Description
TANK U
Armor All – Part 2
Ed Young
March 10, 2002
One of my favorite shows on television is a show that you might have seen before if you have cable. It’s called Fashion Emergency. It’s pretty hilarious. They take men and women who are fashion unconscious, who definitely need a makeover, and they take them into stores and buy them a wardrobe and change their hair. Then they show a before and after picture. They show them walking in front of their friends to get their friends’ reactions. It’s pretty amazing, Fashion Emergency. People who are fashion unconscious suddenly before our eyes are changed into people who are fashion conscious.
Think about the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. This is an epicenter of fashion. People come from all over the world just to shop in our malls. Texas is famous for its herds of cattle. It’s also famous for its herds of clotheshorses, kind of roaming around the Galleria, Northpark, and even Grapevine Mills. We love clothes here in Dallas.
Now, what if I told you this. What if I told you that there is an event that most all of us attend but the majority of us are horribly dressed for it? What if I told you that?
You might say, “Wow. You mean I am underdressed? You mean I’m not put together?”
Yes. If the truth were known, most of us are in a fashion emergency situation. The event I am talking about is something called “war.” The Bible says that we are in battles, in wars, pretty much 24/7. To be specific, spiritual war. God, in his grace, has provided you and me this phenomenal designer wardrobe. I’m not talking about Armani or Versace. I’m talking about from the ultimate designer, the Lord, himself. He has given it to us and he affords us the opportunity to either get dressed or not, to either become fashion conscious or fashion unconscious. The thing about God’s wardrobe is that it never goes out of style. It’s always vogue. It’s always perfect. We can wear it wherever we want to. I call it “war wear.” It’s something that we definitely need if we are going to make it in life. Because Scripture tells us that the evil one fires some heavy artillery your way and mine.
Doubt
In Ephesians, it says that he fires at us something called “darts.” “D” stands for doubt. Are you ever ambushed by doubt? Sometimes I am. Now and then, we doubt God.
We say, “Is God really real? Can I really trust the Bible? Is this some psychological mumbo jumbo, or is it truth?”
Have you ever doubted that way? Don’t freak out over doubt because, when you have faith, you are going to have doubts. If you don’t have doubts, that means you don’t have faith. If there were no doubts, if we knew everything for an absolute certainty, then we wouldn’t need faith. So you are going to doubt in the midst of faith; it’s inevitable. But Satan is always the author of those doubts, as he tries to attack the reasons for your faith. He’s kicking you and me. He’s whispering it to you and me.
We sometimes doubt other people. “Well, I wonder what she meant by that, I don’t know. Maybe she doesn’t really like me. I don’t know about him. Who knows.”
We doubt others and sometimes we can even doubt ourselves. The Bible says that we should examine ourselves. That’s great. We need to do that regularly. Some of us OD on that though. We become so self-absorbed that all we think about is me, myself and I, and what makes me look good and what makes me feel good, and everything about me. We can doubt ourselves. We can doubt who we are before God.
Anxiety
Satan also fires anxiety at us. That’s the “A” in dart. The word “anxious” means to be pulled in different directions. Do you ever feel like you are pulled in different directions? I do sometimes. Satan wants to pull us away from the armor.
He says, “Get out of the tank. Come on and play with me.”
Once we get out of the tank, we begin to feel anxious and pulled here and there and yonder.
Rebellion
He also fires rebellion at us. A lot of us have problems with authority figures. Sometimes students and children want to just power up against their parents. Or maybe you want to power up against your boss, or power up against any authority figure out there. Rebellion goes all the way back to the garden, doesn’t it?
Temptation
“T” in dart stands for temptation. Or you could call it trouble, financial trouble, marital trouble, family trouble, emotional trouble. Temptation – when Satan lures us, it is real.
The darts are real. If you do some study, back in Biblical times, when people would fly arrows or darts, they would be flaming arrows or darts. The opponents would take the tips of the arrows or darts and put them in some kind of flammable material and then fire them. If they hit someone, it would cause a spark and then burn them to shreds.
We are in this spiritual warfare. Most of us are fashion unconscious. Most of us don’t realize who we are in Christ. Most of us don’t realize the wardrobe that God has available to us. So what do we do about it? That’s why I have been in this series called “Tank U.” I have been talking specifically about getting dressed in the Christian life. Are you like the guy trying to play hockey in short pants and a t-shirt, while other people are just slamming you? Do you ever feel like that? I’ve got good news for you, because God tells us how to get dressed. The darts are here, there and everywhere, so here is how to get dressed.
The Shield of Faith
Let me draw your attention to Ephesians 6:16 (NKJV). This is the ultimate wardrobe. I’m talking about war wear. “Above all (that means that this is the ultimate), taking the shield of faith…” It doesn’t say shield of belief, does it? That’s the first aspect of the armor of God. So in the literal language this means that the only thing you need is the shield of faith. Now what is a shield? A shield protects. Back in this day, a shield was this big giant door looking thing, a wooden deal, and there were three or four layers of leather on top of the wood. A good soldier would dip this in water before battle. Why? Because when the fiery darts would come his way, the shield would block the darts and extinguish those flaming darts. A soldier could hide completely behind this shield. The shield provided real protection. Anybody who knew how to fight took up the shield. It’s all we need.
“Above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all of the fiery darts of the wicked one.”
This text does not say, I’ll say it again, the shield of belief. Belief and faith are different. Faith is acting on belief. Once we become Christians, we learn that we have a belt of truth. We also have a breastplate of righteousness. We have shoes shod with the gospel of peace. If we act on truth, if we act on righteousness, if we live out peace, that is called faith. So, faith is acting on belief. Every single person on the planet has faith in something. Everybody is a faithful person. They might have faith in some glassy eyed guru. They might have faith in some material possession. They might have faith in some kind of nebulous-life principle. But we all have faith in something. Our faith is in Christ. We live out, we act out what we believe. Because we believe the Bible is the word of God, we sync our lives up with it and we act it out and live it out.
What kind of faith, specifically, is this act of faith? The writer is not talking about a historical faith or being saved. He’s talking about an active faith. The kind of faith I want you to get into is the faith in the “always-ness” of God. I just made that up. The “always-ness” of God. It’s probably not a word, if there are any English professors here. I just made it up. We need to have faith that God is always involved in our lives. Because if we are believers, he is there. He is involved. He’s engaged.
Check out Psalm 3:3. Here is what David said, “But you are a shield around me, oh Lord; you bestow glory on me and lift up my head.”
I have faith that God is always going to come through.
Look in Psalm 145:13, “The Lord is faithful to all his promises and loving toward all he has made.”
When God says it, he is going to keep his promises. I’m also faithful because God is always in control.
Romans 8:28, “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”
It doesn’t say that all things are good. It says if you are a Christ-follower, God will take all things, horrible things, good things, mediocre things and he will put them in this pot, stir them, and in the end, they will turn out to be good for those people who are called according to his purpose.
I had prayer with a young man who is going through a horrible situation in his life, a situation in which he was treated unfairly, taken advantage of.
I looked at him and said, “Let me tell you something. Even though this is a horrible thing, God is going to use this bad thing, one day, for good. I know right now, you are going through turmoil, strife and depression. But I am telling you that based on God’s word, you stay faithful to him and he will use it for good. He will use that to mold you and make you into the kind of person that he desires you to become.”
Hey, Christian, who do you think allows the darts and arrows in your life? God does. God allows us to be attacked by the evil one. But listen very carefully. He allows the attacks. Why? For our growth and development. If we weren’t attacked, we wouldn’t grow. But it is always within the context, watch this now, of his overriding will. It is always within the context of God’s overriding will. God allows it. If he didn’t allow it into your life and mine, we wouldn’t grow. We wouldn’t develop. We wouldn’t be Christ-like.
The shield of faith is for protection. We understand that. It’s also for unification. If you do your study, you will discover that the edges of shields were beveled. I love this. You can kind of hook the shields together and form this wall, so an advancing army would get behind the shields, hook them together and advance against the enemy. That’s why we desperately need the local church. That’s why we desperately need one another. That’s why the Bible is a “one another” book: serve one another, love one another, be kind to one another, pray for one another.
The problem with Christians is, instead of advancing, instead of locking our shields together, do you know what we do? We turn our shield around and we start comparing shields.
“My shield is better than yours. It’s bigger than yours. It’s prettier than yours. Can you believe the kind of shield she has on?”
We get going back and forth and we are fighting among ourselves, kicking the wounded, instead of advancing against the enemy. That’s why we talk so much here about unity. That’s why we talk so much here about getting involved in a small group. Christianity is not fighting alone. It’s a together thing. It’s a one another thing.
If you have been through this entire study of the armor of God, you might be wondering, “Why in the world did the Apostle Paul give us all the other aspects of armor when he said here in Ephesians 6:16 that all we need is the shield of faith? The Bible says it. Why did God give us the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the feet shod in the gospel of peace. Why did he do all that?”
I am glad you asked. Romans 8:37 tells us, “Because we are more than conquerors.”
God wants us to be more than conquerors. Remember, we fight from a championship, not for a championship. God desires us to dominate our enemy, but it’s not going to happen, it would be a pipe dream, unless we clothe ourselves in the wardrobe of God. We cannot fight naked. We cannot fight unprepared. We cannot fight being fashion unconscious.
The Helmet of Salvation
Hats are really big these days. Every body is wearing hats. You walk around the weekends in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area and all the guys have hats on, visors, hats this way and that way. Some people buy these hats that looked distressed and torn up. That’s the hip thing to do. I’ve seen some students walking around with some hats that are so gnarly, I don’t know what is growing on them. But hats are vogue. They are really where it is at.
God talks about hats in his armor. Why does God talk about hats? Because we all have heads. In our heads are our brains. The battlefield is in our brains. It’s in the mind. I’ve said it over and over during this series. If a soldier goes out and tries to fight without a helmet on, he is in trouble. If he gets his head blown off, he is dead.
Let’s talk about the helmet of salvation. We’ve talked about the shield of faith. Now let’s talk about the helmet of salvation.
Ephesians, Chapter 6, Verse 17, “Take the helmet of salvation.”
Take it up. A Roman soldier had this big old honking helmet. I have got a bucket head, friends. I’ve got a huge head. I cannot find hats to fit me very well. I’ve got a monster head. When I was a little kid and they would make Indian headdresses out of construction paper, they would have to have an extension on mine. It was sad.
But a Roman soldier would carry his helmet around, a big old heavy thing. He would never let it out of his sight. If the guy was eating sushi, he would have his helmet with him. But I am going to tell you something, when he hit the battlefield, he would take the helmet and put it on. It protected him. God has given us the helmet of salvation.
What does it mean, that word “salvation?” Salvation is when you are saved, when you become a Christ-follower, when you ask Jesus Christ to infiltrate your life. Part of salvation is repentance. I love the word “repentance.” Repentance is an about face. It’s a military term. It’s a spiritual 180. That’s what we have to do to become Christians.
Repentance is not saying, “You know I really messed that one up. Okay, I got caught. You got me. Handslap.”
That’s not repentance. Repentance is agreeing with God about your condition, that you are separate from him, that you have committed cosmic treason, that you deserve a Christless eternity, and that you want to turn and go the opposite way. Here is the great part about the grace of God. Once we just begin the turn, God is there to love us, accept us, forgive us and change our lives. That’s the helmet of salvation. This is talking about becoming a believer.
Romans, Chapter 12, Verse 2, talks about the importance of the mind. It says, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
In the Phillips translation it says, “Don’t let the world squeeze you into its mold.” That’s what this verse says, the first part of it.
Do you remember the “Creepy Crawlers” you could buy as a kid? I think they still have Creepy Crawlers. You pour this goop in these little molds. You put it in the oven and take the goop out and you will have these little creatures. They were weird looking. Don’t let the world squeeze you into its mold.
Don’t let the world say, “Here’s what I want for you. Here’s what you better do to look and act like this. Let me squeeze you.”
No. Don’t do that. But be transformed. How? By the renewing of your mind. This word “transformed” is the word “metamorphosis,” to be transformed. Only God can do that.
2 Corinthians 2:11 says, in effect, “Don’t be an igmo.”
I have run into a lot of Christians who are igmos. They are just ignorant about the battle strategy of the evil one, about his schemes and devices. They just don’t get it.
2 Corinthians 2:11 says, “…so that no advantage would be taken of us by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his schemes.”
Look at 2 Corinthians 11:3, again we are talking about the mind here, the importance of the helmet of salvation. Paul says, “I’m afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ.”
Now, it seems like the evil one would have changed his tactics. Think about it. In the book of Genesis, what did he do? He put on the question hat, because the evil one has a bad hatitude. He put on the questioning hat. I hope you got that.
He said, “Eve, did God’s word really say don’t touch the fruit of the tree? Did God really mean that?”
Then he took off the questioning hat and put on the denial hat.
He denied God’s prohibition. He said, “Eat the fruit. You’ll become like God.” He denied the word.
Then he put on the substitution hat. He began to twist God’s truth and distort it into a lie. “Oh, come on, take it. It will be cool. Nothing will happen to you. Surely, you won’t die.”
He does the same thing in all of our lives, doesn’t he? He puts on that questioning hat. “Hey, did God really mean to wait sexually until marriage? Everybody else is doing it.”
“Homosexuality? It’s okay. It’s all right. God didn’t really mean that. It’s okay to lie about this one. Don’t worry about it.” The questioning hat.
Then he puts on the denial hat. He says, “If you do this, you are going to feel like a true man or woman. If you do this, you will get off the hook. If you do this, you will make the grade. You won’t get the bad progress report. Go ahead. Come on. You might get your wrist slapped, but no one will really find out.”
Satan hasn’t changed his tactics. He denies and substitutes by taking God’s word and twisting it and distorting it. We believe it and do the same thing that Eve did. The guy is a master liar, isn’t he? He’s the father of lies. It’s his nature to lie. That’s why we have to know the truth. That’s why we have to understand that it is a mind game. The battlefield is in your mind and mine, and Satan will mess with our minds.
One of the biggest things that I struggle with personally is worry. I am a worrier. When I tell people that, they go, “Come on, man. Are you kidding me? Do you really worry?”
Yes, I do. I worry too much, for example, about messages, about responsibilities, or about my family. Several months ago, I talked to a good friend of mine who has been attending Fellowship Church from the get go. He has been here since the beginning, 12 years. He is really gifted at counseling. He began to share with me some things about worry that really helped me. If you are a fellow worrier, maybe this might help. He took a blank sheet of paper out and drew three circles on the paper. In the first circle, he put “thoughts.” In the second circle, he put “feelings.” In this last circle, he put “events.” So, you have got the thoughts circle, the feelings circle and the events circle.
He said, “Ed, you struggle with worry. Can you control events in your life?”
I thought about it and said, “No, I can’t. I can’t control events.”
He said, “Good. Can you really control your feelings?”
I said, “No. Not really.”
He said, “How about your thoughts? Can you control your thoughts?”
I said, “Yes.”
He said, “Right. We can control our thoughts. If you control your thoughts, that will control your feelings. When you think right, you will feel right. When you feel right, you will be able to handle any event that comes down life’s path.”
Then he drew my attention to Scripture. He said, “Scripture nails it, Ed. 2 Corinthians 10:5, “Take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”
So when you have a worrisome thought, a doubtful thought, an anxious thought, a rebellious thought, or a tempting thought, just funnel it through God’s truth. Think right. Funnel it through his authority. Then, when you think right, you will feel right. When you feel right, you will be able to handle the events in life. I thought that was great. It really helped me.
The Sword of the Spirit
Let’s talk about something else, some offensive stuff. Because if you have been studying with me over the last several weeks, everything that God talked about so far has to do with defensive stuff. Defense. Defense. Now, though, he is talking offense. We only have one offensive weapon, the sword of the Spirit. That’s the Bible. You cannot separate the sword from the Spirit. The Holy Spirit gave us the Bible. He uses the Bible. The Holy Spirit and the word go hand in hand. The Holy Spirit inspired it. He gave it to us. He guides us.
“The sword of the Spirit,” Verse 17 says, “which is the word of God.”
You can compare this sword to a material sword. A material sword gets dull the more you use it. This sword gets sharper the more you use it. The material sword pierces the skin, the epidermis. This sword pierces the heart. Have you ever seen someone before who will just not come to church? I have. I deal with people all the time. I talk to them around the community and they say, “Ed, you look like a nice guy and all that, but I just am not coming to church. Or, there are too many hypocrites there. Or, the church is too big. Or, I had this bad experience when I was 17 years old in church and I just don’t go.”
Let me let you in on a little secret. Do you know why a lot of people don’t go to church? Because they are scared of the sword of the Spirit. They don’t want to be cut by it. They don’t want to be exposed by it. They don’t want to have to come clean by it. They don’t like to have their sin revealed. They know it will convict. They know it will really tell them who they are, and they are scared to death. I laugh when the world says that Christians are pansies and quiche-eaters and need a crutch. That is a crock, because Christians are man enough and woman enough to tell the truth about their condition before God. They are man and woman enough to allow the sword of the Spirit to cut them and expose them so they can live the kind of life that God desires. That’s very important that we get that and understand that.
Have you ever been to a service here at Fellowship Church and maybe you are singing a praise song and all of a sudden you think, “Whoa, that is wacky. That speaks to where I am.”
I have.
Have you ever seen a drama and thought, “Wow, that happened to me this week. That is spooky.”
Have you ever heard me preaching or Preston or Tianne and we talk about something from the Bible and you say, “Hey, have you guys been following me? Have you hired some private investigator on me? Are you reading my mail?”
That’s not me. That’s not the actors and the drama. That’s not the Praise Team. That’s the Holy Spirit of God working through us to connect with you. That’s the sword of the Spirit.
If you are going to use the sword, you have got to practice with the sword. Someone who is a great swordsman, knows how to use his sword. We need to know how to use this sword. We need to know the Bible. We need to know what is going on here. We need to read it and study it and feed on it and allow it to move us and teach us.
My favorite author is John Grisham. I love John Grisham. I am reading a John Grisham book right now. Whenever I read John Grisham, I would love to have John Grisham right there with me to interpret, to explain all the stuff and the characters right there while I am reading the Grisham book. Obviously, that is not going to happen. John is not going to fly in here on his jet and talk to me about his book.
The Bible is the only book I know about where we can read it and the author is right there available to us. I’m talking about the Holy Spirit being available to interpret and help us, lead us and guide us, as we read it. We have got to use the sword.
Matthew 4, when Jesus went one-on-one with Satan. Jesus had been without food and water 40 days and 40 nights. Satan came to him and tempted him three times. He shot those darts at him three times. What did Jesus say? “It is written, it is written, it is written.” Because Jesus knew the truth, because he had the sword of the Spirit, he was able to fight off the evil one. We have got to say the same thing when he throws those darts your way and mine.
The Armor of God. It’s really about Jesus, because Jesus is truth, he is righteousness, he is peace, he is faith, he is salvation and he is the Spirit. That’s what it means to clothe myself in Christ. That’s what it means to put on the Armor of God.
John 14:20, “On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.”
It’s a little bit confusing. What does that mean, “you are in me?” That means the Christian in Christ. As a believer, I am in Christ. If you want to get real specific, that represents the first three aspects of the armor of God, the Christian in Christ, that is, the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, and our shoes shod in the gospel of peace.
This last phrase “I in you” is Christ in the Christian. That represents the final three aspects of the armor of God. That is, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is God’s word. What does that mean, though? What does it mean to be clothed in Christ? What does it mean? How can I use this when Satan attacks? Well, I am glad you asked.
This envelope represents me, Ed. When Ed became a Christian, Ed asked Jesus to come into his life. That’s what becoming a Christian is. Ed has Jesus in his life. He is saved. He is a believer. He’s a Christ-follower. Remember, the Christian in Christ. To be in Christ, as Jesus said, the Christian in Christ and Christ in the Christian, that means Ed needs to be in Jesus. Christ is in Ed, but also, Ed in is Christ. Are you following me? Am I going too fast?
Let’s go ahead and put this, Ed, in Jesus, because that is what Jesus said in John 14:20. Jesus is also God. That’s the trinity, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, one in three, three in one. So if Jesus is God, let’s put Jesus in God. Let’s seal them up and there we go. Let’s say, just for illustrative purposes that Satan wants to get after Ed Young. Let’s say he wants to chew me up, to fire dart after dart and take me out. Let’s say he gets through God the Father. Let’s just say he does. Now he’s got Jesus. Let’s say, he gets through Jesus. He’s got Ed. Maybe he says, “I’ve got Ed now. There he is. I’ve got Ed.”
You open that up and who is inside? Jesus. Is that great or what? For Satan to get to you or me as a believer, he has got to go through God the Father, he’s got to go through Jesus, he’s got to go through us, then he gets back to Jesus. That’s who we are. We are clothed in Christ. We have on war wear, the armor of God and that, friends, is what it means to be fashion conscious.