The Whole Armor of God
A final word: Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.
Put on all of God’s armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil. For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places. Therefore, put on every piece of God’s armor so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil. Then after the battle you will still be standing firm.
Stand your ground, putting on the belt of truth and the body armor of God’s righteousness. For shoes, put on the peace that comes from the Good News so that you will be fully prepared. In addition to all of these, hold up the shield of faith to stop the fiery arrow of the devil. Put on salvation as your helmet, and take the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere.
Ephesians 6:10-18 NLT
Wearing the whole armor of God is important for every believer in their walk in Christ. As Paul closes out his letter to the church in Ephesus he makes the point of giving this final word of exhortation to be strong in the Lord so that believers will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil. From this passage in Ephesians we begin to learn more about this unseen world of spiritual evil in which Paul takes our enemy, Satan seriously.
What I have personally liked about verse 12 is that we learn that we as believers should not consider humans to be our enemies and that instead the opposition we face comes from this unseen world of spiritual evil. Praise be to God that Christ himself has authority over this realm. The evidence of this is throughout Scripture, however Paul actually makes this clear in the beginning of his letter in chapter 1 of Ephesians as he writes…
Now he is far above any ruler or authority or power or leader or anything else - not only in this world but also in the world to come. God has put all things under the authority of Christ and has made him head over all things for the benefit of the Church.
Ephesians 1:21-22 NLT
I closed last months blog with the reminder that Christ Jesus has authority over the unseen realm as is evident throughout His ministry in the New Testament. Overwhelming victory is ours through Christ alone. So as I spend time on the topic of spiritual warfare over the next several months in these blogs I want you to personally know this and take this to heart that Christ has authority over the unseen realm and overwhelming victory is ours through Christ alone. Evil exists in the world and how we as Christians choose to face this evil will affect our walk with Christ. That is why it is important to ground ourselves in the Kingdom of God.
Let me share an excerpt with you from my study Bible on overcoming the devil.
Overcoming the Devil
The New Testament writers were convinced of the reality of evil and the dangers of the spiritual world. So they took Satan (the evil one, the devil) seriously as a real threat. The devil not only inhibits the work of God’s people (see 1 Thes 2:18; Rev 2:10), but he “prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour” (1 Pet 5:8).
The entire unbelieving world is subject to the power of sin and the devil (see Eph 2:2’ 1 Jn 5:19). As the “god of this world,” the devil can blind the minds of unbelievers (see 2 Cor 4:4;Matt 13:19). Although Satan opposes God and seeks to destroy his people (Rev 12:12, 17), Jesus came to destroy Satan’s work (1 Jn 3:8). God turns what the devil intends for evil into good; for example, when believers are expelled from the Christian fellowship, they are exposed to the devil’s destructive power so that they might repent and be saved (see 1 Cor 5:5).
Christians are to stand firm and resist the devil (Eph 4:27; Jas 4:7), praying for God’s deliverance (Matt 6:13) and availing themselves of the armor that God provides for their defense (Eph 6:10-20). Those who yield to Satan’s influence suffer the consequences (See Acts 5:3-5). But believers who walk with Christ are secure because they know that the cross has broken the devil’s power (See Rom 8:38-39; 1 Cor 15:24; Col 1:13; 2:10, 15; 1 Pet 3:22; Rev 12:7-9) and that the Lord protects them (see 1 Jn 4:4). By the word of God, they can overcome the evil one (see Jn 2:14; Rev 12:11).
Although believers need to be wary of the devil and protect themselves from his power, they need not live in fear. The power of the devil is no match for the power of God. In the NT, the Christian life is not centered on spiritual warfare, but on a joyful life of obedience in the Spirit. - NLT Illustrated Study Bible
Like the New Testament writers we also need to take Satan as a serious threat. It is far to dangerous for us as the church to simply be unaware of the enemy, choose not to teach on spiritual warfare or find it an uncomfortable topic to get into as we discussed in last months blog (Why the Church Doesn’t Talk About Spiritual Warfare). In this months blog I am actually doing something I have not done in any of my previous blogs and that is incorporating the resources of visual aids being eight illustrations in discussing The Battle of Spiritual Warfare. Following each of the illustrations I will have a paragraph or two that will correspond to that illustration. It is hard to discuss and teach on this unseen world and thus it felt proper to include some visual aids.
Before we discuss the first illustration, I want you to read a story that comes from David Butt’s book The Devil Goes to Church: Combating The Everyday Attacks of Satan. I am going to incorporate elements from this story into my illustrations so take your time reading this short story.
There is an old story about discouragement called “The Devil’s Tool Sale.”
It was advertised that the Devil was putting his tools up for sale. On that date the tools were laid out for public inspection. They had prices on them, and there were a lot of treacherous instruments: hatred, envy, jealousy, deceit, pride, lying, and so on. Laid apart from the rest of the Devil’s tools was a harmless-looking tool, worn more than any of the others and priced very high.
“What’s the name of this tool?“ asked one of the customers.
“That,“ the Devil replied, “is discouragement.“
“Why have you priced it so high?”
“Because discouragement is more useful to me than all the others. I can pry open and get inside a man’s heart with that when I cannot get near him with any other tools. It’s badly worn because I use it on almost everyone, since so few people know it belongs to me.”
When we begin to understand that discouragement is of the enemy, we can begin to counter it using the weapons of our warfare in Ephesians 6:10-18. It is not natural for a Spirit-filled child of God to walk around discouraged. This is an attack of Satan to put us on the sidelines. - The Devil Goes to Church by David Butts
Here is our first illustration and I want you to think of these illustrations as a battlefield. On the left side you have the Kingdom of God and on the right side you have the kingdom of darkness. Along the left side you see God’s tools and then along the right side you see Satan’s tools. As we read in the story of “The Devil’s Tool Sale,“ you can see all those tools listed here and additional ones I have added. In the middle there is a black dotted line and I want you to imagine this as the battle front between spiritual good and evil. You can see that God’s tools and Satan’s tools are essentially the opposite of one another and in this sense they oppose each other since they are opposites.
An important principle in understanding spiritual warfare is that Satan wants the opposite of whatever God wants. What God says is good, Satan will say it is bad. Jesus wants unity in the church as made evident in his prayer in John 17, Satan wants the opposite and seeks to create division in the church, the body of Christ. Jesus teaches and commands us to love our neighbors, Satan wants us to not love our neighbors and instead seeds of hatred are planted. I would say this last one is rather evident in the American church when it comes to political difference among believers as an example, but we touched on this already in “Christianity & Politics.” The point being that whatever the Kingdom of God stands for, the kingdom of darkness will stand in opposition of that. On to the 2nd illustration.
In this illustration I have changed the left side to being “Areas in Your Life.“ Now some of these things may not apply to you and that is fine, this list is an example for illustration purposes. In this list we can see that generally speaking these are areas of life that are significant parts of a persons life. Satan seeks to break into and affect these areas of your life and unfortunately many believers and unbelievers are unaware of this and so when life goes sideways we are unaware that at times it can actually be the enemies doing.
Now after saying this I want to give a simple example that I regular give after making this statement. For example, if your alarm on your phone doesn’t go off because your phone died and now you are late for work this is not an “Aha! It was Satan that did this!“ No, you simply forgot to plug your phone in before going to bed to charge it and now your phone is dead because there is no battery charge left. Common sense is needed because sometimes we shoot ourselves in the foot putting ourselves in a bad situation and it is natural to play the blame game just as Adam and Eve did versus taking responsibility for our own actions when things in life go sideways.
Now there are two significant things I like to point out in these “Areas of Life“ so lets move onto the 3rd illustration.
As you study this illustration, look at how many areas of life are also areas of relationships. This is the first of two significant things I wanted to hone in on. I point this out because this is an area Satan often attacks because relationships are a significant part of life. We could rephrase areas of relationships as simply being community or even fellowship for that matter. There is strength in relationships, especially for Christians in the church you attend or being a part of a small group. For example, if Satan is able to affect and break relationships in a congregation or small group, this significantly has an impact on ones faith walk. It is important as Christians to be aware of this because if we are aware we might catch a weed growing in the corner that we can uproot before more weeds grow and take root.
The second significant thing I wanted to point out was identity. In the above illustration you can see what things on the list are tied to identity. When a persons identity becomes fractured or broken they are in such a vulnerable place as they try to reform who they are and often Satan can speak lies and insert doubt into who a person is. This is especially true for Christians as well because our identity is that we are a child of God because “I am who You say I am“ as a worship song goes. God the Creator made man in His own image as we read in Genesis 1 and He gave us purpose. For Christians are identity is to rest in God, in the Good News, the Gospel message.
That is one of the reasons why I love Isaiah 43:1 where it is written, “But now, O Jacob, listen to the LORD who created you. O Israel, the one who formed you says, “Do not be afraid, for I have ransomed you. I have called you by name; you are mine.” This Bible verse made popular more recently by the Christian TV series called The Chosen as you can click on this link to learn more as I highly recommend it. In this Christian TV series as Jesus calls people to follow him, particularly the twelve disciples, you see them wrestling with their identity. As Christ calls them by name, they leave their old way of life and take on a new identity and many of them are still figuring this out as the series continues.
We will revisit identity more in an upcoming illustration, but for now lets move onto the 5th illustration.
The apostle Peter in his letter to believers in certain Roman provinces writes a warning to them of their enemy, the devil. Peter writes…
Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your family of believers all over the world is going through the same kind of suffering you are.
1 Peter 1:5:8-9 NLT
Satan is not omnipresent (omnipresent means being present everywhere at the same time) whereas God himself is omnipresent. As a result of this Peter writes of how Satan prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour and attack. Because Satan is not omnipresent, he sends out his demons to and fro to help inform him of who he should attack and devour next. Keeping the battle front imagery in mind from earlier that I shared about in relation to the illustrations, in the above illustration you see I have labeled “spy work“ meaning that Satan spies on humans to learn about their habits, character, strengths, weakness, and identity of who they are. Just like a spy who would infiltrate behind enemy lines to go on a scouting mission to discover the enemies strengths and weakness. Once this spy would have enough intelligence he would retreat back to his headquarters and report what he had discovered to his senior officers so that a plan and strategy could be made to attack the enemy.
This is true of the kingdom of darkness. Satan wants to not only have intelligence on unbelievers, but naturally believers as well because the Kingdom of God is his enemy. So he attacks God’s people and he will do so by attacking us where we are weak or perhaps attack us slowly over time with the tool of discouragement. One of Satan’s favorite tools, “Because discouragement is more useful to me than all the others. I can pry open and get inside a man’s heart with that when I cannot get near him with any other tools. It’s badly worn because I use it on almost everyone, since so few people know it belongs to me.”
What if Satan attacked someones identity with the tool of discouragement along with many other of his tools?
If a persons identity becomes weakened and exposed Satan can break into so many other areas of a persons life. It’s like a domino affect because once a person begins to doubt and not understand who they are many other aspects of a persons life give way and suddenly discouragement, doubt, depression and more begin to set in.
The front lines of the battle field collapses as the enemy moves into other areas of a unbeliever or believers life that were previously off limits to his attacks. Have you ever known someone in your life going through a really hard time questioning who they are, going through a life crisis as it were. Again, this is a person in a vulnerable place and they need those around them to encourage, love and share with this person to build them up. This is something I am sensitive to people around me whenever they are going through an identity crises whether they are Christians or hold a faith other than Christianity because they are in a vulnerable place. As a Christian I have the opportunity to step forward in loving, encouraging and sharing with this person to build them up by the grace of God. The kingdom of darkness wants to tear people down whereas the Kingdom of God wants to build people up.
Now for the final illustration as this is directly pointed towards Christians. There are two fundamental faith practices when it comes to The Battle of Spiritual Warfare.
Praying and reading Scripture daily are priceless when it comes to being strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Praying and reading Scripture daily is something I have written previously about in this blog “Keep it Simple“ if you want to read more on the significance of these two faith practices. These two faith practices come easy for some Christians while for other Christians it is very difficult.
In the above illustration you can see I have prayer and scripture circled and all these arrows pointing to areas of life. Furthermore, you may notice how the vertical green line on the battlefront is much wider now. The reason why I have arrows pointing from prayer and scripture to areas in life is because these two faith practices reinforce and bless these areas of your life. An active prayer life keeps you in tune with God and His will in your life. Prayer with God is communication with God that is not a one way street, but a two way street where we as Christians pray and lift our voices to God so that His will be done in our lives and in which He responds and guides us. As in Jeremiah we read.
"You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
Jeremiah 29:13 NIV
In addition when you add reading Scripture daily, God’s word, we as Christians draw closer to God and God’s fingerprint becomes more evident in the areas of our life. Many times for Christians including myself at times I find myself saying, “God, I wish you would just speak to me and tell me what you want.“ That is when the Holy Spirit responds, “He has, its called the Bible.“ To me this is rather humorous when this occurs and so I go to God’s word and invite him to examine me which at times can be quite difficult to do. The importance for a Christian in reading their Bible daily means being much more in tune with God in that in Him lies our identity, in Him we submit our covenant of marriage, in Him I give control for whatever job or career I have in life.
The reason why I have the vertical green line on the battlefront much wider now is because when we spend time with God in prayer and reading Scripture daily He reinforces our defenses against the kingdom of darkness. When we stand firm in Him we are able stand firm against Satan, against discouragement, hatred, lying, greed, temptation and more.
As we started this blog off with the Whole Armor of God being Ephesians 6:10-18, there are descriptions given to what each of the pieces of armor are for in helping us be strong as soldiers in front of the almighty God. It’s not simply just a belt we are to wear, its the belt of truth. It’s not simply just a sword, its the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. So I would encourage you to revisit that passage to spend time in prayer with God in what is the purpose of the armor of God and the meaning for the different pieces. In addition I will highlight the tools God gives us to live a life with Him that grounds us in Him below.
I look forward to writing more on this topic and having more discussions with those who have commented, messaged, or spoke with me in person regarding these blogs. Blessings
“But now, O Jacob, listen to the LORD who created you. O Israel, the one who formed you says, “Do not be afraid, for I have ransomed you. I have called you by name; you are mine.”
Isaiah 43:1 NLT
