapter 4, the very first event that happens in this chapter is going to be the focus of today's lesson.

Because it is this event where we see Jesus, having just been baptized, going out into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

And we're going to read through this passage very quickly and then I want to make some comments about the events that we see here.

It says in chapter 4 verse 1, And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness for 40 days, being tempted by the devil.

And he ate nothing during those days, and when they were ended he was hungry.

The devil said to him, If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.

And Jesus answered him, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone.

And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and said to him, To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I will give it to whom I will.

If you then will worship me, it will all be yours.

And Jesus answered him, It is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.

And he took him to Jerusalem, and set him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here.

For it is written, He will command his angels concerning you to guard you.

And on their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.

And Jesus answered him, It is said, You shall not put your finger, excuse me, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test.

And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.

All right, so this is the section I want to look at and what I want to focus on, and the thing that I want to point out is something that many pastors have pointed out when preaching this passage, and I think it's something that it's good to remember, and I want to bring it into a context that is very relevant to some things that are happening in our world right now.

Okay, so what we have here is we have Jesus being tempted by the devil in the wilderness, demonstrating that he is the sinless Lamb of God.

We see in other passages of Scripture that Jesus is sinless, and this passage demonstrates his sinlessness by having gone face-to-face with the devil and not being tempted into sinning.

And so, one of the things that's often mentioned by pastors, and I tend to agree with this, is that the way that Jesus addresses the issues that are brought before him, when the devil brings him an opportunity for sin, Jesus responds using the Word of God.

He responds with a very key term.

He says, It is written, and he quotes Scripture.

To the point that by the third time in the narrative, the devil is frustrated, and the devil quotes Scripture to him, which reminds us that the devil actually knows the Bible.

Just because someone knows the Bible doesn't mean that they are a godly person.

And the devil challenges Jesus with the Word, and Jesus demonstrates that the devil is not using the Word in a godly way, but the devil is misusing the Word.

Now, the way that I wanted to address this subject today, and kind of address sort of a relevant issue, is in very recent days there have been a lot of pictures going around the internet, and a lot of people having a big conversation about the fact that during the riots that are currently happening, we are in June of 2020, if anybody's watching this at a later date, and there are riots that are going on in different cities in the United States, and the president visited a church that had been burned, and he took with him a Bible, and he held up the Bible during a press conference, or during a visit.

It's one of those times of...

it's political theater.

It's an opportunity to have a photo opportunity, and he had the Bible with him, and many people lost their minds over the president holding a Bible, saying that he was doing so as a spectacle, that he was mishandling the Word.

Even some Christians took great issue with him holding a Bible.

But what I found interesting was his opponents, in challenging his use of the Bible, themselves used a Bible.

Nancy Pelosi challenged the president, and then she pulled out a Bible, and she read some scripture.

And Andrew Cuomo challenged the president, and then held up his own Bible, and read some scripture.

And what it's a reminder of, especially in times like this, is that just because a person is holding a Bible doesn't mean that what the Bible says really matters to them.

Anyone can hold a Bible, but not everyone can wield the Word of God.

Not everyone can wield the sword.

And that's really the focus of what I want to talk about today, because Jesus, as far as we know, he's not holding a Bible in this scene here, in this situation, but what he is doing is he's speaking the truth of scripture to the situation in his life, and he's using the scripture properly.

Even against someone who's not, the devil.

The devil is using the scripture improperly, and Jesus is properly using the scripture.

And so basically what I wanted to make note of today, and kind of make this the focus of today's lesson, is that if we are going to wield the sword of the Spirit, then we ought to make sure that we're wielding it properly.

We should never try to use the Bible as some kind of prop in our life, and we should certainly not use scripture as just throwing out Bible verses that are meaningless.

But the Word of God is the sword of the Spirit, and therefore, if we are Christians, we should know how to wield that sword, and know how to wield it properly.

Many of you who know me personally know that I teach classes to people on how to safely use firearms.

I'm certified with the National Rifle Association to teach people safe gun handling techniques.

And one of the things that we talk about in class is that when you have the right to carry a responsibility, with that liberty, that right, comes a very big responsibility to carry that firearm safely, and to handle it safely, and ensure that no one else is able to access your firearm, no one is able to use it, but that it's something that you have for your personal protection, and you have the liberty to carry it, and therefore you have the responsibility to wield it properly.

The same thing is true, even more so for the Word of God, because while guns are dangerous to the flesh, the Word of God is a weapon of the soul, and if someone misuses the Word of God, they are dangerous.

And I think about false teachers who mishandle the Word, who misuse the Word, who quote Bible verses completely out of context, and they use them to the damaging of men's souls.

What tremendous danger they are putting themselves in, as they set themselves up against the author of the Word, misusing his Word, just like the devil did in Luke chapter 4 that we just read.

We need to be trained, we need to be skilled, we need to be good at wielding the sword of the Spirit.

The only way to do that is to study to show ourselves approved unto God, to be workmen that need not to be ashamed, rightly handling, rightly dividing the Word of Truth.

So my encouragement to you today, as you look at Luke chapter 4, and you see Jesus masterfully handle the Word of God, I would encourage you, seek to become as good a student as you can possibly be of God's Word.

Seek to become a learned man or woman in the Word of God, and then when the temptations of life come against you, when you're faced with the issues of the flesh and the world and even the devil, you will have a sword that you are able to wield properly.

Not just to show and say, look I'm holding a Bible, but one that you can truly use to to fend off the evil one, the one who is always seeking those whom he may devour.

Study your Bibles, be good Bible students, and I hope that these videos are helpful in you being a good Bible student.

I hope that today has been a useful video for you, and if you are enjoying these videos, I want to remind you, as I do every day, please like, comment, and subscribe, and share these videos that we can reach a wider audience.

I want to thank you again for watching.

My name is Keith Foskey, and I have been your Calvinist.

May God bless you.