How to Pray Yourself into Armor | Ephesians 6:10–20

You're listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a

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That role in is so old, it is, it is

I almost hate to change it. Maybe we can keep this, well,

maybe we can keep the same music and Connor's voice,

but maybe we can just change get a new video. Yeah,

just get a new video.

We should.

Yeah, I think we should. We should, and maybe we

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I guess maybe we're getting We should talk to somebody

about that.

We could literally do it at anytime. We can have

it done by next week. You want to, We just

haven't done it. So anyway, Hey, we are welcome to

the Bible guys. We're in the middle of a series

called Dangerous Prayers. Actually, we're wrapping up this week and

we're wrapping up this week with the with the prayers

of perseverance, and today we're talking about how to rate

yourself into the Armor of God.

This is good. It's a good one like this one.

I'm a fan of this one. Well.

Hey, the segment that we have Desiree has for us

today is called Guess the Word, and so taboo kind

of like taboo. And so the question is, can Chris

guess the keywords that I'm going to give clues to

you about without using the taboo words?

That's right?

Okay, So I have five words that you need to guess.

But hopefully if you're watching online, we're gonna put on

the screen for.

You that I'm not allowed to say on YouTube.

Right, that's right, yep. And then and then you know

your your goal is to race against me, and then

guess them.

That's right.

And there's five of them.

Yes, the uh sort of oh okay, okay, are you ready? Yes, Okay,

here we go. We're gonna start right here. One, two, three.

When you're riding a motorcycle, you need a helmet. There

you go, very good.

Wow.

I wasn't allowed to say head protect, night wear safety okay,

and I said you need a I didn't say you

need to wear yeah, okay.

Oh man. The next one is hard.

Uh you need this to stop arrows shield.

There you go, very good.

It was allowed block defense round captain or protect so

no captain America right right right? Different difficult one, Okay,

this one is hard. You have to run the race, no,

almost marathon no, when when it's a little difficult, it's

difficult and dangerous. You've got to run the when when

they're they're throwing things at you and trying to knock

you down. You got to run the gauntlet. Yes, there

you go, the gauntlet. They're very good. It's where we

keep all the tools of war. Oh yeah, yeah, hand glove, thanos,

iron and war.

Oh that's hilarious. That's hilarious.

Thing so exactly.

So I almost said, uh, where you keep your infinity stones?

I almost said that, but.

Yeah, okay, okay, where you keep your tools of war?

Just oh no, the room, No, the room, the building.

I don't know.

There there's there's there's one on Mound Road in Detroit.

I don't know what this is, like an ammunition place

or something. No, no, no, no, no, no, yeah, almost an

ammunition place.

It's called.

I don't I don't know's.

It's where all the guns would be stored. It's where

all of the you.

Know, I'm not a gun guy because I don't know

these terms.

Yeah no, no, this is their military terms, so I'm

not allowed to say military.

I just realized that messed up.

Oh you blew it? What is it?

Armory, armory, Yes, weapons storage, armory, armor military.

Isn't that so funny? You would have gotten that hard.

Yeah, well there's an armory down the road, like we

have a bunch of people at hair districts at work

at the armory.

That's okay.

And then last one, sorry everybody, then last one.

Uh.

In the Book of Revelation, yes, the devil is described

as a as a thief, as a in the Book

of Revelation, comes up out of the pit.

The enemy.

Oh come on, I'm so so the devil, the devil,

he comes up.

Out of the pit as a she whiz, I'm not

as a flaming.

A flaming, it's a it's a beast.

Dragon.

There you go. It's a hard one. He's a fiery dragon. Yeah,

so say fire wings myth reptile or fantasy.

Now, I know in Revelation they described Mary's birth and

they talk about him being a dragon. But I didn't

know that he comes up out of a fiery pit

as a dragon. It is also the same thing.

It's the same same beast.

Well, I know it's the same beast, but I didn't

know that.

That's yeah.

I'm thinking to myself, like he's described as a and

I'm thinking, gee, whiz, isn't he described a lot of

different ways.

In revelation, but mostly as a dragon?

Okay, dragon escaped me.

Yeah, it's okay, that's okay. That was a good one.

Yes, so are our I'm not as good at getting

the hints out or.

The clues out to you.

No. I thought he did really good except for the

military armory. You slipped on military.

Yeah, the armory. But you know, so.

Our listeners, because I messed up on that one, they

got ten thousand points right there. Wow, that one, just

on that one, y wow, So to be them and

then and then you got four so blessed, So you

got four correct ones.

Is that right?

Yes?

Yeah, so you got four thousand points altogether.

That's good.

So it looks like our listeners beat us.

Yeah, okay, that's what happened. So one mistake Calcassia, Yeah, yeah,

that's the lesson one mistake. Can you lose to win

with one mistake? Okay, there's no redemption, there's no second chances, everybody,

that's right.

So you gotta protect yourself, that's yeah, I guess, yeah,

protect yourself, which you know, the best thing to protect

yourself with his armor.

Oh there, it is right. We need to put on

the armor. There's the horrible transition. You gotta protect yourself

against my penalty points that I made out. That's right.

You know who else needs to protect themselves?

Christians? Christians need the armor.

Hey, you know what you could have done. You could

have talked about arrows and shields.

And was that allowed to say arrows?

Remember you said you need this to protect against arrows

and I said shields. That was one of the uh

and we're talking about the shield of faith.

Oh yeah, right, yeah, you.

Could have done something like that. Yeah, but that's all right.

I did say arrows.

You did. You were allowed to say arrows.

I was allowed to say arrows. Oh okay, yeah, okay.

All right.

So here we are and six verses ten through twenty.

So he says a final word, be strong in the

Lord and in his mighty power. Put on all of

God's armor, so that you'll 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'll 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'll be fully prepared. In addition to all these, hold

up the shield of faith to stop the fiery arrows

of the devil. And 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. And pray for me too.

Ask God to give me the right words so I

can boldly explain God's mysterious plan that the good News

is for Jews and gentiles alike. I'm in chains now

still preaching this message. Is God's ambassador, So I pray

that I will keep on speaking boldly for him as

I should. M h.

So uh. This is obviously one of the coolest passages.

It's one of my favorites to teach kids. Is it

one of your favorite of my favorites.

Uh, it's it's one of the coolest passages to teach

in children's church. You know, you can have a lot

of fun with themes, and you know you can bring in,

uh a piece of armor. You can you have like

a you know, you can buy one of those things,

which we of course, I've bought plenty of those just

for this lesson here. I've dressed up in armor. I've

bought battles in armor. I've done kids camps with armor.

I've done all these sorts of things. And I've actually

seen legitimate armor that I wasn't a part of in church,

but actually I've seen it in the castle where you know,

the actual uh you know, true you know thing that

was created for battle and uh. And it's interesting how

in the first entry, of course, Paul would have written

this and every single person would understand what these mean.

It's just so symbolic, right, Yeah, so that you know,

the the shoes of the Gospel of peace. Wait a minute, no,

it's what is it? The shoes of Yeah, is the

gospel piece. And then the shield of faith, the helmet

of salvation, the breastplate of righteousness, Uh, the gird about

your loins with faith? And then what also am I missing?

The sword of the Word of God? Right?

Yes?

So is that it?

Did?

That cover everything?

Sounds like it. Faith is is your shield?

Yep? Yeah, and and and so they're all symbolic because

the functions of all of these things, uh, they really

sort of mimic uh, you know battle, right, So faith

is gonna is going to be your defense, right, just

like a shield would would stop everything coming your way,

the fiery arrows. You know, it takes it takes faith.

And just talk about that alone. You could do an

entire six week series one on each one of these things,

which I'm sure you've done in the past.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

But you know, the show of faith just to be

able to stop whatever's coming your way, it takes faith

to say, submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil,

and he will flee from you, right, even the devil,

even the demons believe and they tremble to have that

sort of faith is one of the coolest things. And

it's so symbolic of a warrior, you know, keeping away

the defense anyway, he just goes on and on the

word of God being a sword.

So I think it's interesting, he says to it's the

final word. So he's already written. This is six chapters.

He's written in this letter, and he goes, now, let

me finish this up. Be strong in the Lord and

in his mighty power. So a lot of times I

think we make a mistake of trying to be strong

on our own power. Sure, right, we just feel like

what I need to do is I need to be

more courageous. I need to be tougher, I need to

be better. He's like, Hey, you don't have any chance

to win in this battle if if it's in your

own if it's in the flesh. So you have to

be strong in the Lord. And then he says, so,

then put on all of God's armor so that you'll

be able to stand firm against all the strategies of

the devil. He doesn't say, put on some of God's armor. Well,

I've got lots of faith. What about the helmet of salvation?

You're exposed without the helmet, what about the belt of truth? Right,

just because you have faith, if your loins aren't good

about with truth, then you're vulnerable. If you don't have

on the you know, the the shoes of the gospel,

the piece of the Gospel, then you're going to be vulnerable.

So he says, put on the whole armor of God.

And so how the Christian life, how God's designed his word,

the presence of the Holy Spirit, the challenge and the

encouraging accountability of other believers in our life, the keeping

our lives wholly and clean, all these things are part

of that. They all work in conjunction together to protect us.

And so he's saying, put on all of God's armor.

Don't just put on the moment and run out there,

because without the shield, you're going to get wiped out, right, right,

You're not going to win without a sword of the spirit.

Right.

And so I think that sometimes we as Americans were

so independent, we love to kind of make the Christian

life be an a la carte thing. I really like

the faith thing, don't really like sharing the gospel thing.

I really like the helmet of salvation. But I don't

like to just put on the belt of truth. Right,

And so it's not an oli cart it's put on

the whole armor of God. And a lot of times

we want to go halfway and then we wonder why

we get completely defeated because we're only go in halfway.

Yeah, that's really good. And you know, verse number twelve says,

for we are not fighting against flesh and blood enemies,

but against evil rulers and authorities and the unseen world,

and against mighty powers in the dark world, and against

evil spirits and the heavenly place.

Well, clearly Paul didn't know about Republicans and Democrats because

the Christians that listen on our popcast.

No, we are fighting against other people, right, Okay.

I wonder how you're going with that.

We are fighting against other people that we we don't

like each other. People are bad, right, and people on

the other side of the aisle, they're horrible, and Paul saying, man,

it's not the issue, you know, it's it is interesting

because that one verse summarizes so much, right because if

you think about it, like, you know, here, here are

the Jewish people.

They're under, you know, oppression by the Romans. So constantly

there's people walking around who who are you know, they've

already taken your country captive. You're sort of under their regime,

and and and everybody, and of course everybody when they

think of a Roman soldier. That's what they think of.

They think of the hats with the big fluff and

the swords and the armor and big red capes, right right,

So you already know that, like this is a part

of their everyday existence and language, and so they have

constant enemies with armor, they have you know, uh threats.

Paul himself is you know, definitely been. He's been threatened

constantly with death. They've seen, they've seen what happened to

their savior, who you know, was crucified and mobbed against.

And so he's saying, the enemies aren't It's not Kyphas,

it's not the Roman army, right, your enemies? Yeah, I

mean there are things that are going to oppose you,

and there's persecution of Christians currently, but that's not your

real enemy. Your real enemy happens in the unseen world.

We're not fighting against flesh and blood. And so it's

interesting because sometimes we think our enemy is, you know,

our boss is persecuting us for being a Christian. Have

you ever had that? Have you ever been actually persecuted

or pointed out or discriminated against because of your faith

in a situation.

Yeah, I lost the job over the fact that I

was a Christian.

Yeah, yeah, like and where tell us? I mean, you

don't have to name the company?

Yeah, I had, I had two. No, it was a

small business. And the guy hired me and then found

out that I was a Christian. Let me know, he

hated working with Christians and that I wasn't going to

last there very long. And then just a few probably

two months later, he fired me. Wow, he just couldn't

stand me. Yeah, I got I got bench. So you know,

I played a lot of baseball as a kid and

a teenager, and I was good and my dad and

I my dad came to me after we became Christians,

and he said, hey, you know, are we going to

make God first? Or are we going to make baseball first?

And you know, Matthew six thirty three seek first his

kingdom and his right living and all these other things

to be added to you.

My dad said, you.

Know, maybe we should make a decision about church. Are

we going to play on Sundays just because the team's

playing on Sundays?

Whatever?

And I was playing on teams that played a lot

of tournaments, so you know, you had to try out

for the team, and then we played tournaments and they'd

be like Friday night, Saturday and Sunday championship game. And

there were a lot of times where I would I

would not play on Sunday morning, right, so I would

I would help the team get to the championship game,

but then wouldn't play the championship game. And I was

the leadoff batter and the shortstop, so pretty critical both

on offense and defense.

Pretty critical spots.

And then we had our youth group was on Wednesday

nights at the time, and so I had gone to

one of the coaches and I said, hey, you know,

my youth group's on Wednesday night, and my faith is

really important to me. I can make it to all

the other practices, but I need to leave practice at

five o'clock on Wednesdays. And so I had one coach

was okay, that's no problem. You know, we'll support it.

I wound up getting traded to another team. I wound

up being as other coach, and he said it was

okay when I got traded. But then after a few

weeks he came to me said, no, I think it's

a bad precedent. You have to be at the practice.

You're not to practice every time. That you leave a

practice early, you're going to miss the first three innings

of a game. I'm like, okay, And so he started

benching me, and then it started. It was first three innings,

and it was the first four innings. Finally, an old

coach of mine, we were playing against Demna tournament, came

out and goes, hey, how come you're not how come

you set out the first half the game? I said, oh,

I was coach. Kip decided that was what was best.

He goes, is it because it's the church thing practice?

Said yeah, you know, okay, and he traded his center

fielder for me right then and put me on it

and we went undefeated.

The rest of the season. On thember the team.

It was great, but I had so I had a

coach who benched me over church attendance, and I had

a boss fire me over.

Over the thing.

But you know what, I moved into one of the

best jobs I ever ever had after I got fired there.

So the Lord works things out. But in the moment, man,

you know it's going to cost you a lot.

Yeah, and uh, I had. I had a teacher that

that publicly opposed me, ridiculed me, and made fun of me.

Because I was a Christian in a public school, by

the way, and uh and pointed out and laughed. I

mean just everything, and it was just it was like,

this is the worst thing in the world. But I

remember reading this verse and I remember thinking to myself, like,

she's really not the enemy, no, right, like there's a

spiritual battle that's happening, and uh and and and it's

and it's really trying my faith. It's trying my patience,

it's trying my testimony, it's trying my you know, courage,

is trying everything and uh. And then she ended up

giving me an F. By the way, she gave me

an F. And I had to go to my my

mom and my dad and we fought it. And then

turns out that she changed the rules of her grading

system just to make sure that she was able to

give me an F. Well, and she goes, no, these

are my rules. This counts for this much. And they're like,

that's not what you said at the end of the year.

She's like, no, that's that's this year. I know I

haven't done that in the past, but that's what I'm

doing this year. And she changed it just to give

me an F. And my parents who supported me said, hey,

take it with pride.

Yeah, well yeah, where it is a badge, ye, So

that idea of standing, he says, so that you'll be

able to resist the devil in the time of evil,

and then after the battle, you'll still be standing firm.

That's the same challenge to be strong in the Lord

and his mighty power. Both of those things you just

have decide. Hey, regardless of the consequences, I'm not fighting.

People are not the enemy. Satan is the enemy. Now

Satan uses people, he does things, but it's not the people.

The people aren't the enemy. People who vote different than

you aren't the enemy. It's how Satan is working in

the world around us that's the enemy. So this is

why the very first thing he tells us to do

is put on the armor of God so be able

to stand. And then we're not fighting. Its fresh and buddy,

he says, so put on every piece of God's armor

so to be able to stand and resist the enemy

in the time of evil. And then he says, put

on the belt of truth is the first thing.

Right.

So in the Life Application study Bible, there's this whole

segment on the armor, and it says we're engaged in

spiritual battle. All believers find themselves subject to the devil's

attacks because they're no longer on the devil's side. I

love that phrase. The reason why the devil hates us,

You're not on the side anymore. And so so thus

Paul tells us to use every piece of God's armor

to resist these attacks, to stand firm, staying true to

God in the midst of them. So with the belt,

he says, put on the belt of truth. Right, that's

going to sense everything up, that's going to hold everything together.

Is God's truth. It's not our opinions, it's not the

world philosophies, it's not our best ideas or strategies. Whatever

holds everything together is God's truth. And so the devil

fights with lies, and sometimes his lies sound like the truth.

But believers have God's truth in his word, and God's

truth will always defeat Satan's lies in the end. Right,

So that's why we need God's truth. And then the

body armor is what he says, the King James says,

the breastplate of righteousness, right, and this it writes righteousness.

The devil often attacks our hearts, and so our heart determines,

you know, out of the bunch of heart. That's where

the mouth speaks. Out of the bunch of heart, that's

what we decide to do. Our heart is deceitful above

all things, and desperately wicked.

Who can know it.

That's why we need protection, and it determines the course

of what Proverb says, above all else, guard your heart,

because out of it comes the issues of life right

and so man alife. There's nothing more important. Your life

is determined by what your heart is driving you to

be and do, and so you need the belt of

truth holding it all together. But you need this breastplate

of this body armor protecting your heart all the time

and trusting. And he says that's righteousness. Righteousness is right living.

So our heart also determines what kind of lifestyle we're

going to live. Right, If our heart is really with

the world, we're going to live wordly lifestyle. If a

heart is really with God, we're going to live a

right living kind of thing. And then the shoes piece

that comes from the good news. The devil wants us

to think that others telling others the good news is

worthless and hopeless. But he says, man those shoes are

for running into battle. And the battle you're running into

is not just protecting your own life.

The battle you're.

Running into is to set captives free, right with the

good news of the Gospel and then the shield of faith. Yeah,

he said, you know, the devil's going.

To take the book, right to take the gospel. Yeah, shoes,

shoes that I love. Connectsed the shoes, yeah yeah.

And combat shoes are designed for running forward.

Yeah, right, they are.

They're designed for you. Think of like armor. It's going

to be protected up to your up to your knee caps.

It's going to be good, good grip to be able

to run. The Romans developed a shoe pattern on the

bottom so that they got better grip.

Than their enemies.

Did you know that it was one of the advantages

that the soldiers had that the Romans had that others

didn't have. They protected their feet. Their feet were a

better situation. They were able to run faster because of

the thing. And so he's writing, the people who know

about Roman fighters, sure, right, And so it's about running forward.

It's a forward moving mission. By the way, none of

the armor is on the back, all the armors out

in front, right, it's an offensive thing, so that's kind

of cool. And then you have the helmet of salvation.

The devil wants to make you doubt, right, So salvation

is a heart thing. But where the devil gets at

you about your salvation is.

In your thinking.

Right, he wants to make you doubt, So you just

need the helmet of salvation. It protects your minds from

doubting God's work. And then the sort of the spirit.

It's the only offensive weapon we have in this armor,

and it's the word of God.

And a lot of.

Times I think we try to win our arguments by

our We try to win people over by our best

typed argument, and we're not using God's words. We try

to lead people to Jesus, just talking about faith and

talking about our feelings about Jesus and how he answers

all of our prayers, but we don't ever take the

time to learn scripture.

Well, it's Sunday's message, yeah, right, Jesus said, and being

tempted by the devil, his offensive weapon was the word

of God.

That's right, right.

The only way he could he could fight Satan back

was with the word of God. And so I'm always

challenging people. Man, if you want to lead your friends

and family, you want to lead your children to Jesus,

it's not just your religious feelings or opinions that those

are not going to lead people to Jesus. God's words

lead are what cuts and and is what brings the victory. Right,

You need God's word in order to defeat the devil

in your life and in the lives of others.

Yeah, and then I think Chield of Faith is the

last one.

Yeah, we already had Shield of Faith already said it.

Then that's the six week sermon right there there, it

is so and it's right there. So Hey, I definitely

think that this passage, if it's new for a lot

of us, it is a great passage to go back

and read through. And just to contemplate, you know, what

does this mean for my life? Do I pray every

day in the morning? Do I get dressed before I leave?

Because getting up and walking into a battle naked is

probably not going to It's a rough way to fight.

So therefore, you know, do I get up in the

morning and do I spend time in God's word? Do

I take the time to pray? Do I make sure

that God is gonna you know, I go to God

for strength, right, and you know, get dressed.

Before you leave, before you get.

Into the battle of the day. Go back and read it.

I encourage you, especially if it's a brand new passage

for you, and it'll be a good thing.

I was in a just finished up real quick. I

was in a castle in Austria and they had I

think a Schomburne castle, one of the castles in Vienna,

and they had all these armor, you know, like you're

talking about all these coats of armor. But then they

had a battled a set of armor that had gone

through a battle, so all the other I'm shiny and polished.

It was supposed to be for art, yes, and then

some emperor, some king somebody that had lived in that

palace had gone to battle and it was just dented

and beat up all over. And I'm telling you that

was way cooler, because that's what I think of when

I think of this. You're going, he says, you're going

into battle, so stand firm. And then he says, when

you're done, you'll still be standing strong.

Isn't that what he says? Put on there?

He says, to resist a doubt, the devil in the

time of evil. Then after the battle you will still

be standing firm, and so there might be dense all

over that armor, but thank god you had. If you've

been running naked, one arrow would have taken that guy out.

One hit from a mace would have taken that guy

out one sort instead, though he had all that armor on,

and he apparently survived.

Apparently.

It's pretty great.

Yeah, that's really awesome. Okay, well, hey, that's a great

place to end, and hopefully we'll see you tomorrow on

the Bible. Guys,