A Mighty Fortress Is Our God (pt-6) - [Ephesians 6:10-20]

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Soldiers, sailors, airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force, you are about to embark upon the great crusade towards which we have striven these many months.
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The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty -loving people everywhere march with you.
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In company with our brave allies and brothers in arms on other fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the
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German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.
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Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well -trained, well -equipped, and battle -hardened.
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He will fight savagely. But this is the year 1944. Much has happened since the
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Nazi triumphs of 1940 to 1941. The United Nations have inflicted upon the
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Germans great defeats in open battle and man -to -man. Our air offensive has seriously reduced their strength in the air and their capacity to wage war on the ground.
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Our home fronts have given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons and munitions in war.
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Placed at our disposal great reserves of trained fighting men, the tide has turned. The free men of the world are marching together in victory.
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I have full confidence in your courage, devotion to duty, and skill in battle. We will accept nothing less than full victory.
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Good luck, and let us all beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.
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Dwight David Eisenhower. That was a call to battle, wasn't it?
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Maybe one of the most famous calls to arms, to battle, to war, for victory that we know in our modern day.
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Let me give you another battle cry that was a little bit older, but probably more pertinent to today. Finally, be strong in the
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Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil.
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For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers and against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.
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Therefore, take up the full armor of God so that you will be able to resist in the evil day.
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And having done everything, stand firm. Where's that come from? Not Dwight David Eisenhower, but the
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Apostle Paul. Please turn your Bibles to Ephesians 6 as we get back into this battle cry for the saints.
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The saints, all Christians, you if you're a Christian here at Bethlehem Bible Church, you are in a battle, and you would be sinful to think that you're a
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Christian pacifist in this sense, spiritual warfare. We might argue about going to real war, is that sinful or not?
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But certainly it's only righteous for the Christian to be in the Lord's army and to hold their ground.
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With the allies, they tried to take back what Germany had taken already. For Paul and for Christians, it's not a matter of taking ground, it's holding the line.
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The line must be drawn here, drawing the battle lines, not retreating. And Christ at Calvary, as we've just celebrated, has won victory, and we're now to hold that line.
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It's amazing preaching this week, and then even last Saturday as I did Daniel O 'Brien's mother's funeral,
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Elva. And when you preach with something in front of you, it's very sobering. When you preach with a casket, with a shell of a body there, or even now with these elements reminding myself that, of course, it's not the
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Lord's real body there, but those are vivid reminders that my proclamation today is not of my own authority.
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It's not just kind of timely, and it's going to be relevant today. But the preacher stands in the pulpit and speaks not for himself or not even for the church, but he speaks in the stead of God.
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He proclaims the Word of God to others. You remember the man standing down in the corner, and he would be the town crier.
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And he would be the one saying, hear ye, hear ye. And he would speak the words of his king or of his master.
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And today, my heart not only receives the Word of God, but now I proclaim it because it's important.
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We're in a battle. If you're not in a Christian spiritual battle now, then as we learned last week, maybe you should get back to the front lines again.
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We live in a world that's cursed by sin, but also inhabited by Satan and the demonic, invisible, supernaturally powerful demons and his whole cadre.
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So what do we do? Well, this could be an option. God just says, you know what? You can do nothing.
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This will just help you pray a lot. So you're going to really get thrashed and slashed by all Satan and his demons?
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Sure make you good prayer warriors. Maybe you'll be like James one day, known as Camel Knees. On his knees so often, he just was called
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Camel Knees. Or he could try to tell us, well, here's what
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I ask of you. Here's what you can do so that you can stand firm. And that's what God does in his grace and his mercy.
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This is a book of revelation of his graces, of his goodness towards us that we can know what to do.
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He tells us. He doesn't tell us to just figure it out in some kind of Easter egg hunt.
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You're getting warmer. No, he tells us exactly what he wants as we represent his bride.
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The triune God loved the church. The father chose the church. The son died for the church. The spirit seals the church.
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And now how's that church to live? He tells us in chapters four through six. How are we to fight?
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He tells us here in chapter six, verses 10 and following. How to stand your ground against sin while you're in spiritual warfare.
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Well, maybe it manifests itself like this in your life. You have a bunch of unbelieving family members and you're constantly at battle with them.
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What would you do? What should you do? Hold yourself up? Move to Hawaii?
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What do we do? These are great instructions for a person like that who's really struggling against sin, against unbelievers, not like you're after them, but you're in the struggle of proclaiming the truth to them.
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What do I do? How do I act? A great passage for that. It's for the person that loves to be an evangelist with people that they don't know and they like to go down to the common or they like to send out emails or whatever.
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How do I stand buttress against this resistance?
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This will tell us. How do I live in a culture today that everything in the culture says, don't do that.
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That's passe. It's not relevant. There's no absolute truth. If it's good for you, fine.
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What do we do? What Paul tells us, here are six things that we can do that we can become more of who we are as you know.
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And so it's very, very important that we understand these, whether you're an old Christian, a young Christian, no matter who you are, if you're in Christ, this is the call to stand firm and hold the line.
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He reiterates verses 10 through 13 in verse 14, stand firm therefore, that's what he wants.
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I want you to stand firm and remember the whole time he's talking to the church, the importance of the local church.
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Don't believe what Harold Camping says on family radio. The church is done. The church is gone. We're no longer in any kind of church age.
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And so there's no elders. There's no communion. There's no baptism. Send your money to family radio.
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That is not true. The church is the apple of God's eye. The church is what he said he will bless.
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Jesus back in Matthew chapter 16, I will build my church.
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And he's continually building that and he loves his church and he wants to protect his church. Someone tried to attack my bride,
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Kimberly, they're going to pay because I'm going to get after them. I don't mean I'm going to exact retribution and we already read about those
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Proverbs today, but I'm going to protect her. And so would you.
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You'd protect your wife. And here it's just the grace of God that he would give us spiritual protection by what he tells us in his authoritative word.
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Now let's look at six pieces of armor. This is a passage you all know, and here's the great thing about preaching.
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Even though you know this passage, I think you can learn today and be encouraged again today as the spirit illumines the passage to your mind and you can understand it and you can ask the spirit,
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God, help me please apply this truth to my life as I struggle today, or God, get me back in the front lines again.
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Six pieces of armor that you will need if you want to stand your ground against Satan, sin, the culture, the world, but the specific passage is against Satan and demons.
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And each piece of armor is going to be couched in the framework of not only a
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Roman hoplite guard, but also in the larger sense,
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Isaiah 59 with God wearing this divine armor. And then he's going to talk about armor.
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So when you think, how am I supposed to live again? And I've got all these problems with my family and friends, and I've got an unbelieving spouse or I've got all these other issues.
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How do I do this again? And if you remember armor, you can come up with these six faster than if you just said, well, let's see, what are they again?
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And coming up with some kind of alliteration instead of alliteration, Paul comes up with this. So you'll catch it onto it very quickly, but these aren't literal pieces of armor.
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You don't wake up in the morning and say, I'm going to put my armor on now. All right. You just kind of walk through that, put my armor on.
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If you think about the armor in the morning, that's a good thing, but what does it mean for the armor?
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Put on the full armor of God. He is spelling out how to stand firm.
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He is giving you the means of standing firm, how to battle. And remember in Ephesians, the whole concept of chapters four through six would be this.
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You are in Christ, so become more of who you are. You're a Christian now, you're different.
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Act like who you are, become more and more like Christ as time goes on, because the spirit can help you to do that.
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He could have said this, and he did say it in Romans 13. This is the equivalent to putting on the armor of God.
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Romans 13, 14, put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh in regards to its lusts.
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That's what putting on the armor of God is, putting on Christ, becoming more of Christ, more like Christ.
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He says in Ephesians chapter four, if you look at your text, verse 23, Ephesians 4 .23,
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he's reiterating this, but just expanding it out so we will remember it, so that it'll be unforgettable, the whole issue of armor and the soldier, and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind.
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Then to verse 24, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in the righteousness and holiness of the truth.
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And if you look down a few more verses, verse one of chapter five, here's what he's saying in Ephesians six as well.
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This being more general, Ephesians six being more specific, therefore, mimic
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God, be more and more like God. And the text there is remember from several months ago in Ephesians five, become imitators of God.
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You already are a Christian, become more and more and more of who you are. Let's go for the first four pieces of armor in review, and then we'll look at the last two.
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Each one of these is not talking about armor that you literally put on, but it is a reflection of what
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God has already done for you, and then you live out. What do I mean by that? Let's see. The first piece of armor.
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If you're in a battle, what do you do? Number one, you must commit yourself to live a life of truthfulness and integrity in all areas.
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If God's a God of truth, then you need to be truthful. And here he says in this language, very wonderful language,
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Higgins Armory kind of language, and having girded your loins with truth.
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How do you stand? The first thing is you gird your loins with truth. I now have a belt on that you can't see, and if I were to run down 110 towards Clinton that way ...
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By the way, isn't it nice today not to have it be about 147 degrees in this meeting house?
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It was so hot last week. That is the hottest I've ever been while I was preaching. And well, almost.
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Pradeep said it's almost India weather, and so it does get hotter, but this is just nice cool air.
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And if I wanted to run down 110, it'd kind of be difficult because I don't really have running clothes on and running shoes.
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And so I'd probably take my jacket off, or I'd probably kind of hold my pants up a little bit higher, or who knows what
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I would do. And in those days, you didn't have form -fitting clothes, so you had a robe, you had some undergarments, and if you wanted to run, if you wanted to be fighting, if you wanted to just get something done around the house, you would have to pull those things up and you'd tuck in the four corners so you were able to go.
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You'd be ready to do that. And here he says, instead of having truth as some kind of truthfulness as something that you just have around, no, you need to be ready.
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You need to be truthful. You need to be firm and stable. And if God is truthful, then he says,
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I want you to be truthful. You become ready, as it were, for the battle. You become able to fight because you're truthful.
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You're walking in the truth, as 3 John says. You have integrity. We learned last week, this is committing your life to truthfulness in every area.
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How do you deal with parents? How do you deal with an unsafe spouse? Well, one of the things that you can do is you can become more and more truthful.
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That's what God wants. Warren Wiersbe said, a man of integrity with a clear conscience can face the enemy without fear.
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The girdle also held the sword. Unless we practice the truth, we cannot use the word of truth. Once a lie gets into the life of a believer, everything begins to fall apart.
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For over a year, King David lied about his sin with Bathsheba, and nothing went right.
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What a good illustration of that. By contrast, untruthfulness in your life, lack of integrity in your life, it's hard to fight when you don't have your loins girded up.
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Secondly, we saw in review, the second piece of armor, not only should we live a life of truthfulness, you must live a life determined, or live a determined life, and you should be holy.
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You must be determined to live a holy life. If you look at Ephesians chapter 6 verse 14, he goes on to say, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, certainly we already are righteous in Christ.
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God counts us as righteous. We have the imputed righteousness of Christ. But along with the theme of Ephesians 4, 5, and 6, if you are righteous by position, then by practice become more and more righteous.
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Live a holy life. If you're struggling, if you've got people at work that are always after you, and you have a hard time living up to your witness at work, then you not only need to be telling the truth and have integrity, you need to live a holy life, doing what
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God says, to live a righteous life. And here he uses breastplate, protecting the heart and the vital organs.
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It's something that if you don't have a breastplate, you're in big trouble, and it would strap right around the back. Coat of mail if you were rich enough.
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Certainly it's not self -righteousness. No, it's holy living, living the kind of life that will make you able to engage in a fight.
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I think of Job early on, certainly the Lord Jesus Christ, and we could look through each one of these pieces of armor, couldn't we?
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And say, did Christ live a life of complete truthfulness? Did Christ live a life of complete holiness and righteousness?
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Absolutely. If you're going to be in a fight, you've got to live right, Paul says. The third review is found in verse 15.
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Committed to life of truthfulness, determined to live a holy life. And number three, the third piece of armor, you must live a life of confidence in the gospel.
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Peter was so brave when Jesus was around. All those troops come, he whips out the knife, and he cut off somebody's ear.
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Whose ears did he cut off? Whose ear? Malchus's. He wasn't aiming for his ear, by the way. I'm sure he was aiming for his throat, and Malchus ducked.
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He was so brave, and Jesus was walking on water, and when Jesus was close, boy, Peter was just so confident.
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And in a similar way, he says here in verse 15, having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace.
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It does not say with the proclamation of the gospel of peace. This is not you're preaching the gospel. This is with the preparation or the readiness of the gospel of peace.
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You needed to have good shoes back then. When I was a football player in high school, we'd go to some schools, and we would need our deep cleats.
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We'd go to other schools that would have AstroTurf, and we'd put on tennis shoes. But you had to have the right kind of shoe.
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If you had a wet, muddy field, and you had ballet slippers on,
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I don't think you're going to run for two touchdowns. I think you're going to run to the locker room and get the Gatorade for the rest of the men.
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That's what I think you're going to do. And so you'd have these troops, these Roman troops, and they'd have almost hobnob kind of cleats, and they provided surety of footing and reliability of footing.
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They also gave you protection from sticks and heat and what they used as land mines back then.
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So what's Paul saying? Paul is saying you should be confident in the gospel. How about this?
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How would you like to go fight a war knowing that God's fighting you? Now to know that the
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God of peace has made peace with me because of Christ. God's not fighting me anymore, so therefore
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I can go fight. In our house, we love to wrestle, and this is just one of the things, you know, in Nebraska we call it wrestling, all -star wrestling.
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And I didn't grow up with the WWF or anything like that, and it was just more local stuff. We love to wrestle.
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By the way, I think husbands, if you don't wrestle with your kids, you should because you should try to convey to your little ones that you're the strongest person in the universe.
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Why? Because they feel more protected because dad's a He -Man. And so you can just wrestle them and all that stuff, and so we love to do that.
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And so when things get hot and heavy at our house with wrestling, and the kids are jumping on top of me and going all around, the 12 -year -old, 8 -year -old, 6 -year -old, and 4 -year -old, little
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Gracie, when she can tell it's getting a little too intense, she comes running up to me, hugs me around the neck, kisses me, and she says,
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Dad, I'm on your team. I'm on your team, Dad. Maddie used to do it, too, and Luke, too. I'm on your team.
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And they're like, all calling, I call, I'm on dad's team. And there's something about fighting the three other siblings when you're with dad because you know you're going to win.
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And to think that if you have the God of the universe, the omniscient God with His wholly penetrating gaze upon you, knowing who you are on the inside and what you've done, it's hard to go fight someone else.
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Think about it in the days of the Israelites. If you were engaged to be married or if you just bought some land, you did not go have to fight.
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Why? Because you wouldn't be at peace. You'd be thinking about your wife. What good is a man in the infantry if he's thinking about his wife -to -be?
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You're just engaged. That's why the book of Deuteronomy says, just go ahead. I think it's Deuteronomy. Let me just get it straight.
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The Old Testament. Yeah, Deuteronomy 20. You need to have someone who's not divided in their mind, who's thinking, well, yeah,
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I'm supposed to be fighting. I'm supposed to be killing these other Hittites. But somebody else is after me.
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The Canaanites are behind me. So how much more now we, as children of God, God, as we have sung today,
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His wrath has been assuaged. He has been satisfied with the punishment upon Christ.
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He's not after us. He's not our enemy. He's not going to come up behind us. He's our friend. And so when you have problems at work and school and home and there's all the spiritual battles going on, it's nice to know
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God's on your team. And if you forget that, read Revelation chapter 22 and 21.
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We win. We're going to win. And Lenski said it's highly paradoxical that our peace with God makes us avid for battle with Satan.
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Well, that's exactly what happens. Our own heart and our own minds, we know we're prepared for conflict because we know
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God is on our side. We're confident of that very thing. We don't have a split troubled soul knowing that we have to protect ourself from front and back.
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Lastly, in review, number four, the fourth piece of armor that's essential for you drawing the line in the sand against Satan is that you must live by faith, a life of truthfulness, holiness, confidence in the gospel.
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And you must live by faith. The opposite of that would be by sight. And he says there in verse 16, in addition to all taking up the shield of faith, see the issue is really faith.
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It's nothing about the shield. It's just a good visual reminder. What do shields do? Oh, faith does that too, which will be able to extinguish all the flaming missiles of the evil one.
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This is not the small shield because if somebody's shooting a bunch of darts at you, a bunch of arrows at you, you don't want the little small shield.
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I go for the compact shot size shield. Now you want the large seal. Why? It's like a door. One of the
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Greek words it's very similar to is like a door and it's two and a half foot by four foot. So you can get behind that door and in comes the shield and you would go ahead and put some skin on the top of that shield, brass, whatever you could to rub it down to, to get it wet.
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So when those missiles hit that, they'd fly off and you can imagine maybe the best thing
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I can think of is, have you ever had a bee fly in your car while you're driving? Some of me,
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I can't believe I'm alive still. Back and forth, a bee, you know, the bee and everybody's going wild over the bee.
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Who just told me the story? Eric Johanson just told me the story.
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He was up hiking with a bunch of young kids and an eight -year -old and others, they came upon a wasp nest and there's a 20 -foot drop and the bees were, or the wasps were flying all around and the kid was in such a panic as the wasps were stinging him, he about went off the cliff until Eric grabbed him and pulled him up.
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You just don't know what to do. And those missiles, they'd get some darts and they'd put a little fire on them and other kind of pitch and so when it hit, it would fly over everywhere and you'd get burning sensation and fire and it just would wreak havoc when you would receive those.
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You have to have a big, huge shield. And here, the shield isn't a regular shield, but when
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Satan flies in those little missiles like God can't be trusted, or your mom just died, God couldn't, he doesn't care.
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Your child just died, God fell off the throne of the universe. You get diagnosed with cancer, oh yeah,
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God's sure good, isn't he? You get those kind of assailing darts coming at you and you need to have the shield of faith.
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You need to be confident in who God is and that he keeps his promises. Matthew 7, 9,
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Jesus said, what man is there among you when his son asks for a loaf, we'll give him a stone?
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No one that I know of unless he's a wacky. How much more with God will he provide for us?
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Will he give us what we need? We need to be confident that God exists and Hebrews 11, 6 says that he rewards those who seek after him.
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The more we know about God, the more we trust him. Matter of fact, in Psalm 84, he's called God our shield.
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He protects us as we have faith in him and we begin to doubt God and the flip side should be we should be thinking about his attributes and who he is and what he's done.
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It's not just anyone after you, it's not the neighborhood bully. Look at the text, it's the wicked one. The wicked one's after you.
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These darts come and they're sudden, they're unexpected. We have to remember what we believe. The song says faith is the victory that overcomes the world and overcomes the darts in spiritual warfare.
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Confident that God is able to protect me, to provide, that he's already done that. We'll rely on his gracious promises.
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In Pilgrim's Progress, John Bunyan says, quote, a polyuntaunted Christian with a threat, here will
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I spill thy soul. And with that, he flew through a flaming dart at his breast.
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But Christian had a shield in his hand with which he caught it and so prevented the danger of that.
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If you haven't read Pilgrim's Progress, you need to read that book. So biblical, so helpful.
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You say, pastor, it's been a half hour since you started and now you're finally getting to your new point. Good observation.
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On purpose. When I try to review, I try to give you extra things, but we don't want to go too fast and I know my style.
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My style is 500 words a minute and sometimes you just don't get it around the first time.
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You just have to back up and say, yeah, this is exactly what's happening. We'll see if I can go a little faster now. The fifth piece of armor.
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You must live by hope. Life of truthfulness, a holy life, a life of confidence, a life of faith, and now you must live by hope.
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Verse 17 of Ephesians 6, and take the helmet of salvation. The other ones he was saying, you already have these, having this, having that, and you would keep those on.
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Now the battle's getting fierce and so you pick up the helmet. You don't just keep your helmet on all the time because the helmet's hot, the helmet's heavy, and so when the battle starts happening, you pick up that helmet.
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You take it. You receive it, might even be a better way to translate the Greek word. You take the helmet of salvation.
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You take the helmet literally which is salvation. Yahweh wears this in Isaiah 59 and now he gives it to you to wear.
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When you're in a battle, you have to think about your salvation. 1 Thessalonians 5 .8 says that the helmet is not salvation.
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Paul calls it in 1 Thessalonians 5 .8 the what? The hope of salvation.
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You have the hope of salvation. When you're in the battle, you have hope that you're going to not have to struggle your whole life, that there's going to be glory, that one day you're going to get there.
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Helmets back in those days were either made of leather or they were made of metal. They put a sponge on the inside because who wants a big heavy metal helmet?
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So you put some sponge up there. Literally, the word helmet means head covering.
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So for those of you that don't believe in head coverings for today in 1 Corinthians chapter 11, you do believe in head coverings for today in spiritual warfare.
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You need to have your head covered. All Christians, not just ladies. They sometimes have a little hinged visor or something coming down on their nose for extra protection.
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And the helmet, strangely enough, protects what part of your body? Your head. Thinking properly.
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Thinking the right way. That's one of the main things. When someone comes in for counseling and there's a huge crisis, do you know what
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I try to do first of all? I try to fix the problem and pat them on the back and give them a Bible verse and send them away and give them a $100 check.
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I mean, $100 bill. $100 check. Wow. Everyone's coming to counseling. No, I want them.
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There's some problems we can't solve and we have to just point them to the God who can solve them and we want them to think properly.
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God is after your mind. It's a battle of minds. That's why Romans chapter 12 makes it clear. By the renewing of your what?
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Mind. Right thinking. I'm in a battle. Is there any way out? What's going to happen?
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We have the hope that one day, this is not talking about we're saved right now. This is about since we're saved right now, there's going to be future salvation, future deliverance.
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I'm not going to be in this problem forever. It's been one month since my mother died today and the first few weeks
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I'd kind of just break down and just cry and think about her. Something would remind me of her and I just would cry and I still miss her.
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But it's amazing now one month later. It's not that I love her less, but I just can function a little bit more and I was thinking the other day,
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I don't have to live my whole life without my mom. I'm 45 now and if my dad lived to be 55, my mom lived to be 65,
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I'll make it to 60. That's bad calculation. That ignores the sovereignty of God.
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But I might live a day or I might live 40 more years, but I know there's going to be an end to this struggle.
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Losing a mom isn't spiritual warfare, but you get the idea. There's going to be an end to this struggle, an end to this battle, an end to these tears and the remorse and the missing because it's going to be done one day.
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And that battle with your unbelieving family, that battle with your unbelieving spouse, that battle at work, that battle within yourself, it's going to be gone one day.
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How great is that? One day gone. It's good to think about it.
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This is the only way we can ward off blows from Satan, just like a regular helmet. We can have an eternal perspective.
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We can have the hope that our present struggle with Satan will not last forever. You know the hymn, stand up, stand up for Jesus.
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The strife will not be long. The day of noise of battle, the next the victor's song.
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That's the whole helmet of the hope of salvation. Or I like John Bunyan too, hobgoblin nor foul fiend can daunt his spirit.
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He knows he's at the end. He knows at the end shall life inherit. We get eternal life.
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We're getting there. We're going to go to heaven. We've got to have that kind of spiritual
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Kevlar helmet so we can have confidence in what God says about our future. And then lastly, and this is really the apex of it all, and this is the sixth and final piece of the armor.
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Even though verses 18 through 20 will talk about spiritual warfare, but the last piece of armor is found in verse 17.
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You must use your Bible. You want to battle, you want to be in the battle, you want to hold the line, a life of truthfulness, holiness, confidence, faith, hope, and using your
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Bible. Read verse 17 along with me and take the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.
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God's given you his word. It's a personal gift, the word of God. Take it. Hide it under a bushel?
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No, you don't want to do that. Take that. Now this sword was the shorter sword.
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It was straight. It was sharp on both sides. And depending on study, you'll find that it's either six to 18 inches long or 20 to 24 inches long.
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The longer one was called a gladius in Latin, a gladius.
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Wonder what we get from that? Gladiators had those short swords. I have a gladiator sword in my study, and I thought about bringing it out, but then what's next?
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PowerPoint, I guess. I don't know. So I didn't, but I should be able to describe to you a 24 -inch sword that's sharp on both sides.
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And it was for close hand -to -hand battle, and they would practice parrying. They would practice stabbing. It wasn't necessary for lopping off.
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It was for poking and jabbing and killing and slicing and dicing. How about that? Mekaira is what it was called literally in Greek.
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It was offensive, and it was certainly defensive, too. You could protect yourself. Two -edged, it was like a dagger, but bigger.
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Then you're starting to think already, Hebrews chapter four, verse 12, the word of God is what? Sharp, and it's living, and it's powerful, like a two -edged sword.
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And sometimes for the handle, they would have some kind of metal, or sometimes they might have some kind of corrugated bone handle that you would use, deadly accurate stabbing, thrusting.
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All the legionaries would have it. And the text does not say the spirit himself is the sword.
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The text says the spirit is basically given, the sword is given by the spirit, the spirit of God gives us his word, as 2
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Timothy 1 would talk about. He enables us to use it as well. And here, what would you guess for the word of God?
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Which is the word of God? If you were going to pick a Greek word for the word of God, or a cross -reference verse for the word of God, what would you pick? I'd probably pick
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John 1 .1. In the beginning was the word. That's a good choice, but that was wrong.
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There's a word that means general, lagos, in the beginning was the word, John 1. And there's a word for a word that means specific, that's rhema.
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General word, lagos, in the beginning was the word, Jesus is called the word. And then there's a specific word, let me illustrate it this way.
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This is the word, lagos. Ephesians 6, verse 18 is the word rhema, it's more specific.
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If you were going to be writing this, do you think Paul would say, when you use the spirit of the Lord's sword, the spiritual sword given by the spirit of God, and you're in a battle with somebody at work, or an unsaved loved one, just read to them all the
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Bible. Just give them all the Bible. Here's how you solve your problems with your boss at work who's not a Christian. Here's the
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Bible. Well, certainly the Bible would be a good thing to give them. But what Paul is after is, as there's precise paring, and jabbing, and thrusting, you use the word of God, and it's precision for certain circumstances, and you use that precise word of God in those circumstances.
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So when something's coming up, and you say, I'm super anxious about this, then the word of God that should come to you is what?
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Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved? Well, maybe if you're not saved and you're anxious.
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But how about, be anxious for nothing? So it's specific.
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Now, let me give you an illustration. Let's turn to Mark, excuse me, Matthew chapter four, and I want to show you our
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Lord Jesus Christ, and how he uses specific Bible verses in his temptation, and this should guide us so we can better wield our sword, the word of God.
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This is the best example of using the word in spiritual warfare in all the
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Bible. Our Lord Jesus Christ gives us a great illustration of how to use the Bible specifically to deal with satanic warfare.
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Now I don't want you to quote the Bible to Satan, we've already discussed that, but as God uses the word specifically, accurately, precisely, so too must we in our own lives.
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That's why it's so important to know your Bible. C .S. Lewis said, give me 10 minutes to chop down a tree, I'll spend my first two minutes sharpening the ax.
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We want to know that book, and here we have in Matthew chapter four, this is clash of the titans.
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This is divine versus diabolical, as one man said. This is it. This is Satan versus Jesus.
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It's like a desert match, if you want me to push it. This is it, and he says in verse one of chapter four, then
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Jesus was led up, Mark said he was impelled, up by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
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And here comes this cosmic clash. This is a great passage right here. It's almost a whole sermon in and of itself.
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What happened in Matthew chapter three? Jesus gets baptized, the heavens are rent open, the spirit of God descends in bodily form like a dove.
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God says this is my beloved son in whom I am, what, well pleased. Inauguration of messianic ministry, okay?
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Here comes the test. Now God impels him out, Satan tempts. God is not tempting from the inside, that's
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Satan's job, that's what he's doing. God is going to test him. One man said heaven had opened, now hell opens.
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The spirit impels him out. Jesus just did not carelessly wander into the trial. It's not that Jesus wouldn't go on his own, but Adam in a perfect world was tested and he failed.
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Jesus is going to be tested in an imperfect environment, a horrible environment, probably the worst wilderness you could think of back then.
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Will he make it? Your eternity rides on his obedience.
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The wilderness, in the Old Testament, the wilderness was just a place of God's curse. It was horrible, dangerous, lurking ahead.
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Anti -Eden is here. Will the second Adam make it? Israel didn't make it, Adam didn't make it.
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What's going to happen now? I'd go so far to say that if Jesus fails these temptations, it's worse than the fall because at least after the fall, there was a savior who came, the second
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Adam. And what happens? He's tempted by Satan, the adversary.
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Oh, if Jesus can just think one thought improperly, Satan has done his job.
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Just one little bit, just let up just one minute. Just think one unbiblical, ungodly thought.
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Salvation for the elect, gone. Man's redemption, obliterated.
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And here's Satan, he's not even afraid to assault Christ himself. Nobody around to help him.
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If you look down at verse 11, after Satan left him, behold, the angels came and began to minister to him.
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It's fair to translate that with the interpretation that the angels were not around, therefore afterwards they came.
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Because this is isolation. This is Jesus and Satan, that's it. Look at the first temptation, don't trust the
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Father. If somebody said to you, don't trust the Father, how would you use the Bible as your rhema to counteract that?
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Well, let's see what Jesus did. Verse 3 of Matthew 4, this is a perfect timing for Satan.
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He knows. The tempter came, said to him, if you are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.
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He doesn't say, if you are the Son of God, you're not. The Greek is, you are the Son of God and I will exploit that.
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Since you are the Son of God, how could you go without food? What good dad doesn't give their kid food?
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I mean, that's pretty bad. We already read about that in Matthew chapter 7. What good is this authority and relationship to God the
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Father if you don't use it? Just act independently of God. Just act on your own. It's not that big a deal.
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Your Father has provided for Israelites, sinful Israelites, manna from heaven for 14 ,600 days.
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What's a little bread? Jesus, he doesn't know this because I don't think Satan knows all of the future. He knows his doom.
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But one day, Jesus is going to feed 4 ,000 men and 5 ,000 men on two separate occasions, maybe 10 ,000 to 15 ,000 people each.
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You're going to give a lot of bread for other people. It's a mission of mercy. It's a mission of compassion. Just give some bread. It's harmless.
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You're God's son and you're born in a barn and you have no food. Little village, no place to lay your head.
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Just violate the plan of God. It's not that big a deal. You have the right. You deserve it.
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How does Jesus respond? This is our example of how Jesus takes something out of the
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Bible to respond to the specific situation. And he responds this way. Some things are more important than food, i .e.
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my obedience to God. He answered and said to him, and this should be your answer as well when you try to deal with situations in your life, it is written.
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It's written and it stands written, man shall not live on bread alone but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.
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I'm going to depend on God. It's mandatory. Notice he identifies himself with a man there.
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That's a good sub point, but he's quoting what book of the Bible? Jesus was tempted three times and he responded with the
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Bible three separate times and all from the book that you probably love the most, love so much you've read 10 times in the last year.
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He quotes from Deuteronomy. Hey, you want a homework assignment this week?
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Read the book of Deuteronomy. How about that? Let's read Deuteronomy. Read all 52 chapters.
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There's not 52 chapters. It's written. And Jesus is quoting a verse that comes from Deuteronomy 8 that says, you know,
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God let Israel hunger so that they might trust him. They might have faith in him.
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And I'm hungry, yes, I've been out without food for 40 days, but I'm going to trust him. There's something more important than food physically.
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It's better to starve. It's better to be emaciated than go against God of the universe.
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William Hendrickson, the great Presbyterian commentator said, quote, tempter. You are proceeding upon the false assumption that for a man in order to appease hunger and keep alive, bread is absolutely necessary.
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That's right. What do we do with the temptation? We respond with the word of God.
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We're not like Oscar Wilde. I can resist anything but temptation. That's not us because we have the word of God.
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When God says, you know, you can't trust him, you're in the midst of a horrible trial, you don't know what to do. The word of God that should come to your mind should be something like Psalm 31.
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But as for me, I trust in the Lord. Thou art my God. My heart rejoices in him because we trust in his holy name.
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What else can I do except trust God? Maybe this comes to your mind if you're in a bad situation and you need to use the word of God like a sword.
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1 Corinthians 10 .13, no temptation is overtaking you but such is common to man and God is faithful.
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That's right. Look at the second temptation. First was, take things on your own.
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Don't submit to God. Don't obey him. The second one was, presume on God's care. Test God. Then verse 5 says, the devil took him into the holy city.
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What city is that? Jerusalem. And he had him stand on the pinnacle of the temple and he said to him, if you're the son of God, throw yourself down for it is written he will give his angels charge concerning you and on their hands they will bear you up lest you strike your foot against the stone.
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Rabbinic tradition, when the Messiah comes, he'll stand on this exact spot. And here, with Sir Walter Scott, I say it's kind of creepy when
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Satan quotes scripture, isn't it? Oh, it's just kind of weird, Satan up there quoting scripture.
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And so here's what Satan says, oh, you're going to quote scripture? All right, you're going to quote scripture? Then I'll use scripture too.
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If that's what you're going to do, submit to the word of God, then I'll give you some verses to submit to. Trust God? Okay, prove it.
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Prove your confidence in God's protection. Put your money where your mouth is. Take you up to this pinnacle, literally this wing, and maybe it could be up to 450 feet above.
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It's not really on the temple where the holy of holy was, it could be on the outer sanctuary. Take them way up there, 450 feet up, so much so that the
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Jewish historian Josephus at the time said, if you would stand in this spot, you would be giddy, you'd be dizzy.
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Simon Magus, supposedly, who he thought he was the Messiah, tried to prove his
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Messiahship, he went up to this spot and jumped off, and there was a great thud.
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Here's the testing spot. By the way, tradition also says this is where James Christ's half -brother was thrown down from.
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You're going to just live on God's word, then here's a verse or two for you, and he quotes the Bible. My question to you is, what did he do to it?
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We're running out of time, so let me just tell you. A, he omitted the phrase, to guard you in all your ways, and then he twisted its meaning.
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Instead of trusting God, from Psalm 91, test God, presume on God. It's a modern liberal trick.
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Just change the meaning. God will protect you, Satan said, no matter what you do. He'll watch out for you.
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But God doesn't condone being rash, or putting ourselves in certain situations like that. No. Here, Satan's quoting the
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Bible. A PS congregation, cults all quote the Bible, for the most part.
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They have Bible words, Bible vocabulary, with different meanings. Just because somebody comes around quoting the
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Bible doesn't mean anything. They've been taught well by their father, the father of all lies, Satan. You can look at the root of the error, back in Genesis chapter 3.
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What did Jesus say? Verse 7, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. It's written, right from Deuteronomy 6, 16.
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You're not going to test God. No, we're not going to do this. I'm not going to presume on God.
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How do Christians presume on God? Let me give you a few examples. God's sovereign anyway, so why pray?
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God's in charge of who's going to heaven, and the elect are sealed, so why evangelize? If I yield to this temptation,
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Jesus is going to forgive me anyway. God really wants me healthy, so I don't have to exercise, or take care of my body, or don't need to wear seatbelts.
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Just kidding. Okay, that's not what the other one is. That could be an illustration of, why do
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I have to protect myself if God holds my days? Could be. That was just for somebody in the congregation, a little pastor to friend talk right there.
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If God's sovereign in our church, well, why do we have to do anything? No, we don't want to presume on God. Our attitude should be obedience and trust.
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And then lastly, time's gone, but we didn't have our ... We had some shorter hymns today.
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Third temptation, great example of Jesus with the sword of the Spirit. The third temptation is found in verses eight and following, go for the easy way out.
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Bypass the will of God, go for the easy way out. Satan brings his big gun out now. He's not pulling any punches.
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He's not disguising himself anymore. Oh, you know, use the Bible. He's just going for it. Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in their glory.
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Well, what exactly are those kingdoms? How many kingdoms are there? Are they literal kingdoms? We don't know.
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There are some things that we're not supposed to know, so the secret things belong to the Lord. God didn't tell us.
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Somehow it was true, though. All these kingdoms were shown to God, and I'm sure they were literal kingdoms. I don't think they were somehow figurative kingdoms.
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He showed them the glory. He showed them, Luke says, the moment of time, and so probably
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Rome and Egypt and Greece and all that stuff. And he said to him, verse nine, all these things
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I will give you if you fall down and worship me. Forget the roundabout thing now.
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Just get on your knees and worship me. Oh, worship the king. Just bow down. What a challenge to the first commandment.
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I mean, to the commandment, yeah, first commandment, you shall have no other gods what? Before me. Abandoning loyalty to the
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Father? How could Jesus? But you know, Jesus, it's going to be hard. You're going to be sweating, as it were, great drops of blood.
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You're going to be in that garden just praying out, oh God, if there's any other way, Father, if possible, let this cup pass from me.
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I don't know if Satan knew that part would happen, but I'm sure he knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of the wrath of God, and Jesus would have to be that as the lamb.
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Who cares about Psalm 2 -8 when God said to Jesus, ask of me and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance.
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Forget that. Take this shabby substitute. Take this plastic version. Why go through all that stuff?
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How does Jesus respond? Jesus is your example. You're in a tight spot. I'll use the
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Bible to help myself, not say something to Satan, because we're not Jesus, but just use the Bible, specifically with the problem in my life.
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And Jesus says, in his third response, the third it is written, verse 10, he said to him,
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Be gone, Satan, for it is written, and it stands written, you shall worship the Lord your God and serve him only.
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I'm faithful to God. I have fidelity towards him. And here, Deuteronomy chapter 6, verse 13 and 14, he says that very thing.
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The devil left him, and behold, the angels came to minister to him. What a great example of Christ showing us how to use the word of God.
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Here's the situation, don't trust in God. Well, what in the Bible is applicable to me trusting in God?
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That's what I'll use. Trying to evangelize a friend, what should I do? What in the Bible is applicable for me evangelizing my friends?
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That's a great passage about Jesus there using the word of God. Now, you don't have to use
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Deuteronomy alone, but it's always convicting to think, how well do I know Deuteronomy? Trust God in temptations was the lesson from Jesus.
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Don't test God and endure through. Don't go for the easy way out. Well, here's the good news and the bad news.
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Which one do you want first? All right, let's do the bad news first. When God teaches you a truth in your quiet time, in the radio or on Sunday morning preaching, he gives you opportunities to live that out, doesn't he?
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To see if you really believe it, to live it out and say, yes, I've just been taught that, now I have the resources for it.
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And so I'm sure the Lord is setting us up so we will understand what spiritual warfare is, so then when we're in it or in it deeper, we'll be able to live it out.
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But the good news is we know what to do. We know, okay, if I'm going to live a life of spiritual warfare and be in the battle,
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I better tell the truth in all areas. I better have a life of integrity. My business should have integrity.
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My taxes should have integrity. My bank account should have integrity. My giving should have integrity. Well, what else?
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I need to live a holy life. What Christians do, I do. I need to live a life of loving the right things and hating other things and having affection towards God.
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Well, what else? And you just can go right on down the line and say, if these things are true in my life, then
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I'm ready to fight Satan. And don't forget the Bible. It's the most important thing of all.
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I think, how do we use the Word of God? Moody said, a mutilated Bible is a broken sword.
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So I think what would be good this week is to say, let's as a congregation read the book of Deuteronomy and let's just master that book.
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How do you master a Bible with 66 books? Well, this year let's master Deuteronomy and the next year let's master the next and the next and the next.
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Say, well, I can't remember all these six. Let me just paint one last picture. Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life,
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John 14. Jesus is our righteousness. He's our holiness, 2
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Corinthians 5 .21. Jesus is our peace, our confidence, Ephesians 2 .14.
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Jesus is faithful, Galatians 2 .20. Jesus is our salvation,
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Luke 2 .30. And Jesus is the Word, John 1 .1. Put on the armor of God.
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Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Let's pray.
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Lord, thank you for our day today. Thank you for the opportunity to worship you. And Father, we can't worship without your
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Spirit helping us. And Father, we can't worship you without your Word. And we know you've given us this precise revelation so we might think properly and then we might act properly as well.
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And Father, I pray for our dear congregation and even the visitors here, certainly many of those in our church who are gone for the holiday.
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Father, would you help us by your grace to do these things? Would you help us to put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh?
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Father, would you help us with the spiritual warfare we're bound to be in here being in West Boylston?
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How many other churches preach the gospel here? How many other churches preach the gospel even in our area? And Father, we want to make a difference.
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And we know if there's no pushback, then we must not be doing the right thing. So Father, would you give us boldness?
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Would you give us courage? Would you help us to stand for you? What a privilege to say, I've been bought by the blood of Christ Jesus.
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I represent him and here's what God says. Father, help us to do that. Help us not to run away like Peter in those times.