Category Archives: Whole Armor of God

Safe From Harm

10 Monday Jul 2023

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Hello and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman where, this week, I am continuing my study on the Whole Armor of God.

The passage I am studying is Chapter Six verses 10-18a of Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians.  The New King James Version of the Bible renders these verses as: “Finally, my brethren, 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.  For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.  Therefore take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.  Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod  your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.  And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit…”

There is a vast amount of subject matter in this passage.  I needed a starting place and while I was meditating on this passage and listening for what would resonate with me, I listened to Malcolm Smith’s teaching Spiritual Warfare.  The study series focuses on the Armor of God and, in the first hour, Mr. Smith said two things.  The first was that Paul was looking at a Roman Soldier when he wrote this epistle but it was not a soldier readying himself to go onto the battlefield but one prepared to defend.  The second thing Mr. Smith said was the Whole Armor of God is God Himself.  Mr. Smith quoted Isaiah 59:17: “For He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head; He put on the garments of vengeance for clothing, and was clad with zeal as a cloak” and made the point that, as God is Spirit and doesn’t need to wear a breastplate, helmet, garments, or a cloak, this passage is describing His attributes in images the human mind can understand.

I agree with Mr. Smith’s points.  One reason is because of this verse in Be Thou My Vision (one of my favorite hymns!): “Be Thou my breastplate, my sword for the fight, be Thou my whole armor, be Thou my true might, be Thou my soul’s shelter, be Thou my strong tower, Oh raise Thou me heavenward, great power of my power.”  I realized what Mr. Smith was saying was not a new concept: that God Himself was our armor and protection was a truth I was singing on an almost daily basis without giving any real thought to the words. 

A second reason is how seamlessly the whole armor of God being God Himself flows into the idea of defense*.  I was curious about the Hebrew and Greek words for “defense” and “defend” so I looked them up in the Strong’s concordance.  I was not at all surprised to find multiple words-more in the Hebrew than the Greek-translated as “defense” and “defend”.  I did think it significant that “defense” is used exclusively for one Hebrew word throughout the Psalms.  It is also translated once as “defense” in Isaiah.  This word is misgab (H4869) and means “a cliff or other lofty or inaccessible place, altitude, a refuge, defense, high fort or tower”.   

For example, misgab appears three times in Psalm 59: “I will wait for You, O You his Strength; for God is my defense…But I will sing of Your power; Yes, I will sing aloud of Your mercy in the morning; for You have been my defense and refuge in the day of my trouble.  To You, O my Strength, I will sing praises; for God is my defense, My God of mercy” (verses 9, 16, 17).  The passage in Isaiah says, “He will dwell on High; His place of defense will be the fortress of rocks; Bread will be given him, His water will be sure” (Isa. 33:16). 

God as our defense is something I want to look at in more detail so, for the sake of this post, I will move on to my third reason for agreeing with Mr. Smith.  This is the presence of the little Greek word του (pronounced too) which appears in this passage.  It is often translated as “of” but the word means “of this person, his”.  I suppose the fact the Whole Armor of God is spiritual is an obvious one.  Still, how we think of the Whole Armor of God meaning something belonging to Him or His as an attribute, is important.  There is a story in 1 Samuel where David is going to face Goliath and King Saul gives the young man his armor to wear.  David could not walk in the armor and had to remove it before facing the enemy (See 1 Samuel 17:32-40).

The Whole Armor of God is not like that of King Saul.  It is not a spiritual armor that belongs to God that He loans to believers in order to help us face an enemy and we make the best use of it as we can.  Looking at the armor as God Himself protecting, defending, and strengthening us for the fight is important because then we can see the armor is exactly suited to us and our situation.  Jesus has partaken of our flesh and blood.  He is not unable to sympathize with us but has been tested in every respect the same as us (Hebrews 4:15).  In Him we live and move and have our being which means He is not only our armor protecting and defending us but His life in us imparts the power and might we need to be able to stand.

I see what I can only describe as a disconnect in my fellow believers.  I see my precious brothers and sisters exhausting themselves fighting battles; ones which, tragically, they seem to have no hope of winning.  They appear to have forgotten that every aspect of our Christian lives flows out of God Himself.  I found a passage in Steve McVey’s book Grace Walk which describes the state of a great many Christians today: “In the natural world, trying harder is commendable and often effective.  But God’s ways aren’t our ways.  Sometimes they seem to be opposite from ours.  In the spiritual world, trying harder is detrimental.  That’s right.  Trying harder will defeat you every time. 

“No Christian has a problem with the previous paragraph as it relates to salvation.  If an unsaved person were to suggest to you that he was trying hard to become a Christian, what would you tell him?  You would probably make it clear that he could not be saved by trying, but by trusting.  You would tell him that there is absolutely nothing he could do to gain salvation.  It has all already been done.  Salvation is a gift to be received, not a reward to be earned.  A person who tries even a little bit to gain salvation by works cannot become a Christian.  As Paul said about salvation, “If by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace.  But if it is of works, it is no longer grace; otherwise work is no longer work” (Romans 11:6).  In other words, it has to be either grace or works.  We are saved by grace and, and trying hard has absolutely nothing to do with it.

But many Christians who understand that trying is detrimental to becoming a Christian somehow think that it is essential to living in victory after salvation.  The truth is that victory is not a reward but a gift.  A person does not experience victory in the Christian life by trying hard to live for God.  It just won’t work!” (McVey, page 18).

When he was explaining why he thought Paul’s description of a defending rather than attacking soldier important, Malcolm Smith said our spiritual warfare is an odd one because we are not fighting to defeat an enemy or claim ground.  We stand in Christ’s victory and conduct our warfare from the security and steadfastness we have in Jesus Christ Himself.  So real is His victory that, borrowing again from the Apostle Paul, we do not fight like those who beat the air (1 Corinthians 9:26).

I hope to take a more extensive look at this in the upcoming weeks.  Until next week, “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might…that we may be able to withstand in the evil day.” 

Amen.

*The Strong’s has “defence” rather than “defense”.  I will continue to use the spelling “defense”.

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

Be Thou My Vision | Hymnary.org

Unconditional Love Fellowship – Ministry of Malcolm Smith

Green, Jay P., The Interlinear Greek-English New Testament, Volume 4, Revised Second Edition, Authors For Christ, Inc., Lafayette, Indiana, 2007

McVey, Steve, Grace Walk, Harvest House Publishers, Eugene, Oregon, 1995

Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville Tennessee, 1990

A Quality of Life

03 Monday Jul 2023

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This post marks the first in my new study series on the Whole Armor of God as described in the 6th chapter of Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians.  The Armor is mentioned twice in this chapter.  In verse 11 we are instructed to put on the whole armor of God and in verse 13 we are instructed to take up the whole armor of God.  The words translated “put on” and “take up” are different in the Greek and I plan to take a look at them later in the study.  But where to begin? 

Despite it being the first mention of the Full Armor of God, picking up the study in Ephesians 5:11 felt like I was beginning in the middle of a thought.  While the entire Epistle is important to my understanding of the verses I will focus on, I decided on verse 10 as my starting point:  “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.”  The latter half of that passage, “be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might” has been foremost in my mind over the past week.  They have taken on a special meaning for me as I have watched my backyard bloom.

In a previous post titled “Being Indestructible”, I told the story of my Mom rescuing some cactus pieces that had been uprooted and left lying by the side of the road.  Those cactus pieces have not only survived but thrived and the title of that older post was apt: they are all but indestructible.  At the writing of that pervious post, my stepdad had VERY carefully trimmed pieces of the abundant cactus and scattered them around the base of the tree to prevent wildlife from using the spot as a bathroom.  I watched and waited to see what these pieces would do.  Would they too, take root and thrive like their parent plant or would they wither and die?  The answer is, both.  Some have withered and died but others have taken root and are beginning to grow and thrive.

Just a few weeks ago, my stepdad was back at work in the backyard this time trimming my Mom’s rosebushes.  The bushes were thought to be dead and my stepdad was ruthless in his pruning.  His ruthlessness paid off because the bushes erupted in the most gorgeous blooms.  There was life in them after all.  As I spent last week preparing myself for what I hope will be an in-depth study on the Whole Armor of God, I meditated on the words from verse 10 and thought about the cactus and the roses.  Here they both were bursting with life when there was no reason to think life was in them.  It made me realize how our Christian lives were like that: circumstances might not appear suited to sustain life but we have a life within us that can never die.

This is a truth that must not only be guarded but kept in the forefront of our minds.  Over recent weeks I had been aware of, but hadn’t been paying close attention to, the effect the goings on in the world around me was having on my mental health.  It all came to a head when a particular headline brought me to tears and I realized how I was feeling.  I was angry and sad.  I was terribly afraid particularly that my loved ones were going to suffer.  I had no hope for any sort of future.  After all, terrible things had happened in the past so what was to stop the atrocities of history from being repeated?  I despaired.  The darkness was too vast and too powerful and there was no hope of standing against it.  The moment I realized the state of mind that had crept up on me, I had to act.

Fortunately, I have walked with the Lord Jesus Christ for years now and knew what to do.  First, I needed to be alone with Him with no other voices to distract me.  Second, I needed to give myself a good talking to.  Who was my God?  Did I really believe the darkness was anything compared to Him?  Of course not!  But, I had been bombarded by words which had no life in them and I needed to counteract them with words full of truth and life.  Words like John 1:5; “And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it”, and Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 1:

“Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come” (Verses 15-21).

As I quoted Paul’s beautiful prayer, my mind grasped hold of the words “in the knowledge of Him,” and I remembered another prayer of Paul’s in the same epistle: “For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height-to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 2:14-19). 

I do not think the importance of the knowledge of God can be understated.  Knowing Him is the very definition of eternal life (John 17:3, 1 John 5:20).  The weapons of our warfare are wielded against every argument and high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God (2 Corinthians 4-5).  I recently finished reading Andrew Murray’s Commentary on the Book of Hebrews and wanted to share something he wrote on the importance of knowing God:

“’Consider…Jesus.’ The one sure and effectual remedy the epistle offers for all the prevailing feebleness and danger of the Christian life, we know.  It has been said to us, “You do not know Jesus aright.’  The knowledge that sufficed for conversion does not avail for sanctification and perfection.  You must know Jesus better.  Consider Jesus!  As God!  As the Man!  In His sympathy! In His obedience!  In His suffering!  In His blood!  In His glory on the throne; opening heaven; bringing you in to God; breathing the law of God and the Spirit of heaven into your heart as your very life!  As little as you can reach heaven with our hand can you, of yourself, live such a heavenly life.  And yet, it is possible because God has borne witness to the Gospel of His Son with the gift of the Holy Spirit.  The Priest-King, on His ascension to the throne, sent down the Holy Spirit into the hearts of His disciples and, with Him, returned Himself to dwell in those who, in the power of His heavenly life, they might live with Him.  Consider Jesus, and you will see that you can live in the heavenlies with Him because He lives in you!” (Murray, 566)

That truth, that we are now seated with Jesus in heavenly places, is one of the most powerful weapons in our arsenal.  God, rich in mercy and because of His great love with which He loved us has made us alive together with Christ, raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 2:4-6).  All authority in heaven and earth is His (Matthew 28:18) and anything the darkness might say to the contrary is a lie.

I was talking to my Mom about all of this and she described a video she’d seen which I think is a wonderful picture of what I am trying to say: a woman was painting her wall but there was a stain on it.  It didn’t matter how many coats of paint she used, she could not paint over that stain and her frustration grew.  Then, the camera pulls back and it’s revealed the stain is actually a shadow.  There is a staircase across the room and, because of how the light strikes, the shadow of the bannister is cast on the wall.  There is nothing there to paint over.

The darkness is like that.  Like the banister, it is very real.  However, there was no stain and nothing prohibiting the woman from completing the work that had been put in her hand to do: the stain was an illusion.  Being powerless against the darkness is also an illusion.  We do not have any ability when we rely on our own strength but we are strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. 

This is, I think, where Spiritual Warfare begins.  The Kingdom of God is within us and that is also where the battle rages.  It is a battle for the mind and part of the fighting of it is speaking the truth out loud to ourselves so our ears hear them.  Darkness covers the earth and gross darkness the people but we see Jesus.  He is the strength of our lives.  It doesn’t matter where we might be scattered or what our lives look like to an outside observer: Christ lives in us and His life is endless and indestructible.  Therefore, I will not fear!

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

Read about the cactus here:

https://renaissancewoman.blog/2021/06/28/being-indestructible/

References

Murray, Andrew, Holiest of All: A commentary on the Book of Hebrews, Whitaker House, New Kensington, PA, 1996, 2004, Page 566