Tag Archives: Spiritual Warfare

Guarded On All Sides

29 Monday Jan 2024

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Hello Readers and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman! 

This week’s post is another installment in my study on the Whole Armor of God described by the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 6:10-18a.  This post will (I think) be the last on The Shield of Faith which we are told to “take up” because, with it, we “will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one”. 

There is a long standing belief that the Apostle Paul was describing the Roman soldiers either soaking their shields in water or covering them with a wet hide in order to protect them from burning arrows.  I cannot say with absolute certainty that this is not true.  I have added a few books to my reading list to see what arguments are made and sources used for this belief and, since I have not yet read them, I am putting this idea on a shelf until a later time.  What I will say is that my studies on Ancient Warfare has told me this is highly unlikely.  I shared these studies in last week’s post so won’t repeat them here.

My studies have also led me to believe fiery darts or burning arrows were not something a Roman Soldier would face in open combat.  I don’t know if this is true for you but the mental picture that would form whenever I read this passage in Ephesians was one of Roman Soldiers lined up in battle using their shields for protection against flaming arrows being shot at them by the enemy.  Both sermons I heard and images from movies helped to form this mental picture.  If this picture is inaccurate (and I believe it is) what does this mean when we study Paul’s letter to the Ephesians?  Was Paul mistaken?  How does this passage tie in to the warfare of the day?  If it doesn’t describe actual warfare, can we trust this passage?

My study has led me to answers that I find satisfactory.  If you have asked these questions yourself and perhaps not dared to ask them of anyone else, I hope these answers are a help for you as well.  My simple answer is this: I believe the Apostle Paul used actual warfare as an analogy but then built on it in a way that transcends any sort of warfare.  He twice made the point that our warfare is spiritual rather than carnal and our enemy a spiritual rather than one of flesh and blood (See 2 Corinthians 10:4-5, Ephesians 6:12) so I am not at all bothered he would begin with an analogy rooted in actual warfare but then point out our weapons have properties far and above their earthly counterparts.

There is every reason to believe the Apostle Paul wrote his letter to the Ephesians while he was in prison being guarded by Roman soldiers.  I believe that he would not have let such an opportunity go to waste.  I imagine him asking his guards questions, drawing them out, building relationships with them, and looking for those opportunities to share the gospel.  I think these soldiers would have eventually shared their experiences and thus Paul’s passage on the Whole Armor of God was rooted in ancient warfare but, rather than describing battles fought by infantry,  I believe the picture he was painting was one of siege warfare. 

Flaming arrows were an integral part of siege warfare.  The goal of using them was to cause distraction, chaos, and terror.  The arrows didn’t need to start a fire though if even a few succeeded the better for the army laying siege.  These arrows did need to be stamped out and that meant the defender no longer had his full attention on any mounting attack.  As I take this into account along with the fact that the Apostle Paul writes it is the Shield of Faith which quenches these fiery darts, I see both the enemy’s tactics revealed as well as our defense against them. 

I have spent weeks looking at the definition of faith along with the meaning and use of the word in its original language.  I think the dictionary definition of faith is important to know as it makes me careful to listen to what others mean when they use the word while at the same time I am careful to hold the original meaning close.  The original use of the word was one of covenant.  Faith was the response one made to another person according to all that person revealed him or herself to be.  Our faith in God is the same: God reveals Himself to us and we respond to that revelation.  “Faith comes by hearing,” Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, “and hearing by the word of God” (10:17). 

Jesus is the Word who became flesh John writes in his gospel and he goes on to write “No one has seen God at any time.  The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him” (See John 1:14-18).  As our eyes are opened to see Jesus, who is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15), we respond to that revelation.  We come to know Him intimately and through Him to know the Father.  This knowing is the definition of eternal life (See John 17:3, 1 John 5:20).  It makes perfect sense to me that the Apostle Paul would state the defense against the fiery darts used in siege warfare-weapons intended to distract and cause fear-was the shield of the faith which originates in the revelation and word of God.  “Has God indeed said…?” the enemy asked in the garden and the tactics have not changed in millennia.  Perhaps not every arrow will start a fire, but if they can lure us away from our stability in our faith and make us doubt all He has revealed Himself to be, the tactics have been successful.

But, the Apostle Paul writes the Shield of Faith quenches every fiery dart and there is no proof a Roman soldier ever used his shield to quench anything.  Protect and deflect absolutely: quench no.  I can see the Apostle Paul warning his readers of how the enemy would attack.  There would be no need to go out to meet the enemy in battle: the enemy would come to us.  The attack would be leveled at the foundation of our faith and trust in Jesus Christ.  We would find ourselves under siege.  The analogy found in Ancient Siege Warfare is a perfect one.  And yet here is where the Apostle Paul transcends his analogy and, in order to understand why he writes the Shield of Faith quenches all the fiery darts of the wicked one when no shield would have been capable of such a feat; we have to take into account several things.  First, the two words used for “word”.  Second, Psalm 3:3 and third, Paul’s understanding of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus is the logos of God (John 1) and our faith comes by hearing the rhema (Romans 10:17).  Logos (G3056)means “something said, including the thought, by implication a topic (subject of discourse) reasoning” while rhema (G4487) means “an utterance”.  There isn’t much discernable difference between the words on the surface but let’s think of it this way: Jesus is the thought of God made manifest in flesh.  He is the living word, God expressed, and is also the revelation of God’s thoughts toward humankind.  The words (rhema) He speaks are spirit and life (John 6:63).  When Jesus faced the enemy in the wilderness, he spoke these words: “man shall not live by bread alone but by every word (rhema) that proceeds from the mouth of God.”  We need both: we must know the Logos of God who is Jesus Christ but we must also hear the rhema that proceeds out of His mouth.

Psalm 3:3 says “But You, O Lord, are a shield for me…”  It would be more accurate to use “around” or “about” in place of “for” in this passage.  The word in the Hebrew is baadi (H1157) and means “in, up to, over against, beside, among, behind, about, within.”  Each of these words is important to consider and the picture here is not just of a shield being carried in front of one but rather a shield that utterly surrounds and protects.  I have no doubt the Roman soldiers would have loved to possess such a shield and I think this is Paul’s point: you, Believer, possess such a shield.  “In Him we live and move and have our being” Paul declared to the Athenians (Acts 17: 28) and I think this is his point in his letter to the Ephesians: the wicked one will lob fiery darts at you in an attempt to destroy your faith but fear not!  Your Shield of Faith is the very life of Christ which surrounds you on every side!  This shield quenches every fiery dart!

The Shield of Faith.  Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.  Man shall live by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.  The words that Jesus speaks are spirit and life.  Before Jesus ever declares the words He speaks are spirit and life, He says, “it is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing.”  Jesus later says this about the same Spirit: “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.  He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you” (John 16:13-14).

I find it interesting that the word used in Ephesians 6:16 and translated quench is translated as quench in another significant passage. The word means “to extinguish” and is used for what the Shield of Faith does to the fiery darts of the wicked one but is also used in 1 Thessalonians 4:19: “Do not quench the Spirit”. 

This is something far too many believers have done.  They have fallen victim to the fiery darts of “the Holy Spirit died out with the last apostle” and the fiery darts of “the Holy Spirit was no longer needed once we had the Bible.”  The Bible is precious to me.  It contains the very words God has spoken to so many others but the fact remains it contains the words God has spoken.  The Spirit gives life, Jesus said, and the New Testament is packed full of the description of our new covenant life in Jesus Christ through the vitalizing working of the Holy Spirit.  Without the Spirit at work in our lives, speaking what He hears to our hearts and minds, and causing our knowledge of Jesus Christ and who we are in Him to come to maturity; the Shield of our Faith cannot quench the fiery darts of the wicked one. 

Paul writes this in 2 Corinthians 11:3-4: “But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.  For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or if you receive a different spirit which you have not received, of a different gospel which you have not accepted…”

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth.  He is the only trusted voice to lead us into the truth that is Jesus Christ.  Without His teaching, guiding, instructing, and leading, we have not heard the words by which faith comes and our shields are not capable of quenching the fiery darts of the wicked one.  There is no substitution for KNOWING Jesus Christ, and through Him the Father, for yourself.  That is done by the Holy Spirit indwelling us and teaches us.  You must know He indwells YOU.  You must know that YOUR body is the temple of the Holy Spirit.  There is no priest or teacher or any other intermediary that is necessary.  The Spirit has been shed abroad in YOUR heart!  This is the absolute truth.

Maybe this is too much for you to believe.  Read the scriptures I have shared in this post for yourself.  Read to the end of John 6 where Peter says, “To whom shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life.”  Then ask that the Spirit Jesus promised He would send would open your eyes to see Jesus has kept His promise.  Ask Him to convince you it is the truth that both Jesus and the Father dwell within you in the Spirit, and ask Him to open your ears to hear the words of eternal life.

Faith comes by the hearing of these words of God and this faith is a mighty shield that surrounds you on every side.  It is a living shield fully capable of quenching every fiery dart of the wicked one.

Hallelujah!  It is so! 

Amen.

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

References     

Quenching fire arrows on shields (romanarmytalk.com)

Hebrew Concordance: ba·‘ă·ḏî — 8 Occurrences (biblehub.com)

Green, Jay P., The Interlinear Bible: Hebrew, Greek, English, Volume 2, Authors for Christ, Inc., Lafayette, IN, 1985

Strong, James, The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, TN, 1990

Come to the Mountain

17 Monday Jul 2023

Posted by in Studies, Whole Armor of God

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Hello Readers and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman where, this week, I continue my study in Ephesians 6:10-18.  This passage is where the Apostle Paul describes the Whole Armor of God. In last week’s post, I looked at verse 10 which states, “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.”  This week, I want to look at how “be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might” relates to Paul’s admonition that we “stand”.

I have read this passage many times but I have to say I never paid close attention to how many times the Apostle Paul says the word “stand.”  Verse 11 says, “Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.”  Verse 13 says, “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.”  The first word of verse 14 is “stand”. 

Malcolm Smith has pointed out that the soldiers guarding the Apostle Paul during the writing of the Epistle to the Ephesians were just that: guards.  They were not equipped to go out onto the battlefield and fight but, should the battle come to them, they were ready to mount a defense.  The soldiers stood in the strength and might of the authority of Rome.  How much more strength and might belongs to us because we are in Christ Jesus!

This is a truth I have not heard proclaimed by very many of my fellow believers.  They acknowledge that their Salvation is entirely a work of Jesus Christ but then everything else pertaining to the Christian life is somehow achieved based on behavior and merit.  The Apostle Paul asks the Galatians; “Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?” (Gal. 3:3).  I would ask this same question to those conducting warfare.  Our warfare is Spiritual not carnal.  Our weapons are Spiritual and so is our enemy.  It ought to be obvious ours is not a warfare we wage in our own strength.  We do not need to go out and seek our enemy.  We stand and our strength is in the Lord Jesus Christ and in the power of His might.  We stand in His victory which is made our victory because we are in Him and He is in us.  Our flesh life is exchanged for His.  As the Apostle Paul says, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). (NOTE: the word “in” I have italicized is really “of” in the Greek.  It is not that we put our trust in the strength of our faith in Jesus, rather we live by His faith because He lives in us.  An important distinction.)

Christ’s victory is total and complete.  There is nothing that is not subject to Him (See 1 Corinthians 15:27).  This truth is something it appears believers have forgotten especially when it comes to sin.  My fellow believers do not recognize sin is put away by the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ and not for us only but for the entire world (1 John2:2) but are out engaging in “spiritual warfare” and miserably failing.  The result of conducting a battle in the strength of the flesh is much like the Hydra from Greek myth: if one head is cut off two more grow in its place.  Christ’s ultimate victory over sin and death is not spoken of as if it is the reality of believer’s day-to-day lives.  The Apostle Paul wrote an amazing passage on Jesus Christ’s victory over sin and death in his letter to the Romans.  I am quoting from The Message as I like the emphatic language:

“All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers.  But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace.  When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down.  All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the end of it.  Grace, because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life-a life that goes on and on and on, world without end.

“So what do we do?  Keep on sinning so God can keep on forgiving?  I should hope not!  If we’ve left the country where sin is sovereign, how can we still live in our old house there?  Or didn’t you realize we packed up and left there for good?  That is what happened in baptism.  When we went under the water, we left the old country of sin behind; when we came up out of the water, we entered into the new country of grace-a new life in a new land.  That’s what baptism into the life of Jesus means.  When we are lowered into the water, it is like the burial of Jesus; when we are raised up out of the water, it is like the resurrection of Jesus.  Each of us is raised into the light-filled world by our Father so that we can see where we’re going in our new grace-sovereign country.  Could it be any clearer?  Our old way of life was nailed to the cross with Christ, a decisive end to that sin-miserable life-no longer captive to sin’s demands!  What we believe is this: if we get included in Christ’s sin-conquering death, we also get included in his life-saving resurrection.  We know that when Jesus was raised from the dead it was a signal of the end of death-as-the end.  Never again will death have the last word.  When Jesus died, he took sin down with him, but alive he brings God down to us.  From now on, think of it this way: Sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word.  You are dead to sin and alive to God.  That’s what Jesus did” (MSG, Romans 5:20-6:11).

I often hear 1 John 1:8-10 quoted as proof that even we believers are doomed to sin.  These verses ought not to be quoted without starting in verse 7:  “But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.  If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.  If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.” 

Read the passage of Romans again.  We each one of us lived in a realm of darkness where we knew sin.  Our eyes had not yet been opened to the reality of our lives in Jesus Christ and so, we cannot say we have not sinned.  But now, we have been raised into a light-filled world in Jesus Christ.  We are new creations in Him.  Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” 1 John 5:20 says, “And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ.  This is the true God and eternal life.”  1 John 5 also says, “We know that whoever is born of God does not sin; but he who has been born of God keeps himself; and the wicked one does not touch him” (verse 18).

 The word “keeps” in 1 John 5:18 is a word of warfare.  It is tereo (G5083) in the Greek and means, “a watch, to guard (from loss or injury by keeping the eye upon, to withhold, hold fast, preserve.” Paul writes to Timothy, “O Timothy!  Guard what was committed to your trust, avoiding the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge-by professing it some have strayed concerning the faith” (1 Timothy 6:20-21).  We are not to be idle or passive in our Christian lives but, like Paul’s Roman Soldiers; we guard the revelation of who Jesus is in us, we watch for those who would steal it from us, and we stand. 

My precious fellow believers, let us stop wasting our energy engaging in battles that cannot be fought in our own strength.  The battle is the Lord’s! So is the building the Kingdom of God here on earth.  Let us remember the word of the Lord which came to Zerubbabel through the prophet Zechariah: “not by might nor by power but by My Spirit.”  This word echoes that written by Solomon hundreds of years before: “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman stays awake in vain” (Psalm 127:1).

His victory is ours by sheer gift. The greatness of the power that is ours in Christ Jesus is the same mighty power the Father worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and set Him at His right hand in heavenly places.  The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set us free from the law of sin and death.  We are not come to Mount Sinai, the physical mountain where Moses received the law which was incapable of making anyone perfect: we are come to Mount Zion and the city of the Living God, one not built with hands. (See Ephesians 1:15-23, Romans 8:2, Hebrews 10:1-4, 11:10, 12:18-24). 

“Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession” (Hebrews 4:14).  Our warfare is not conducted in the same way the world conducts theirs.  Ours is not to gain victory but is rather conducted from the safety and security of His victory.  We stand in the truth of who Jesus Christ is in us and our strength is not that of the flesh which fails but is in the Lord Jesus Christ and in the power of His might.  May that truth saturate your being in the coming days and may it be the foundation on which you stand.

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

Scripture quotations marked MSG are taken from THE MESSAGE, copyright ©1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson.  Used by permission of NavPress.  All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

References

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

Safe From Harm

10 Monday Jul 2023

Posted by in Studies, Whole Armor of God

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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