Rick Warren - Never Fight Your Battles Undressed! – Part Three

Thanks for joining us for Daily Hope with Pastor Rick Warren.

Today we bring our series The Invisible War to a

close as we take one last look at how the

unseen world of good and evil intricately shapes our day

to day existence. Join us for eye opening biblical insights

into the spiritual dimensions that influence our lives in ways

we never imagine. Right now, here's Pastor Rick Warren with

the final part of a message called never fight your

battles undressed.

Now, the fifth thing you need, and of course this

is what a soldier needs, is he puts on the helmet.

And of course the helmet was probably the most important

part of a soldier's war centurions where because if you

get a head wound, that's often a mortal wound. If

you lose your head, you lost it. And so you

want to have I mean, not many people are walking

around headless, right, Okay, So you want to wear a helmet.

And he says, you got to put on the helmet,

and that's the next verse, verse seventeen. He says, you

need to put on the helmet of salvation. Salvation. Now,

what is the purpose of a helmet? It is to

protect your mind, your mind. And so the fifth piece

of weapon of weapon protection you need is sanity. Sanity

and sanity means I protect my mind from evil thoughts.

I protect my mind. That's what a helmet does. It

protects your mind, It protects your head. And if you're

going to win the spiritual battles of life over doubt, discouragement, depression,

defeat and all the things you got to learn how

to control your thoughts, you got to have sanity. I

didn't say hanity. I said sanity protecting my mind from evil.

Now what is it that protects my mind from evil? Salvation?

When I get put on salvation, I get a whole

new mind. Let me just say it this way. If

you don't know Jesus Christ, if you don't have him

in your heart, if you're still outside the family, you

friend have zero protection against Satan, none whatsoever. Satan's not

afraid of your words. He is afraid of God's word.

Satan's not afraid of your thoughts. He is afraid of

god thoughts. And it is salvation that protects your mind

and protects the home of a salvation. Now, I don't

want to go into this in a lot of detail

because We've spent weeks talking about the importance of guarding

your mind, but it is amazing to me what people

allow in their mind, what they'll read, what they'll think,

what they'll listen to. You know, let's just admit it.

Do you know what television is? It's a drug with

a plug. That's really all it is. It's a drug

with a plug. And most of it on there is

not really very good for your brain. There's some good stuff,

and there's some stuff that's just fluff, but there's a

lot of stuff on there that's actually bad and it's

not good for your mind. The Bible says this in

Colostion three two. Keep your mind on things above, not

on worldly things. That means when Satan puts a dart

and he shoots a dart of doubt in your mind,

he goes, I'm not going to believe that I got

the helmet of salvation on. Instead, I'm going to think this.

You cannot choose what happens to you. You cannot choose

everything that's going to happen if you do, but you

can choose what you think about. You have one hundred

percent control over that. And when you choose to think

on things that are good and true and right. And

just when you choose to think on the word of God,

you are putting on the helmet of salvation. Now when

you think about each of these issues, integrity and purity

and serenity, peace and certainty and sanity, you know what

that is. It's a perfect picture of Jesus. What this

is talking about is letting Jesus Christ live through your life.

Nobody has more integrity, more sanity, more purity, more certainty

than Jesus Christ. Now there's one other thing that you

have to have in order to fight the battles in

life and win. And Paul says, you got to put

on every piece and the fifth piece is maturity. If

you write this down, maturity And what is maturity just

knowing a lot of the Bible? No, it is knowing

the Bible and knowing how to use the Bible against Satan.

Maturity is the ability to use the Word of God

against Satan. And unfortunately, most people don't know how to

do this. You may have been in church for a

year or two years or ten years and you've heard

lots of Bible taught, but you don't know how to

use the Bible again, satan. That is maturity, how to

use the word of God against the devil. Maturity is

when you practice the word of God, not just know it.

Now here's a passage on the screen. It's not on

your outlines. It's a long passage, but it's important. Hebrews

five twelve to chapter six, verse one. Let me read

this to you. Paul's talking to believers, and he says,

you know, you, guys, you've been Christians for a long time,

and you're still immature. You're still babies. He said, you

ought to be able to be a teacher. In fact,

here's what he says, though by this time you've been

a Christian this long, By this time, you ought to

be teachers. Now you ought to be teaching the Bible,

not just sitting listening to it. But he said, you

still need somebody to teach you the elementary truths of

God's Word. You need milk, not solid food, he said.

Anybody who lives on milk is still a spiritual baby.

But solid food is for the mature. And then here's

the definition of maturity. Who by constantly practice. In other words,

not oh I know that Bible, not I've studied that Bible,

but I practice the Bible, who, by constant practicing have

trained themselves, and you can train yourself. That's maturity, who

by constant practicing have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.

What's he talking about there? Maturity is when you know

the Bible so well that you go, you hear an idea,

you go, oh, that's not of God. Of course that's wrong,

that's foolish, that's dumb. This is right, that's wrong, and

you can quickly judge. You know that's not right because

I know what the Bible says. That's wrong. That's the Bible.

That's a good thing. I shouldn't say that. I should

say this. I shouldn't do that. I should do this

because you've trained yourself to know right from wrong. He says, Therefore,

let us leave the elementary teaching about Christ. Teaching is

about Christ and go on to maturity and of faith

in God. Now, the seventh weapon that a soldier would have,

and of course this one is important, is his sword. Now,

a sword is so important because this is an offensive weapon.

You see the are you ticklish? Tom? This shield is

a defensive weapon, but the sword is an offensive weapon.

This one is where you're going after Satan rather than

him coming after you. You're taking over territory, you're expanding,

you're enlarging the kingdom. You're going after what you want

to go after in life. Because you're not just defending

yourself as some poor person under attack. You're saying, I'm

coming after you, buddy. You're not gonna get my family, Satan.

You're not gonna get my job, Satan. You're not gonna

get my career. You're not gonna get my marriage, you're

not gonna get my mind. I'm coming after you. And

the Bible calls this the sword of the Spirit. And

notice the next verse, verse seventeen. He says, you take

the sword of the spirit, which is what is it?

The word of God? Look up here, this is your sword.

The Bible is your sword, and the Bible says it

can cut and the sharper your sword is the more

you can do with it. This is your sword. Now

here's that. Listen to me very very closely. The Bible

does not become your sword until you memorize it. If

it's all the words you're in this little book and

you got on your shelf, it does you no good

at all. But if you memorize a Bible verse. It's

in your mind, and remember that's where the battle is.

Now it becomes a sword. If you have a Bible.

You could have one hundred Bibles on your shelf, and

as long as they're closing on the shelf, they do

you no good. There's no power in them just sitting there.

It's only when you take truth out of here and

you put it in here and you remember it, then

it becomes a sword. Now, Jesus taught us how to

fight Satan in the temptations that he went through in

the wilderness, And in every temptation he answers Satan's dart

with a quoted scripture. And Satan said, why don't you

do this? Why don't you do this? And Jesus is

modeling it for us. He says, well, it says in

the Bible da da da da Da Da Da da

da da, and he quotes back. Now, Jesus did not

pull out his pocket old Testament when he was tempted.

And when Satan said, look, I'll give you all these

things if you'll fall down and worship, he didn't say,

you know, I know somewhere over here in Deuteronomy, hang

on just a minute, okay, Iatan, hang on, I know

over here, somewhere there's a verse that said, oh yea, yeah, yeah,

this is it. Oh no, no, that's not it here. No, no,

he he just quoted it. He had it in his mind. Now,

let's admit he did have an advantage because he wrote it. Okay,

he wrote it. But the Bible does not become your

sword until you memorize it. The single most important thing

you can do as a Christian is memorize verses that

help you. Barnutt I started this when I was seventeen

years old. I have memorized thousands of Bible verses. That

gives me power, because when you're tempted, you never have

a Bible with you. Let's say you're tempted to spend

money you don't have on something you don't need, and

you're in Nordstroms and you see this good looking dress,

and Satan says, a fiery dart man, you'd look sexy

in that, but you can't afford a three hundred dollars dress.

And he said, oh, come on, just get to put it.

Charge it. You can't afford it, but charge it now.

You're not going to pull out a verse out of

your pull out a Bible at that point, going now,

I know somewhere over here talks about not spending money

you don't have. You need to add it verse memory.

You say, what do I have to memorize the Old Bible?

Of course not what do you memorize the verses that

help you in the most tempting areas that you have.

If you have a problem with impatience, you better be

memorizing some verses on patients. If you have some problems

with anger, you need to be memorizing them versus on anger.

If you have a problem with watching where your eyes

go and lust, you need to be memorizing some verses

on lust. If you have a problem with spending too much,

you need to be reading through problems and going, oh,

that's a good one, And you write it down on

a little white card, and you keep it there, and

you keep saying it over and over to you got

it memorized. You don't have to memorize the Old Bible,

but you need to memorize the ones that help you.

If you're always copping out and not telling standing up

and saying what you believe, you need to memorize some

verses on courage. If you have problems with doubt, you

need to memorize some verses on doubt. So whatever you're

struggling with, that's what you need, because then you got

a sword to fight back. Otherwise, when Satan puts us

on your right, you got nothing to fight back with.

You're like, I'm just gonna take you on, Satan, and

he stands back and goes. You think I'm afraid of

your words. I have no fear of your words. But

when you quote the word of God, that's sword. That's

the sword. And let me wrap it up with two questions.

First question, how do I put on all this weapon?

Is this guy handsome? You know? I tell you what?

Now you know what, ladies, just godly hunker, burning love,

is single and he will wear this on a first

date if you want to. You owe me. You owe

me on that one. How do you put on this

with this weaponry or this armor so you're protected against

Satan and discouragement and doubt and all these things that

he throws at you. Two words, write this down through prayer.

Prayer is the way you put on the armor. You

put on all of these pieces by praying about them

and you say, God, today, I need integrity in my life.

I need it. I need to know your truth and

I need to do your truth. I need to build

my life on truth. And God, I need purity in

my life today. And there's a lot of impure things

out there. I don't want impure relationships, impure thoughts. I

don't want impure motives. I need a clean heart. And

you ask God to give you a clean heart, and

you say, God, I'm so dressed out. I need I

need serenity today. I need peace. I need to put

on the shoes of good news of peace. And God.

Today I'm gonna be anxious and I'm gonna have worries

and I'm gonna have fears. And God, I need you

to give me serenity and I want to put on

the shoes of peace. That's how you say it. And God, Today,

when there's doubts come at me, I need certainty. I

need to know. And you just mentally dress yourself. You

don't go into battle undressed. And God, I need sanity.

My life is insane right now. My schedule is insane.

Right now, my world is insane. Right now. I need sanity.

I need the helmet of salvation. I need you to

help me protect my mind from all the goofy ideas

that Satan tries to throw in there and go, you're nuts,

and all of those wacky, crazy thoughts that I get.

I need sanity and God, I need maturity. And I'm

going to memorize the Bible verse. You know, if you

memorized one verse a week, at the end of this year,

you'd have a fifty two versus memorized. That means you

got fifty two swords to use. You're no longer defenseless

against Satan. You need maturity, and so prayer. Write this down.

Prayer is how we fight the battle. A lot of

people don't get prayer. A lot of people think prayer

is just something you just tag on. It's kind of

like singing the national anthem before a game. Yeah, you know,

it's kind of nice. It's important to do, but it

has no relationship whatsoever to the game. It's like, oh,

say and you you know, and then and every colaugh

and then the real game starts. A lot of people

think that's what prayer is. Did you just kind of

do it? You do it before you eat, you do

it before you go to sleep. You do it in

the morning, you do it before a meeting, and it

doesn't really You didn't have to put your mind in

gears like Charlie Brown Christmas Special and the teacher. Wow

wow wow wow wow wow wow. Why uh, And it

doesn't even matter.

No.

Prayer is how you fight the battle. Prayer is how

you win the battle. And you put these things on. Now.

Last question, when in your day is the best time

to get spiritually dressed for battle? Morning or evening? Yeah? Yeah,

because when you get up in the morning. That's why

you should have a quiet time in the morning. You

get up in the morning and you sit down and

you pray and you mentally put on the spiritual warfare

because you're getting ready to go out into battle. Doesn't

make a whole lot of sense to end your day

with a quiet time because you know that means you

get all dressed up in your war gear and then

you get in bed. That would be uncomfortable, okay, And

so you need to do it at the start of

the day. My challenge to you that you will begin

to use this metaphor in your prayer life and use

it with regularity. Memorize this metaphor so you can pray

these six things so you can say, Okay, God, I'm

going into battle today. I need to have these six things.

I need integrity, I need purity, I need serenity, I

need certainty. Come on, God, I need your help. I

need sanity, I need maturity, and know what it means.

If you can memorize this, you can spiritually prepare yourself

for battle every day, and you're going to start living

in victory. What's bow our heads? Father, We know that

Satan lasts when we try to fight him without any

armor on and without any weapons. Forgive us for all

the times that we've thought other people or the enemy.

Help us to realize we're not fighting against people made

of flesh and blood. But the problem is behind the

problem problem, and it is the spiritual evil, the satanic influences,

the evil rulers and authorities, the unseen world, the powers

of darkness. And we're not going to win by human methods.

Help us to put on the mental armor of integrity.

Knowing and doing the truth of purity, keeping our motives

clean of serenity, living and speaking good news of peace,

and living in harmony. Help us to put on certainty.

Trusting your promises and sanity, protecting our minds from evil

and maturity using the word of God. Help us to

practice using it, and that we would do it, realizing

that is prayer. In prayer, we win the battles. If

you've never invited Jesus Christ into your life, say this prayer.

Jesus Christ, as much as I know how, come into

my heart plus against Satan without you. I need you

to save me. I need salvation. I need the helmet

to protect my mind. So I asked you to come

into my heart and life and change me in your name.

I pray. Amen. Hi everybody, this is Rick and I

hope you enjoyed today's broadcast. You know, if you just

prayed that prayer for the very first time, or you

just recommitted your life to Jesus again today, would you

let me know about it. There's something real about sharing

your commitment. So write me Rick at pastor Rick dot

com and say, Rick, I prayed that prayer of commitment.

I gave my life to Christ. And I'll send you

some material that will help you on your journey with Jesus.

And I'll also pray for you. God bless you.

You're listening to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. We're so happy

you've chosen to study along with us today. Every day

our faith is assaulted by the world's values, our sinful nature,

and the forces of evil. But by wilding God's word,

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