Two
weeks ago, we looked at the evidence all around us of the supernatural evil –
the growing supernatural evil. Last week
we began our look at the supernatural armor God has provided us for our
protection in this deadly spiritual battle. In so doing, we also reminded ourselves
that we are never, ever alone in this battle. God lives inside each follower of
Christ, and God provides angels who always guard us. Always guard us, even when
circumstances seem as it we are left alone.
Before
we look once again at the spiritual armor Paul wrote of in his letter to the
Christians at Ephesus, let’s remind ourselves that it was to the pastors and
church leadership of the Ephesian church that Paul warned, “I know that
after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not
sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise,
speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.” (Acts
20:29-30).
It
was the same Ephesian church that received a rebuke by the Lord Jesus: “But
I have this against you, that you have left your first
love. Therefore remember from where you have
fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I
am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place—unless
you repent. (Revelation 2:4-5)
It is within these contexts that we discover once again the many reasons we must not neglect the full armor of God – reasons not the least of which is reflected in an 18th century hymn written by 22-year-old Robert Robinson. Here are some of the lyrics: “Come Thou Fount of every blessing, Tune my heart to sing Thy grace, Streams of mercy, never ceasing, Call for songs of loudest praise . . . Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love. Here’s my heart, O take and seal it. Seal it for Thy courts above.”
Prone
to wander. It’s a danger to which EVERY Christian needs to be alert and a
spiritual battle for which every Christian needs to be prepared.
It’s
easy to be unaware of the battle, especially when our lives are quiet. But, as someone on a social media site wrote earlier this month about the battle: “Not every storm
is loud. Sometimes it comes through distraction, discouragement, or the slow
drift where prayer fades and the Word begins to feel distant. We don’t always
notice it happening, but one day we wake up feeling empty and disconnected and
we wonder how we got there. But Scripture never told us to coast. It says, 'Be
strong in the 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.'”
And
so, the Lord Jesus warned us, “Therefore keep watch [be alert],
because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand
this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was
coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be
broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will
come at an hour when you do not expect him. (Matthew 24:42-44)
So,
let’s move again into our examination of the Christians spiritual armor. Last
time we looked at the belt of truth with which the apostles urged us to bind up
our loins. The word ‘loins’ in Scripture often refers to the center of a
person’s strength.
So,
when Paul used the belt illustration, he was telling his readers that if we
don’t hold truth close to ourselves, if we compromise or dilute God’s truth,
then we open ourselves to mortal attack by our Satanic enemy – which is likely
the reason we see so much demonic activity in our culture. Truth – God’s
eternal truth – has been so severely diluted and compromised that even in many
churches it is nearly unrecognizable.
I
was going to move past this piece of our armor since we looked at it last week,
but I felt urged in my spirit to say a few more things about God's truth
because it is the very core, the very foundation of our ability to successfully
engage in this spiritual warfare.
Some
years ago, I had a brief conversation with someone on one of my social media sites
who thought a church marquee was an abusive use of the Christian message. Here is what the church sign read: “The
fact that there’s a highway to hell and only a stairway to heaven says a lot
about anticipated traffic numbers.”
He
responded: “Christians should do better than using abusive scare tactics to
gain and retain members.” I told him the
church sign was a direct allusion to Matthew chapter seven: (Matthew 7:13-14) “Enter through the narrow
gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to
destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate
and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a
few find it.” But he
didn’t seem impressed. He certainly didn’t change his mind.
I’ve
even had pastors tell me in private conversation that they do not talk about
certain social issues in their homilies so as to not offend people in the pew.
Christian,
please always remember this immutable fact – all of us – church leaders and
those in the pews – we are all responsible and accountable to God to never compromise
truth.
So, now, before we move further into Paul’s description of our armor, let’s look once again at this entire section for context:
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of
His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand
firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not
against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers,
against the world forces of this darkness, against
the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore,
take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist
in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. Stand
firm therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the
breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the
preparation of the gospel of peace; in addition to all, taking up
the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all
the flaming arrows of the evil one. And take the
helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word
of God. With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the
Spirit . . . .” (Ephesians 6:10-18)
Turning our attention to the breastplate, no Roman
soldier would ever go into battle without his breastplate. It protected him not
only from the sword or spear in close combat, but also from arrows coming from
the side or rear. Without it he would likely die in battle.
But Paul, well acquainted with Roman body armor, told his audience to put on the breastplate of 'righteousness.' The word ‘righteousness’ as used in Scripture, carries the idea of thinking and acting according to God’s commandments. It holds virtue, integrity, and moral purity as godly principles.
The equation seems simple enough. Obey God’s
laws – the more scrupulous the better – and you’ve got nothing to worry about.
But God has something deeper in mind when it comes to Biblical
righteousness.
Listen to what the Lord Jesus said to the crowd of disciples, curious onlookers, and some religious leaders. “For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom.” (Matthew 5:20)
The scribes and
Pharisees were meticulous in their observances of the Law of Moses, as
well as in their multiple oral interpretations of those laws by their
scholars. In fact, the two major theological schools of Hillel and Shemmai both
taught that oral traditions were as authoritative as the written laws handed
down by Moses and the prophets. Their oral traditions informed them that if
they followed those traditions and interpretations of the Law, God would
consider them ‘righteous.’
Yet, the Lord Jesus told His disciples – and He tells us the same thing – unless their righteousness surpassed that of their religious leaders who were scrupulous in their observances, they would not enter the kingdom of heaven.
I can imagine what the crowd thought to
themselves: If even the holy men around us will not enter heaven, then WHO can
ever be saved?
Who, indeed?
As the New Testament
repeatedly informs us, Biblical righteousness is not defined so much by what we
DO, but by what we ARE. And please pay attention to this follow-on comment: It
is what we ARE that must translate into what we do.
That’s why
anyone who claims to be a follower of Christ but still acts and thinks and
talks like he or she did before allegedly becoming a follower of Christ, that
person is a liar. Here is this word from John’s first epistle: (1 John 2:4) “The one who claims, “I know him,” while not keeping his
commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in this person.”
To
repeat, because of its important point: Religious rituals and good works, in
and of themselves, save no one. That was precisely the stumbling stone the Holy
Spirit spoke of in Romans 9:30-32 “[The] Gentiles,
who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness
which is by faith; but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did
not arrive at that law. Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith,
but as though it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone.”
Painstaking
observance of the law or of tradition saves no one. Why? Because sin is part of
our inherited nature, written like some genetic code into our spirits
that invariably leads us away from the Savior.
That was the lament of that great apostle, St. Paul. Feel this man’s passion as he cries out in Romans 7 regarding his sin nature: “For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. . . . For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want . . . I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good . . . Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? (Romans 7:15-24)
But Paul didn’t stop at the
end of chapter seven with the bad news. He moved on to the next verses that we
find in chapter eight. It is there that Paul shouts the good news about
the righteousness that God imputes to us – the righteousness God credits
to us – solely on the basis of our baptismal faith: “Therefore there is now
no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus – which mirrors what he
wrote a few chapters earlier: But now apart from the Law,
the righteousness of God has been manifested . . . even the righteousness of
God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe . . ..” (Romans
3:21-22).
Listen also
to what Paul wrote to the church at Philippi: “I count all
things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my
Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but
rubbish so that I may gain Christ,
and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness
of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the
righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith . . . (Philippians
3:8-9)
So, what ARE we? The Christian’s answer is
girded and secured by the belt of truth – truth that assures us that we are a
precious child of God, that we are born into His family through our baptismal faith
– faith in the shed blood of Messiah Jesus, whose blood alone can wash away
each stain of our sin.
St. Paul again tells us what we ARE in his
letter to the Christians at Corinth (1 Corinthians 1:30-31) But
by [God’s] doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from
God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption
. . . .”
God says we are righteous because – and only
because – of our relationship with Him through faith in His Son. That’s God’s
view of us; Holy and righteous because of who we are – what we are – by faith
in His promises.
Consider King David for a moment. Here is what
he wrote in 2 Samuel. “I
was also blameless toward Him, and I kept myself from my iniquity. “Therefore,
the Lord has recompensed me according to my righteousness, according to my cleanness before His eyes.” (2 Samuel 22:24-25)
It is essential that we
understand the context of David’s remarks. This is AFTER his sin with Bathsheba,
and his murder of her husband Uriah. But when David repented of His murderous
sins in Chapter 12 of 2 Samuel, the prophet Nathan told him: “The Lord also has taken away your sin; you shall
not die.” (2 Samuel 12:13)
And David BELIEVED God's promise.
Certainly, David suffered terribly in
his lifetime for his sins. Bathsheba’s first child with David died, and David’s
own children rose up against him. One even tried to murder him. But our point here is that David’s honest
repentance brought him God's forgiveness, but that God ALSO removed David’s
sin. He REMITTED David’s sin. He obliterated David’s sin. That is why the king
could say he was clean in God's eyes.
I’ve spoken multiple times in the past
about God's promise of forgiveness. I’ve reminded us all that He completely erases
our sins from His memory. But if Satan can create doubt in our mind about God’s truth concerning what
we already ARE in Christ – forgiven, clean, righteous – if he can insinuate
uncertainty in the unalterable promises of God, then he will have created a critical
chink in our armor – and he will go in for the kill.
That is why girding ourselves with Biblical TRUTH is so important
to the Christian. God’s truth produces a strong faith and trust in
Christ. God’s truth sets us FREE from fear that God has lied to us about any of
His promises, or that His promises do not apply to us because of our past sins.
None of the Roman soldier’s armor was
superfluous. Each piece was vital to his safety and the safety of his comrades,
as well as to his ability to successfully wage battle against the enemy. In the
same way, none of our supernatural armor is superfluous. Each piece Paul
mentions in this sixth chapter of Ephesians is rooted in God’s truth and is vital
to our safety – and the safety of others. Our armor, all of it, is also vital
to our ability to successfully wage battle against our supernatural enemy.
Gird your loins with truth – God’s inerrant and
infallible word. Read it. Study it. Memorize it. Tell it to others. And put on
the breastplate of righteousness which God credits to us through our faith in the
sacrificial atonement of Jesus the Messiah.
The clock tells me we are out of time, so I
will start next week’s message looking at the shield of faith.
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