Ephesians 6:10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. 11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. 13 Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. 14 Stand firm therefore…
[Maybe you've seen the raw power in that video where the lions take on some cape buffalo?] Well, at this point in the letter to the Ephesians, finally, Paul is wrapping things up. Finally, he says, be empowered in the Lord. By the Lord, the King of the universe! Why is this important? Well, all these things Paul has been talking about for the past three chapters, guarding the oneness, and building up one another, laying aside the old self and all bitterness and wrath and impurity, truthing in love and speaking no rotten words and being kind to one another, ranking ourselves under one another, flowing our wants together with what the Lord wants - all of this and more - it is all humanly impossible. It is not only entirely unfathomable but unachievable - in our own strength. We cannot hope to achieve any of it without God’s supernatural power. Without the help, the power of His indwelling Holy Spirit. It is to your advantage that I go away, Jesus said - because then I’ll send the Helper, and He will not only be with you - He will be IN you!
So, power. Paul uses three different Greek words for power here. And there are so many ways to describe the power of our Almighty Omnipotent God. How much power are we talking here? Limitless! [The power that sustains a billion billion stars!] Be empowered by the Lord, Paul says, and in the strength of His might. [recall Eph. 1.19] I ask the Lord to enlighten the eyes of your heart, so that you will know and understand how surpassingly great His power is toward us who believe. Limitless! Unfathomable! whatever "this" is, THIS is not too difficult for the Lord. Nothing is impossible for the Lord. His is the same power that raised Jesus from the dead. And who can do that? Who can bring something dead back to life? Who can create life out of dust? Out of nothing? Science has yet to even whiff at that. Sure they have created chains of amino acids in test tubes, but the miracle of life - even the tiniest single-celled creature - what kind of wherewithal is required for that spark of life? You bring me that tiny creature, and I squash it in front of you - what kind of power does it take to bring that creature back to life? Other-worldly, unfathomable power, that’s what kind. This is the same power which is at work in us - and through us!
Power - Jesus said apart from Me there is nothing you can do [Jn 15.5]. But all things are possible to those who believe! And Paul says, be strong. Be presently, constantly, daily, ongoingly empowered by the Lord, by the strength of His might. Again, how strong is the Lord? How much power does He have? Is anything too difficult for Him? Is there any situation, is there anything even the worst enemy could throw at you, that He can’t handle? God’s power is perfected in weakness, don’t you know… [2Cor 12.9] You feel weak? Now you’re ready!
And may I add that the world is DYING to see this power unleashed through God’s people. They don’t need a new creed or a clever mission statement. They sure don’t need fancy buildings or slick programs. They don’t need to see how happy we can be when everything’s going our way, when we’ve got everything handled, when we have lots of stuff. I’d like to suggest that the greatest power in the world - is love. Especially when it's unleashed in the face of difficulty. I have loved you with an everlasting love, He says. Before the world began, I loved you. Abounding in lovingkindness, He says. I have wonderful plans for you. The unfathomable power of enduring love.
Lamentations 3.22-23 The LORD’S lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.
Isn’t this what Paul told the Corinthians? You can have all the spiritual gifts in the world, but without love, you got nothing. You can have all the wealth in the world, but without love, you’re truly bankrupt. Love is the power to turn the other cheek. Power to forgive. Power to love my enemies and pray for those who persecute me and to bless the nations. Power to stand firm - not moved away from the Gospel and not moved away from one another. Power to love one another. Power to love my spouse. And my kids. And my neighbor. And the Lord with all my heart. What kind of power does that require? It’s not in our nature. God, fill me with Your Spirit, with Your power, with Your love. We do not have because we do not ask. We must come to the end of ourselves - as Paul said, God’s power is perfected in us when we are powerless…
And here’s what Paul tells us next. God’s power positions us to Stand firm - to stay in place, like a stake in the ground. Immovable. He says it three times in this section. Tap into God’s limitless power so that you can stand firm. Standing firm doesn’t mean we’re not moving forward, not seeing forward progress of the Gospel in our lives and in our world. But we are staying put. God’s power empowers us to stay in place, like a stake. We’re NOT moving away from one another. Like Samwise Gamgee - I’m not leaving you, Mr Frodo. We’re continuing to guard the oneness. We’re loving one another, encouraging and building one another up. And we’re definitely not moving away from the Lord. Peter says our adversary is like a prowling lion [1Pet 5.8]. What do lions like to do? How do they hunt their prey? Lions don’t attack a healthy herd, certainly not the whole herd. What do they do? They target those who are weaker or smaller, and try to isolate them from the herd.
Stand firm, he says. And where am I standing? Right next to you. Right next to my brother. Again, as Americans we default to the singular. We think it’s all about me-myself-and-I keeping my own spiritual act together, just trying to survive the arrows and the schemes that are thrown at me. But these commands are all plural. Yes, Paul is writing to a group - but that’s entirely the point. That’s what he’s been saying to these believers for the past three chapters. You are a family. You are one body. And I implore you, I beg you, make every effort to guard the oneness. Be standing firm - side-by-side. Because not only is life full of brokenness, broken people, not only is the body full of broken messy people, but there is an enemy. And here’s the thing - you are not my enemy. We are not wrestling against flesh and blood, Paul says. My enemy is NOT the person next to me. My enemy is not the one sitting across from me. If you’re married, you are not sleeping with the enemy. Our real enemy is not any person. There is... another.
Diabolos, Paul calls him. Our English word ‘devil’ derives from this. The Greek word means, to throw across. One who throws across. Slanderer. Throwing accusations. Throwing lies and deceptions. Talk about rotten words - diabolos deals them out in spades. We are most like the devil when we are handing out rotten words - words about people, words that tear down. Which is why we need to be strong in God’s mighty power, and put on His full armor, so that we can stand firm against the rotten words and against the schemes of diabolos. That word gives us our English word, methods. Methods.
I’d like us to consider for a moment the methods of diabolos, based on what we’ve been learning - what does he try to do? He tries to:
split up the body [4.3] AND split up families [5.31]
puff up the members [4.2] and shut down the ranking-under [5.21]
get us operating in our own strength [6.10, 5.18]
get us pursuing what we want/not inquiring of the Lord [5.10,17]
get us to waste our time and our lives on ourselves [5.15-16]
pursue sensuality [4.19] at the expense of spirituality [4.22-23]
dumb down and doubt and dispense with God’s Word [4.14-18, 24]
shut down serving [4.12]
tolerate filth (including our words) and cultivate ingratitude [5.3-4]
tear down and not build up [4.29]
cultivate unforgiveness and hiding [4.25]
keep us out of community [4.2,16, 25, 5.2]
keep us from praying [6.18] - on the defensive!
keep us from times of reverence [6.5,9], times of celebration [5.19]
In essence, he is scheming to move us away from Jesus - away from the truth and away from one another. But greater is He Who is in you than he who is in the world! We do not need to be moved one inch by any of his methods. That is the whole point of what Paul is saying here. Stand firm!
There’s one other method he tries. Back in [4.27], Paul said do not give diabolos an opportunity…! No space. No foothold! Not even a toehold! When we allow ANY of these things space in our lives, we are giving a foothold to the enemy. [Like back on Dday, when the Allies were trying to get a foothold on the beaches of Normandy?] For us today, the enemy is liable to try to get a foothold at a time and in a place that you DON'T expect… So Paul is saying, don’t give him any room to maneuver. Don’t let him move you even an inch. He’s probably not going to drop a huge bomb in your life - it’s going to be subtle. Deceptive. A little bit here. A baby step of compromise there. [which is how you boil a frog, right?]
But we’re not just holding ground. The word resist here actually means, we are going on the offensive. We are actively taking ground. We are opposing - “so that you will be empowered/enabled to oppose/go on the offensive in the evil day.”
2Timothy 3:8 Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith.
2Timothy 4:15 Be on guard against him yourself, for he vigorously opposed our teaching.
James 4:7 Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
1Peter 5:9 But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world.
Go on the offensive, Paul says. The best defense is usually a good offense. Not just any offense. Not reckless offense per se. But we go on God-guided offensive [which is generally how you win at chess - on the offensive, but not recklessly so]. What does this look like in the Christian life? Well, it’s tied to suiting up for battle, putting on this full armor of God. We are wrestling against things we can’t see or touch - and so the weapons of our warfare are designed for this battle which is rather invisible. We’ll look at this next time. For now, we’re talking about resolve. Our calling is not to simply circle the wagons. We’re not holing ourselves up in our Christian bunker, hoping we can make it to the end. We are advancing and taking ground for the kingdom. Every nation. All the families of the earth!
In battle, used to be you would raise a red flag. At least that what some did. Red flag - anyone know what that means? Anymore, that means something different. [red flags = danger, stop the race, stop the game, get out of the water; or a communist flag] But not for Pirates! Time was, raising a red flag signaled the intent to give “no quarter” (red being the color of blood). To give an enemy no quarter meant to show them no mercy. Their blood was going to be spilled. It meant to you were not going to provide food or housing (no quarters) for the enemy. No quarters for them. Take no prisoners. Remember the Alamo? Santa Anna famously raised a red flag at the beginning of that siege [anybody know what date that was - Feb 23, 1836]. (“No quarter” was actually outlawed by the Hague Convention of 1907 - such that now all white flags [i.e. of surrender] are supposed to be honored.) White not red.
What we understand as believers is, that on the spiritual battlefield, things are different. No white flags - only red ones! No quarter! That’s what Paul is saying here. No surrender - and no quarter! Be strong in the Lord and His mighty power! This is not too difficult for the Lord!
Close the door, put out the light
You know they won't be home tonight
The snow falls hard and don't you know
The winds of thor are blowing cold
They're wearing steel that's bright and true
They carry news that must get through
They choose the path where no one goes
They hold no quarter, they hold no quarter
Walking side by side with death
The devil mocks their every step
The snow drives back the foot that's slow
The dogs of doom are howling more
They carry news that must get through
To build a dream for me and you
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