Sunday Morning Worship Service September 20, 2020

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Sunday Morning Worship Service from Faith Baptist Church

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the blessings of this past week and they have been abundant. We are grateful for his answers to prayer and things that he has given and provided that were beyond what we could ask or think and even things we didn't even think about.
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And yet here he comes, he comes with his abundant mercies and grace and we are so grateful for those blessings and the blessing of gathering together today to worship the
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Lord and serve him together, to hear from his word, to be encouraged and challenged by it.
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And I trust you're anticipating those blessings today. The blessing also of uniting our hearts and our voices in song as we worship and sing praise to him and express even the benefits that are ours thinking of the weaponry that we have for our spiritual warfare.
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Before I begin the service itself, just a couple of words of announcement. Tonight in the evening service, we're doing a series called
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Songs in the Night and tonight we'll be looking at the song of the satisfied soul from Psalm 34 and encourage you to be back for that service this evening.
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And then if you notice on the congratulations side of the page, what a joy to hear of Dave and Sue Whitmer's anniversary yesterday, celebrated 50 years of marriage.
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So it would have been September 19th, 1970, 1970.
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Do you know how old I was in 1970? Yeah, wow.
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So congratulations to Dave and Sue and God has blessed you richly. I asked him yesterday at the other thing to celebrate this wedding between Max and Allison.
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I asked them, I said, are you doing anything special for your 50th? I asked Sue, I didn't ask
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Dave because I didn't want him to have to tell me his surprise that he had for his wife. But I asked
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Sue, I said, are you doing anything special for your 50th anniversary? She said, we're alive and together.
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What more do you need? So congratulations to them. But in the planning ahead section, you notice if you've observed that yet that in the four
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Sundays of October, we've got some guest speakers lined up, Gordon Taylor for the first two
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Sundays and Ron Burnett for the last two Sundays. Pastor Chris and I are gonna be hopefully getting some time for some much needed
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R &R. So these gentlemen have agreed to fill in and serve you during that time.
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And I know they've been here enough times before. I know that there'll be a blessing to you and just encourage you through the month of October under their ministry to be faithful.
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And I know that the ministry of the word will be a great encouragement to you and a blessing.
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Well, as we worship together today, I wanna start with Psalm 31, verses 23 and 24.
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Say, love the Lord, all you his saints. The Lord preserves the faithful, but abundantly repays the one who acts in pride.
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Be strong and let your heart take courage, all you who wait for the
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Lord. Let's open our service with song. Jim, please come lead us, shall we? Thank you, pastor.
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It's on page 336, 336 in your hymnals. My hope is in the
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Lord. Let's all stand together, please, and sing all four verses of my hope is in the
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Lord. ♪ My hope is in the
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Lord who gave himself for me ♪ Our father, again, we are truly grateful and thankful for who you are, our mighty
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God, our heavenly father, that we can come even now and give you the praise and the thanks for who you are and your goodness to us, your mercies and grace that are forever promised in Jesus Christ.
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We thank you for this meeting. We thank you for this church and the body. We ask your blessing upon the service, all aspects of it, but we ask it in Jesus' name, amen.
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Thank you, may you be seated. I'm gonna read together
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Psalm 130 on the back of your bulletin if you wanna follow along as we read.
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Just as a reminder, the Psalms are the songbook of the Bible. What we've been doing on Sunday nights in these
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Songs of the Night series is looking at a psalm and then also singing that psalm.
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All of the psalms have been put to music. Some of them are easier to sing than others, but we're learning some new ones along the way.
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Sunday morning, we read together from the psalm, Psalm 130. Out of the depths have
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I cried unto thee, O Lord. Lord, hear my voice. Let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.
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If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? But there is forgiveness with thee that thou mayest be feared.
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I wait for the Lord. My soul doth wait, and in his words do I hope.
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My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning. I say, more than they that watch for the morning.
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Let Israel hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption.
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He shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities. The Lord add his blessing to the reading of his word together.
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Jim? In your blue books, that is your supplement books, number four, page four,
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Before the Throne of God Above. And we're gonna sing all three verses. Before the
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Throne of God Above. ♪
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Before the throne of God above ♪ ♪ I have a strong, perfect plea ♪ ♪
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I pray the priesthood name of God ♪ ♪ Who ever lives and bleeds for me ♪ ♪
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My name is graven on his hands ♪ ♪ My name is written in his heart ♪ ♪
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I know that while in heaven he stands ♪ ♪ No tongue can bid me that demand ♪ ♪
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When Satan tempts me to despair ♪ ♪
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He tells me of the guilt within ♪ ♪ Upward I look and see him there ♪ ♪
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Who made an end of all my sin ♪ ♪ Because the sinless savior died ♪ ♪
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My sinful soul is counted free ♪ ♪ For God the just is satisfied ♪ ♪
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The look on him invited me to look on him invited ♪ ♪
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Behold him there, the perfect spotless righteousness ♪ ♪
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The great unchangeable, the king of glory himself ♪ ♪
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I cannot die, my soul is purchased by his blood ♪ ♪
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My life is healed with Christ the high ♪ ♪ With Christ my savior and my
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God ♪ As we go to prayer this morning, we want to pray for our missionary of the week, which should be the
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Hammermeisters. They serve in a suburb of Vancouver, British Columbia. Surrey is the community they're in.
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And we want to pray for them as they continue to try to hold their group together, their church. Before the
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COVID lockdown stuff came, they were meeting in a community center. And then, of course, they had to leave that.
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And then for months and months, weren't able to gather anywhere. They've recently been able to get together again.
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Most of the people who were with them before that lockdown have returned.
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So we're thankful for that, but continue to pray for that work, for its stability and its growth and its longevity.
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And we also want to pray for Harold Smith. Harold had this shoulder surgery. He's been having some difficulties as a result.
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He has an appointment on Tuesday, a follow -up appointment with a surgeon. So pray for Harold regarding that.
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We were glad yesterday to see Alison McCann, Max Haben get married.
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So I want to pray for them as they venture off on life together. Pray for Maxine Gommer.
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Maxine had a fall several weeks ago now and still having some difficulty with her wrist.
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So I want to pray for her. And then also, if you would, continue to pray for our grandson that he would be able to get home soon.
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And I won't say more about that now. I said something in Sunday school about that updating that situation, but we want to pray for that.
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So let's look to the Lord in prayer, shall we? So our
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Father and our God, we are grateful as we come before you today that before your throne, we have a great high priest and he intercedes for us.
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He ever intercedes for us. And because of his ongoing, continuous priestly ministry, we can come boldly before your throne.
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And so we do today. We come not on merits of our own or we could get nowhere.
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We come solely on the merits of our high priest, on our Savior, the
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Lord Jesus Christ, whose blood has graciously atoned for all of our sin.
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And on his merits, we stand. And so we come before you and we pray that you would intervene in these situations that are of burden and concern to our hearts.
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We pray for these who are struggling with physical limitations, illness, or whatever.
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We think of Harold and what he's struggling with, with medication as well as the pain of his shoulder.
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I pray that there would be some answers for him on Tuesday. Continue to pray for Kathy and thank you for the progress, even this week.
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And we thank you so much for the effectiveness of that procedure last Monday. But do pray for continued improvement.
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May she soon find herself able to walk with much greater ease.
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We pray for Bob Klein today and pray that you would encourage him, continue to give strength to his body, effectiveness of chemo treatment, even as another one this coming week.
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We do pray for Max and Allison. Thank you for their new life together and all that you have done in bringing the two to one, to become one.
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And now I pray that as they look to years together, should you tarry and should it be your will for them, we pray that you would give them grace and growth and great blessing to the church, to your people, and to their community.
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We pray for Maxine Gomer today and ask that you would give grace to her and her struggles with her wrist, the pain that she's experiencing.
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Likewise, may she soon be able to join us again, fully recovered.
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We thank you, Father, for the ministry and faithfulness of the Hammermeisters. And we pray today as they serve in British Columbia, that you would bless that ministry, bless the faithfulness through these many years.
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Thank you for those who have stayed faithful during these months of lockdown and no services.
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And as they get back together again, I pray that you would bless them richly with not only spiritual growth, but stability and numerical growth.
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We ask for that church to be firmly established. Use Darren and Elizabeth to that end, we pray.
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And Father, we do again thank you for granting us the joy and the privilege of gathering together on this
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Lord's Day. And Lord, we are reminded in our text for the day that we are in a warfare, we are in a spiritual battle.
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One of the places where we see that evidently is in our own nation with the conflict on so many levels.
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In the political world, the political fighting and infighting is sometimes very grievous and tiring.
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And we pray that you would be merciful to us as a nation and grant us leaders that would turn to you and look to you.
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We think of now the upcoming nomination of a
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Supreme Court justice, and we pray that this would occur speedily and that there would be a good justice, one who is fair and one who truly upholds the law and is faithful to the constitution of our nation.
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Because Father, we realize how destructive it is when law and order are disregarded for personal preference.
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So we pray that you would grant us a good justice on that high court. Then Father, we also pray regarding the moral decay of our nation, our land, and what is tolerated and even defended from the subject, the issue of abortion, to even the production of a movie that would celebrate young girls in a lewd way and be defended.
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Lord, we pray that these kinds of things would be decimated and rid from our land.
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We pray for mercy and for grace to see that happen. Lord, we commit the remainder of this service to you and ourselves, and we pray that in the remainder of these moments together today, you would speak to us, you would challenge us, encourage us, even convict us, and we pray this in Jesus' name and for his sake, amen.
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Number 413 in your hymnals, 4 -1 -3, faith is a victory.
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It's three verses, but we're just gonna be singing two, the first two verses of 413.
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Let's stand together, please. Verses one and two. ♪
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And camped along the hills of light ♪ ♪ Ye Christians, soldiers rise ♪ ♪
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And pressed the battle egg the night ♪ ♪ And the glowing skies against the foe ♪ ♪
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It builds below, let all our strength be heard ♪ ♪
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Faith is the victory we know that overcomes the world ♪ ♪
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Faith is a victory, faith is a victory ♪ ♪
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His banner over us is love our sword, the word of God ♪ ♪
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The saints above with shouts of triumph triumph ♪ ♪
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France swept on o 'er and the faith by which ♪ ♪
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Is still our shining shield ♪ ♪ Faith is a victory, faith is a victory ♪
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Thank you, please be seated.
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Our scripture reading this morning, we wanna read Ephesians chapter six and verses 10 through 18.
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Message this morning will focus on verses 16 and 17. Let me encourage you to follow along in your copy of scripture as we get those verses in context, beginning in verse 10.
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Apostle Paul is wrapping up this letter to the church at Ephesus. He says, finally in verse 10, "'My brethren, be strong in the
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Lord "'and in the power of His might. "'Put on the whole armor of God "'that you may be able to stand "'against the wiles of the devil.
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"'For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, "'but against principalities, against powers, "'against the rulers of the darkness of this world, "'against spiritual wickedness in high places.
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"'Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God "'that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, "'and having done all, to stand.
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"'Stand therefore, having your loins "'girt about with truth, "'and having on the breastplate of righteousness, "'and your feet shod with the preparation "'of the gospel of peace.
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"'Above all, taking the shield of faith "'wherewith you shall be able to quench "'all the fiery darts of the wicked.
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"'And take the helmet of salvation "'and the sword of the Spirit, "'which is the word of God, "'praying always with all prayer "'and supplication in the
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Spirit, "'watching thereunto with all perseverance "'and supplication for all saints.'"
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Brief prayer. And our Father, I pray as we consider today these components of the armor of God that we need to put on, that you would help us to see its application and very practical application in our everyday life.
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We pray in Jesus' name, amen. So Friday morning was really kind of a pretty difficult morning, personally, for nearly two weeks at that point.
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Our grandson had been kept away from his mother. It was in violation of an order of the court.
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So an emergency hearing was set up, and it was set up for Friday morning. And the purpose of the hearing was to request that the judge order our grandson to be returned home immediately.
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We had been praying for this hearing to occur, been praying earnestly for it to take place, and it finally came.
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And so now, on Friday, we're praying fervently for the judge to order for that return.
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And there were other things involved in that hearing as well, but that was, of course, the big thing, the major concern.
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He didn't have to do that. The judge didn't. I mean, he could've come up with some reason why he wouldn't order that return.
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And we have learned that there's not much that you can really say is absolutely certain in these kinds of situations.
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So we prayed, and we prayed. I woke up early that day, about 4 .30 in the morning, and I prayed as I tossed and turned because I didn't really wanna wake up that early.
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But the brain goes, and you just keep praying, and you're praying. Finally got up about a half hour or so later and got my
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Bible reading started, and in the Bible reading, I see these different verses that apply to the situation, and so I'm praying those verses into action, if you will.
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And then I went out for a walk and did my two -mile walk, and while I'm walking, it's just a constant matter of prayer.
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And through the whole ordeal, through the whole ordeal, before, during, and after,
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Satan plied his wiles and hurled his darts. You know, we can think of the armor that we're talking about here in Ephesians chapter six, that we need this armor for our spiritual warfare to fend off the big things, you know, like those major attacks, those temptations that if we give in to them, they'll really mess up our lives, and they'll really ruin us.
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And we definitely need the armor for those things, but not only for those things.
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Verse 16 begins, and it's translated into King James, above all. A better way to interpret that or translate that would be in all circumstances, in all circumstances.
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So what Paul is exhorting here in verses 16 and 17, the pieces of armor that he's telling us that we need to have in our spiritual warfare, is we need this in all circumstances.
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And we need this in all circumstances, because listen, spiritual warfare takes place everywhere.
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It takes place anywhere. It takes place in all kinds of circumstances.
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And not just for the big things that will ruin your life. We need this armor in every circumstance of life, even in earnest prayer for a little boy's deliverance and protection.
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And Paul specifies in verses 16 and 17, that in all circumstances of your warfare with the wicked one, you need to prepare yourself with three vital pieces of armor.
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Helmet, shield, and sword. Helmet, shield, and sword.
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First one in the list is that of the shield. And he says in verse 16, you need to take up the shield of faith.
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Literally there, translated taking, it's take up the shield of faith. It's an imperative.
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It's something you need to do actively and intentionally. Take up that shield of faith.
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Now, maybe you're familiar with the different kinds of shields in ancient warfare, but maybe not.
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And what Paul is talking about here, he's referencing the shield that the Roman soldier would use in battle.
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And this kind of shield that he's talking about, he's using as an imagery. It was a shield that was about four feet tall and about two and a half feet wide.
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And the purpose of that shield was to protect the majority of the body. It's not like that 24 -inch
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Captain America shield, you know, that round one that he holds and he can cover this part of his body, but the rest, or he can get down here, but the rest is exposed.
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No, this is a huge shield that covers the better part of the soldier's body.
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And it was made of wood, but then covered with either canvas or leather.
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And what the soldiers would often do, especially in fighting certain kinds of enemies, enemies that were inclined to use arrows or spears or darts that they would dip in like a tar kind of a substance and set it afire and hurl those things at their enemies.
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What the soldiers would do is take that shield and dip it in some water so that the leather or the canvas absorbs the water.
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And then when those fiery arrows hit the shield, the shield would extinguish the arrow.
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Well, this is the imagery that Paul uses here, and he uses it because your enemy loves to shoot fiery darts at you.
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Ian Hamilton describes these darts as well -aimed, powerful, often sudden and unexpected temptations and accusations of the devil.
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Did you get that? Not only temptations, but accusations of the devil.
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So some of the darts that the wicked one uses, these flaming arrows that he shoots at you, come in the form of your thoughts.
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Thoughts. Thoughts like, because of your sin, God isn't gonna listen to you.
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God isn't gonna listen to you. Doesn't matter that you've repented and turned from that sin.
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Doesn't matter. Satan still comes back to you and he says, you remember what you did? You remember what you said? Remember that?
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You remember that? And you think God's gonna listen to you now? This is a battle the other day.
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One of them, you know, one of the kinds of ideas or thoughts that he shot in the midst of this turmoil.
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Another one is, do you really have enough faith to believe what you're praying for will come to pass?
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Do you really have the faith? How strong is your faith after all? Have you ever heard that?
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Have you ever had that thought come into your mind while you're trying to pray or you're thinking something through? I guarantee you have.
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You've had any experience in prayer? Surely you have. Do you really believe that God hears you?
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Do you really believe that God cares about this situation and all kinds of things like that? You remember what you said?
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Satan throws at you. You remember what you did? These are things that are going on in your mind.
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These are things that are going on in your thoughts. These are darts that Satan is hurling at you in the quietness or the silence of your own mind.
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It's not even that anybody else is doing anything. This is just what's going on in your own thoughts.
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Sometimes those darts can come in the form of the enticements in your surroundings.
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You remember what John writes in 1 John 2, verse 15? He tells you not to love the world, neither the things that are in the world.
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Then he talks about them in verse 16. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.
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And that is a threefold way of covering just about all of the enticements that can come your way just walking through this world, living in the culture in which you live.
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And these things, you can just be walking along and all of a sudden, this dart flies at you that is a lust of the flesh, some kind of a desire related to your flesh, or some kind of a desire related to your eyes, or some kind of an enticement to get proud and lifted up with pride about your own personal superiority over somebody else.
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Satan loves to hurl darts in the form of the culture, the world around you.
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So you need to take up this shield of faith. And the shield of faith affords for you some spiritual protection.
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Now this shield, I find interesting that the Lord God himself used this imagery in the expression of the
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Abrahamic covenant. You remember in Genesis chapter 15, the Lord comes to Abram and says to him,
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I am your, what, shield, and your exceeding great reward.
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The Lord says, I am your shield. So when you take up the shield of faith, what you're doing is you're taking up your
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God, your Lord, what he has revealed about himself, about who he is, and about what he is like, who he is like.
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You take up the shield of faith. So here's the thing about the shield of faith, and this will help you fly in the face of the wicked one who comes at you and says, is your faith really strong enough?
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Do you really have enough faith? The deal is, the shield of faith is not so much concerned with the quality, if you will, of your faith.
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It's concerned with the object of your faith. In whom is your faith centered?
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The object of your faith needs to be the Lord Jesus Christ. Because as in the song we sang earlier before the throne of God above,
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I had this strong and perfect priest. And why is he there interceding for you?
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Because of his finished priestly work. He bore all your sins penalty on the cross.
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In his blood, there is the purging, there is the cleansing of all sin.
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Your faith is in the object of Jesus, who is Jesus Christ, the priest, your high priest, who has finished all of his priestly work.
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So Satan comes to you, reminding you, yeah, you remember that sin you committed?
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You remember that thing you did? Remember that outburst, that sinful outburst?
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He doesn't remind you that you were smitten about it and that you confessed it to the
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Lord. He doesn't remind you of that. He doesn't remind you that you repented of it and that you don't have anything to do with it.
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He doesn't remind you of that. He just reminds you of what you did. He reminds you of what you said. He reminds you of the thought that you had or whatever.
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He reminds you of these things. And this is where you take up the shield of faith and you extinguish that dart and you say,
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Jesus paid it all, all, all, every sin.
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And your faith is in the object of Christ, who is engaged in ongoing priestly work.
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Hebrews 7 .25 talks about that, that we have this high priest who is constantly interceding for us, constantly interceding for us.
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So even this morning as we prayed together as a congregation, our high priest was interceding at the throne of God.
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When I was praying incessantly the other day, the high priest, my high priest was interceding before the throne of God.
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Do you think Satan wants me to remember that? Do you think he wants you to remember that?
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Absolutely not. He wants you to forget all about that. He wants you to turn your attention on yourself and on the perfect, have you ever thought this?
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Is my prayer perfect enough? Are my words just right? Is my formula what it ought to be?
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Have you thought things like that? Have you forgotten? And in moments like, you think things like that at that moment because of the fiery darts, because the one thing that the devil wants to do is to get you to stop praying, make you throw up your hands in despair and say, oh, what's the use, what's the use?
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I can't get it right anyway. Take up the shield of faith and remember, you have a high priest who is always interceding in your behalf.
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And this high priest, this one whose work is finished in the past, he's finished work in the past, he has ongoing work now, he is also offered to us exceeding great and precious promises.
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Take him up, take him up with that shield of faith. Put your faith in Christ and his work past, his work present and his promised work in the future.
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And then dip that shield in the water of the word. Dip it in the water of the word, such as Hebrews chapter four verses 15 and 16, where we read that we do indeed have a
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God who cares. He hears and he cares. Verse 15, we have not a high priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are and yet without sin.
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Let us therefore come boldly before the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
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He does care and he does hear. Take that, fiery dart.
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You see the water of the word, the shield soaked in the water of the word, how that will extinguish the dart that says
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God doesn't hear you. Your prayer isn't getting any higher than the ceiling. He doesn't really care about this situation.
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Look at all the junk going on in the world. Look at all the other people who are in so much worse situation than you are.
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Look at what's going on in our nation. Do you think God really cares about this little insignificant thing that you're so burdened down with?
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You take up the shield and you dip it in the water of the word and you hold it up to that fiery dart of the wicked one and you say, yes, yes, he does care.
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He does hear. And then you can dip it in the water of the word that you find in Romans eight, verses 38 and 39.
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And the wicked one sends the fiery dart your way where he says to you, look at what you've done.
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It's you, you are separated from God. For sure you are separated from God. Remember what you said.
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Take the shield of faith, dip it in Romans eight, 38 and 39, and you can say
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I am persuaded with your shield in place, I am persuaded that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our
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Lord. And the dart is extinguished. Or dip it in the water of the word you find in 1
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John 5, 4 as the world around you with all the desires of the flesh and the enticements of the eyes and the pride of life come hurled at you, burning fiery darts coming at you.
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And 1 John 5, 4 you read, what is the, what overcomes the world?
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Even our faith overcomes the world. Our faith is the victory that overcomes the world.
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We sang about that, the word tells us that. Take up the shield of faith.
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But then in verse 17, the first part of verse 17 in our text in Hebrews chapter six, it says take the helmet of salvation.
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Take the helmet of salvation. Now we've seen this word take show up a few times in this passage, right?
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This whole passage on putting on the armor. But here John, Paul uses a different Greek word.
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In the previous words he uses the word that means like to take up, like you reach over and you pick something up and you put it on or you take up, there's the shield, it's there.
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You reach over, you take it up. But here the word isn't like take something up, but it's more in the, it has more of the idea of receiving something that is offered.
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Receiving something that is being held out to you. So for example, a soldier in a military unit, he needs to go, he's gonna go through the supply line and there's some supplies that they're gonna dole out.
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As he goes through the line, the supplies for him are offered to him and he receives them, taking them to himself, but he's receiving something that is offered.
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So verse 17 could be put this way. Receive the helmet of salvation.
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Receive the helmet of salvation. Regarding this, Charles Hodge said, that which enables the
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Christian to hold up his head with confidence and joy is the fact that he is saved.
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Let me say that again. That which enables the Christian to hold up his head with confidence and joy is the fact that he is saved.
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And why is it important that you receive the helmet of salvation? Because the wicked one, he comes your way and he does, if there's, he does not want you to have any sense of confidence and he certainly doesn't want you to experience joy.
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Receive the helmet of salvation. You might hold up your head with confidence and joy, knowing that you are saved.
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Now, turn with me to 1 Thessalonians 5 because Paul uses this same idea of the helmet of salvation in 1
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Thessalonians 5 verses eight through 10. 1
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Thessalonians 5, look at verse eight. He says, but let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet, the hope of salvation.
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Now, let's continue reading. For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our
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Lord Jesus Christ who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him.
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All right, so look how, you know, Paul is, it's kind of like in Ephesians chapter six, Paul uses a shorthand expression for what he elaborates on here in 1
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Thessalonians 5. He says, receive the helmet of salvation and then he goes on.
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But here in 1 Thessalonians 5, we get a deeper understanding of what that helmet of salvation is all about.
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For a helmet, the hope of salvation, he says. Well, how is this helmet that's going on my head, how is this protective to me?
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Well, it protects you from Satan's accusation that comes your way to accuse you of doom.
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Satan comes your way and he says to you, you certainly, look, look how far you are from holiness, the perfection of the
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Christian life. Look how much you fail. Look how often you fail.
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You certainly can't be a Christian. Have you ever heard that voice come your way?
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But what is the hope of salvation? First part of verse 10. For God has not appointed us to wrath.
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God has not destined us to wrath. The hope of your salvation, by the way, is not determined by whether or not you ever sin.
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Because that would put it all on you, wouldn't it? On what basis are you saved?
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Are you saved on the basis of your works? Do your works contribute to your salvation?
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If so, then Satan has a case. He's got a pretty good case against you.
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Because everyone in this room, you know, you fail in more ways than you know.
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And you say, well, I don't do any gross sins or anything like that. I'm pretty good, you know, you're also pretty proud.
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There you are, sin. You see, we can't escape it. The hope of our salvation does not rest in how perfect we are.
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The hope of our salvation rests in how perfect Christ is and what a perfect sacrifice
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Christ has made. And because of that perfect sacrifice of Christ, if you are in Christ, you are not appointed or destined for wrath.
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So this helmet of salvation protects you from that accusation of Satan that comes at you and says, certainly you are doomed, you are doomed.
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No, I am in Christ. And that helmet of salvation not only protects you from Satan's accusation of doom, but it also protects you with the certainty of salvation.
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The Lord, it says here in verse 10, or verse nine, God has not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our
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Lord Jesus Christ. So I have this protection of the certainty of salvation and it is certain, now listen, because you know how that salvation is acquired.
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It is acquired through our Lord Jesus Christ. Again, it's not acquired, salvation is not acquired by my merits.
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It's not acquired by my efforts. It's acquired through our
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Lord Jesus Christ. His merits, His perfect work, His perfect obedience, both active and passive.
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You have the certainty of salvation, not only because you know how it's acquired, but you know upon what it is based.
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What is your salvation based upon? Verse 10 tells us, goes on to tell us.
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God has appointed us to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us.
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Who died for us. Your salvation, if you are Christ's, is based not on your work, not on your efforts, not on your merits, but it's based upon the death of Christ.
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Christ died for you. Christ died in your place.
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Christ, in dying for you, He paid the penalty of all your sin. God made
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Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we who are sinners might be made righteous and might be made the righteousness of Christ.
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You know what it's based upon. The death of Christ. And you have that certainty of salvation.
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You're protected with a helmet of salvation, with a certainty of salvation, because you know the outcome.
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The outcome of that salvation. Again, verse 10. He died for us so that, whether we wake or sleep, whether we live or die, we should live together with Him.
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Do you get the scope of that? Whether we live in this life, we live together with Him.
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Look, if you are Christ, if you are in Christ, put on the helmet of salvation. Satan comes to you and says, you're doomed.
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You're certainly doomed. No, I'm living together with Christ. I'm not doomed, I'm alive.
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I'm living together with Christ. And guess what? Mr. Devil, when
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I close my eyes in death, and this shell of a body is laid in the tomb and lowered into the earth,
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I am still living together with Him. When my body sleeps,
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I am living with Him. This is the helmet of salvation.
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This is a certainty of salvation. Again, Ian Hamilton is very helpful in this in his more or less pastoral commentary on the book of Ephesians.
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Let me share with you what he wrote regarding this helmet of salvation. I found it most helpful.
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He says, Satan is malignantly adept at plying our minds with plausible reasons why our hope before God is built on the shakiest of foundations.
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Isn't he, though? Isn't he? He says, our lives are so full of contradictions and inconsistencies.
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We experience lapses of faith and failures of trust. And we even fall into grievous sin.
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Our minds can be besieged with a host of reasons that may rob us of any assurance.
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What then are we to do? Take the helmet of salvation.
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Don't look into yourself to find crumbs of comfort. Look out to your
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Savior and His perfect salvation. What guides our minds is the salvation perfectly accomplished for us by our
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Lord Jesus. He has made the once for all perfect, complete, and unimpeachable atonement for sin.
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That's why Charity Bancroft could write in the hymn we sang a few minutes ago, when
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Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within, upward
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I look and I see Him there, who made an end to all my sin.
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There's the helmet of salvation. There's the helmet of salvation. Hamilton went on to say, your salvation is impregnable because your
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Savior is impregnable. Take up the shield of faith.
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Put on the helmet of salvation. And the last part of verse 17 in our text says you need to wield the sword of the
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Spirit. Wield the sword of the Spirit. What do you think of when you think of the sword? Don't you think of the, don't you think of the night?
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Have you ever been to, have you ever been to medieval times? Some of you have been there.
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We went a few years ago, Christmas gift to the grandson and we all went and you sit in this, it looks like a, it was a little
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Coliseum kind of thing and there's this big huge open arena down in that thing and you get to eat a night's meal at this table without any silverware, you know.
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So you get this roasted half a chicken and all this stuff and you have to eat with your hands.
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You know, it's kind of a delight. But what's going, what you're really there for is not the meal, believe me, believe me.
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It's not, what you're really there for is what's going on down there in the arena, in that dirt arena.
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These knights come out on their horses and they joust and they all do all this stuff.
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And then, you know, one of them gets knocked off the horse and the other one gets down off his horse because he has to kill his opponent.
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And so they take out their swords. Isn't that what you think of? A big sword and they get into this, you know, sword play until finally one of them gets, hmm, pretends to get killed.
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That's not the sword that Paul is talking about. Instead he's talking about a dagger. He's talking about the kind of knife that would be kept in the belt, that would be pulled out in close hand -to -hand combat.
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When do you need such a sword as that? Such a dagger as that? You need it, as one writer has said, when you're being misled by error and philosophies of men.
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When you're being deceived by false principles of morality, rationalizations of vice, plagued by doubts, overwhelmed by fear, enticed by unlawful gratification.
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Use the sword, wield the sword. And you want to use the sword because of what it is.
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He says here in verse 17, "'Receive the sword of the
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Spirit, "'which is the word of God.'" What is this sword?
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It is the word of God. Now, I don't want to bore you with details, but you need to understand the significance of the term that Paul uses when he says the word of God.
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There are two Greek words that are translated in our English Bibles with the term word. One of them is the
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Greek term logos. So for example, in John 1, when you read, "'In the beginning was the
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Word, "'and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.'" What you're reading in the Greek is, "'In the beginning was the logos, "'and the logos was with God, and the logos was
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God.'" And that word logos is, we can think of it as the whole corpus of God's revelation.
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That's the word of God, the logos of God, the whole corpus of God's revelation. But there's another
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Greek word, also translated word, and it's the term hrema.
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And this refers to usually an individual word.
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So hrema is a hrema, if you will. But it can also be used, hrema can also be used to speak of a statement.
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So think of it like this, and that's the term that Paul uses here. The sword of the
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Spirit, which is the hrema of God. Take a dagger that is the hrema of God in your hand -to -hand combat with the wicked one who attacks you, with your foe, with your enemy.
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What is he talking about? He's talking about, in these close battles, you need a statement from God to pierce that which is coming at you.
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You see this illustrated perfectly by the Lord Jesus. So look at Matthew chapter four, for example.
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Matthew four is the account of Jesus being led into the wilderness, being driven into the wilderness, by the
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Holy Spirit. You read that in the first verse of chapter four. It says, then was Jesus led up by the
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Spirit into the wilderness. Literally, he was driven out by the Spirit into the wilderness to be put to the test by the devil.
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Okay, so the devil is gonna come to Jesus, and what does the devil do? The devil comes to Jesus in hand -to -hand combat, and he throws this idea at him when he's hungry.
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Jesus is hungry. He's been fasting for 40 days. And the devil comes to him, and he says, hey, you're the
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Son of God. Command these stones to be made bread. That seems like a reasonable thing to do when you're hungry.
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You have the power to take a stone and turn it into bread, and you have something to eat. Shazam. What does
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Jesus do? He takes the sword of the Spirit. He takes the
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Hrema of God, and he says, it is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word,
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Hrema, that proceeds out of the mouth of God. So Jesus takes the dagger of the word, and he pierces the enemy with that dagger and defeats this threat that comes against him.
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Use the sword because of what it is. It is the word of God. And use the sword because of its source.
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Where did it come from? It is the sword of the Spirit. The sword of the
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Spirit. We call it the sword of the Spirit because it's the Holy Spirit that brought the sword into being.
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You know this from 2 Peter 121. Prophecy didn't come. The word of God didn't come by the will of man or the ingenuity of man, but it came as men were born along by the
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Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is the source of the sword because he brought it into being.
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But listen, it's the sword of the Spirit also because it is the Holy Spirit who brings into your mind the
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Hrema of God in these times of testing, these times of temptation.
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So again, Jesus, we see this with Jesus in the wilderness. And you notice how
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Jesus is where he is because the Spirit led him out there, drove him into that wilderness to be put to the test.
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How is it then that when this temptation came,
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Jesus could answer, respond to the temptation with a Hrema, with a sword, with the word of God?
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Because of the third person of the Trinity who is at work ministering came upon Jesus, the same third person of the
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Trinity who dwells within you and is the one who brings to mind
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Hrema of God at critical times. So the other morning, and I'm struggling in prayer, and Satan comes to me, and he says, you really don't believe
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God's gonna answer that prayer and turn the heart of the judge in your direction, do you?
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And my mind goes to the heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord. He turns it wherever he wants.
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And so on and so forth, you see. Where did that come from? You say, well, you had that memorized as in the storage bank of your brain.
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Yeah, it was, but why then? Why now? Because of the work of the
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Holy Spirit, the sword of the Spirit. The Spirit brings these things to mind and helps you to slay the wicked one.
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So use the sword because of what it is. Use the sword because of its source, but also use the sword because of its power.
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Word of God, Hebrews 4 .12 tells us, is living and powerful, and it's sharper than any two -edged sword.
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It's living. That means it's always relevant, always relevant.
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You know, I don't have to make the Bible relevant. No preacher does. He just has to show how it is relevant.
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It already is relevant. It's living, it's always relevant. It's relevant in every age.
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It's relevant in, listen, every circumstance, which is why
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Paul says, in all circumstances, take up the sword, receive the sword of the
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Spirit. It's living. It's also powerful, it's powerful. It accomplishes the intended purpose that God has for giving it.
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This is what he says in Isaiah 55, verse 11, right? The Lord said, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth.
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It shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the thing for which
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I sent it. The word of God is living and it is powerful.
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It will accomplish the purpose for which God sends it. Every day, every single day of your life and my life, the enemy is, he's hurling fiery darts at you, at me.
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Is the shield in your hand? Every day, the wicked one wants to make you insecure in your salvation.
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Are you wearing the helmet? Every day, he comes at you in close range with a whole bunch of ideas and enticements and rationalizations that will lead you into sin.
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Are you ready with the dagger? You ready with the sword? In all circumstances, you need the shield, the helmet, and the sword.
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Our Father and our God, I pray this morning, we would understand just how critical it is.
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Why Paul wrote what he wrote. These are not optional pieces of equipment that we can take or leave, but we as your people, followers of Christ, those whom you by your grace have redeemed and claimed as your own, we need these pieces of equipment.
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We need this, we need this shield of faith. We need to receive this helmet of salvation.
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We need to wield the sword of the Spirit. Oh, by your grace, help us to take these things up, receive them, and put them on.
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This we pray in Jesus' name, amen. All right, would you take your blue supplement books and turn to number 52, number 52.
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And I want to sing just the first two stanzas of this hymn, O Church, Arise.
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These two stanzas especially focus on this armor that we are to wear as a church, as God's people, in the spiritual warfare in which we are engaged.
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Let's stand together as we sing stanzas one and two. O Church, Arise. ♪
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O Church, arise and put your armor on ♪ ♪
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In the call of Christ our captain ♪ ♪ For now the weak can say that they are strong ♪ ♪
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In the strength that God has given ♪ ♪ With shield of faith and belt of truth ♪ ♪
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We'll stand against the devil's lies ♪ ♪ An army bold whose battle cry is love ♪ ♪
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Reaching out to those in darkness ♪ ♪ Our call to war to love the captive soul ♪ ♪
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But to rage against the captor and with the sword ♪ ♪
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We will fight with faith and valor ♪ ♪ When faced with trials on every side ♪ ♪
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We know the outcome is secure ♪ ♪
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And Christ will have the price for which he died ♪ ♪
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An inheritance of nations ♪ Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only
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God our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority before all time and now and forever.