The Call to War
May 26, 2024
Preached by Noah Gwinn
Scripture Reading
Ephesians 6:10-20
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.13 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 firm. 14 Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, 15 and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. 16 In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; 17 and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, 18 praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, 19 and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, 20 for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.
Let’s pray before we get started.
Heavenly Father…
INTRODUCTION
We’ve been in a sermon series over the last six weeks called “Awake, O Sleeper: Walking as Children of Light in a World Darkened by Lies.” Each week we’ve taught through a passage from the New Testament book of Ephesians in order to look at a lie told to us by our culture, see how it has oftentimes crept into the church, and then see how the Scriptures give us a positive vision forward, based on the good news of Jesus. We’ve talked though lies told to us about the church, sexuality, race, family, and more. And I don’t know about you, but I have been so helped by this series.
Today is our last week in this series, and we will be looking at Ephesians 6 and how it addresses the lie that there is no spiritual realm around us. In fact, Ephesians 6 is so insistent about this spiritual reality that not only does it tell us there is a spiritual realm, but it also paints a picture of a spiritual battle being waged right now, in which you and I play a part. And so we’re going to walk through this passage asking three questions: who do we fight against? what do we fight with? and how do we engage in the fight? To make it simple, when it comes to our fight, who?, what?, and how?
WHO DO WE FIGHT AGAINST?
As many of you know, I have a brother who is three years younger than me. I loved growing up with a brother, and even today he’s one of my best friends. But as anyone with two boys in the house knows, with boys in particular, there is a lot of wrestling. Being three years older than my brother, for a long time our wrestling matches were pretty one-sided. In fact, he’s got a number of stories of injuries and hospital visits from wrestling matches that got a little too heated. But then, he started taking Kung Fu. No problem, I was still able to hang onto my heavyweight title for a bit longer. But then he decided to start going to the gym… and join the army. And I quickly realized that my once little brother was a lot bigger and stronger and more well trained than me. The tables had turned, shall we say. There came a time when I couldn’t just rely on my own strength to wrestle him if I was going to beat him. I was going to have to call in some stronger fire power. Now, it’s his birthday in two days so I’m going to keep my comparisons of him to the devil to a minimum.
But in the same way we have a very real, very strong enemy with whom we are wrestling, and as this passage begins, we need to be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Whatever the apostle Paul is about to say in the next few verses, he wants us to know that this battle is something that we will not be able to engage in on our own strength. We need the very strength of the Lord.
But why? Who is it that we are fighting against that requires the very strength of the Lord?
Look with me again at verses 10-12.
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
Our main enemy, as verse 11 shows us, is the devil. Not the devil of pop culture who wears red spandex, has horns, and carries a pitchfork. We are talking about Satan, the deceiver, the serpent in the garden. Verse 12 goes on to describe the devil’s allies – his henchmen. These are the rulers, the authorities, the cosmic powers over this present darkness, and the spiritual forces of evil. What do you think our culture believes about the devil or spiritual forces of evil? What do you believe about the devil? Just a year ago in May of 2023, Gallup Research Center conducted a survey of over 1,000 Americans, asking these same questions and others related to their belief in spiritual beings. Of these 1,000 or so Americans, while 74% say they believe God exists, only a mere 58% believe the devil exists.[1] Whether or not this surprises you, what might be more striking is what Barna Research Group found in a similar study. This time surveying those who profess to be Christians, Barna found that nearly 2/3 of professing Christians agree that Satan is not a living being but is instead simply a symbol of evil.[2] This is a problem.
Throughout church history, Christians have regularly spoken of the three enemies of the soul: the world, the flesh, and the devil. In our day, we no doubt recognize the enemy that the world is. It seems like everyone has an opinion about why and how the world is going to hell in a handbasket. We could name any number of ways that the Nazis or North Korea or the perpetrators of human trafficking are manifestations of the enemy of our soul that the world is. And then for many people, and especially churches in theological streams like ours, it is easy to recognize the enemy that our own flesh can be. Pastor Benjamin taught a few weeks ago on a doctrine in theology called total depravity. There is deep brokenness in our own hearts. We get that. But I have to wonder, even if we would have the right answers to survey questions about the world, the flesh, and the devil, do we actually live as if the devil is a real, living enemy of our soul with a plot to destroy us? As David read in our confession, “Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8). Do we actually believe that? Do we act like it?
In general, while many people in our church certainly believe that the devil exists, I don’t get the sense we think about him very often. And I think the reason for this is that we have started to buy the lie that the culture around us is selling – that the spiritual is not what is most real. That to believe in the spiritual is to show yourself to be uneducated and unscientific. That what we need to be most concerned with is the day to day, physical realities that are in front of us, that we can touch and feel and see with our eyes. Yet I believe that without regularly considering the reality of the spiritual realm, in the daily lullaby of work, relationships, school, distractions, and any number of other things, we have been sung to sleep by the enemy of our souls.
But over and against this, the apostle Paul is trying to wake us up. This is why he uses battle language. I really don’t think Paul uses the image of battle because he loves warfare. Warfare is destructive, it’s violent, it’s contrary to God’s good design of peace on earth. And yet, I think he uses this warfare imagery to show us what no other metaphor can capture. That is, in order for us to understand the severity of the attacks of the enemy, Paul uses the most serious, violent image he can. He uses this imagery because of what is at stake. Your life is on the line.
When I was a freshman in college, my dorm room was probably only 50 feet or so from very active train tracks. They were most active, however, at about 2 in the morning, when the lovely, kindhearted train engineers would greet the sleeping college students with a few loud blasts of the horn. For the first few weeks, I remember thinking, “what have I done? Will I ever sleep this year?” Yet once month 2 rolled around, I was sleeping like a log, and when a friend visited one time, he asked me “how can you sleep through that?!” At first, I didn’t know what he was talking about because I had forgotten that there even was a train. Why is that? How could I possibly sleep through and forget what sounds like the Polar Express going through my dorm room? It’s because we can become numb to the loud realities of life when we don’t stay vigilant.
To use Paul’s image of warfare, imagine that your neighborhood was a war zone. But instead of actively engaging in the fight or defending your home, you’ve become so accustomed to the idea of M16s and hand grenades in your backyard that you have forgotten your enemy even exists. Imagine how vulnerable that would leave you to attack! You might go outside to mow your lawn in the middle of an onslaught. How much more with our spiritual enemy who wants to lull you to sleep in the middle of battle. Indeed, Satan will count it a victory if he can cause you to forget you are in a war with him.
Look again at verse 12: “We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” Notice who we do not wrestle against. Our fight is not against flesh and blood. Contrary to some of the darkest moments in the history of the Church, the Kingdom of God is not advanced through military power. And contrary to some of the darkest moments of the Church right now, the Kingdom of God is not advanced through social media keyboard warriors taking up the two-edged sword of memes and one-liners to own someone they’ll never meet.
If this is true, that our fight is against spiritual forces of evil and not against flesh and blood, this means that the enemy of the Kingdom of God is not Donald Trump or the LGBTQ community. People are the prize to be won over by the Kingdom, not the enemy to be slaughtered. Instead, we have demonized people and done away with the devil. Let us instead go to war against the devil and his legions, while loving our neighbor and seeking to proclaim the good news of the Kingdom of God to every corner of our city.
But if we are going to stand a chance against our true enemy, we need to suit up with a strength that is stronger than our own. If this battle is truly as intense as it sounds, we are going to need armor. So, what do we need to fight with?
WHAT DO WE FIGHT WITH?
Look with me at verses 13-17.
13 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 firm. 14 Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, 15 and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. 16 In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; 17 and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God
The passage starts, “therefore.” So based on all that he’s said before about the fight we’re engaged in and the enemy we fight against, he is about to tell us something. “Therefore take up the whole armor of God.” I just want to pause to point out two things. First, notice here that this is not part of the armor of God. This is the whole armor of God. The word used here that’s translated “whole armor” is actually just one word in the Greek, and it is a technical term for the complete equipment of a heavily armed soldier. In the context of the Roman empire which Paul is writing in, this would have been a fully equipped Roman soldier who is ready for any kind of battle.
The other thing I want to point out is that it is the armor of God. This is not chintzy, low-class armor. This is God’s armor. But what does that even mean? One pastor helpfully noted, which we will see in just a second, that the armor of God is the benefits and privileges of the gospel.[3] Truth, righteousness, peace, faith, salvation, the Spirit, the Word of God. Having these things belong to you is a benefit and privilege of the gospel. So, to put these two ideas together, the benefits and privileges of the gospel are all the equipment we need to engage in the fight against the enemy of our souls, the devil. There is no extra secret sauce we need in order to ensure his defeat. Church, you may feel as though, when the evil one attacks you in your mind, in your suffering, in your family, you may feel as though you do not have all you need to fight the enemy, but this passage assures us that in Christ, we have all that we could possibly need to fend off the evil one.
But what does it look like to “put on” these things? To help us answer this, I’m going to read a passage from Romans 13 that is a parallel in many ways to this passage, and to much of what we’ve seen in Ephesians. If you’d like to turn there with me, keep your finger in Ephesians 6, but I’ll be in Romans 13:11-14.
11 Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed. 12 The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires
So, we see some similar themes. A call to wake up, the idea of light breaking in, an admonition to flee from sin. But if you look at the end of verse 12, it says, “put on the armor of light” and then in verse 14, “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”
So, it seems as though there is this deep connection between putting on the armor that Paul talks about in Ephesians 6 and Romans 13, and putting on Christ. This should not surprise us if the armor really is the benefits and privileges of the gospel, because to believe in the gospel is to be united to Christ and get all the benefits and privileges of Christ. To simplify, in a very real sense, we can say that Jesus is himself our armor. And to put on the armor is to put on Christ. So, when we talk about putting on the armor, this means reminding ourselves of all the ways that in Christ, the gospel is our true reality. So, these are things to believe. Remember, the devil is called “the accuser” in Scripture. So, it’s important to be able to fight back against his accusations and deception with the truth of the gospel. It’s something to be believed. Let me show you what I mean by illustrating the work of the devil and how putting on Christ as the whole armor of God perfectly outfits us for battle.[4] Feel free to flip back to Ephesians 6, I’ll be referencing the armor seen in verses 14-17.
The belt of truth – Jesus describes himself as the truth (John 14:6), so when the devil tries to attack us by telling us lies about ourselves or about God (John 8:44), we can look to Christ, who will remind us of the truth of the gospel.
The breastplate of righteousness – When the devil tries to convince us that we are sinners at our core and that God wants nothing to do with us, we can look to Christ, who gave us hisrighteousness on the cross (Rom. 3:19-31) and who draws ever nearer to us in our sin, as he is the only one who can wash us clean. So, we can answer back to the devil, “yes, I know I’ve sinned, but I no longer rely on my own righteousness for salvation, but only the righteousness of Christ.”
The shoes of the readiness given by the gospel of peace – when the devil tries to convince us that others are our true enemies, we can look to Christ, the prince of peace (Is. 9:6), who fully embodied what it meant to pursue the outsider (Matt 9:11) and who himself gives us the ministry of reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:18-19).
The shield of faith – when the devil does his best to plant seeds of doubt in our mind, we look to Christ who was faithful on our behalf (Col. 2:16) and who himself gives us faith as a gift in the gospel (Acts 3:16; 2 Peter 1:1; Phil. 1:29; Eph. 2:8-9).
The helmet of salvation, or as Paul calls it in 1 Thessalonians 5:8, the helmet of the hope of salvation – What do you do when the devil comes to you and whispers in your ear, “you really think you deserve salvation after you did that?” Or when he says, “You think you still have the favor of God? This is the hundredth time you’ve said you’ll stop.” Or “You really think you can be a community group leader after you sinned in that way?” Or “How can you believe in God when your life is marked by cancer, or infertility, or divorce, or death?” Let me read you a passage from Ephesians 1. This is how Paul starts his letter. Verses 3-5: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will.” Although the devil wants to convince you that your sin is outrunning the grace of God, your suffering is outpacing the goodness of God, and that your defeat is coming from the spiritual realm, in Christ, we are reminded that the heavenly places are exactly where our victory is coming from. So, when the devil says those things to you, you can answer back, “yes I know parts of my life are really, really hard.” Or “I know I have sinned in some pretty shameful ways. But before any of that happened, I was chosen by God before the foundations of the world, that I would be holy and blameless before him.” Our salvation began before we were born, and the very hope that we have for the completion of our salvation is the fact that Christ did not stay in the grave but rose again victorious over the devil himself.
The sword of the Spirit which is the word of God – When the devil tries to convince us that we are powerless to fight temptation, we can look to Christ, who is himself the Word of God. Hebrews 4:15 tells us that “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.” When Christ himself was tempted by the devil in the wilderness, how did he respond? He responded by quoting back to Satan the very Word of God. “It is written” Christ would say (Matt. 4; Mark 1; Luke 4). And when the devil tries to convince us to use the Word of God as a sword against others, we can look to Christ who shows us how to wield what is the only offensive weapon listed here, brandishing it not to destroy one another, but only the true enemy, the devil.
You see this? This armor is like chain mail for the soul. When we are serious about putting this armor on, the enemy does not stand a chance. But there’s one thing we have to realize, and that is that if you know that you are in the midst of battle, you don’t wait until you are personally being attacked to put on your armor. No, you put it on before heading into the fray. So this is a call to us. We have to come prepared. We can’t afford to start taking spirituality seriously only when things go south. When you arise from the waters of baptism, you receive your deployment orders for the Kingdom of God, so we need to be ready to engage in the fight at any moment. We can’t be lulled to sleep by the daily rhythms of our lives. We must keep our armor on and stay vigilant.
What are the things in your life that are causing you to be lulled to sleep by the enemy? What do you need to do to regularly put your armor on? How do you encourage your spouse, or roommate, or friends, or kids to put their armor on?
HOW DO WE ENGAGE IN THE FIGHT?
So we’ve talked about the enemy we are fighting, and we’ve talked about the armor we fight with, but now let’s look at the question – how do we engage in the fight? In other words, how do we actually put on the armor? We put on the armor by looking to Christ and believing the gospel. But this requires action. That’s why we see throughout the passage these commands to “be strong” and “put on” and “stand” and “take up” and “withstand,” with some of these being used more than once. This whole passage is calling us to believe and to act on that belief. Now, not later.
It can be so tempting to look at this battle and just crumble, tap out, stay in your seat. Or to look at all the lies we’ve been talking about over the last six weeks and be paralyzed because you don’t know where to start. And I think this passage shows us two main ways that we can engage in the fight.
If you haven’t already flipped back to Ephesians 6, let’s do that and look together at verses 18-20.
18 praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, 19 and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, 20 for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.
Praying
The first way to engage in the fight is by praying. Verse 18 begins “praying at all times in the Spirit.” This verse actually starts in the middle of a sentence. Did you catch that? Paul talks about putting on the whole armor of God, names the pieces of armor, and he says to put on this armor “praying at all times in the Spirit.” And then he continues on to ask for prayer for himself and for the saints.
We need to stress here that prayer is one of the greatest weapons of spiritual warfare in our arsenal. Paul is not blind to the danger of the battle we are in – he just outlined how intense things really are. Yet in response to the spiritual forces of darkness waging war on the Church, Paul commands prayer and asks for prayer. Paul understands that prayer is like a spiritual nuke to the enemy. We must stop treating prayer merely as a perfunctory introduction to meals or conclusion to community group gatherings. No, prayer is calling upon the creator of the universe in the name of the Son of God by the power of the Holy Spirit. Let’s be clear, too often we think of Jesus and the devil as these two equally matched forces constantly going back and forth in the leader rankings. The Bible is very clear, there is no contest between God and Satan. God is infinite in power, and the only power Satan can wield has been given to him by God. Let us not forget, Satan is a mere creature. Our God is the almighty creator, and it is his name and power that we call upon in prayer. Do we even realize the power at our disposal as we pray?
We must pray. We must pray that the work of the enemy would cease. We must pray for any foothold of the enemy in our church to be destroyed. We must pray earnestly for the salvation of the neighborhood around this church. Let me just brag on the youth group for a second. Most of you don’t know this, but a few weeks ago for our youth group gathering, 25 of our teenagers walked around this neighborhood for an hour earnestly praying for you and for the people that live in this neighborhood. It was so beautiful. We got to see, for an hour on a Wednesday night, the kingdom of darkness be pushed back by the kingdom of light. What would it look like for us to do this regularly? To plead to God on behalf of our neighborhood for the work of the enemy on these streets to cease. To see the neighbors walking to church each week, being discipled, lives being changed.
To be transparent, I have been burdened for a little over a year now for the prayer life of our church. Don’t get me wrong, I love the prayers that happen in classes, in families, in community groups, in the service on Sunday morning. I have just been wanting to see even more of it. Part of what got me thinking about this is the fact that we have a prayer room downstairs that may be the most underutilized room in the entire building. And about six months ago, I went down there, and was looking around and thought to myself, “this room looks like a room that could use some love.” And then I started thinking about what it would mean for this room to be a place where people would want to spend time. For this room to be a war room on Sunday mornings and throughout the week where we could call upon the name of the Lord and actively engage in the battle against the kingdom of darkness. So, I talked with Megan Connor, who makes every space she touches more beautiful, and we started to dream together about what a revitalization of the prayer room would look like. And all I’m going to say is, you’re going to want to go down there and take a look at her handiwork.
To use the revitalization of the prayer room as a metaphor for just a second, I wonder if we could commit together as a church to revitalize our prayer life. I firmly believe that this neighborhood and this city and your workplace and your families will look different if we commit to this.
Preaching
So, one way to put on our armor and engage in the fight is praying. The second way is preaching. And when I say preaching, I don’t just mean what I’m doing right now or what our pastors do every week. No, I mean preaching the gospel to yourself and to others. This is exactly what I laid out for us earlier in the sermon. Are you feeling condemned by the devil? The good news of the gospel says that “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom 8:1). Are you feeling shame over your sin? The good news of the gospel says that Jesus has taken your shame into the grave with him and in its place has given you honor. Are you feeling alone in your spirituality? The good news of the gospel says that Christ will be with his people to the end of the age (Matt. 28:20). We must learn the art of preaching to ourselves, and then help others to do the same by preaching the gospel to them.
So, we need to pray to God, and we need to preach to ourselves. But we don’t do these things alone. One thing that doesn’t come through in our English Bibles is that every command in this passage is plural. So, it should read like, “y’all be strong,” “y’all take up the armor,” “y’all stand.” We are to be strong in the Lord together. We are to take up the armor together, we are to stand together. In battle, if a soldier is alone, they are much more likely to fall than if there is a whole battalion fighting together as one unit. This is one of the many reasons we gather together as a church. If you are only ever listening to sermons alone, or reading your Bible alone, or praying alone, imagine how vulnerable you are to spiritual attack. It is vital that we do all of this together. But then also consider how God is always in this together with you. Even when we forget to preach to ourselves, “the Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Rom. 8:16). Even when we forget to pray, “the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (Rom. 8:26).
CONCLUSION
Let’s draw this to a close. We’ve spent 6 weeks traversing through different lies that we are told by the culture around us, and there are a number of responses we can have to hearing all of these lies. One response we can have is that we can look at all of these lies and look at the state of the world around us and just give up because we don’t even know where to begin. Another response is that we can have the posture that says, “something needs to be done, but someone else will deal with it. It’s not my responsibility.” Yet another response could be that we take up the belt of truth and the sword of the Spirit and go on a rampage against people that disagree with us, learning all of the right one-liners to throw back in their face and sit back smugly because we stood up for “truth.” Each of these responses fails to take Ephesians 6 seriously.
Ephesians 6 recognizes that there are a lot of lies, but we know the truth, and this passage tells us what to believe and what to do. Something does need to be done, and this passage arms us to be the ones to do it. And we are to take up the belt of truth, and the sword of the Spirit, but we are to wield them in the way Jesus does.
Church, although the culture around us has bought the lie that there is no spiritual realm, it ought not be said of us. We must take seriously the battle that we are born into, and the battle that we are equipped for when we are born again. The Lord has given us his very armor to fight back against the evil one. Let us believe faithfully, let us pray earnestly, and let us preach the truth of the gospel to one another unashamedly.
[1]https://news.gallup.com/poll/508886/belief-five-spiritual-entities-edges-down-new-lows.aspx
[2]https://www.barna.com/research/most-american-christians-do-not-believe-that-satan-or-the-holy-spirit-exist/
[3]This is a point made by Tim Keller during his series on spiritual warfare, preached from this passage.
[4]Much of the work in this section is inspired by Britt Merrick’s sermon, “We Wrestle with the Devil”
Sermon Discussion Questions
How often do you think about the fact that we have an enemy who is out to get us? When you do think about it, how does it make you feel?
What are the things in your life that are causing you to be lulled to sleep by the enemy?
What do you need to do to regularly put your armor on? How do you encourage your spouse, or roommate, or friends, or kids to put their armor on?
What are aspects of the gospel that we see in the armor of God that are most dear to you? What are those aspects that are easiest for you to forget?
Do you pray like it is the greatest weapon in your arsenal as a Christian? Why or why not? What are ways that you can grow in your prayer life?
