Blessed Assurance – The Fight of Your Life – Sermon – Pastor Dave Page

This message from Paul and this message from myself are much the same in that we both mean them to be received as a warning, a call to arms, and also as a declaration of victory. You may not feel this, or even recognize this, but each of you were born for a battle. You were born for the battle. And I can assure you of a declaration of victory in this battle because, when you were born again, in Jesus, you were born to win. That is the first thing you must understand…before we look at anything else Paul has to say – You need to know that because of Jesus victory over death and his defeat of Satan when he returns; because you have made him Lord of your life – then you’ve already won But it doesn’t mean that you won’t have to go through the battle or may not be going through it even now.

This is a wonderful passage of Scripture that talks about the Christian warrior. And understand, it’s not talking about the pastor, or the evangelist, or the missionary; it is talking about Mr. and Mrs. You, every man, woman and child in the church. It is talking about each of you hearing me, reading this, or watching online this morning. So let’s look at what God is saying to you specifically this morning.

Every Warrior has an Adversary

First, the Christian warrior has an adversary—we must know our enemy.

Look, again, at verse 11—Paul says,

“Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.”

That’s your adversary. You must know your adversary. He is called the devil.

Now, the cultural persona of the devil today is sort of a laughable character. We think of the devil as some medieval superstition. We make jokes or social media memes of the devil, we call hockey teams devils and demons, and we talk about deviled ham, and devil’s food cake, and it’s sort of a joke. We think of the devil as some sort of a guy in long red underwear with a pitchfork; that is the caricature we have of the devil. Our sophisticated age today makes the idea of a real and a personal devil more or less preposterous.

Cute, eh??? If that represents any part of your perspective of the adversary, let me urge you to change that!!

You have an adversary.
That adversary is very real.

God’s Word does not speak of your adversary as some figment of the imagination, we must always remember that it has always been Satan’s purpose to undermine God’s kingdom; to get as many people as possible to Bow down and worship him, and he’s really good at it.

Look how Paul describes him?

Not only is the Devil a fact; he is a destructive foe.  Look again in verse 11:

“that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.”

Look at that word schemes. The Greek word for schemes is methodia; it’s the word we get methodical from. Satan is very methodical.

• He may even step back two steps in order to go forward three steps;
• He may let you think that you’re getting away with your sin;
• He may even seem to be blessing you and helping you along your way. He is very deliberate and make no mistake, he has made a plan to sabotage each of our lives and each of our homes;
• He is wary; and
• He is elusive.

Apart from the leadership of the Holy Spirit of God, he would deceive each and every one of us.

Your enemy is also spiritual. Look in verse 12: “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Here’s why I point this out – You see, sometimes people think that because something is spiritual, it is good. Don’t miss this, there’s spiritual goodness and there’s spiritual darkness.

Your enemy is deliberate, he is divine in his own way, and he’s also disturbing. Look, again, in verse 12. Satan is in this fight to the finish, and there’s nothing that devil will not do to wreck, to ruin, to destroy your life.

So, that’s the very first thing you need to understand – You are a warrior, and you have an adversary, the devil, and this battle is a very real part of our life.

Every Warrior has Armour

That’s the second thing, equally important that you understand this as well, God in his mercy and grand redemptive plan gives each Christian warrior armor. We don’t only have to recognize our enemy; we need to get ready for the battle as well. Because, if we don’t get ready for the battle, we’re going to lose it. God gives us both a whole set of armour and Holy armour. Look in verse 13:

“Therefore put on the full armor of God”

That is so very important—and we can’t skip by it, that you take the full armour, that you don’t leave off a single piece.

I mentioned last week in the message that I used to play football for the Kingsville Cavaliers. I can remember the game well, in my grade 10 year we were a really good team. I was pumped up that day. I was ready, I played offensive end and being a tall guy, I was a good target for our quarterback to look to in a jam, and he did regularly. It was late in the fourth quarter, and we were playing the St. Anne’s Saint’s, on their home turf and we were down by a touchdown. During what would be the final possession for us –  I found myself, with an equipment malfunction – the strap that held my chest/shoulder pads together had broken. So, what do you do when you’re down by a touchdown and closing in on the endzone? You stop, pull yourself out of the game and you rely on the rest of your team to get the win while you get your pads fixed right?? No !! You stay in the game because your invincible and just this once there’s no way you’re going to get hit in such a way that those pads might move and, let’s say, maybe you could get hit just like that and break two ribs? Come on, what’s the chance of that happening? I got the call – the play was ‘look in right’ — the quarter back and I connected and I was going full speed. And then, I saw him, I can remember it like yesterday. He lined me up. There was only one thing to do, and that is to go through this man to endzone. So, I’m going full speed. This other person is coming at me full speed. I’m trying to look over and through him to the endzone, never slowing down a bit. We collided like two freight trains. His helmet perfectly jarring my chest pad just enough for the impact to knock us both into the middle of next week and break two of my ribs. Next thing, I’m on the bench opening my eyes, trying to figure out what on earth had happened. I’ll tell you what happened. I thought I could go a little faster if I left off one part of the protective armour that a football player is supposed to wear, just one piece – a strap. I said, if I leave that off, if I leave that one little piece off, It won’t matter just this once. Anybody here ever broken your ribs.

Put on the whole armor of God. Don’t leave off one piece.

Now, let’s look at that armor.

“Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist…”

Ephesians 6:14.

Now, that belt, Church, is honesty. It is our sincere honesty that holds everything else together. Truth and honesty are synonymous.

• You are to believe the truth.
• You are to know the truth.
• You’re to love the truth.
• You’re to tell the truth.
• You are to live the truth.

And if you don’t, your life is going to come apart. You cannot get into this battle unless you have the belt of truth.

Satan is a liar, and Satan will come against you with lies. Jesus is the truth.

Satan’s attack is untruth. His attack is lying and deception. His attack on you is to bring a lack of honesty into your life. If we are not wearing truth, if you do not have the belt of truth, if you do not have honesty in your life, in the big things and in the small things, we are going to lose the battle – plain and simple. It is truth that holds everything together, and without truth everything falls apart.

Here’s the second piece of armor—that is the breastplate of righteousness. Not only do we need truth; but you need righteousness. A warrior in the 1st century had a breastplate. It would cover his heart; it would cover his vital organs. And, without that breastplate, of course, he was very vulnerable to any sword thrust, to any arrow. And so, he must have a breastplate, and that breastplate is righteousness.

So, what is righteousness? It is purity.

Jesus said,

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

Now, what the adversary wants to do is to attack you, not only with lies, but he wants to attack you with impurity.

• He wants to get you to that website; or magazine…
• He wants to get that into your heart, into your mind.
• He wants to get you doing some crooked business deal. Oh, we say, it’s just this once. That may be so, but it’s a crack in the armour…. and Satan knows exactly where the crack in your armour is.

Now, look in verse 15:

“and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.

Ephesians 6:15.

Paul is saying, put on the shoes of peace, your feet fitted with the preparation of the gospel of peace.  A Roman soldier would have hobnails on the bottom of his shoes, very much like football cleats, because when you’re fighting, you need a place to stand. And you need to have good footing. In this passage, Paul is going to tell us to stand and therefore your feet need to be fitted with the preparation of the gospel of peace.

Church, Paul is talking about peace with God, and he’s talking about peace with one another, and he’s talking about the peace of God in our heart. You see, Jesus gives peace, and unless you have peace, you cannot win this battle. Sounds like a contradiction, doesn’t it? You can’t win this battle unless you have peace – But you’ve got to have that peace of God in your heart. You see, how does Satan attack? Well, he comes against your honesty with lies. He comes against your purity with lust. But how does he come against your peace? Well, he does it with things like doubt and discouragement, whatever he can do to destroy your peace.

Which is why God also gives us the shield of faith. By the way, remember when Paul wrote this, he was most likely chained to a Roman soldier. I suspect Paul’s looking this guy up and down, said, You know, I can get a spiritual lesson out of that. And so, the Roman soldier also had a shield. It was about two by four feet; it was made of wood covered with leather, because, in that day, they would take flaming arrows, dip them in oil and shoot them. And so, Paul says,

“take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.

Ephesians 6:16.

Church, we have to see how we are to be dressed for the battle.

As I’ve said, our adversary:

• is deliberate;
• our adversary is strong;
• our adversary is disturbing —he’s all of these things

So, we have to be dressed for the battle. When I was taught this scripture a long time ago, my sunday school teacher told me to look at each one of these pieces of armor, and she said don’t they really represent Jesus. So David – just put on Jesus….You just put on Jesus.

Every Warrior has an Attack

This is the final thing I want you to notice. It’s not enough simply to put on the armour; we’ve got to get into the fight. And I don’t want to offend any of you with this but so many of us in the western church today want to dress up in the armour and sit in the Church or sit at home.
“I know Pastor but to go on the attack – really?” Yes, really!!
Remember at the outset I said you’ve already won the battle – In Jesus we have declared victory!

Now, what guarantee’s our victory? – the power of our sword.

“Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God

Ephesians  6:17.

Folks, in any battle, you need a weapon, you need a sword. We are called to get into this battle. And God, has given you a sword to fight with. Take the sword of the Spirit. Now, I’m talking about the power of our sword, because ours is a very powerful sword. We’ve talked about it’s power for several weeks now… It’s not like any other sword. it is the sword of the Spirit and God’s word come alive.

Jesus had been fasting for forty days and forty nights, and the devil came, and the devil said, Well, if you’re the Son of God, why don’t you turn these rocks into bread?

And Jesus pulled out His sword, and said, “It is written.” Stchk! ““It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.

— Matthew 4:4.

Again, Satan comes to Him to tempt Him. Again Jesus said, “It is written” – “it is written.” Three times Jesus is on the attack with God’s word.

And you have that same sword, that same power…come on, we’ve talked about this …. you have that same resurrection power and that’s the provision of the Spirit. Once you’re dressed up in the armour, you take the Word of God, which is the sword of the Spirit, and then you look to heaven for your power. So he says, Pray—look at it; he says here – “Praying …”

“pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.

Ephesians 6:18.

FBK, we are in this battle together. I need you, and you need me, and so we fight together.

Did you hear me?? Do you know what the church is? In this battle, this church is just a big battle station – that’s all it is. It’s just a place where we come to reinforce and reequip ourselves. It’s a place where we come to get spiritual intuition, and spiritual power, and spiritual encouragement to go out into the fight, because we fight, not against one another, but with one another, against a common enemy.

How do we conclude this series that you folks have worked so hard to consume???

I think it’s simply with these two questions:

For some of you here or watching this morning? Are you walking with Jesus? I mean in the trenches – in your home and workplaces, in your neighborhood. He is the only way to salvation. The Gospel message is a simple one: We have sold ourselves into sin. And as such, we are rightfully and eternally condemned because of it. But because God loves you, He did for you what you could not do for yourself

So, Jesus came to earth to receive the consequences of my sin and your sin and offers healing, forgiveness and salvation to all who will simply receive it as a gift. – that’s all you have to do, just say yes.

And the second question is this – Does the world around you know that you are His??

Do you remember back in Chapter 2 of this letter Paul says:

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, ² in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. ³ All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh  and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. ⁴ But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, ⁵ made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. ⁶ And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, ⁷ in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. ⁸ For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith…

— Ephesians 2:1-8

Well, because of that, we are called to live that out – Paul says in just a few verses later:

¹⁰ For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

— Ephesians 2:10

Church, in our lives, we are called to nothing more important than this. That’s why next week our new series is going to focus on this very principle – in the context of neighbours. For many of us, this summer we will spend time and more time with or around our neighbours. What a tremendous opportunity to we have to show the people around us Jesus and our church. What a wonderful opportunity we have to put into practice all that we’ve talked about these past months.

Let’s Pray.