There is a battle going on for our souls. We have an enemy that knows how to manipulate our minds and choices and is intent upon defeating us in this life and keeping us from having eternal life in heaven when we die. But the good news is he is a liar and a defeated foe who cannot force us to do anything. What is going to win the battle is realizing we are in a spiritual battle and fighting it in a spiritual way with spiritual weapons. Those spiritual weapons are described in Ephesians 6:10-18: “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. 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, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints; “ Now we don’t wear armor today like the people of Paul’s time did when he wrote this but spiritually we need to be armed and dangerous. When we have on the spiritual armor these verses imply, then we cannot be defeated.
Be Strong in the Lord, Not In Our Own Strength.
Let’s break it down: From the very start, he wants us to get it straight that we must be strong in the Lord. He is the one who defeats the enemy when we come into agreement with Him and do things His way. It is “Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the LORD of hosts.” (Zechariah 4:6). Anything other than that and we are picking up those ‘carnal’ weapons again, trying to do it our way. All through the Old Testament, we see the example God set for war. He would send singers and praisers in front of the armies of Israel (Read 2 Chronicles 20) and the enemy would defeat himself. The power of praise should not be underestimated. I know many times when fear or depression tried to seize hold of me, I recognized it as an attack of the enemy and began to worship and praise God and the evil attack lifted. Demons have to flee in the presence of God. The Word says God inhabits the praises of His people (Psalm 22:3). Praise Him! Put on worship music, sing songs of praise, whatever you have to do to worship Him.
Who Is Our Enemy?
Paul then goes on to describe our enemy. He says he isn’t flesh and blood. He goes on to tell us he has a very well-organized kingdom. Satan and his demons are not omnipresent. They are not everywhere at the same time as God is, but Satan is well organized and has demon princes, if you will, over different territories and over different people. Satan loves to imitate God. He isn’t omnipresent, but he sure makes a lot of people think he is by being so well organized. He is organized into principalities like a network over the whole Earth. It makes sense, even the Bible says Satan is the prince of the power of the air (Ephesians 2:2). Francis Frangipane in his book The Three Battlegrounds says if you live in an area that has a high suicide rate or a particular crime that is prevalent that this is the sign of a principality that has been set up by demon spirits that can only be broken when more than one believer gets together to break the power of that principality (Matthew 18:19).
Paul then tells us to take the whole armor of God. THE WHOLE ARMOR OF GOD. You can’t just have some of it on. The knights of old and the Roman soldiers of Paul’s time knew that if there was a part of them that was not covered by armor and defended in some way that that was where the enemy might strike a blow against them. Same with us. We need the whole armor of God and then, as this verse says, we make our stand and even when we have done all we can do, we still make a stand. Our stand is trust in God and in the weapons He has given us. They say the Apache warrior was the most formidable of all the Native American warriors. It was because they would fight down to the last man. The last man standing would tie a leather thong to his leg and tie it to a stake in the ground as if to say, “Come on, bring it, I’m not giving up.” Having done all to stand, they would stand.
Guard Where You Are Most Vulnerable
Now let’s look at each piece of this armor. “Having your loins girt about with truth”. Our loins can be defined as our most tender places. What areas are you most vulnerable and weak in? For most of us, it is on our thoughts and minds. He says know what your weakness is and then apply the truth to it. For example, we think we are weak, He says we are strong (2 Corinthians 12:10). Study and train your thinking to think like the Word of God says, instead of all that defeated thinking. Part of the Roman armor was the skirt he wore beneath the leather armor. If it was long it had to be pulled up and tucked into the belt so it would not trip him. It is the same with us spiritually, we can’t allow ourselves to trip ourselves up with defeat, stinking thing, traditions or lies from the devil.
The Breastplate of HIS Righteousness
“And having on the breastplate of righteousness”. We are not righteous in ourselves (Isaiah 64:6), but we do not stand in our righteousness; we stand in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Read Romans 6, study it, comprehend it. We are, as it says in verse 5, “PLANTED together in the likeness of His death, we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection”.
Stand Firm!
And, what about “your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace”? What is He saying here? What are we to be grounded in? The answer? PEACE. There is no soldier for whom one piece of this armor will do any good if his feet are cut out from under him. And the Christian won’t be able to stand if he doesn’t have a sure standing and foothold in PEACE. This is what holds us to the Rock. Our peace and assurance we have in knowing that no matter what comes against us, we need not be afraid or shaken. We can experience peace. You must have the right shoes, the right standing. A construction worker doesn’t wear high heels on a job site and an ice skater doesn’t wear army boots on the ice. Neither can the Christian stand in the shoes of worry, doubt and fear.
If you don’t know it already, I’m going to tell you. The biggest part of the battle you will fight is in your mind. Oh yeah, Christians are made or they lose depending on where their mind is established. The Bible says, He will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Him (Isaiah 26:3). And again, He has not given us the spirit of fear but of love and peace and a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7). Romans 12:1-3 says, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.”
Philippians 1:28 says, “And in nothing terrified by your adversaries: which is to them an evident token of perdition, but to you of salvation, and that of God.” Don’t be terrified and filled with fear. The enemy can smell fear. That is his weapon. False Evidence Appearing Real. What is real to you? The Word of God needs to be more real to you than the storms around you. Why is it that Jesus could rebuke the storm? Because he was peace. The storm could not withstand Him. And the storms of life cannot withstand you if you know in whom you are established and who is your peace.
I think the worst enemy we have sometimes is ourselves. I think sometimes God allows us to go through some things until we learn to rest in Him and to be at peace. Give it to God. As long as you want to fight it yourself, God will let you. As long as you fight it the way you think it ought to be fought, using all those weapons of the flesh, you won’t do anything but get worn out. Sure, it may not be easy, but the Bible says God laughs at his enemies (Psalms 2:4). And we need to get to that point where we laugh at the devil’s assaults. We do this in the power of the Lord’s might, though not in our flesh. We have to have the goods. In Acts 19, we read about seven sons of a
A Jew named Sceva, who saw Paul casting out demons and decided they would try it out. So, they went to a demon possessed man and spoke to the demons in that man adjuring them in the name of Jesus that Paul preached and the demons said, “Paul we know and Jesus we know, but who are you?” and then this one man with the strength of the demon spirits in him beat those seven boys badly and sent them away screaming and naked.
The Joy of the Lord is Our Strength.
We have to find that place where we can have joy in the midst of our problems. The joy of the Lord is our strength. What does that tell you? If the devil can rob you of your joy, he robs you of your strength. Why do you think he works so hard at stealing our joy? So, where do we get this joy? Psalms 16:11 tells us: “Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fullness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.“ Get in His presence. Spend time with Him. Open that Bible, worship him, listen for His voice, let Him fill you with His peace. Read the Word of God. Memorize it. Study it. Let God speak to you through it. He is your strength. Say the Word of God out loud. Why? Because when you do, your ears hear it and it gets in your mind and soul and spirit. The devil hears it and flees. God hears it and honors it as you come into agreement with Him and His word. This is the ‘preparation’ part. Remember your feet shod with the PREPARATION of the gospel of peace? You can’t wait till you are in the storm to study. No, prepare yourself every day, whether you are going through a storm or not. So many Christians wait till they are going through something to pray and cry out to God and search His Word. Prepare ahead of time! Let the Holy Spirit guide you daily. He knows what is ahead, not you.
Your Faith is Your Shield.
Verse 16 says, “Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked.” Hebrews 11:1 defines faith for us, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” When life comes at us like fiery darts and we think surely we will be destroyed, we have to see with eyes that God gives us, eyes of faith. When we see through these eyes, then it is like raising up a shield and this verse says Satan’s fiery darts will be quenched. And isn’t it interesting that he says, ‘above all, take the shield of faith. The shield is the first active piece of armor in this list. Even before the Sword of the Spirit. Why is that? Because if we don’t lift the shield of faith and have no faith, the rest of the armor, I won’t say is of no effect, but the rest of the armor can’t stand up to what the shield of faith can stand up to. The shield of faith is in our hand; the Bible even says He has dealt to each of us a measure of faith (Romans 12:3), but we have to engage it. How do we do this? By believing! Believing and faith are not the same thing. Faith is like having a gun in your hand capable of bringing down a charging elephant, but believing is like pulling the trigger! If you don’t pull the trigger, then you will be trampled underfoot, although you had a weapon capable of bringing down the elephant. And how do you get faith? “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.” (Romans 10:17). This is called Rhema, hearing the Word of God speaking in your spirit. When it becomes revelation and understanding to you, then faith is born, then the Word becomes a sword. I did an entire article on faith you might want to read.
Guard Your Mind.
Verse 17 speaks, “take the helmet of salvation”. Yes, all that we are talking about here means nothing if you are not born again or saved, as some call it. In John 3:3 Jesus said, “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” And in verse 16, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” I think it is significant that the symbol of salvation in this metaphor is a helmet, something that covers the head. Jesus is the head and we are the body. Because He is the head, we are saved, because of His life and sacrifice we live. He has us covered as the head and the head directs all things of the body. And as a helmet protects the head and the brain, so our assurance of salvation guards our mind and thoughts.
What about “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God”? This is the other active piece of armor. This is something we must learn to wield. We have to know how and when to apply it. When Jesus was tempted by the devil in the wilderness while fasting 40 days (Matthew 4; Luke 4), the devil tried to even use the written Word by misapplying it but Jesus knew the Word and how to apply it. He is our example. The enemy cannot withstand a blast of THE TRUTH. But it is only the truth and a sword if it has become revelation and Rhema to us. Hebrews 4:12 says: “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” I have heard it said all my life that the Bible is your sword. But I have news for you. It isn’t. It is no more than words on a page if you don’t approach it right. It is no more than words on a page if you don’t let it get deep down inside of you and let it speak to you in your innermost being. The devil isn’t scared of you carrying around a Bible. You can carry around the biggest family-sized Bible you can get and he still isn’t scared. What scares him is when you start reading it and studying it and believing it. Then it becomes a powerful two-edged sword. So, the written Bible in itself is not a sword. It is more like a storehouse for the swords. The swords are in there. They are sharp and powerful. But you have to draw them out. It is significant that this verse says, “piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit”. The soul is where your will, mind and emotions dwell, your spirit is where God communicates with you. God wants you to discern what is flesh and what is spirit. What is emotion and what is truth? Learn the difference. It is so important.
And then Paul ends his dissertation on the armor of God with, “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints; “. Do not ever underestimate the importance of prayer. Let’s not overlook the word supplication in this verse either. If you look it up in a dictionary, it means to humbly entreat God. And that is a good definition, but let’s look at the root of that word, ‘sup’. This is a word we don’t use anymore, but during that time and for many centuries, it meant to come and dine, to eat, to take food in slowly and enjoy it. Jesus said in Revelation 3:20, “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.” So, perhaps Paul is trying to emphasize the importance of prayer is like feeding our spirit the way food feeds our body. ‘Sup’ with the Holy Spirit and with the saints. Spend time in His presence and in the love and unity of His people.
Yes, we have an enemy, but I think the Bible makes it clear that we are to stand against him and we are to win. I heard a preacher make a very profound statement on spiritual warfare that was so simple yet so powerful and it was this: “Spiritual warfare in its simplest form is when the enemy comes against you and you don’t react the way he wants you to.” When he comes against you with fear, don’t be afraid. When he comes against you with worry, don’t worry. Stay steadfast, focused. “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.“ (Isaiah 26:3)
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