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I'd like to start off with a quote today from a theologian. I'd like you to ask yourself the question, when was this written? The world is passing through troubled times. The young people of today think of nothing but themselves.
They have no reverence for parents or old age. They are impatient of all restraint. They talk as if they know everything. And what passes for wisdom with us is foolishness with them. As for the girls, they are forward and modest, unladylike in speech, behavior, and dress.
Who wrote that? When was it written? Ann Landers? Did she write that? Dear Abby, James Dobson, Moral Majority, Jerry Falwell? Actually, that's an extract from a sermon preached by Peter the Hermit in 1274 AD.
There is nothing new under the sun. Paul said, realize this, in the last days, difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips without self-control, brutal haters of good.
And Paul has been talking to the church about family life, wives, husbands, children, workers, and then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, he says, you're in a war. Turn to Ephesians 6, and I want you to see that with your own eyes.
This gospel of grace permeates parents and children, the way you work, slaves and free, masters and bondservants. And then out of nowhere, with military-like abruptness, Paul says, you're in a war. Spiritual pacifists may not apply.
Instead of walking in chapter 5, you're walking the Christian life. Now it's, you're in a war. And Paul wants everyone to know at Ephesus, and even here now, 2 ,000 years later, that we need the proper assessment of the enemy, and we need proper armor.
As you know, Ephesians 6, verses 10 and following is the armor of God passage. How many people have read the armor of God before? Of course, we know the armor. And it's important for us to see, as we've been working through the book of Ephesians, chapter by chapter, two sermons a chapter.
By the way, I hate to say goodbye to an old friend today. Right, the last sermon on Hebrews. I mean, on Ephesians for a while. I think I counted, we went through Hebrews in 103 sermons. And so Ephesians has just been six, speeding it up a little bit.
Why would Paul end with the armor? Is the armor important? Is it something that we do? Is it provided for us? Been a lot of commentators writing on the armor of God. And one man named William Gurnall wrote a book, a book that contained 12, 261 chapters, 1400 pages on these 11 verses.
And so I thought, well, I only have two hours for the sermon today, so I think I can get it done. He said, here's my book title for Ephesians 6, The Christian in Complete Armor. Good, but you know how Puritans love to have subtitles for their books?
Here's the subtitle of the book. The Saints' War Against the Devil, wherein a discovery is made of that grand enemy of God and his people, in his policies, power, seat of his empire, wickedness, and chief design that he hath against the saints.
A magazine opened from whence the Christian is furnished with spiritual arms for the battle, helped on with his armor, and taught the use of his weapon together with the happy issue of the whole war. Paul has been working through Ephesians, and you know, big picture, it would be something like this.
Here's who you are in Christ, chapters one, two, and three. This is what God the triune God has done. He's blessed you with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. He's predestined you, his son has redeemed you, the spirit has sealed you.
Jesus has made peace, not between just you and God, but if you are at peace with God, and other Jews and Gentiles are at peace with God, you're at peace with one another. He talks about this great mystery of the gospel, where God knew all along what the gospel was, but we didn't know until he told us, because we're finite, we're sinful, and we can't think the mind of God until he reveals himself.
And Paul ends this book with a very important topic, and that is there is an invisible battle going on, and we need to recognize that and have the right armor so we can combat the real and true arch enemy of the Christian church, and that is Satan.
Let me give you some introductory notes from chapter 6, 10 and following, and then we're gonna get right into the section. Introductory note number one. Doesn't this strike you oddly, where we end with this section of parents, and wives, and bondservants, and workers, and masters, and then he says, it's just startling, finally, this is an abrupt transition.
I mean, we're going from peaceful homes and serenity at work to, oh, you're in a war. One writer said, it is marriage, parent-child relations, and in the daily working world that we need to recognize that we are not dealing merely with flesh and blood, but with rulers, authorities, cosmic forces, spiritual forces of evil.
If in fact the church, if in fact the family is a trophy of God's grace, is a showcase of God's grace, don't you think Satan hates the church? Don't you think he hates the family? The answer is yes, and he will do everything he can to cause problems, and Paul doesn't want that, and so he says, I want you to be strong in the Lord and the strength of his mind.
If you're looking for an outline, let me just give you some confidence-building strategies so that you can not have to worry about Satan. I think we've got two problems when it comes to Satan. There's people on this side of the camp where everything's satanic.
If you overeat, it's satanic. There's temptations, there's trials. Satan's involved in politics. Satan's involved in my daily living. Satan's involved everywhere. I rebuke him, I cast him out, I send him to Fitchburg, I do all these things.
That's an inside joke, by the way. How many people here live in Fitchburg? And then we tend to be here at this church where we could minimize Satan. Satan, he's real, he's the father of all lies. He's powerful, he's anti-Christ, he's anti-church.
And while we might laugh about an excess in this area, I think Paul's discussion in Ephesians 6 is a good remedy for us to think, well, you know what, we can't see Satan and his hordes, therefore, what's the big deal?
Now, Paul's whole theme in this book is to exalt the triune God and to give you encouragement. Chapter 6, verse 22, he wants to encourage you. So we don't have to come to this passage and be all afraid, and what if Satan can oppress me and possess me and make me lose my salvation, and I'm just left on my own?
God saved me, God justified me, God redeemed me, and now I'm on my own by myself as a sentinel out in the middle of nowhere, and I'm going to be vanquished by this strong enemy. No, he wants you to have confidence.
Let me give you some confidence-building strategies from Paul in light of who you are in Christ so that you can properly navigate this situation. Number one, confidence-building strategy, you never were meant to stand on your own.
You don't have to rely on yourself, in other words. You can be confident, and look at verse 10. Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Well, what if Satan's too strong? What if the enemy's too powerful?
What if I can't resist? I have not been able to resist much temptation in my life, and I know I can't trust myself. I can't live a victorious Christian life on my own. Am I going to have the ability? Well, in ourselves, we should have no confidence in our own ability, but with the Lord's power, with the Lord's strength, and He uses all kinds of words for strength and might and power, we should have confidence.
I don't have to be afraid. I don't go to sleep at night thinking, what if Satan's going to get me? I think Satan is out there, but I know who the Lord is. And he says, be strong in the Lord. I like the way he summarizes it.
You know, he uses a word that means nothing to a preacher. Finally, in closing, in summary, but for Paul, he says that there's a few things that remain. This is what remains, and I want to tell you about spiritual warfare.
The church at Ephesus and Bethlehem Bible Church. Let me tell you finally, in light of what God has done for you freely, full of sovereign grace, even though you were sinful and an enemy of God, we even heard at the testimonies of the baptism, that you're adopted, you're a child of God.
And by the way, has not God given you every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places? And if He has given you that, Ephesians 1 .3, won't He give you ways to try to combat Satan and the enemies and the hordes against your soul?
Of course, if He didn't spare His Son, won't He give you everything else? If He gives the biggest gift, won't He give you the smallest gift? And here's this battle, be strong. By the way, this is not a word that means I personally have to be strong.
I went to the gym yesterday and I did bicep curls and tricep extensions and quads and all that stuff. I'm working myself out. No, no, literally this is be strengthened. Strength comes from another and it's given to you.
This isn't you get yourself strong. This is God is willing and eager and generous to strengthen you. When He says, you need to be strong in the might of the Lord. He's trying to tell you, you know what?
This by myself, I'm strong and I can withstand temptation. I can withstand discouragement. I can withstand doubt. I am my own person. That's not what we should do. We are dependent people. We are frail people.
And He highlights it in verse 10, be strong in the Lord. Be strengthened by the Lord, not by yourself, not even through primarily other Christians or other means, but it's in the Lord and in the strength of His might.
We have to realize when we have the strong enemy, that self-sufficiency is deadly. I have to realize that I'm weak and that you're weak. By the way, this being strengthened in the Lord, doesn't that remind you of the Lord Jesus on earth?
What was in fact the Lord Jesus, the eternal Son who took on flesh, true human nature? Wasn't He strong in the Lord, His Father? Wasn't He dependent on God and who He is? In the battle with Jesus and temptations from Satan, it wasn't Jesus saying, you know what?
It's me against Satan. It's the Father's good pleasure to send me and the Spirit of God's good pleasure to help me to be dependent. Jesus was obediently dependent on the Father. Even David, it says of David in 1 Samuel 30, he strengthened himself in the Lord, His God.
True or false? We are more than conquerors. Well, true, but we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us and gave Himself for us. I love the song that goes like this. High King of heaven, my victory won.
May I reach heaven's joys, oh, bright heaven's sun. Heart of my own heart, whatever befall, still be my vision, oh, ruler of all. That's what Paul was after, to be strengthened in the Lord. Not his own strength, but the Lord's strength.
And so, therefore, our confidence is not in ourselves. We don't trust our own resources, our own natural weapons. Did we in our own strength confide? Our striving would be losing. Beuys said, a Christian is foolish if he thinks Satan can be resisted by human strength alone.
Well, there's another confidence-building strategy, and that's found in verses 11 and 12. Well, if we are not supposed to trust ourselves negatively, now let's make it positively. Christian, be confident in what God supplies.
You can be confident in what God gives you. Of course, His generous, great, gracious God, He will take care of you. The adversaries may be fierce and wicked, but the Lord is adequate. Verse 11, put on the full armor of God that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.
Put on God's armor. The language here is pretty staccato. It's pretty drill instructor, drill sergeant-like. He's not blending things together. It's like one, two, three, four, and that's the language here.
You're in a war. It's war language. Put on, just like you put on some clothes. This is used in Luke 15. Quickly bring out the best robe and put it on Him. We need the armor of God. It says in Colossians 3, we put on the new self, which is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the One who created Him.
Why do we need God's armor? We're gonna see what the armor is in a moment, but why do we need it? You see the verse? That you may be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. Here's the language.
You put somebody out to guard something and you tell them what? When the enemy comes, you shirk back. When the enemy comes, you retreat. No, you tell them most likely, when the enemy comes, you hold your what?
You hold your ground. You stay the course. Maintain your ground. Victory at Calvary's been won. You stand firm. You say, well, how could I against Satan? Did He not sweep away one third of the angels in heaven with His mighty power?
Is He not a roaring lion seeking people to devour like Noah, like David, like Moses, like Peter? Doesn't He want to sift me and you like wheat and devour us? Yes, but David isn't addressed here. You're addressed here.
And it says you've got to recognize He's got this organized strategy. And He's got these wiles. How many people's Bible translation says the wiles of the devil? Some say wiles. Yes, schemes. It's where we get the word methods.
He has methods. With all due respect, He's the first Methodist. No, just kidding. He's got plans. See, we live our life just once and we figure out the hard way what to do. Satan's been dealing with people for generation after generation, thousands and millions and billions of people.
He knows the right strategy. And you just have to back up to Genesis 3. And what's his strategy with Eve? God's not good. God's not generous. God's holding out of you. He's got these plans. He knew what to do at the beginning because He's so wise.
And compoundedly, He makes Himself disguised like an angel of big fangs and gross sulfur smells. No, an angel of light. Paul says, church, stand your ground. He's got wiles. He's got military ploys. He's been doing His methods for a long, long time.
And while He tempted Eve, hindered God's servant in Zechariah, snares the wicked, you're to stand. This all started the spiritual warfare in Genesis 3, as I said, and I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed.
He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise His heel. Satan loves these methods. I just read some methods and added some of my own. He loves to mix truth with error. He loves to make everybody say, truth doesn't really matter.
What matters is ecumenism. If God really loved you, He wouldn't let you suffer like this. He loves that method. He loves to take scripture and just quote a little bit of it or misquote some of it or quote it out of context.
He loves to persecute. He loves to create doubt. He loves to make you think, you know what, you can do it on your own. Pride and hypocrisy and worldliness, promoting false doctrines and idolatry. Sin's not that bad.
God's not that holy. He has His methods. And Paul writes in verse 12, look at your Bibles, for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. It seems like we do. Politicians and governments. But we don't wrestle against flesh and blood.
But against the rulers. There's a ranking here. We don't know exactly how they're ranked, but there is a ranking against authorities, against cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
He not only has methods, He has an organization. He's a good administrator of wickedness and debauchery. And so therefore, I can't just say, well, I just kind of saunter up to Satan and think, well, I'm here and I know what's in me.
My natural thoughts, my natural disposition is, I can do it. I can take care of this. I am self-sufficient. Calvin said, Paul impresses their danger on them by telling them the nature of their enemy.
I mean, it's one thing if you go into battle and they've just got pea shooters, wrist rockets. It's another thing if they have 50 cows triangulated on you. And Paul says, we're struggling. We're hand-to-hand combat.
We have some wrestlers in the congregation. This is wrestling language. We're struggling. We're trying to get the guy's neck up here and expose his neck. We're trying to do it in a tricky way because if you just have the same moves wrestling every single time, your opponent's gonna get it.
So you have to trick and deceive and to be cunning when you wrestle. I read this week that often the wrestler who lost in Greek wrestling contest had his eyes gouged out. So you better win. But it's not people.
The enemy's not the people. We're not people. What Paul does is he says, by the way, Satan's real. He's powerful. He has methods. And then he parades past us all these organized ranks. So we would say, yes, this is really true.
I don't know if you've been to a parade or not, but you just see people just coming by one after another, after another. I think of the parade I went to in Mondaemon, Iowa once. And they just had a Batmobile go by.
They had some corn combines drive by. They had some, like a place that sold fresh water come by. They had a place that sold outhouses went by. People really clapped for that one. I thought, I am in Iowa right now.
The parade isn't a parade that you wanna go to, but you need to know about. Rulers and principalities, forces. You say, well, based on this kind of enemy, this isn't gonna be one and done. This is till death do us part.
I better not go AWOL. Therefore, verse 13, take up the whole armor of God. Just not kind of can't piecemeal it. That's the point. So that you may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all to stand firm.
Enemies are formidable. We need all the armor of God. We need to hold our ground in this evil day. Now we come to the actual armor. Verses 14 through 17 talk about the armor. If you like kind of like the exciting part of the sermon where you think, oh, I grasp that better now.
I learned that, I understand it. This is the point. This is the part where I thought, okay, I've got it. When you're studying the scripture and you're gonna have to preach, there's a point in time where you think, okay, I see it.
And if I see it now, I can tell the congregation. Most people think this. Paul has been in jail enough, right? What was Paul's MO? He goes to a town. He wants to know where two places are, the synagogue, because that's where he'll preach and the prison, that's where he'll be.
Paul saw a lot of Roman soldiers. He might've been tied and tethered to some. He certainly saw them walking around the street and he could see their swords. He could see their breastplates. He could see all kinds of things in their feet.
And therefore Paul says, see how a Roman soldier looks. I'm gonna use this as a description, as a metaphor, as a good way to teach someone what this armor's like. If the Roman people needed this for being their soldiers, you need this too.
I think that's partly true, but it's not mainly true. You remember Paul was at Ephesus for how many years teaching them? I mean, he wrote this from prison, but when Paul went to Ephesus, how long was he there?
Three years. What did Paul teach the church at Ephesus for three years? Did he teach them 1 Peter? Did he teach them the book of Revelation? Did he teach them the gospel according to Luke? What did they teach him?
He taught them the Old Testament scriptures. And wouldn't it surprise you if I told you there is a strong warrior king, Messiah, who has armor in the Old Testament? Would that surprise you? It shouldn't surprise you.
But what we're gonna do before we look at the armor, I'm gonna take you to one book in the Old Testament that if you grasp these three passages, you'll go, oh, it's Jesus's armor. What armor am I to take up?
Let me just throw this out to you right now. The breastplate of righteousness, if you need to have a righteous life in order to withstand Satan, how are you doing? Well, I think you're probably overconfident, and I probably think that it's not very perfect.
How many O-rings, defective O-rings, do you need to have a space shuttle blow up? So I got some righteousness, but to stand before God, to stand before Satan even, what are you gonna do? You need righteousness.
Whose righteousness is it? And before we look at the passage, I'm here to tell you that this is just like Paul. Everything's about Christ, in Christ, for Christ. The Father sending the Son, the Son going, the Spirit of God empowering Jesus, applying His benefits to our life.
And what Paul wants to end with is, the Lord Jesus Christ, He's your powerful advocate, strong king, and Messiah warrior. Satan and Jesus are not co-equal and have symmetry in their power. If Satan is strong and powerful, yes, that's true, you need somebody who's stronger than Satan, right?
You need somebody whose armor is bigger than yours. I can just remember Peter. Here's Peter's armor walking up to Satan. Essentially, I'll never deny you, Jesus. Huh, okay. Good thing Jesus prayed that Peter wouldn't be sifted.
To understand Ephesians chapter six and the armor of God, you need to understand Isaiah 11, 49 and 59. Let's go there. 11, 49, 59. I'm gonna say that about five times. So you walk away and you're like, I'm gonna go read Isaiah about the servant who comes in the name of the Lord and he's a mighty victorious warrior Messiah.
It's Isaiah 11, 49 and 59, a passage that talks about Jesus, the warrior king of God, who is the messianic king who's come to establish his kingdom and he has power. This passage in Ephesians is the description of the armor of Jesus from the Old Testament.
Therefore, we draw our strength and our power from him and him alone. So Isaiah, what chapters again? 11, 49, 59. I wish I could have come up with some song. That'd be a good zip code. What zip code do you live in?
11, 49, 59. That's kind of, sounds good. In the year 2525, if man is still alive, I like 11, 49, 59 better. Don't you? The young people are like, what is he talking about? Think oldie station on Spotify 60s.
Think that. Of course, Paul is gonna say, look at the Old Testament and see the warrior king who has the armor. Chapter 11, verse five. Speaking of the Messiah, the warrior king, righteousness shall be the belt of his waist and faithfulness, the belt of his loins.
Do you see it? Chapter 49, please, of Isaiah. You wanna know about the servant of the Lord Yahweh? You wanna know how powerful he is? He uses the language here, of course, of a Roman soldier, but not primarily of a Roman soldier.
Isaiah 49, verse one. Listen to me, O coastlands, and give attention, you peoples from afar. The Lord called me from the womb and from the body of my mother he named me. He made my mouth like a sharp sword.
And then the most important passage is in Isaiah chapter 59. Isaiah 11 has belt around the waist, which is righteousness and faithfulness. Isaiah 49 has the sharp sword out of the mouth. And Isaiah 59, verse 16, please.
11, 49, 59. Verse 16, he saw that there was no man and wondered that there was no one to intercede. If you're gonna stand before a thrice holy God, you need a mediator, you need a go-between, you need an advocate.
Then his own arm brought him up salvation, or brought him salvation, and his righteousness upheld him. He put on righteousness as a breastplate and a helmet of salvation on his head. He put on garments of vengeance for clothing and wrapped himself in zeal as a cloak.
Here we have in Isaiah 59, 49, and 11, the Messiah, the warrior king. Who do you need in the day of battle? Answer, the Lord Jesus Christ, perfectly found in him, uniquely found in him as the warrior king.
So let's go back to Ephesians chapter six, please. Isaiah 11, 49, and 59 talk about this great Messiah who has the armor. And he just got done saying, be strong in the Lord and the strength of his might.
While it's true that we wanna live a righteous life, we wanna live a faithful life, we wanna live a life of truth, that's all true, but that's secondary to the primary focus of the text. And that is, if you're gonna have to battle Satan, who do you want at your side?
Who do you wanna be trusting in? Who do you want to be thanking for? Who do you want to be confident in? How can you trust in your battle over Satan if it's your righteousness against a satanic enemy?
But if you have a Lord at your side, we're the right man on my side. He says, take up the whole armor of God. And we come to confidence building strategy number three, to Christian church, stand confidently in the armor of Jesus Christ.
We are not made to do it on our own, number one. We can be confident that God will take care of us, number two, and now specifically number three, we can be confident in Jesus Christ and his armor that we saw in 11, 49, and 59 of Isaiah.
Verse 14, stand therefore. And now he's going to give six pieces of armor. You're gonna want them to be Jesus' armor. And this is a good way to try to get people to think through and go, oh, now I see it.
I know what Roman soldiers look like, but I also have been taught by Paul what the Messiah King looks like in the Old Testament. Six pieces of God's armor, six pieces of Jesus, the Messiah's armor. One, God's truth, the belt of truth.
Stand therefore having fastened on the belt of truth. You might think kind of like Scottish kilts and they're kind of flowing. Well, back in those days, you'd have a robe and if you needed to run, you better sash that up.
You better gird up your loins. You need something to pull this up kind of like a girdle fashion so you could run, so you could be ready to go. And so they would have a belt, a wide leather belt, and it'd have probably a dagger on it or a knife and other things.
And you need not just a real belt, what's the text say? The text says the belt of truth. Charles Hodge says girdles of spiderwebs for the Christian warrior are human reason, human plans, church tradition, dead orthodoxy.
You need a different kind of girdle, something that's truthful. The belt helps the soldier go off to battle and we need truth. What kind of truth is this? Well, he's been talking about truth in Ephesians.
He mentions truth seven times. Ephesians 1 .13, the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. That's what he's talking about. Christianity, when you're fighting Satan, you need to say to yourself, what does the Bible reveal about Jesus the Son?
What does the Bible talk about when it comes to foundational revelation of the Son, the truth of the gospel, the content that is true? That was, by the way, foundational to Jesus' life, was it not? To the law, to the prophets.
How many times did Jesus say, it is written? That was enough. This is truth of Christianity. You think, okay, I'm in a battle and what do I need to remember? I need to remember that I can trust the Son, that his promises are true, that Satan is the father of lies, but I can trust what God has said.
One writer said, it may be specific reference to the gospel that is the true message. By the way, at a side note, doctrine matters. Does it not? Doctrine matters. Even Paul said, preach the word in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and doctrine.
This is the truth that Christians believe about the triune God, his salvation, his security, his promises, his hopes, his faithfulness. If I'm going to be in a spiritual battle, I know to myself with the belt of truth, what's true and what's not.
By the way, here's what Paul does not say. Stand therefore having fastened on the belt of my truth. Oh, I hate it when people say that. Well, that's your truth, this is my truth. I'm thinking, I don't know what planet you live on, but it's not the right planet.
But then I have to preach to myself and realize you're not my enemy because you're flesh and blood and I know my enemy's not against flesh and blood. The truth of God's word and the promises of the gospel, that's what we need.
Secondly, we need a breastplate of righteousness. Verse 14, put on the breastplate of righteousness. Now, if you want to talk theology, what kind of righteousness is he talking about? Righteousness, root word right, to do the right thing, to obey the law, to merit righteousness is what Jesus did.
If you're going to fight in a battle, what kind of righteousness do you need? Do you need righteousness that is given to your account by Jesus through faith? We call that what kind of righteousness? Imputed or reckoned or credited.
Then there's another kind of righteousness that since we are right with God, we'd like to live a holy life. That's called what kind of righteousness? Imparted, who said imparted? Oh, okay, excellent, all right.
Well, let's close in prayer. We had baptisms today. Imputed righteousness, imparted righteousness. Righteousness is doing the right thing. Why did Jesus not come down on Friday, die, go up to heaven on Sunday?
Because he needed to live a perfect life and do the right thing before God. And that's imputed righteousness. That's Jesus's righteousness that you, dear Christian, have. When God sees you, he sees Jesus.
Nothing you can do to undo it or to do it, it's done for you. Imparted righteousness is since God has saved me and I'm a new creature, I'd like to live a right life. Is that a good thing to do? Obey, say no to sin?
There's another kind of righteousness that we don't discuss here except as an error. It's called infused righteousness. Where I'm in the hospital and they have to infuse me with some extra blood, they're like pouring it into me.
That would be a Roman Catholic doctrine. They talk about infused. So forget that one for a second. What do you need in the battle against Satan? Jesus' perfect righteousness? Our last week's righteousness that you did.
I mean, honestly, how'd your week go? How many people, you don't have to raise your hand. How many people here were satisfied with their holy living last week? Satisfied with your prayer life? Satisfied with preaching the gospel to unbelievers every day?
Satisfied with scripture reading? Satisfied with sacrificially loving your wives? Satisfied with submitting to your husband? Satisfied with honoring your parents? How'd you do? So if you're in a battle, what do you need to look to?
Whom do you need to look to? Of course, it's the Lord Jesus. I have a doctrine of truth, yes, and wrapped it around. It gets me ready for the battle because I know the promises of God are yes and amen in Jesus.
And now I have the righteousness of that mighty warrior in chapter 59 of Isaiah. No wonder Paul said in 1 Corinthians 1, by God's doing you are in Christ Jesus who became to us wisdom from God, that is righteousness.
The verses that I'd like somebody to preach at my funeral, I'll read them and then you'll probably remember where they're from. This is what Paul is talking about. My little children, I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin.
But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father. Jesus Christ, the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins and not only ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. That's 1 John 2.
If you're gonna stand before God, you can't stand before God without a mediator. And you can't even stand before Satan without a mediator. No wonder Proverbs said, the righteous are bold as a what? When you know you stand in Christ, that he is your captain and your savior and he'll never leave you nor forsake you.
Then when you're in a battle, you're like, okay, what's the worst thing I can do? What's the worst thing that can happen to me? I'm dead. Is that so bad? Well, maybe for the moment it would be bad, but ultimately, you know what I'm saying.
The breastplate protects the heart. The word breastplate, by the way, a side note, word thorax, when we get the word thorax, it protects us. Righteousness of Christ. Ian Hamilton said, there's little doubt that Paul is thinking principally about the righteousness of Christ.
This is so important to stand before Satan with righteousness and ultimately stand before God with righteousness. No wonder there's lots of people these days who are trying to jam in our righteousness into Christ's righteousness for judgment day.
It's wrong. Jerry Bridges, at the time you trusted Christ, you were at the precise moment declared righteous by God. You were justified. Justification was not only a past event, it's a present reality.
This is where so many Christians miss it. They look back to the day that they trusted Christ. And if you press them, they'll say, yes, I was justified at that time. But today they seek to live their lives as if it depends on them.
In their mind, they have reverted to a performance relationship to God. And so is the thinking. If I had my quiet time, if I hadn't had any lustful thoughts and these kinds of things, then I expect God to bless me today.
We want to pay our own way. We want to earn God's blessings. The apostle didn't do that. Paul looked outside of himself and saw himself clothed in the righteousness of Christ. It is our nature to drift toward a personal performance relationship.
And so what Paul is saying is, you stand before God based on the work of another. So fight. It was of Jesus who said, I will rejoice greatly in the Lord. My soul will exult in my God, for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation.
He's wrapped me with the robe of righteousness. And because of that, because you stand before God perfectly righteous, act righteously. I don't usually quote pietistic mystics very often, but I'll quote one today.
Jesus, Thy blood and righteousness, my beauty are my glorious dress. Amidst flaming worlds and these arrayed, my joy shall I lift up my head. Behold, shall I stand in Thy great day. For who ought to charge, shall I lay.
Well, we've got some other pieces of armor, don't we? And so what do we have to do? We have to go into 1 .5 podcast mode. All right, you're ready? I'm not even that concerned that you know every little piece of armor, although you should, it's in the Bible.
I'm mainly concerned that you know who's giving you the armor, that's who you're trusting in. That's the whole point. Paul's not gonna start off with all these accolades about who God is, the triune God, and said, by the way, I hope you make it.
Shoes, God's peace. And shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. Here's what it means. I'm in a battle against Satan, but I have peace with God because God the Son has earned it for me.
This is Romans five language. We have peace with God. There's a peace that's subjective feeling. He's not talking about that. There's a peace where God is at war with me. Every unbeliever has a personal relationship with Jesus, and that's one of enemy, arch enemy.
But because of the Son's work, now we're friends. And so now you're gonna battle knowing that you're okay with God. What if you had to battle the whole time thinking I don't even know if I'm on God's team.
I don't know if he likes me. Maybe I'm on the wrong side. Caesar's troops, they said, won for lots of reasons, partly because of their footwear. How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who proclaims peace.
That's the idea. God's justified us. We are at peace with him and we can fight. Well, what else does he say? He gives us another piece of armor, shield of faith. Verse 16, in all circumstances, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one.
Now they have small shields that you could put on your arm, kind of circular, or they had huge shields that you would hold up over your head and it was like a door. Because darts were coming and flying so you couldn't just do this because you would get slaughtered.
You'd have to hold, it's kind of like you hold the door over your head. That's what he's talking about here. This is that big door shield, four foot by three foot. And you think, you know what? There's all kinds of darts of Satan, all kinds of evil flaming darts, but I have the shield of faith.
I know in whom I believe. My faith has an object. I can believe in him. And what they would do is they would take arrows and they would dip it in kind of a tar pitch like thing. It would harden. And then before they shot those arrows, they would light them and they would shoot them up with this arc and they would land on the person or the shield and it would splatter with all this fire, burst into flames.
How am I gonna survive that? Well, we know who the Lord is. We know what he's done. And it's not what I do, but it's what he's done. Yes, but I've got all those sins in my skeleton closet. Maybe I've got some kind of, you know, some barrier against what I'm gonna do, what Satan's gonna do.
No, no barrier, but those skeleton sins have all been paid for. Be confident of the battle. In Pilgrim's Progress, Apollyon taunted Christian, here will I spill thy soul. And with that, he threw a flaming dart at his breast, but Christian had a shield in his hand with which he caught it.
And so prevented the danger of that. Faith, we say, we're not trusting ourselves. We rely perfectly on the obedience of the sin bearing death of Jesus. Five, helmet of salvation. God's salvation. We have to think the right thoughts.
This helmet of salvation. And by the way, this is not really even take up, it's receive. God hands you this helmet and how are we supposed to think? We're to be thinking about God's grace, God's sovereign grace, God's supernatural sovereign grace.
We're not to be thinking my standing before God is based on my performance, my religion, my baptism. Those are shaky foundations. If God is for us, who can be against us? That's the idea. The anchor of the soul, Hebrew six calls it.
Oh God, the Lord, the strength of my salvation, thou have covered thy head in the day of battle. Well, is there anything else we need? Number six, God's sword. The sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.
God's word. We have God's word. And God's word is about the son. I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me. And on turning, I saw seven golden lampstands. And in the midst of the lampstands, one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest.
The hairs of his head were white like wool, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire. His feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace. And his voice was like the roar of many waters.
And in his right hand, he held the seven stars. And from his mouth came a sharp, two edged sword. We have the word of God. Not by might, not by power, but by thy spirit. Did not Jesus do this very thing?
What did Jesus say when Satan tempted him three times? Survey said, did Jesus say that? No. Well, the old rabbis would say, Jesus said three times, it is written. And by the way, the tense of the verb is wonderful because here's what Jesus said.
Satan, it is written, it stands written and it always will be written. So the armor is of Jesus and you're in Christ. Jesus is the truth. He's our righteousness. He's our peace. He's faithful. He's our salvation.
And he's the word. Is there anything else Christians should do? Yes, they should pray. Strategy four, be confident that the Lord answers prayer. Praying at all times in the spirit, all supplication and prayer.
To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints. I mean, if I have to be dependent on myself, I'm not gonna make it. I need to be dependent on Christ and his armor and his righteousness so I can make it.
And one of the best things we can do to show our dependence upon the Lord is what? To pray. Self-consciously and regularly, we think to ourselves, how could I ever do this? Who is adequate for these things?
Paul understood this and he prayed in chapter one. He prayed in chapter three. And now he's saying, dear Christian, pray. Pray without ceasing. Just have an attitude of prayer. Pray all the time. Pray for others.
And matter of fact, he said, pray for me. Do you see what he says in verse 19? And pray for me also. Paul needs prayer. Pastors need prayer. That the words may be given to me in opening my mouth. Not if I open, but I'm gonna open my mouth and I'd like to open my mouth and speak boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel for which I am an ambassador in chains, not just one around the ankle, but probably two, two chains that I may declare it boldly as I ought to speak.
Pray for me, Paul says. And then he gives some final greetings so that you may also know how I am and what I'm doing. Tychicus or chance or lucky is how you translate it. The beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord will tell you everything.
By the way, if you have any questions about doctrine, you're like, I don't know about predestination. Guess who you can ask? Ask Tychicus, he'll tell you. I've sent him to you for this very, by the way, wouldn't that be funny?
Lucky teaches you about predestination. It works out fine. Boy, the serendipity of God. I sent him to you for this very purpose. Why am I always talking about pastors? Yes, they should convict of sin and yes, they should exhort people to trust in the Lord Jesus and avoid hell.
But what do Christians need? Christians need to learn about the Lord Jesus and what encourages you more than anything? The Lord Jesus, that He may encourage your hearts. How does a Christian get encouragement?
For Paul, it was Jesus one, Jesus two, Jesus three, Jesus four, Jesus five, Jesus six, in every chapter. I want you to be encouraged. Peace be to the brothers. Jews and Gentiles there, their peace has been made by Jesus and love with faith from God the Father and equal to the Father, of course, is the Lord Jesus, one God, three persons, co-equal.
Grace be with all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with love incorruptible. Isn't that a great book? What a book extolling who Jesus is. It starts off at the very beginning with grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus and it ends with grace be all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with love incorruptible.
You need encouragement, you read the book of Ephesians. And by the way, if you're here today and you're not a Christian, I just want you to know, you think you're free and you think you have free will, but you know what 2 Timothy chapter four says?
You're enslaved to Satan and you do his will. What an awful taskmaster Satan must be and what an awful taskmaster it will be for you at the very end without a mediator between you and God. You say, well, I'm a Christian here today though and I don't know if my love for Jesus is incorruptible.
Could anybody here say their love for Jesus is incorruptible? My personal love for Jesus has no corruption in it. Who could say that here? Well, you could, but you're not telling the truth. How can he end a book of encouragement with grace be with all who love our Lord Jesus with love incorruptible?
Well, you've been here long enough and you probably know the answer. Did you know what he said in chapter one? In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation and believed in him, you were sealed with the promise Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of his glory.
The incorruptible-ness is not from me, it's of the Lord and I am sealed along with you dear Christian until the day of redemption. Isn't that good news? So then go live a life of holiness and faithfulness and obedience, I want you to do that, but not because it's going to improve your standing, not because you think God will be more pleased with you, but because your gratitude and your thanksgiving overflows.
Let's pray. Thank you Father for this word, that your spirit, the Holy Spirit inspired, that you would reveal your truth to us and we end with how it started, to the praise of your glory, to the praise of your glorious grace, to the praise of your glory.
I pray for the Christians here today that you would encourage them. They're going to make it and Satan tempts me to despair, but we're going to make it. I pray that you'd give them that hope so then they can live without fear and confidence.
You're not mad at us, you're not angry at us and so therefore we can rest in you. We trusted you at the beginning for our salvation, we're trusting you for our sanctification, we're trusting you for our glorification, we're trusting you to win the battle over Satan.
It was defeated, he was defeated at Calvary and now he just has a few more life blows, he tries to whack at us and then it's over for him. For those that are here today who heard the testimonies of baptism and probably had those testimonies resonate in their hearts, they're playing with sin, they're playing with idolatry, they know the truth.
I pray that you would convict them today. It's hard to be convicted, but then it's a wonderful conviction and I pray that you'd give them no rest. While we get rest as Christians, give them no rest. Would you make their consciences hyperactive until they rest in you, the Son.
In Jesus' name, amen.