The people are obedient. God blesses.
Then what? We all know that Satan
then attacks, right? We see it all
through the Old Testament. We see it all
through the New Testament and we sure see it in our own lives and in the life
of this church. In fact, we have seen it
in the life of this church for years now, even when we were in Runaway Bay.
How many of you were around this
church when we were in Runaway Bay? If
you were here, or there, or part of this church when we were there, then you
probably remember God allowing us to see this perfectly illustrated in a
service one Sunday morning.
Now, I am all about
illustrations. I love a good
illustration because they help me to understand and personalize a truth from
God’s Word. God illustrated through the
prophets when they would do something dramatic to emphasize what God wanted the
people to know. Jesus used great
illustrations called parables. All the
greats like Paul and Peter and John in the New Testament used illustrations and
all the great preachers today use them.
But nobody can hold a candle to God
when it comes to illustrating what He wants us to learn. In March of 2012 I started a sermon series on
the full armor of God based on Ephesians chapter 6 because I saw our church
being attacked by Satan and I wanted us to realize that we were in a war and we
needed to be prepared. So, I stood up
that morning and began to preach but just as I did, a visitor walked in the
front door and walked down the aisle and whispered something to one of our
ladies and they both got up and walked to the hallway where they began to have
an argument – loudly.
The commotion quickly got everyone’s
attention and since everybody was focused on the argument, I asked two other
ladies to go ask them to be quiet. Well,
now we have four people arguing twice as loud so I asked two men to go out
there and shut them up right now and they did and everything calmed down for a
few seconds and everybody came back in and sat down except the visitor lady.
She got on her cell phone and started
talking to somebody very loudly about how this just wasn’t working. She then walked back down the center aisle
straight toward the pulpit and said over the phone, “Hang on. Let me let you talk to
the preacher” and tried to hand me the phone. That’s the truth! I’ve never seen anything like it before or
since. Well you can imagine I did not
talk on that phone but insisted she hang up and sit down.
She sat there on the front row for a
minute or two but finally said real loud, “Well,
I can’t wait. I have to go.” So, I lovingly encouraged her not to let the
door hit her on the way out. After she
left, I realized that God Himself was illustrating my sermon. I am not saying that woman was the devil or
demon possessed or anything like that but I have no doubt that Satan was trying
to disrupt our meeting that morning and used that woman to do it.
What Satan didn’t know was that he was
being used as a tool by God to show us the schemes of the devil. God allowed us to see that there really is a
war going on and that old schemer, Satan, will try anything to get between us
and God’s teaching and His Word. 1 Peter 5:8 tells us the truth that
Satan prowls around like a roaring lion looking to see who he can destroy but
the greatest trick Satan ever pulled was lulling us into thinking everything is
okay and that there is no fight and no war.
According to the Barna Research Group,
over half (52%) of evangelical Christians believe that Satan is not real but is
instead just a symbol of evil. Well, let
me assure from the truth of the Bible that Satan is real and living and wants
to kill you dead if God would only allow it and if he can’t kill you, then he
will certainly tempt you and destroy you by any means necessary and you don’t
stand a chance against him on your own.
He is smarter than you, tougher than
you and he has been doing this long enough to be able to know just how to get
you and your only hope is to put on the full armor of God and then stand. So turn to the book of Ephesians, chapter 6
and let’s be reminded of what we need to do to be able to go to war with the
devil.
Paul knew the cycle. He knew that when he was obedient that God
blessed and then Satan attacked. He had
seen it in his own life and in the life of the different churches he had
started. I believe that if Paul were
here today, he would want us to go back over this passage because this church
has been obedient. This church was part
of something amazing last week. I don’t
know how much of it you saw but God used this church starting late last week
and then in the service Sunday morning and most definitely that afternoon when
this church went to ground zero of the poor, the addicted and the incarcerated
and fed them and loved on them like they had never seen before.
Do you think Satan is just going to
let that kind of biblical obedience go by without attacking? Most of you can vouch that is not going to
happen so let’s read Ephesians 6:10-18
and see what our responsibility is in fighting this battle.
Finally, be strong in the
LORD and in his mighty power. 11Put on the full armor of God, so
that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. 12For our
struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the
authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual
forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13Therefore put on the full
armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your
ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14Stand firm
then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of
righteousness in place, 15and with your feet fitted with the
readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16In addition to all
this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the
flaming arrows of the evil one. 17Take the helmet of salvation and
the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. 18And pray in the
Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in
mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the LORD's people.
Look at verse 10 again. Be strong in the LORD and in his mighty
power. How many of you want to do
that? Most all of us would agree that we
want to be strong in the Lord. But how
many of us start out strong, on the front lines, waging war and engaging in
battle and then a month or a year goes by and we find ourselves sitting behind
a desk somewhere stationed in a comfortable base somewhere doing paperwork?
We are still in God’s army. We still have our weapons and armor. We are just not fighting in this spiritual
battle like we once were. It’s almost
overwhelming when we realize that we really are going to have conflict. Not jus conflict where we expect there to be
but there is conflict everywhere. Do you
know what the problem is? We are “being
strong” … all wrong.
It is important that we look closely
here at the word Paul uses for “be strong”.
The original Greek word was endunamao and it literally means “to clothe
oneself with power”. In our translations,
we may think it refers to self-effort but it really means to accept it from
God, not build it from within. For us,
if someone says we should be strong then we think we should start working out,
trying harder every day to build up and get in shape. We know there will be conflict so we start
doing everything we can to build ourselves up.
But look at what it says. Be strong in the Lord and in His mighty
power. It doesn’t say be strong, Todd,
in your power. It means to accept the
power of God in your life which is often just the opposite of what we think of
when we are told to be strong. That same
word was used of Paul in Acts when he was struck down on the road to
Damascus. He was taken to a house and
there he received strength from the Lord.
In Romans 4, Paul describes Abraham as being strong in the faith; same
word. He got the strength from the
Lord. It wasn’t something he did or
built or prepared. It was not of himself
that he was strong. That may be hard for
us to understand in a time where it seems that we have to look out for #1 and
nobody else is going to.
But it is really a good thing that we
don’t have to engage in this conflict in our own strength because while we will
have conflict, the conflict is supernatural.
We will talk more about verse 11
later but go on to verse 12. 12For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but
against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark
world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
If our conflict is supernatural or
spiritual then these are the evil spirits.
These are the demons, evil angels, Satan’s minions, whatever you want to
call them. They are real. There is a real war going on between the
forces of darkness which is Satan and the forces of light which is God. And it is waging all around us, all through
the universe and it has since Satan and his angels fell from Heaven.
That first sin of Satan’s pride has
led to an epic and universal war being waged and the consequence of losing the
battle will be the price of your soul or your witness, not to mention your
life. With all that at stake many people
still don’t believe there is even a war being waged and that is victory #1 for
Satan. If he can make you think there is
no war then that means you won’t fight it.
The 10th chapter of Daniel is a perfect illustration of the spiritual
warfare that is being fought. I won’t
read the whole thing but I encourage you to write it down and read it
later. In Daniel 10, Daniel has been
praying fervently for three weeks but has not heard from God. Three weeks go by and finally an angel comes
to Daniel and says that his prayer was heard the first day and that he was sent
by God to tell Daniel some good news but a demon had delayed him. Evidently the battle was so fierce between
the two that the angel said he had to go back and get reinforcements. He went back and got Michael, one of the
chief angels, to help him and finally, three weeks later was able to come to
him and tell Daniel the good news.
Satan has a well-organized army. A thorough study of verse 12 would show a hierarchy of evil from private to general all
with the goal of giving heartache and pain, despair and death, tragedy and
suffering. All of this is going on all
around us. Do you want to face that kind
of power on your own? I don’t care how
strong you are. You are not powerful
enough to beat Satan. That’s why God
says to be strong in Him.
So, because there is conflict, we will
be strong in the power of the Lord, recognizing that the conflict is
supernatural but also seeing that the conflict is personal. Look at verse
13. Read. No, now wait a minute. That’s not it. Hang on.
I’ve lost my place. I’m looking
for a certain verse in here. Hang on. You know, it’s that verse where it talks
about us going on the attack; where we advance against the enemy. But all I see is “stand” and “stand your
ground”, “withstand”. And verse 11 says
about the same thing as 13. Take up
God’s armor and stand.
If this conflict is personal, when do
we ever get to attack? Don’t we get to
ever shoot back or go hand-to-hand, maybe do some karate? Let me ask you, knowing who our enemy is, do
you really want to go hand-to-hand him?
I Peter says he is a roaring lion.
He is called the accuser, the adversary, the beast, the deceiver, a
dragon, the enemy, the father of lies, the evil one, a murderer, serpent,
tempter, thief, and wicked one.
The Bible describes us as witnesses,
children, pilgrims, sheep, believers, even athletes but when it tells us to
fight it says we are to stand. Put on
the full armor of God and stand. Just
like we don’t get in shape and be strong on our own, we also don’t put on our
own armor. If we did we would mess that
up.
Proverbs 14:12 says, “There
is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death”. Nowhere is that more literal than right
here. The devil is smarter than
you. He is stronger than you. He has been around a whole lot longer and he
will overcome you unless you do as this says.
Put on the armor of God.
Isaiah 59:16-17 Isaiah says this about God, “He saw that there was no one, he was
appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm worked salvation
for him, and his own righteousness sustained him. 17He put on righteousness as his
breastplate, and the helmet of salvation on his head; he put on the garments of
vengeance and wrapped himself in zeal as in a cloak. 18According to what they have done, so
will he repay wrath to his enemies.”
Do you want to fight Satan and his
army of demons in your strength and in your righteousness or would you rather
put on the armor that God Himself uses and then stand as God and the angels
fight? There is a conflict. It is supernatural and it is personal but
when you try to fight your battle; when you try to solve all your problems and
rely on your own goodness and good looks then you sin exactly like Satan sinned
that first time. It’s the sin of pride
and that’s when Satan gets a hold in your life.
He can work with pride. He knows all about pride. Good grief, he started it! And when you try to figure out, scheme,
connive and solve your spiritual problems or your physical problems or your
economic problems, that’s when Satan wins that battle.
Instead, God wants us to come to Him
and tell Him that we are humble enough to admit that we can’t do this and we
need Him to do it. When you tell God that
you will go where He wants you to go and do what He wants you to do and say
what He wants you to say but He will have to fight the battle…that’s when God
gets the glory because that is when He wins the battle.
Do you see the person sitting next to
you? Now, look at the person on the
other side of you. Look at your family
sitting around you. Do you see
them? Those people are not the enemy. I know if you are married to them, sometimes
you might think they are, but they are not.
Your neighbor down the street who drives you crazy is not your
enemy. The Bible makes it plain that our
enemies are real, spiritual and deadly and we are constantly battling them.
Satan would love for you to not
believe that there is a battle. And he
would love it if you thought the person next to you was the enemy. He gets a kick out of that, I’m sure. He also loves when church folks battle each
other. That’s one of his specialties. But that’s not going to work here,
Satan. We know I John 4:4 says, “You, dear
children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is
greater than the one who is in the world.”
Is He in you? Do you have a relationship with God through
His Son Jesus? If you don’t then you
literally don’t stand a chance against Satan.
In fact, you are on his side.
Jesus died on the cross to be a substitute for you and to be the perfect
sacrifice that was needed because of your sin and all you have to do to be able
to stand against Satan is believe that Jesus is the only way. Do that today.
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