Text: Eph. 6:10-20
Facebook live: In Christ, you are clothed for battle!
11 Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
As we conclude our time in the book of Ephesians this weekend, I thought we’d take a moment to review.
We began with live in humility, love and peace!
Followed by Pastor Nelson and, teaching Children to Get Along!.
After my vacation, we talked about, walking in the light of Christ!
In the light of Christ, the new-self becomes a servant, one to another in the unity of marriage but also reflected in the life we live together in a world broken by sin.
Last week as partners in marriage we remembered that, Christ loves you and you love others!
And today, we conclude that In Christ, you are clothed for battle!
The whole Armor of God protects the Christian in this life as we struggle against the devil and his work to point us away from Christ and his saving good news. That is Paul’s message to the Ephesian church and for you and me today.
12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against: but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
What you'd get if 99% were good enough:
No phone service for 15 minutes each day.
1.7 million pieces of first class mail lost each day.
35,000 newborn babies dropped by doctors or nurses each year
200,000 people getting the wrong drug prescriptions each year
Unsafe drinking water three days a year.
Three misspelled words on the average page of type.
2 million people would die from food poisoning each year.
Unknown.
We are thankful that it is not that which we do that makes us righteous but that which Christ has done which saves completely and makes us acceptable to God.
In Christ, you are clothed for battle!
There's battle lines being drawn
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind
It's time we stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down
Songwriter: STILLS, STEPHEN, Published by Lyrics © Warner/Chappell Music, Inc. http://www.metrolyrics.com/for-what-its-worth-lyrics-buffalo-springfield.html
For What it’s Worth - the anthem of the unrest of the late 1960s, 1967 in fact … from the pen of Stephen Stills and the band Buffalo Springfield. The Vietnam War raged on, along with the draft and the draft dodgers who went to Canada; Kent State, and the students who died protesting at an Ohio University, an institution of higher learning. Richard Nixon and Watergate; the White House tapes and on and on … this was a hard and turbulent time in our nation’s history.
Today seems headed in a similar direction. Ferguson, Baltimore, Cleveland, and unrest in the streets fill the headlines. Black lives matter verses all lives matter, pro choice or pro life, politicians vying for Presidential nominations and protests going on around the country. Battle lines are certainly being drawn, politically … socially … and morally. Christianity and the church are being attacked on all sides. Young people are speaking their minds ... by their very absence from church.
In 1966 Time Magazine, on its cover asked the question: “Is God Dead?”
Almost 30 years ago, Joan Osborn asked the question, in her hit song from 1995, “What if God was one of us” you might remember the chorus …
What if God was one of us / Just a slob like one of us / Just a stranger on the bus / Trying to make His way home?
Today many may wonder and ask this same question as they struggle with the brokenness of their lives, in a world that is spiraling out of control, with ... it seems like… little ... or no hope.
Paul tells the Ephesian church to:
11 Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.
Many Christians today take this as their marching orders from God to get in the world being ready to battle the righteous fight for truth, justice and moral purity.
And while we are told always [to] be prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; (1 Peter 3:15) we are also told to do this, with gentleness and respect.
For Paul reminds us who the enemy really is.
12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, - not against those who appear to be the enemies we face - but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
The darkness of the devil and his demons are the ones railing against Christ and the victory won at the cross.
The target is on you, too.
It can cause you to fall back into the darkness that you have been rescued once and for all from.
You are clothed in Christ with the armor of God!
The soldier's first article of faith is summed up nowhere more eloquently than in an 1865 letter from General William Tecumseh Sherman to General Ulysses S. Grant, where he wrote:
"I knew wherever I was, that you thought of me, and if I got in a tight place you would come--if alive."
This is the unwritten, unspoken but unbreakable contract of the battlefield: You will leave no one, dead or alive, in the hands of the enemy.
U.S. News and World Report, July 29, 1991, p. 5.
God’s armor is for your protection. Paul tells the Ephesian church and us to:
13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand [or stand firm] in the evil day,
Days just like today … not to battle, but to stand firm … not to fall again into darkness and the temptations of the devil … but to rise, being clothed with Christ daily!
With the image of battle lines being drawn and battle armor being put on … belt, breastplate, shoes, shield, helmet and sword,
Paul says that we are really armed and fitted with truth, with righteousness, with peace, and with faith through the Gospel, the sword of the Spirit, which is God’s word.
You dear friends are clothed in Christ, with the armor of God and his saving gospel!
In the Joan Osborn song, Eric Bazilian, the writer, asks this question:
If God had a name what would it be?
And would you call it to His face?
If you were faced with Him in all His glory
What would you ask if you had just one question?
Songwriter Eric Bazilian, Published by HUMAN BOY MUSIC http://www.metrolyrics.com/what-if-god-was-one-of-us-lyrics-alanis-morissette.html
As a Christian rescued by Christ and shown mercy in the face of my own depravity, I could only sing God’s praise for what he had done for me. We are not called to faith to escape the trials of this world, for from the words of Jesus himself he says:
33 I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33
But, in spite of these trials we are to sing the truth of God’s rescue in Christ. To call, by the power of the saving gospel, those to faith by the word of God through the working of the Holy Spirit, that in spite of the devils lies that questions “did God really say” from the Garden of Eden, to the lies of our own day which question the existence of the historical Jesus, our own sinfulness, or the working of the devil in the world, that yes … God was one of us and because of Jesus we live, move and have our being.
In the world of Paul’s day and 22 … standing in the midst of the Areopagus, he said:
“Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. 23 For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. 24 The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, 25 nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.”
You are God’s child because he desires you. You are God’s child because he died for you and freed you from the curse of the law that you and I could never keep … with even 99% being a failing grade.
You are God’s child because by his Spirit he called you to believe the word of the gospel giving you faith and raising you from being dead in trespass and sin to newness of life in him, Jesus Christ our Lord.
The song asks the question:
If you were faced with Him in all His glory
What would you ask if you had just one question?
Jesus gives answer to questions in Matthew to the sheep and the goats when he says in Matthew 25:
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Matt 25:31
34 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Matt 25:34
But the questions the righteous will ask:
37 … ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King [Jesus in glory] will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ Matt 25:37-40
You are clothed in Christ with the armor of God!
In the name of the Father, and of the Son + and of the Holy Spirit!
Amen.
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