Fortified in Grace (Ephesians 6:10-13)

Joshua Kehler: Hello everyone.

Welcome to the Grace House Church podcast.

I am Joshua Kaler, one of the pastors at Grace House, and I wanted to take a

second to introduce today's teaching.

we are a group of house churches and being a house church, we drum

roll, meet in homes when we gather.

We share a meal together.

When we gather, we pray for one another.

We celebrate God's work in each other's lives.

Read scripture together and praise and worship together.

And really the centerpiece of our gathering together is remembering Jesus'

death, burial, and resurrection, and soon coming by partaking in communion together.

We also participate in a time of teaching and preaching from the Bible.

Sometimes I get to teach, sometimes it's somebody else and sometimes

it's more straightforward and like a classic sermon, although there's

always dialogue and discussion.

Sometimes it's less monologue though, and more dialogue where everyone's

participating from the get-go.

And some of my favorite, most edifying times together.

Well, this is one such teaching we're.

You have to put your notes to the side and try to follow where the spirit's leading.

I've actually cut out about 45 minutes of amazing discussion

and insights from the Saints.

First, you may ask, wow, you're cutting out 45 minutes.

How long do you guys go?

Well, you know, when you're together in a house, time flies when you're having fun.

Secondly if they're amazing, why cut that out?

You may ask or be thinking, not comfortable having their voice,

their ideas, their opinions, their struggles, their joys.

Listen to on a publicly available podcast and preserving the intimacy of the group

so that that kind of vulnerability can flourish as of utmost importance and our

chief concern, and we'll protect that.

So that being said, when, and if you listen to this, it might sound

a bit disjointed, uh, unorganized.

The outline won't win any awards, nor should it.

but there is a lot of talk about Jesus and the gospel of grace, which

is always good and always edifying.

I'm also following through on a commitment to the beautiful people of Grace House

who have requested these teachings.

I pray if you listen, that Jesus has made much of it in your heart, blessings and.

Let's go to Ephesians chapter six

where we find out that the Christian life is like going on vacation.

Just kidding, . It's not.

it is a battle and, uh, but one that's already won and Paul wants us to remind

us, and he wants us to live our lives from a place of victory, not a place

where we're anxious or we're overwhelmed or full of weary or doubt or, confusion.

but from a place of peace, from a place of boldness and confidence

in who he is and what he's done.

and so let's read in verse 10, chapter six.

Finally.

Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.

Put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand against

the schemes of the devil for you.

Do not wrestle, 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.

Therefore, take up the whole armor of.

You may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all to stand

firm stand therefore having fastened on the belt of truth and having put on the

breastplate of righteousness and as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness

given by the gospel of peace and all circumstances take up the shield of faith

with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one and take the

helmet of salvation and the sort of the.

Which is the word of God, praying at all times in the spirit with

all prayer and supplication.

To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supp, supplication

for all the saints and also for me, that words may be given to me in

opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel for which I

am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly as I ought to speak.

This is the word of the.

Thanks be to God, thanks to God.

Amen.

father, let the words of my mouth, the meditation of my heart

be acceptable in your sight.

Oh, Lord, Lord, again, we just want what you have for us this morning.

Save us from the opinions of amen and good ideas.

We need the wisdom.

That's from God.

That is you, Jesus.

Amen.

And Lord, we just pray.

That you'd make much of Jesus in our hearts above any circumstance, any

situation, any anxiety, any fears, the feebleness of our tiredness,

just the exhaustion of life.

We just pray we'd wait on you during this time and that Lord, like you say, like

you promised, we'd mount up with wings like eagles that we'd run and not faint.

So restore unto us the joy of our salvation.

And renew a right heart within us.

In Jesus name.

Amen.

Amen.

so we're on to.

The Belt of Truth.

and we're gonna get into it today in 1864, a physician named Igna, SIM Simis.

His name's crazy.

You don't have to remember the name, but remember his story.

Okay, 1864.

That's not that long ago.

This doctor stumbled onto the theory.

We now call germ theory.

. In those days, everyone thought diseases would spontaneously generate in the body

because there was something wrong with the body, like having too much blood.

That's why they had bleed you or getting too hot or something like that.

Fever.

That's where this would come from.

And so doctors would go between patients without ever washing their hands.

They would go from working on a corpse, doing an autopsy to delivering babies.

This was just general practice, and so they would go and they

would never wash their hands.

It was believed in those days also that a gentleman's hands didn't need

washing because they were already clean.

Crazy, right.

That's a, that's wrong culture.

Yeah, a cultural blind spot.

So doc doctors would go from working on the corpse of a dead person to

delivering a baby, which is why death rates in hospitals were so incredibly.

I mean, it was like at 40%.

So this doctor began to suspect that they were carrying diseases with them in small

particles, invisible to the human eye.

He didn't know what to call them, so he called them microbes.

literally it's translated little pieces of flesh microbes.

That's where the word comes from.

It seems so obvious to us now looking back, but nobody

in those days thought that.

He tested his theory by having just the interns wash their hands with

water and a little chlorine before delivering babies, and found the

mortality rates went down dramatically.

But even then, the doctors wouldn't accept the theory because the idea

that all this destruction was caused by something you couldn't see.

just seemed unbelievable to them.

We can't see it.

It can't be, there's no point.

it can't be that something we can't see causes so much destruction.

At a famous conference, this doctor pleaded with these doctors, gentlemen.

For God's sake, please just wash your hands.

But nobody listened for about two decades until Luis Pastor,

which we all know him, came along.

Even his own wife didn't believe him, and he died in an asylum.

Thought to be a crazy man.

Wow.

Yeah, because he saw all the death in the destruction around him,

and he was calling it out and everybody thought he was a fool.

We can't see it.

It can't happen.

We can't see it.

It can't happen.

Many Christians can be as equally naive when we talk about spiritual warfare when

it comes to what's happening in their.

Because they're disbelieving of what they can't see.

That's where our wrestle, that's where our battle is.

We wrestle not against flesh and blood.

not in the physical, but in the spiritual realm, right?

Mm-hmm.

. Andy Stanley says that if you wanna see the evidence for the spiritual

realm, you won't find it by looking through a microscope, but by

looking in the rear view mirror.

The rear view mirror of your life, right?

Can't you look back and see how certain temptations were just too perfect.

You know, it's Joseph in the book of Genesis.

he's this young, strong man and pot's wife, makes sure everybody's

out, and then she comes on to him, like it's just too perfect.

A set of circumstances perfectly timed and specifically tailored for you.

It's way.

Been merely coincidental, right?

How the wrong person was put into your life at just the right time.

I performed, that's actually how I met my wife up at a camp, church camp, a skit

in Japanese because me and my brother wanted to be missionaries to Japan.

And so, , uh, suicide is a crazy thing in Japan because if a student fails,

he doesn't get into the right school, he's not gonna get the good job.

It's an honor culture.

And so the parents look down on the student, the students look down

on themselves and their suicide rate is insane in Japan because

of that perf perfect standard they try to set for themselves and

the parents set for their kids.

So anyways, we did a skit about suicide.

We did it in Japanese and cuz the whole point of the camp.

trying to, show kids like, you don't have to wait to be older,

to be used by God, and that, that was the whole point of camp.

but anyways, I met my wife after that.

That was amazing.

But a counselor came up to me and she was like, Your temptation's

gonna increase a hundred percent.

The Lord gave me a word for you.

I was like, okay.

Weird.

And then there was this girl at the camp who I thought was pretty cute, but,

outta my league kind of thing and stuff.

Well, then she became obsessed with me at the camp, wrote my name on her

stomach, burned it in with a lighter, and, and just was like, it's like the

movie Fatal Attraction or something.

it was bad, but like a sheep to his shearers is, I was dumb and I

was like, oh wow, this is awesome.

It can't be that word that God gave me, And she had one thing on her mind, and

I remember, going to a park with her, I was gonna minister to her as getting, you

know, know, missionary dating, disciple of her in the trenches, as we would call it.

And I remember it was a bad situation.

I was in and with her and we were alone and everything and it was crazy.

And we are at this park and it's dark and all of a sudden the sprinklers came on.

and I was like, God, we rescued me.

And, we ended the, and the relationship ended, but too perfect a situation.

Nothing against her, like nothing.

Huh?

I said, maybe all right.

amazing.

but it was just like this so dialed to the point where some stranger was

told by God, you need to warn this kid.

And warned me.

It was like too perfect of a situation that sit back and observe as soon as

like taking a stand, doing something.

Hey, we can, we're not gonna let people despise our youth.

We're gonna be used by Jesus.

and, And that temptation comes.

And, and there's other times where God's tried to rescue, me in the

midst of it and I've been too dumb.

the wrong person was put into your life at just the right time or the

right question was planted into your head to throw you off track.

Did God really say, does God really care about this?

Does he really value.

Doesn't he want this for you?

Or the suspicion in your heart came at just the right time?

Maybe God doesn't want what's best for me.

Maybe God forgot.

Maybe this is punishment, suspicion just a little bit.

Or the perfect storm seemed to happen in an important relationships to really

drive a wedge between you, like something at work or something in a marriage.

Something like this perfect storm that just like.

Your number right on it.

The very thing you know to drive a wedge to break you.

Paul concludes the Book of Ephesians by reminding them of the presence

of these spiritual forces, an attempt to churn them once again

away from trusting in themselves.

And a trust in God.

The whole point of Ephesians is to lean into the strength, the sovereignty.

The divinity, the holiness, the omnipotence.

The omniscience of.

Are good God.

He's telling us to pray that we might see it and taste it with spiritual taste buds.

He's praying that we might expand our capacity for his love, like over and over.

He's saying this is the whole point.

And so by presenting these spiritual forces that are powerful and strong,

he's saying once again, don't leave this book going out into your own.

Because that would be the worst sermon ever.

He's like, I don't want you to treat this like a typical western religious

sermon where it's like, cool, I found out some cool facts about God.

I understand the Greek word and the Aris tense, and now I've got the knowledge.

And now tell me the three things I have to do to better my marriage,

now I'm gonna go do it in my own strength, and I'm gonna try really hard.

Paula say, Guys, the whole point is that you're not only facing the world, which

he talked about in chapter two, the flesh, and then now you're also facing the

spiritual forces that want to destroy you.

Do not move out from the presence of God.

Stand firm in him.

Do not move beyond the gospel of what he's done.

Stand in it firm.

That's your foundation.

That's the house that is built on the rock.

You taking the sermon upon yourself to do it and to do the

PowerPoints or the key things that's building your house on the sand.

That's man's might and man's strength.

And he says, no, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.

. You cannot be strong in yourself and strong in God.

And it is only when you sense your weakness that you will be strong in God.

So God beautifully, we're all, we're like, why trials?

Why trials?

Why is it so hard?

Why storms isn't it so often to reveal your weakness and his strength

aren't trials to undermine your self?

the, I could do it.

I, we just watched the shows this last week and it's Peter walking on water.

It's incredible.

and Peter gets his eyes on the storm.

He's I got this.

and the whole point is like Jesus says, no, I got you.

I've got you.

I'm the Lord of the storm.

I'm the Lord of the storm.

All through our lives, the storms that come in are to show that he is faithful

to rescue, that he is faithful to save,

even when we feel like we're out in the middle of nowhere, that we're vulnerable,

that he is a mighty fortress, that he is our shield, he is our strength.

He is.

Sustenance.

he is everything.

And so trials, God allows these things when it talks about perfecting your

faith, that over and over you see that he's faithful even when we're not.

Yeah.

I think the desire for, the pill, the spiritual pill, it, you could see it

in like the whole weight loss industry, which is find the right diet, this

is the one, and people are promising you, this is the one, the self-help

industry is a billion dollar industry.

the whole thing that they combat in the first century is mysticism, which

was like, Hey, Jesus is cool, but.

, don't you really want to get spiritual?

We'll take you, we'll give you the five secret principles.

We'll give you the deeper knowledge.

more than, yeah, because of Christ, you love him.

Don't you really wanna learn live for him?

And it's this, here's what you do.

It's pushing religion into Christianity.

The thing about Christianity is we gotta remember, and what flies in the face

of our Western culture is Christianity is not about going from weakness to.

. That's not maturity.

It's going from strength to weakness.

that's Christianity, that's the gospel.

That's the upside down nature of it.

it's increasing more my dependence every day.

What's crazy is the baby.

Christian and the Christian who's walked for 40 years.

It's not so much about time is what time does to cause dependence.

And so maturity isn't, I've, graduated seminary, I have x a

number of years I've got this.

It's those who linger long in the presence of God.

That's maturity.

And for me early on I'm like had those moments where I'm like abiding and I just.

, the Lord and I'm there and he's talking to me about Hey, I pass up that trash.

he's I felt like God was like pressing my conscience.

oh yeah.

Like little things like that.

It was like every part of my life was feel, but then I would run out ahead

and I would go in my self-sufficiency.

I would go, okay, I got it.

Okay.

Here's what you say about purity.

Here's the verses.

I'm gonna say, I'm gonna go out and try my own, and I fall flat on my face.

Why doesn't it work?

because I've left my strength, I've moved from abiding, depending on him as

the source of my joy, the source of my strength, that he's my greatest desire.

to conquer a desire, you need a greater desire, and that's

just in every sphere of life.

and when you sit in that, when you linger in that, when the Holy Spirit's preaching

to your heart daily, it was ch Persian.

I did a biography on.

And he said that over the past, like 40 years, he hadn't gone more than 10

minutes out of fellowship with Jesus.

That's mind blowing.

So he would just, he'd catch himself.

Wait a minute, something's weird, and, like when you go over to

somebody's home, you're so used to the smell in your own home, right?

And then you go over to somebody's home and you're like, oh, that's what

the zeto smell like, Or, you guys say, oh, that's what the calor smell like.

It's a mixture of pets and kids and children and, all of it.

It's like that he would go into an environment and go, oh wait,

this isn't where the Lord is.

but just that knowledge, that intimate relationship.

But he said the way that he got there was through drum roll.

Suffering.

Yeah.

Suffering.

So there's, because we didn't wanna hear that . What suffering

refines out of us is self.

And our own attempt at Righteousness, it reveals that we are weak.

It reveals that we can't swim against the storm no matter if we've, like Peter,

been a fisherman and grew up on the lake, that we cannot triumph over the storm.

We need the Lord of the storm in our boat.

that's maturity.

Maturity recognizes Jesus is the Lord of the storm and I'm not.

And you learn the Lord's heart like the Lord.

Cause suffering, but he redeems it.

He hates evil.

He hates suffering.

It's one of the reasons he came back.

Yes, but he will use suffering our lives to accomplish the exact

opposite of what the enemy wants to accomplish through suffering.

The enemy thinks if they suffer, they're gonna abandon you because

they only love you because things are good and cushy like he told Joe.

Look at Job, and God said, you can do this much.

And he only allows the exact opposite of what Satan is trying

to accomplish, which is the defeat of evil in Satan, which is amazing.

And that it ultimately serves our joy in the end.

when he wipes every tear from our eyes, to see him triumph, to see him glorious,

to see him rescue us over and over.

we'll get to it, but like we need to see every day.

The Lord is my.

Like I shall not want like he leads me, right?

though I walked through the valley of the shadow of death.

Thou art with me.

You're Rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Like you've prepared for me, a table in the presence of my enemies.

like we need the Lord all the way through every step of the way.

We don't go, okay, God, I'm trained.

Launch me out.

It's no.

Everything's about being in him abiding, being like he is our strength.

and Paul reminds us of that here, be strong in the Lord and

in the strength of his mind.

One of the ways that we know that if we're strong in ourself, are strong in God.

And this is just so undoing.

So I'll move through this quickly cuz I don't want this to be

too convicting, for me, is.

Prayer pulses in verse 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.

He says in every situation, what is prayer?

Prayer is that.

Our communicating that we need, God, we need his rescue.

We're we're confused.

We don't know what to do.

Making supplication we're misaligned.

We begin to think and we begin to tell him how beautiful he is over

the things that our hearts are fondling currently at the moment.

Paul Miller.

Amazing book called The Praying Life.

He said, according to Jesus, acknowledging our neediness opens the

door to genuine and lasting happiness.

Religion usually talks about what a person has to do, but Jesus

talks about what we can't do.

Very important how we read.

When Jesus is talking, he says that our weakness, not our power, or what

we bring to God, enables us to know God, our weakness, not our power.

We have an allergic reaction to dependency.

But this is the state of the heart most necessary for a praying life.

A needy heart is a praying, heart dependency is the heartbeat of prayer.

If you're not praying you are quietly confident that time, money, and talent

are all you need in life, you'll always be a little too tired, a little too busy.

But if like Jesus, you realize you can't do life on your own, then no

matter how busy, no matter how tired you are, you will find time to pray up.

And so he is just saying that shows our neediness, our dependency.

Lord, I don't know what to do in this situation.

Rolling up.

God, I'm exhausted today, but I know you say that I am.

The be great in your kingdom is to be the servant of all.

Help me gimme strength to serve.

Let me see how you've served me.

Like just that continual prayer life, that continual talking to

the Lord, the tasting good food.

Lord, that's amazing.

Like talking to him all the time about everything.

That ongoing communication, how do we appropriate God's strengthen our lives.

Armor and the belt of truth.

The armor Paul tells us the environment we do god's work in is

not a playground, but a battleground.

It's not vacation.

it's, it's a battle.

I remember, two missionaries were coming home, from Africa and they

happened to be on the same boat that Teddy Roosevelt was coming home

on a safari that he had just done.

And so as they pull in, they had spent their entire lives,

they were retiring, their old.

They had nothing to their name.

And as they pull in on this ship, coming back to America, there is a parade.

There is, the band, the big brass band plane, there's banners all

celebrating Teddy Roosevelt, he's come back, he's been victorious.

he's killed lions, and stuffed them,

wow.

Look at our president.

It's so cool.

And everyth.

And as everybody cleared, as he got driven away, as everybody just dissipated,

these missionaries had one suitcase to their name and they were left alone.

Nobody picked them up.

They made their way with what little changes they had,

and they got a hotel room.

and they were gonna try to figure out where do we go from here?

And the husband had just had enough.

He'd been like, I can't believe that we have given our lives to God.

We have spin ourselves, for his kingdom and his work.

And, uh, not one single person was there to welcome us home.

What's up with that?

He probably didn't say, what's up with that ? He's so frustrated and his

wife like, like wives are off to do.

Corrected his vision and said, but honey, we're not home yet.

We're not home yet.

That's good.

We're pilgrims.

We're not home yet.

this isn't where we get that welcome.

This isn't where we get that celebration, where we get that parade that's

coming that and from God himself.

It's a, the angels are a much greater brass band than the best brass band.

And I like spa music, but man, I like the super tones.

But man, being welcomed into heaven and having the King of Kings and

the Lord of Lords himself look at you and say, well done now.

Good un faithful servant.

Come enter into my joy.

Let's celebrate.

Let's feast, let party.

It's gonna be, everything.

Yes.

So it reminds us that's coming and it Sure.

The Holy Spirit is the guarantee God has has written our names in the Lambs

book of life, not in a pencil where he is gonna erase it depending on what you do.

But by his blood, he's engraved you on the palms of his hands.

You are ever before him.

It's no mistake after talking about what the Christian life is to be, that he

gets us to this spiritual battle imagery.

Wherever God's people join God's work of redeeming and renewing in every

sphere of life, the enemy will oppose.

No Saint is.

Wherever marriages are built up, families are made healthy places of

work infiltrated with loving servants, churches that love each other and

demonstrate that through love, that we are really Jesus' disciples to the

watching world where cities are loved and served and prayed for, where just

injustices and fought and mercy wins the day the enemy will oppose that work.

He's okay with.

Stasis static.

He's okay.

And he likes when we're just on coast, he doesn't like the people who are taking a

stand, standing in the Lord's strength.

He doesn't, he, he'd rather it.

Lukewarm, you're neither hot or cold, you're not causing all this and stuff.

And Yeah.

you don't get involved in other people's business.

You just mine your own business.

You've got, eternal insurance.

you're, you're just, yeah, you're g He loves that.

He loves that.

The danger about the lukewarm church is that Jesus is trying to

get in and break bread with you.

You know, he's like, Hey, the whole Christianity thing is about

us, me and you sharing and sitting at the table in fellowship.

, right?

Therefore, take up the whole armor of God.

Or we put on the whole armor of God that you may be able to stand

against the schemes of the devil.

Verse 13, 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 and giving the spiritual armor,

Paul is not introducing a new theme.

He hasn't.

Covered yet in Ephesians.

Now, each of the pieces of armor is simply a way of applying the gospel

that he's been teaching for six chapters through Ephesians to different per life.

He, in essence, is saying, let the gospel be all over you, your head.

Your heart, your waist, your hands, your feet.

When we become a Christian, there's a sense in which we have all the

blessing and power and privileges and benefits that are Christ.

In another sense.

We've been learning this whole time in which we need to

appropriate it to put it on.

Their stories about people who've been given an inheritance and their bank

account is got millions of dollars in it, and yet they're evicted because they.

Draw on what they have.

They live like poppers.

They live like they're poor.

They live in that old time kind of way.

that they grew up in, scarcity mindset, and and they won't literally

draw on what belongs to them.

They have the card running, it's yours, and, And, and so Paul is

saying, we need to put this on, right?

It's yours, and this armor's pretty amazing.

Now just put it on and we're gonna talk about what that means.

We have it, we need to put it on to bring what we have in Jesus

into the core of who we are.

The gospel is the power of God, in your life.

Romans one and the way God reverses the corruption of sin and repels

the power of Satan from you.

So Paul's urging the Ephesians to take the things he taught them about God

and cover every part of them with it.

Leave no part out.

. The way we keep the corrupting influences the enemy out of our lives is by

establishing every part of our life, our hopes, our dreams, our failures, our

worries, our fears, our relationships, our pleasures, our disappointments.

on the good news of Jesus on the gospel of what he's done.

The flip side of this is that whatever part of you is not established in the

gospel, whether that's your marriage, your job, your dreams, whatever part is

not saturated in that gospel, identity is subject to manipulation of the enemy.

Against you.

I think we all know this, right?

Let the gospel cover your head and your feet and your waist and your chest.

That's the armor.

Because when something is covered by fortified in the

gospel, Satan can't touch it.

You're strong in your identity, you're putting it on you, you're

thinking about it, and we're gonna talk about how that works with truth.

The armor of God puts stress on the fact that this is not

something we have naturally.

It's the armor of God.

It's from God.

It's his armor.

It's something that has been provided to us as a gift to us.

It's not something we muster.

It's not something that we get after, going to seminary.

Hey, you've got your, your degree and now you can wear the armor.

I don't know.

I, growing up in youth ministry, we'd always have youth pastors trying

to explain the armor and I, it was so abstract and I was like, okay.

I I don't get it.

What does it mean?

Put it on, and so I'd be like, in my room, I'm like, uh, my dad would always

say, I dunno if you saw Batman in 1989 by Tim Burton, but, his car was so cool.

he'd just say, shields up.

And the shields,. So my dad would always say that when he'd pray, he'd

be like, Lord, we're going out today.

Shields up,, and we'd all make the noise, you know, what is this mean to put it on?

But first of all, it's from the Lord.

I told you guys, let's look at Isaiah 59.

I'm just gonna read it in the message.

and listen, look, listen.

God's arm is not amputated.

He can still save.

God's ears are not stopped still.

There's nothing wrong with God.

The wrong is in you.

Your wrong-headed lives cause the split between you and your God.

Your sins got between you so that he doesn't hear.

Your hands are drenched in blood.

Your fingers dripping with guilt.

Your lips smeared with lies.

Your tongues swollen from muttering obscenities.

No one speaks up for the right.

No one deals fairly.

They trust an illusion.

They tell lies.

They get pregnant with mischief and have sin.

They hatch snake eggs and weave spiderwebs.

Eat an egg and die, break an egg and get a snake.

The spiderwebs are no good for shirts or shawls.

No one can wear these weavings.

They weave wickedness.

They hatch violence.

They compete in the race to do evil and run to be first to murder.

They plan and plot evil, think and breathe evil.

They leave a trail of, wrecked lives behind them.

They know nothing about peace unless than nothing about justice.

They make torturously twisted roads, no peace for the wretch who walks down

these roads explaining a very dire situ.

A very dire city, a very dire state, which means that they far cry from fair dealing,

and we're not even close to right living.

We long for light, but sink into darkness.

Long for brightness, but stumble through the night.

Like the blind, we inch along a wall groping Islas in the dark.

We shuffle our way in broad daylight like the dead, but somehow walking,

we're no better than the bears groaning.

No worse than the doves moaning.

We look for justice.

Not a sign of it for salvation.

Not so much as a hint looking at their own people to save their own strength.

To save.

Our wrongdoings pile up before you.

God, our sins stand up and accuse us.

So not only are they in a dire way, no, not only can their own strength not save

them, but they're choosing the darkness.

The crookedness of the God is seeing that and he's.

Going to give an answer to it.

Our wrong di wrongdoings pilot before you.

God, our sins stand up and accuse us our wrongdoing stare us down.

We know in detail what we've done, mocking and denying God not following our God.

Spreading false rumors, whipping up, revolt, pregnant

with lies, muttering, malice.

Justice is beaten back.

Righteousness is banished to the sidelines.

Truth staggers down the street.

Honesty is nowhere to be found.

God is missing an action.

Anyone renouncing evil is beaten and Robb.

And so that's the situation.

This kind of is a biography of all of our salvations.

This is the, no one wants God, no one seeks for him in Romans three, this is the

realistic portrayal of a life separated from God, a life who tries on its own to

sustain itself, to be self-sufficient.

To be self-righteous.

That's out for its own.

That's out to decide this is where truth is coming from.

This is where I get pleasure.

this is right and this is wrong.

And in the whole scheme of it, God looks at it and all it's

doing is piling up wrath for the day of judgment, righteousness

is banished to the sidelines.

verse 15, God looked and saw evil looming on the horizon.

So much evil on no sign of.

He couldn't believe what he saw, not a soul around to

correct this awful situation.

And isn't that the state?

Can't we all testify to that?

Not as much as we wanted it, no matter our strength, you know all the

false messiahs in the past, all the religious systems in history could

never save, could never lift a finger, could never change the human heart.

So he did it himself.

Took on the work of salvation.

He dressed in righteousness, put it on like a suit of armor with

salvation on his head, like a helmet put on judgment like an overcoat.

And he threw a cloak of passion across his shoulders, which is such

a beautiful description of his zeal for saving you, his desire to save.

He'll make everyone pay for what they've.

Fury for his foes, just desserts for his enemies.

Even the far off islands will get paid off in full.

Nothing escapes his eyes in the west, they'll fear the name of God in the east.

They'll fear the glory of God for he'll arrive like a river in a fled stage,

whipped to a torrent by the wind of God.

I'll arrive in Zion as redeemer to those in Jacob who leave their

sins, God's decree as for me, God says, this is my covenant.

Within my spirit that I've placed upon you and the words that I've given you to

speak, they're not going to leave your mouth and the mouths of your children

nor the mouth of your grandchildren.

You'll keep repeating these words and won't ever stop God's orders.

And so he says, I'm gonna go to battle.

I'm going to clove.

With righteousness as a breastplate, the helmet on my head as salvation.

I'm in ager myself up with armor and not a single person who's done

wrong will be able to stand against the holy glory of almighty God.

And Jesus comes onto the scene.

Yeah.

And people ask him, where's your army?

He tells Peter, when Peter draws a sword, put it away.

That's not how we.

And he goes to the cross and he wins.

By losing his righteousness that he wore became our righteousness, the salvation

that he provided, that he went to battle and he accomplished it so crazy.

And then, We see it there.

No one escapes.

No one escapes God's righteous, holy judgment upon sin because sin is evil,

wicked, and twisted, and God is holy and just, and there has to be an answer to it.

And Jesus stepped in and he bore that answer.

He took the punishment, he.

Took the legal wrath for what I deserved from a Holy God

I love that verse because it's like even where you think God doesn't see, even when

you've forgotten, he remembers and elated on Jesus's shoulders so that you could

be redeemed, so that you could be made right, so that you could be forgiven, so

that you could be brought back into Eden walking with God in the cool of the day.

Family restored.

He bought us back.

He redeemed us by the blood, by his blood that he shed as he suffered in our place.

Jesus won the victory that day.

Yeah, he put that armor on, and so when he is talking about the armor,

he is not talking about an armor we muster, but he's talking about the

armor, that gospel armor that he wears.

That it's a foreign righteousness that's given to us to protect our

heart, to protect our conscience.

We'll talk about that next week, that the helmet of salvation, that we are to have

that, that we are new creations in Christ.

The oldest pass away, behold everything's become new.

That faith in who he is, however small it is, and however big the dart is,

we'll quench the fiery darts of the.

If it's faith in him and what he's done and what he declares

to be real, the belt of truth.

get into and talk about these things, but guys, this isn't something

you must, or it's not okay, I'm putting the, it is recognizing

what he's already accomplished.

The gospel is good news about what's been done, not advice of what you have to do.

The armor of God is not advice about what you have to do.

It's appropri.

What has already been done and what has already been, won for

you at the cross of Jesus Christ.

For fight in the resurrection, in the empty tomb, it is

appropriating the work of Jesus Now as he intercedes on our behalf.

Doesn't sleep, doesn't slumber, but sees it intercedes as that faithful

high priest that we can come to boldly and find grace in the time of.

That he is gentle and he's lowly of heart, that he's drawn to our failures, that he's

drawn to our weakness, that he's drawn to.

Those times when we're so frustrated at the brokenness of this world

and the brokenness that we do to others, that he's constantly moving

towards us and not away from us.

that's what we're.

Taking everything that he won for us.

We're putting that on.

And that's how you're protected.

That's how you're strong is when the gospel is ging your loins, when

the gospel is protecting your heart.

when your mind is saturated in your new identity, when you believe what God says

is true, when you believe that he's the authority in this world, and you could

say, yeah, this is what I want to do, or this is what you say is true, but it is.

It is written.

It is written that this is what God says is true.

This is how he made the universe.

And he is my authority.

He is my king.

He is my Lord.

He is the captain of my salvation.

so like it is putting these things on and what God has done.

So it's another way of him saying, be who I made to.

Yeah, live it lid outta who I made you.

I, at the beginning of the study of Ephesians, we talked about the kid who

was never good in school and then he took the SATs and he scored one of the

highest scores you can get in the SATs.

And he is geez, that's crazy.

I actually get my life together.

I didn't know I was the smart.

And so then he became an entrepreneur and he built a business and everything.

20 years later, he got his real score.

They had mixed him up.

He got some other kids'.

But just the idea that this is who you are.

You are not this, you are, this transformed his life.

Now, that's a goofy story about an S A T.

This is Jesus Christ Saint.

This is who I've made you.

Now you are a child of God.

You are not a human being that I have made a little.

You were dead and I've made you alive.

You've been born again.

You have a new nature.

Not a reformed nature, not a remodeled nature.

A new nature.

Yes, powerful.

The oldest passed away.

Everything's become new.

You are a child of God.

I'm no longer a slave to fear.

I am a child of God.

That is like what we need to sing every day and.

appropriating the gospel.

We don't, the gospel's not the ABCs, it's the A to Z.

You don't move beyond the gospel into deeper theology.

The gospel is the deeper theology.

Your life will be spli spent, meditating, chewing, tasting, thinking, thinking

out the implications like a accountant Wayne, or as Paul uses reckoning.

filling out the ledger, weighing it, letting that reality of what God says is

true the more we move out and that the more we stand in, that we stand in it.

That's where the victory is because the Victory's already been won in the gospel.

So Isaiah 1115 says, and also righteousness will be the belt

about his loins and faithfulness the belt about his waste.

So again, all this is something that God does and something God gives.

It's not something you dredge up or you go to Bible school to earn.

It doesn't come at the end of four years after you.

It will each in every Christian, but you must appropriate it.

Put on the gospel that's already yours.

Take the various benefits and resources you have in the gospel

and not just believe in them intellectually, but use them.

But use them.

Tim Keller says that if you really believed for a day

that God loved you, no matter what you.

And you couldn't get more of his love and you couldn't lose it.

That he loves you fully and completely.

That you would live a different life.

A different life.

Why?

Because I don't have to worry cuz God loves me.

If we really leaned into that one little fact, like I don't have to be anxious.

because this is passed through the nail scar hands of Jesus.

He's sovereign.

He sits on his throne.

So like this, if he loves me, then he knows what's best for me.

He knows what's good.

So I can just be at peace.

I can like, see how transformative that is.

Even that little decision can come from a place of our gospel identity because

like I would, I often try to do so much because I want to please everybody.

Yeah.

What happens is, And then I end up failing everybody, which then I spiral and I

go into this ah, man, I'm worthless.

And this whole thing, that's one of my struggles.

So it's an identity issue.

It's an identity issue because if I believe that I am already,

loved and adored that like I've been approved, that whole part of

the gospel being applied to the.

the wrong, the, that which was deficient in my heart.

I think we all have something like at the root of everything, that everything

springs, we could look the same fruit.

where it could be anxiety, maybe I've got anxiety, but it's because I fear

that, somebody's not gonna validate me.

Where my wife, she could have anxiety cuz she doesn't have control of the situation.

So the root is different, the fruit looks the same, but really it's the

gospel that then applies to the root that kills all the fruit, the bad

fruit, And so for me, I remember.

being rejected in a sense.

And that's my, greatest fear is, so this group of guys, they went on a

trip, I was excluded and I remember my heart was just like devastated

and torn and I wanted to like, just, oh, these were supposed to be family.

All this stuff, I'm the redheaded stepchild, although I don't have red hair.

it.

Just, all I could see is myself.

Oh.

And then I started questioning my personality.

Oh man, I'm flawed, I'm an outsider.

I'm all the, I don't fit and all this.

And it was like, I, it was one of those moments where Lord was showing

me this and all of a sudden I went, why are you cast down on my soul?

Yeah.

And I started preaching to my heart, and I think this is like

putting the gospel armor on, and I said, You quieted the opinion.

I said the only circle that your desire for validation and fear of rejection, the

only circle that really mattered matters.

that other circle you want to be in is just an echo that will never satisfy.

Yep.

You didn't deserve to be in that circle.

You chose to remove yourself from it.

You ran from it.

But God left that circle and he.

Died to bring you in.

He validated you through his validation and you'll never pull it away.

I can't tell you like right then and.

I just started worshiping.

I was healed.

Like I'm in the circle . I'm never gonna be rejected, accepted.

He will never leave us or forsake us no matter what.

All of a sudden now I don't have to worry about my personality, my performance.

Was I good enough?

Did I bring in enough of this?

Am I a good enough teacher?

Or am I funny enough?

Like all that analyzation that's just destroys you.

It was like, I'm accepted.

I'm accepted in heaven above, and that is invincible, and that's

where my identity is, and that's putting that gospel armor on.

And now this area where the enemy wanted to drive a wedge and he

could have done it if I would've stayed in myself in my own armor.

Now.

Now I would've pulled back from those relationships.

I would've been colder, indifferent, or I would've tried to get

back or passive aggressive.

All of a sudden, division starts to happen.

Now I can just love my brothers because I've been accepted, I've been loved,

I've been brought in, and now I can look for ways to bring them in cuz

I know how it feels to be excluded.

But that's not against them.

Now I get to bring them in and bring other people in.

I get to go to the highways and byways and expand the

circle, and bring people before.

that's the armor wear.

That's like putting it on.

And that all of a sudden, that arrow was quenched, it was destroyed.

The attack and the schemes of the enemy was done away with.

Now there's, I could tell you 10 other stories of where the lion

ravaged me and pulled me out of the circle, and had his way.

but again, Christ rescues, he redeems, we talked about prayer

where Paul prays for the Ephesians and he says, open the eyes of their.

that they might see this expand their capacity, give them power

to comprehend with all the saints, the height, the width, the depth,

and the breadth of the love of God.

, so like we can't just.

Move out in our own strength and go, God loves me.

God loves me and tell ourselves 10 times.

We literally need the Holy Spirit himself to preach to us.

Yes, and a heart to receive it, and a dependence that even in that, he

would be strong for us because we're gonna bump up against the situation

we're just telling ourselves.

it's not enough.

We need the Holy Spirit to take up the word of God and to breathe the fire that

it is into our hearts, So even in that, we move out independence, it's crazy.

It's Lord, I want to believe this.

Help my unbelief Lord, when I don't believe it, will you catch me?

Yeah.

And can we like get back to the, can we get back to the race?

Emotions are like musical instruments, They, you need the notes, right?

You need somebody to write the music.

Yeah.

But that's the expression of the notes.

So emotions are given to us to express ourselves like in worship and passion

and zeal and these things like, like God doesn't make us satton robots

where we just, I will, I'll Barry, he wants zeal, he wants like people who

like, Love him because he loves us in the same way and we're made in his

image and we reflect that God isn't a robot where he is like, I love you.

I will send my son to die for you.

we will spend a million years together.

You know he is zealous for you.

He is zealous for your joy.

He is passionate.

It says like it gave them great pleasure to.

To choose you before the foundation of the world.

God's yeah, let's get junior.

Jesus.

Junior, Christina, let's get, let's do it.

Excited to save.

Yeah.

To choose you, to bring you into his family.

and yeah, but we need the notes.

two points on that or is the psalmist, he's constantly talking

about, he delights in the law of.

. Yeah.

he meditate.

It's on it day and night, like it's sweet to him.

Like honey, what he's saying there is he saying, you're my authority.

Yeah.

And that's where I find my delight is when you are in charge, God.

Yeah.

When what you says is say is true.

There was a lady who Andrew's mom actually was talking to in counseling who.

He committed adultery and Andrew's mom was trying to point out to her in scripture.

You're like, this is what the Lord says about this here and here.

And she's oh, a sweetheart.

those are for me.

, not somebody who's picking and choosing, not somebody who's I like this part.

I don't like this part.

, it would be like if I said, I love Andrea, but not Nicole, Kayla.

I can't take part of her.

I, if I, Tom comes into my house, Tom, you can come in, but leaves

the noodle out there like it's red.

Ridiculous.

You can't separate the person.

Like you can't pick and choose.

it's, it's, he's everything.

He's the king.

like we.

. And then finally, is, CS Lewis and the Chronicles in Narnia.

The kids are about, the beavers are telling the kids, Hey, you're about

to meet Aslan and, such and such, getting him ready for the meeting.

And then it comes out that he's a lion, and they're like, wait a minute.

Aslan's a lion.

he's nice.

He's gentle, right?

And she's, and the beaver's what?

No, he's a lion.

He's terrifying.

He's terrifying.

But he's.

, and I love that because CS Lewis captures God is powerful.

He's not your, he's not like a bud.

He's not even a man who's better than you.

He is the un caused cause.

He holds the atoms and the molecules and the palms of his hand.

He speaks and brings about the laws of nature.

He's on the ocean and then the fury of the waves and the storm

and the lightning of the thunder.

He says, be quiet.

And it obeys him.

It bows to him.

And so too, should we, but he's.

He's good and all that power is used for your joy and his glory.

Not to punish.

Not to wrath you, not to manipulate the situation to cause un purposed suffering.

It is for your good.

It is for your joy.

And we submit in his goodness and his glory.

He is our authority and our lives are right.

They fit, they're right.

When we live under that authority, that what he says goes that he's our authority.

Not popular culture, not popular opinion, not, the morality of the day, which

is constantly changing, but what he says is true, even if it's unpopular.

So that's that idea.

He's ferocious, but he's good.

Let's end on that.

So we'll get to the Belt of Truth next week.

But we want to take communion now, again, just thinking about this armor that the

Lord gerd up and you wouldn't, again, it would be crazy to go into battle

and to let that be stripped off of you.

But think about it, as second Corinthians 5 21 says, God made him sin to become sin.

Why?

That we might become the righteousness of God and Him.

Yes, guys.

That's incredible.

That's incredible.

Like he took your place.

You can't ever get over that.

impeded it says, Hey, we should be maturing.

These things should be happening in our life.

If it's not, , then it's because we've become shortsighted under blindness.

Forgetting that we've been forgiven from our sins.

Yes.

Like part of our victory is standing and that's why Jesus gave it to us.

Over and over.

Every time you're together, you're eating or drinking.

Remember, my body broken for you so you could become whole My bloodshed

so that you could be forgiven.

Why?

Because, as we learn in the vagus, without the shedding of

blood, there's no remission.

A sense why Levis also tells us, because the life is in the.

It was a visible symbol of a life being exchanged for a life.

The cross is so bloody because it's a visible symbol that the very son

of God had to die in your place.

For you to have peace today, yes, for you to have a renewed heart,

for you to have eternal life.

. But the gospel also tells us that he was glad to do it.

That he was the willing lamb, who was perfect man, who was slain on our behalf.

So by his wounds, we're healed, right?

So Jesus loves you.

He's for you.

He's provided everything you need for life and godliness, and.

Anticipates that we would lean into him, that we would realize our

weakness even before we get out of bed.

Go.

I've probably blown it, I'm already thinking, I'm already getting stressed.

Re oh, capture my heart.

Let me put that helmet on load.

Thank you for salvation.

The salvation that's invincible, that Satan himself can't pluck

us out of the father's hand.

I'm safe.

I'm secure.

No matter what happens today, heaven is my home.

That's my destiny to be with you forever.

Thank you.

Boom.

Get outta bed.

Better than a cup of coffee, right?

Oh yeah.

Plant your feet in the preparation of the gospel of peace, right?

You're like, here we go.

We're gonna go minister.

The good news.

We get to tell people good news.

The prophets had to tell people bad news.

We get to be like the new prophets who get to tell good news to a hungry and

thirsty and weary and broken world.

And no matter how much they look on the outside when they hear the

gospel, because it's a power that they're just like, oh, that's duh.

There's something reverberating in their heart that says,

you've been made for that.

It's true.

It's true.

Let's remember.

Jesus, let's remember.

let's lean into him.

Let's be evermore dependent.

Let's, make it the goal to recognize our weakness this week.

Let him search us and know us.

Yeah.

So that we would be like little children.

And lean on to our Abba who's provided everything.

Pray.

father, we thank you for this day.

We thank you for your word.

We thank you for just this book of the Bible.

Lord, we thank you for your good news.

Thank you, man.

Set people free for religion.

set your own people free from religion.

Lord,

what Bad news,

God make us proclaimers of your grace.

You're so good.

There's none like you.

And Lord, we say thank you once again and where our hearts have grown.

A little icy Lord to you for me,

for that substitution, Lord, even as we ingest this bread and this

wine, we pray that, Lord, your good news would, shape our hearts right.

That our souls would be nourished on the lamb that was slain before

the foundation of the world.

So we praise you.

We thank you for today.

In Jesus' name, amen,