Stand Firm

Well, good morning. I'd ask you to open up your Bible to Ephesians chapter 6, please. Ephesians chapter 6. There's a bittersweet feeling that I have that I will no longer be needed here real soon, Lord willing. So I'm happy for you, although it will be a bummer not be able to come here consistently. But I certainly am happy to see that it looks well, the prospects of having a preaching pastor, a pastor here that can preach full time.

So I rejoice with you all at the same time feeling slightly embittered, but God will see me through. So today we'll look at God's word. We'll look at Ephesians 6, verses 10, specifically through 13. But I'll read the entire section here for context. So Ephesians chapter 6, verse 10. Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.

Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 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. Therefore, take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, having done all to stand firm.

Stand, therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit with all prayer and supplication.

To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints. and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare the gospel boldly as I ought to speak. O Father in heaven, may your gospel be boldly declared here and now and this morning. God, may we boldly declare your gospel, your word, against all enemies, The enemies that are at work within our flesh, the enemies that are at work without, there is always a battle to be had.

And we know that your word, working by the Spirit, which is the word of Christ, is the only thing that can stay the enemy, that can defeat the enemy, that can make a stand against his schemes and cause him to flee. help us Lord to find no other protection no other false protection that the devil schemes us into believing will protect us from his attacks but let us rather satisfy ourselves in the means of grace and the armor that you have provided to protect us from the evil one God in heaven help us not to grow weary of doing good let us by the gospel of Jesus Christ be strengthened by his spirit to meet the enemy at the battle line and to see the victory of Christ played out in our lives. We thank you, Lord, for this great gospel truth. We thank you for the comfort that comes with our Lord.

May we look to him now, in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, I'm not sure exactly what a knucklehead is, but I know I was one of them in high school. And one of the knucklehead things I used to do As a football player, actually this is more middle school going into high school, but as a football player, one of the things I would do in my knucklehead-ness is when a play was being made down the field, so attention was down the field, I would try to find a big guy on the other team that wasn't used to getting knocked around too much, and while he's kind of trotting down, going down towards where the play is at, I would go up beside him when he wasn't expecting it, and just hit him real hard on the side, and it would just knock him down, flat on his butt.

Now, I was a pretty scrawny kid, middle school, going into high school, and so I never would have been able to do that in any other circumstance. But because this poor fellow was looking at the field down, and everyone was looking down the field, I got away with knocking him right on his butt. It felt good about myself as I kind of ran away. But I stopped doing that, because one game, I never got caught, which is amazing.

I never got caught by my coaches or referees or anything, by my dad. But one time, I decided I wasn't going to do it again because at the beginning of the game, I played down the field. I knocked some big guy on his butt, felt good about myself. And then it was probably mid to late game later, I was trotting down the field, and I got hammered from the side, completely wiped out, and it was the guy that I got earlier.

He wasn't mad. He didn't get angry. He didn't yell. He just kind of ran off like I did. And I realized, yeah, I'm not going to do this anymore. But the point is that the only reason why this big fellow would be able to get knocked off his feet was not for any other reason, but he wasn't prepared.

He wasn't ready for an attack. He wasn't ready for the hit. And here it reminded me of where we at here in Ephesians 6 as I was meditating on it is that at the beginning of this book of Ephesians it really highlights the work of God in salvation The first three chapters we call it the Indicatives of Scripture It's all about the power of God in salvation.

In fact, it's all the power of God. There is no work of man to be found there. In fact, as a young Calvinist, when I first came to that understanding, the first three chapters of Ephesians really excited me. That's all I would spend my time on for a moment. But yet, if that's all we have, if our theology is just that, then we're going to find ourselves unprotected.

We're going to find ourselves in a position to where we can easily get knocked over by an enemy. We're going to find ourselves not bearing in, not protecting ourselves, not ready to handle and attack. And so that's why we have a full, as Christians, we need to have a full-rounded theology. We have a full-rounded understanding of what it means to be a Christian and what our duties are in this world as we travel it.

And so that's why we read all of scripture, all the epistle of Ephesians, even here at the end, as the ending of the epistle of Ephesians looks very different than the beginning, where the beginning is all about the power of God and salvation and all his majesty and how he has conquered the enemy through Jesus Christ. At the end, what we have here is a battle cry or a call to arms from Paul. And so it's a very marked difference between from the beginning to the end in which he says, finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might in verse 10.

You see how beautifully the two major themes of Ephesians, Ephesians, and really the scriptures, come together in the indicatives and the imperatives. The indicatives of what God has done for you, the imperatives of what you need to do. When he says, be strong, imperative right there. You need to be strong, he says. Be strong. And that's almost like you can think of telling a football player, hey, you need to dig your cleats in.

You're about to get hit from the side. Get ready. Be strong. Bear in. Get ready. Be strong.

But notice the strength is found not in yourself, but it's found in a foreign object, that is, or it's found in the divine when he says be strong, and here's the indicative, in the Lord and in the strength of his might. You see how the indicative and the imperative come together. Be strong for God is strong, and be strong in his might. Again, this is like saying that you are about to get hit, you're about to get attacked, and you need to bear in to something other than yourself or you're going to get wiped out.

You think of a tornado coming down and coming towards your house, you're not going to go out and just relax. But you're going to find some place to bear in and take shelter because an attack or something serious, a force, is coming. And Paul here is telling us, he's saying, there is a force coming, you need to be strong, you need to bear in, you need to be prepared.

Because this isn't just simply God's power revealed and you must do nothing, but rather God's power revealed and you use that to bear in and to be strong and get ready for the attack. And the specifics of what that strength in the Lord looks like to be strong, right? Imperative that you must do in the Lord, in his might, the indicative. What that looks like in particular is it found in verse 11 when he says, put on the whole armor of God.

So if you think, okay, how do I be strong? Because, you know, he's not literally, he's not telling us all that we need to be physically strong. Paul's not concerned about whether or not we're doing enough workout routine in the week. The strength that he's referring to here is you need to be actively working out righteousness in your life, which is found only in bearing in to Christ.

And now here, the put on the whole armor of God is how you do that, but it's not a physical armor set, but it's a spiritual armor set. It is a spiritual armor that God has given us, and that is the specifics of how we can be strong in his might. Now, I say that, but that's not the main objective of Paul in these three verses here. He's going to get to what the armor of God is.

He's going to get there. He's going to say specifically what the spiritual armor of God is so that we can be strong in the Lord to withstand the attacks of Satan. He's going to get to there. But these three, four verses that we're in now, that's not his main objective is to detail the specifics of the armor of God. That's not what he's doing. He's doing actually something else, which will be the focus of the sermon of what we're going to talk about this morning.

Paul's main point here is not to detail the whole armor of God, but Paul's main point, and that will be in 14 through 18. But Paul, 11 through 13, Paul's main point in these verses is to detail the enemy in terrifying detail to make you want to put on the armor of God and to be prepared to fight. So Paul's main point from 11 through 13, the main point of the sermon, the main point of our discussion, will be that he wants to encourage you, you need to put on the armor of God.

The enemy is real. He's coming. He's there. He's powerful. You need the armor. You think about a firefighter.

A firefighter doesn't always put on his gear unless there's a fire nearby. Firefighters don't always wear firefighter uniforms. I remember being surprised when I found stuff like that out. You mean police officers don't always wear their gear all the time as a child? I remember realizing, no, they wear normal clothes just like everyone else. A knight didn't always wear armor.

In fact, it was very cumbersome for a knight to always wear armor. He would wear armor only when the enemy is afoot That when he wear armor Every other time he would wear comfortable clothes The point is here is that if we don understand that there is an enemy nearby and an attack is coming, we will not brace ourselves, we will not put on the armor of God. And so Paul here is saying you need to understand that an attack is here, it's serious, it needs to scare you so much that that armor of God looks so precious you can't wait to put it on.

And we won't understand our need to do it unless we understand just how serious of an foe, how powerful, how scary the enemy is. So this is what Paul's trying to get our minds on. He's trying to get our hearts on that. Because if you notice, there is nothing more simple for us as Christians than to think that there's not a fight to be fought. There's nothing more simple for us to just want to be lazy and think, well, all things are well for me.

It's calm. I can just relax. And the Bible knows that not at all for the Christian. If at any moment you think that you can just relax as a Christian, you do not understand the enemy that is right at your doorstep. And this is what Paul is saying. His point here as before he gets to the whole armor of God is to say, the enemy is scary. you need the armor.

Look at the scary enemy and look at the glorious armor that's here for you. Grab hold of. I'm getting ahead of myself right now, but oh well. That's why we come to church, right? That's why we do our morning devotions, right? You know why that gets stale and empty?

It's because you don't realize that this is to prepare you for a fight, a battle that's happening right now. You want to know why you get bored doing the means of grace that the ordinary means of grace that we do each day is because you're not looking at as there is an enemy that's trying to kill me and this is the means that God has given me to don the armor that I need to withstand his attacks. You see, when our minds are on that and we just simply go through the motions, we get bored and stale.

But when we understand that there's a battle raging, it becomes very, I don't want to use the word exciting, but exciting. So this is what Paul's doing. This is what we're going to be talking about for the next few minutes. The Christian has been called out of dark into light to use the light to combat the dark. And if you are a follower of Christ in this world, that means there is always a fight to be fought.

You are always on duty, the battle is always at hand, and you always need the armor. so Paul's going to detail that need for the armor to encourage us to always be putting it on and really again detailing the enemy by in this way Paul encourages you to do so by detailing the what and the who of the enemy he's going to detail the enemy to scare you straight and to put it on the armor and he's going to do it in these 11 and 12 verses 11 12 with the what and the who of the enemy. It reminded me, as I was considering that, verses 11 is the what of the enemy, verses 12 is the who, who is the enemy. And it reminded me of, you remember 9-11 when that was going on, the attacks on, from Al-Qaeda.

You remember when that was happening, the day of, you remember that? The first thing that we were all wondering is, is what's going on? What's happening? Is this an accident? Who's attacking? Why?

What's happening? And then once we kind of got our bearings on what's happening, we then ask the question, who is this enemy? Who is he? And I think that's the way that Paul's answering or he's detailing the enemy is to say what the enemy does and who the enemy is. And then we'll see in verse 13, after you've been scared enough by the what and the who of the enemy, we get the comfort of what God has provided to combat at this enemy in verse 13.

So what is the enemy? What does the enemy do? What the enemy does? Well, let's look at verse 11. He says, again, put on the whole armor of God. And here he is now detailing the enemy.

This is the what of the enemy, what he does, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. That's what the enemy does, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. Before we get to the schemes of the devil, which is more central to what he does, notice how he says that you may be able to stand against the devil. Stand, that Greek word, it denotes a stand your ground to defend yourself.

That's what stand means there, to stand your ground and withstand the enemy, defend yourself. In fact, if you look at the next verse in verse 12, he says we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. And what he wrestles the same kind of understanding in a stand and wrestle there means hand to hand combat. And so this is what the enemy does. He attacks us to where we need to be able to stand and to have intimate hand to hand combat against this enemy who attacks.

The enemy always attacks God's people. Paul does not say, for those of you who are going to get attacked by Satan, make sure. He assumes that if you are a child of Christ, you have a target on your back, and the devil hates God and you so much he will attack. You will get attacked. Revelation 12, let's go there. Revelation 12 is a great imagery of this.

Satan is one who attacks God's people. God, Jesus Christ, from the beginning, he has done this. And looking at my time, read it in your own time. In Revelation 12, you can see he begins that attack on the woman who gives birth to a child. This is Israel before Christ has come. The devil was attacking to try to stop Christ from coming.

Then he tries to devour the child himself which is Satan trying to attack and kill Christ himself And then once he failed at that he attacks the early church we see in chapter 12 in which he fails at that And so there this culminating well, maybe not a culminating remark, but a final remark about how he attacks everyone after the early church. Look at verse 12 of Revelation. I'm sorry.

Look at Revelation 12, verse 17, when he says, then the dragon became furious with the woman. So again, he failed at every single point. One thing you can see in scripture is Satan continuously fails. He thinks he has victory, but then he fails. He thinks he has victory, but then he fails. He thinks he stopped Christ, but then he comes by trying to make Israel fail the covenant that they were in with God, right?

He thinks he has Christ beat at his death, but then he fails at the resurrection, right? And he noticed the whole thing's a failure. He thinks he can consume the church, but he always fails. And so Satan becomes furious, in verse 17, with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring. That is the whole church age. On those who would keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus.

And he stood on the sand of the sea. And so that is what the mode is right now in this life that we're in right here. is that Satan is overwhelmed with anger and fury for failing. And so all he wants to do is attack those who would obey the commandments of God through Jesus Christ and try to attack and stop that from happening. That is what Satan is doing.

He's so filled with fury that he uses all of his abilities to attack those who would obey Jesus Christ and his gospel. And so it's not a matter of maybe he'll attack. It's not a matter of perhaps. It is Satan will. He is the kind of enemy. What he is is one who will always attack.

And how does he, what does this attack look like, this specific attack look like? Well, again, go back to Ephesians chapter 6 and look at 11, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. He's always going to attack you, And the way he attacks is to try to bring about, well, to have a false reality. Scheming is like a deception, lies, right?

There's a truth, a true reality there. But then he tries to then curb that or twist that into a false reality and grab hold of you and bring you into that false reality. And this is how Satan attacks. This is what he's done from the beginning, right? The reality, the truth is that our greatest good, our greatest happiness is found in glorifying God and obeying him.

And what is the scheme of Satan that he uses to attack? Did God really say, right? And then he grabs hold of man and brings him into his scheming reality, his false reality where they find their death. Or as a Christian, right, what is the reality as a Christian? Our greatest good is to follow our shepherd, always. It's to obey him. to see what he has done for his children, and to gladly follow him as we turn away from our sin.

That is always the reality of what's best for us. But what does the scheme that Satan attacks us constantly with? You'll be happier if you disobey. Usually it's this right here, just this once. That's how it usually is, right? Like just this once you disobey, you'll be really happy.

If you notice, that's how it usually happens. Satan doesn't just bring the onslaught of temptation on you to say, just turn away from Jesus altogether right now. Usually you'd say, hey, just disobey just once in this area, you'll be a lot happier. And then it just kind of gets worse and worse and worse and worse. The point being, what's being said here is that Satan, you know, what does he do?

Well, he always attacks. And the way he attacks is he brings a scheme to our flesh to try to draw us away from the goodness of Jesus Christ our Lord. That's what he's looking to do. He hates the idea that God would have a people that would obey him. And so he goes after you by trying to create a scheme in which you'll be happier if you simply do it this way.

This is how he attacks. Satan is always trying to pull you into his schemes. part of utilizing the means of god's grace as i kind of jumped the gun earlier a little bit but part of utilizing the means of god's grace right coming to church having your morning devotions in the word of god having a prayer life part of utilizing the means of god's grace is to understand what lies you are tempted to believe in what lies satan is giving you is feeding you that you are tempted to believe in, right? And then to replace that with the truth, right?

I am tempted to be short with my spouse, my children. I am tempted to be irritated, irritable, and I want to replace that with the truth of being loving, of being selfless, of being kind. The list goes on and on. Any sin that you're tempted with, it is a lie from Satan that he's tempted to pull you and saying you'll be happy, and part of your means of grace that you participate in is to see which lies am I tempted to believe, which schemes is he trying to grab his little, his hands on me to bring me in, and how can I replace that with the truth of God's word?

This is part of what it means to be engaging in the worship, engaging in the means of grace, is to withstand the attacks of Satan. Satan's attack is to stop you from enjoying Christ. That's what he wants. He wants to stop you from enjoying Christ. What he does is he wants to stop you from enjoying your Lord. Or, and this is more somber and this is even scarier, his greatest desire is to pull you away from Christ altogether.

His greatest desire is to pull you away from Christ altogether. It reminds me of Christian and Apollyon and the Pilgrim's Progress, if you haven't read that. read it today, start today. And you remember what happens, Christian gets his armor and he's walking off, you know, after having a good time getting his armor and who comes to him, Apollyon, to bring him back to the city of destruction, to bring him away from Christ, away from the journey to the celestial city, to bring him back to where he was.

And here's the reality is that Apollyon is sometimes successful. I'm not trying to scare you into doubting your salvation here, but that needs to be something that we take seriously, is that Satan wants to take you away from Christ. He wants to, on a, you know, the worst case scenario, stop you from enjoying Christ. The best case scenario, to keep you away from Christ.

We all know someone who had been enlightened and tasted the heavenly gift of the Holy Spirit, who then made his home in the deception of the enemy. we most of us probably know someone who has endured that so we got to take the attack of the enemy seriously the what of the enemy's attack wouldn't be so terrifying though if it wasn't for the who the enemy is so again the verse 11 is the what he always attacks he attacks by bringing you into his schemes to at least stop you from enjoying christ even to pull you away from Christ altogether. That wouldn't be so scary. You know, you could think an ant could have the worst intentions for me, but he doesn't have much power to do anything with it.

So, oh well. Satan has the worst intentions for you, but who he is makes those intentions even scarier because he is not a weak enemy. You know, we just sang it in A Mighty Fortress is Our God. I like how that hymn, Martin Luther, really highlights the power of our foe. And it's true. The what of his attacks is terrifying enough, but whenever you realize it's backed up by the who of the enemy, of being a strong enemy, it is a terrifying reality.

And look at verse 12 to see that who. Who is this enemy? Well, in verse 12 he says, 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. So he is a hidden enemy with authoritative power that has a pervasive kingdom of darkness directed at you to take you away from Christ.

That should terrify you. It should make you sober-minded. He says, we have a hidden enemy. Verse 12, for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. His point is that our main battle line, where we need to stand, is not primarily against the physical realities around us. And that doesn't mean that the physical realities around us isn't trying to grab hold of us to bring us to Satan.

The point that Paul's getting at is that the enemy is behind the physical reality around you. You know, it'd be scary enough if all we had was the physical enemies around us, but he's saying you got to understand that there is a force behind the physical people, systems, everything around you that is directing their attacks to take you away from Christ. You see how that ups the ante a little bit?

I mean, just an example, a very general example is to look at the sexual revolution from the last generation to where we are now. That doesn't happen so crazy fast without a spiritual force behind it directing the attacks. You know what I'm saying? Like, it's not like these just random people are just acting randomly. Hey, you know, I really think that divorces should be just any time you want.

I really think that you should have, you know, sex just casually. I really think that you can be a boy when a girl girl boy or blah, blah, blah, blah. It's not like just a bunch of randomness. It's all coordinated behind the scenes by a sinister evil force that is directing its attack against the church of God. You understand that? And so it's not like simply, it's just we got this physical world that is like, man, they're really just against me.

There is a spiritual element behind it directing its attack to bring you away from Christ. It reminds me of, you remember Elijah? and the king of Syria. We won't go there. But in 2 Kings chapter 6, the king of Syria is really frustrated because he's trying to take out Israel. And Israel just keeps on knowing his moves. And he's like, what, is there a spy?

What's going on here? And they say, no, Elijah, the prophet, knows your moves as you say them in your bed in your chambers Elijah is a prophet He being told by God what you going to do And so he says well I probably should take this Elijah guy out And so here comes the king of Syria surrounding the town which Elijah is in Elijah's people, they open their window. They see this army surrounding them for Elijah.

And they say, look what's happening. And what does Elijah say? Oh, God, open their eyes. And when they open their eyes, they see the spiritual armies of heaven surrounding the army of the king of Syria. And it makes them realize, oh, there's a whole hidden army for our defense here. They're all right.

This is kind of like the opposite, though, of where we are now. The fact is, is if we had eyes to see the sinister forces behind the physical realities behind us, we would see that it's much more serious than we can imagine. As serious as it seems, as we look at the physical world around us and their hatred and their working, there is a spiritual army of Satan that is directing it.

If we had eyes to see, Paul is saying, it would scare you even more. The man who wants to look up pornography on the computer, if he understood the spiritual forces that are behind that, it would mean something so much more than simply doing something in your privacy. There is something I often say to people when it comes to having a more lively prayer life or a growing prayer life is I think a very helpful thing for you to do is to in your prayer life, start big.

Go on a walk in the morning as the sun's coming up if you have to. Start big. Oh God, look at the creation around. Look how beautiful you are. Start big. Oh God, I consider the gospel, how Jesus came to die for sinners, his kingdom. and you start your big elements of who God is, what he's doing in creation, what he's doing in recreation, right?

And then kind of bring it down. And Lord, I'm so thankful that you called me out of darkness into light. I'm so thankful that you spent the spirit in me. And then you get very specific. In this day that I have to go to work, to take care of my children, take care of my grandchildren, I get to do that in light of this huge reality of your kingdom. and this next breath that I take, right, and making breakfast I'm about to make, I get to do that for you in your kingdom.

Do you see how you start big and then you get really specific to where you're at? I think it's a very helpful way to pray. And I was struck this last week of how we need to do the same with the enemies that we face. Because this isn't just random things that we face in the physical world. Random temptations. We need to understand there is a whole sinister movement behind it. spiritual forces behind it that is vaster than we can imagine.

And it ought to, again, as we consider the vastness of it, it should make us sober, serious. It should make us think, I need help. I need the armor of God. Not only is he a hidden foe, as he says in verse 12, for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. That word for, by the way, is to say he's a serious enemy. Take him seriously.

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood. No, he's behind flesh and blood. He's behind it to coordinate attacks. Imagine, again, I'm kind of regressed. I got to be careful. Imagine, though, that hurricane that's bearing down on a town.

Imagine, though, that it is led by someone directly to kill you. It's not just that there's a great physical force, but it's directed by an enemy against you. That's what he's saying. We do not just wrestle against flesh and blood. But then he goes on to detail the who of the enemy when he says, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers.

And what he's detailing there is our enemy is one with authoritative power. He's not weak in any measure. He's been given authority by God. And so he is a very powerful foe. You think of in chapter two, verse two of Ephesians, how he says when he talks about our life in darkness before we came to Christ, he says, in which you once walked following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air.

He's a man, or a man, he is an angel with authority, with power, who is hidden. And he also says in verse 12 of Ephesians 6, he says, over this present darkness against the spiritual forces of evil and the heavenly places. The way to understand that is that he is not only hidden, he's not only with authoritative power, but his kingdom is vast and pervasive.

It seeps through everything. the kingdom of darkness is over everything. So you cannot hide. You cannot simply bury your head in the sand and hope it doesn't come for you. But this powerful enemy is always on the attack and as darkness seeps through everything he will find you You have a powerful enemy that is always at work to pull you away from Christ and into his schemes It's not a question, is that happening now?

It's a question of, do you understand what's happening to you now? Do you have eyes to see it? And we need to then, at this point, look at how verse 13 starts and rejoice. therefore that word therefore in 13 is saying there's a way that you can withstand as as dark as the enemy is and i hope as you close your eyes you consider just the temptations you face and how you give into it you feel that you feel the power you you know it's there then look at the word therefore in verse 13 and rejoice because this is a therefore that says god has not left you or abandoned you.

Satan's attack is not the end of the story, but the defense of God that he's provided in Christ is. I find it very fascinating. And really what you could read when it comes to this is when Jesus is leaving the apostles in the upper room in the Gospel of John, and that whole teaching that he does after communion, that whole teaching, the prayer that he has to God is basically Jesus saying, I'm going to leave, but I'm not going to leave you defenseless.

And I love what he says. If you look at John 17, 14, I find it very fascinating how Jesus, well, let me read it and then I'll make a comment on it. He says, I have given, John 17, 14, as he's praying to God, he says, I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. He says this, I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one.

They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. So sanctify them in the truth. Your word is truth, as you sent me into this world, so I've sent them into this world. And for their sake, I consecrate myself that they also may be sanctified in truth. I find it so fascinating. Jesus understands the spiritual warfare that's happening.

He's not ignorant to it at any measure. And I find it fascinating. He says, I don't ask that you take them out of the world. I ask that you keep them in the world. Thus is the confidence Jesus has to guard his sheep. Thus is the confidence to say, gee, I know I can keep my sheep.

They are in my hand and no one can take them. That although the battle rages in a scary fashion, Jesus is confident that no one can take them out of my hand. He will not leave us as orphans, but rather he gives us his spirit of power, and he's glorified in you manifesting that in light of the attack of the enemy. And so there's a confidence that we walk about this world as we know attacks are here.

And that confidence is the same confidence Jesus has. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but keep them in there so they can glorify me as they do battle in my name by my power and my might. There is a confidence as we look at the attack of the enemy that we must have in Jesus that he has overcome the world. Jesus wants you to stay in the world and do battle because it glorifies him and the victory is sure.

And he's provided everything to ensure that victory. And so be encouraged with verse 13 with that in mind. chapter 6 of Ephesians, verse 13, therefore take up the whole armor of God. Now why does that encourage us? Because God has provided a whole armor set for you that will ensure victory. And it's his armor, and it's his complete armor. We don't just take some here, some there, then we're unprotected and we'll get defeated.

But take courage that Jesus says, I want them to stay in the world so they can take up the whole armor that I will provide them through the spirit and be able to defend themselves against the evil one. So again, it goes to your mind. What's the purpose of the means of grace? What's the purpose of gathering together? What's the purpose of my morning worship or prayer and reading scripture is that I can take the whole armor of God and know I am protected.

He has provided everything you need. Take up the whole armor of God that you may be able, in verse 13, to withstand, to stand, to wrestle against the evil one in the evil day. You may be able. What an encouragement whenever you are dealing with some temptation to sin that you've fallen to, that you can look and see Jesus has provided everything. And that doesn't change now that I've fallen prey to the attacks of his schemes for the moment.

He's provided everything, all the armor of God. I can Paul says I may be able to withstand And notice how he says in the evil day What encouraging about that This is just a day that we have this fight before us You understand, this is a battle and it never stops. I don't care if you plan on getting old and moving to Florida and watching soap operas and daytime dramas.

The battle doesn't finish ever on this earth before Christ returns. But beloved, it is just a period of time that will finish. And it has to be. You remember when you're in such a big project and you think this is never going to end. And you've got to put your mind on the fact that it will end. It's going to look really nice.

When you're in the middle of a major conflict, a battle, you must remember that this is just a time. Jesus will return and end all evil, all wickedness, and set you up in perfect righteousness with no fight but only rest for you. I can't comprehend that. I can get a taste of how great that's going to be. You're going to the return of Jesus. He brings a perfect kingdom, no more evil, and you get to put your armor down on the ground and just rest?

I don't that gets me so excited but I can't even fathom that why because there's such a battle today to be fought but beloved in that eternal time after the day is over what are you going to be saying to yourself oh that I would have just fought more it was worth it all to fight all the more so I can rest all the more here in eternity so yes the power rages and it is awful and scary intense, filled with sweat, blood, tears, everything, but it is worth it for it's just a day. One day Jesus will return and put the evil one into the abyss. And finally, he says in verse 13, having done all, stand firm, having done all that he has provided for us in the Lord Jesus Christ by his spirit.

This is what makes the worship, the belief, the following, the faith, the trust in Jesus so beautiful, is that we see the enemy around, we see his hatred of us, we see what he wants to do, but yet we see our wonderful, dear Lord Jesus Christ who has provided us everything for godliness. This is what excites us to come to church. This is what excites us to wake up and pray out to God to read scripture is because we know that he's provided everything that we need in his word to withstand the evil schemes, the lies of Satan.

And although the battle rages, it will one day end and we'll be able to rest forever in Christ Jesus our Lord. What a hope we have in Christ. What a armor we have in Christ. So we delight ourselves by looking at the enemy, but yet looking at Christ who has conquered the enemy. Oh God in heaven, I thank you for Jesus Christ our Lord. I thank you, Lord, that your word is truth.

And Lord, I'm amazed how you never are, you never withhold the truth, even whenever it's a scary truth. The fact of the matter is, Lord, we have a terrible enemy who has awful power, who has the worst intentions for us, with a kingdom that is so vast that it is even pressing in even as we speak to each one of us. Lord, would you awaken us as Paul is crying out a call to arms, a call to battle?

Would you awaken us to this call? Would you help us not to be sleepy or to be taking our rests when it's a time for battle? Lord, I think of how much spiritual darkness and forces are attacking our families. Satan wants to destroy my children. He wants to take my children away from the gospel. And he wants to utilize my sin to do so.

The implications of this are vast. Each one of us can consider it in their own lives and be overcome by the attacks of Satan against our willing flesh. Would you awaken us to this enemy? and help us to respond to that call to arms to be wanting to put on the full armor of God, knowing that when we do all to stand, we will stand because of his power? Would you help us to be strong in the Lord and to delight in the hard, withstanding the battle, wrestling that we have to endure, knowing that our strength comes from Christ and knowing that one day in eternity he will bring us to his eternal kingdom where we'll be able to rest forever in the worship and service and righteousness of our Lord.

We thank you for this hope. We thank you for this truth. We thank you for Jesus Christ, our Lord. In Jesus' name, amen.